Bello stripped out of his gun belt and suspenders. He folded them neatly and placed them both on the lowest level of his wardrobe. After which he pushed on the double doors of the wardrobe until he heard them click in place.

Ever since he'd seen that girl, the one with the big eyes and the smallish body, he'd started making small slips. He was a man who wore control like a second skin. He still had the memory of what his father's lack of control had done to his mother, to all of them.

He never wanted that for himself. So he never slipped. Even for pleasure.

That evening as he ran water over the clothes he'd worn during the day, he refused to lean back on the sink. When the water filled up, he washed with a mechanic precision every inch of the deep grey dress shirt and black trousers he had four versions of. Just as he wasn't given to looseness, he also wasn't vain. Like his father. The man was a peacock.

As Bello hung the clothes on the line to dry, his shoulders shook. That happened rarely and only when he'd seen something really disturbing. Like the time–no, he refused to think of it. But the shaking refused to stop even when he bit his lip and slapped his chest.

The desire to give himself over to anything, any vice was overwhelming. His body fought him. He fell to the ground, curled in on himself and thought of anything. Anything but how average his life was. But as his mind drifted, all he could see were deep brown eyes gazing up at his, a soft annoyed smile playing on small lips.

That girl, maybe she'd be his vice after all.