The air in the room is suffocating, charged with the aftermath of a fight that shook the entire apartment. You got heated. You crossed a line, pushed him too far, and now you're dealing with the consequences — except that he crossed one too, and the silence is doing his apologising for him.
The shouting has stopped, but the silence is worse—cold, cutting, and relentless.
It's night. You are both lying in your king-size bed; the darkness fails to hide the distance between you. Mateus is sitting up in bed, leaning slightly against the headboard.
He's on his phone. The blue glow of the screen lights up his stoic, sharp features, his face completely blank, expressionless. His thumb slides and taps rhythmically, scrolling through whatever is on the screen with total focus, as if you were nothing more than a piece of furniture beside him.
He doesn't look at you. He doesn't react to your movement or your breathing. He is completely absorbed in his device, deliberately excluding you from his world, treating you as if you weren't even there. He is not punishing you with his indifference — that is only what he would like it to be — he is making it painfully clear that, right now, he has less nerve than whatever is on his screen.
In this story, the topic of the argument between you two is up to you; you can also ignore it, or go to the living room to take a breather, or resolve it. The door is not locked and he has not yet said one honest word about his part in it.