Is obsession a sickness, or the most sincere form of love? It’s a difficult question, since love has always been sold to us as the ultimate sacrifice.

I always believed that.

And that’s why I was capable of anything.

For love.

Obsession is the most sincere form of love, because you’re capable of giving everything without question.

The knife went in slowly. Not because I pushed it, but because he didn’t resist. Or maybe he did — maybe his hands searched for mine in that last second, but I no longer remember clearly where his effort ended and where my disappointment began.

What I do remember is the sound.

It wasn’t like in the movies. There were none of those exaggerated screams or violent drama. It was something clean and perfect; he held his mask until the very end.

That made me smile.

I kept the knife still for just a moment, closing my eyes, feeling his heart beat against the blade — once, twice, three times.

I looked at him.

He looked at me.

His eyes — that gray-green that shifted with the light, greener in the mornings and grayer at night — began to lose their color.

I noticed. I’m good at noticing things like that.

"There," I whispered, because someone had to say it. "You’re becoming what you promised me."

With my free hand I fixed his beautiful blonde fringe. The same gesture he used to make with mine. I think he taught it to me without meaning to. Especially when he did it with others.

"Without meaning to, I painted myself more in your colors," I said, twisting the knife. "That makes me more yours." I curled into his chest, into a patch of his apron that wasn’t so splattered. "But now, you are only mine."

I stayed still until his chest stopped moving, his hands stopped resisting, and his eyes stopped trying. I didn’t do it out of fear, or doubt. It’s simpler than that.

"The things that matter deserve that care," I repeated for the last time — his phrase, my inheritance. "They deserve someone who stays until the end."

I withdrew the knife with the same gentleness with which he used to take care of me. I wiped it on the fabric of the green apron; I had chosen it for the color of his eyes — that color which now existed nowhere in the world except on my clothes.

I looked at him one last time. His new eyes, his new skin tone.

"Now you’re white," I laughed, as I fell to my knees. "Now you understand what I suffered."

But the shop bell gave its final alert — its classic and magical clink clink, announcing an arrival.

"What have you done, Ryne!"

That was a week ago.

Ryne Moore: Yandere as a Philosophy of Love

White has always bothered me — I don’t know why, it just gives me a headache to look at it. And right now I was surrounded by that color.

That’s why I had asked Nolan to paint the café yellow.

"Like your eyes," he had told me, with a soft smile, as he mixed the paint with a wooden spoon.

I heard the classic squeak of hinges from the only door, announcing her arrival.

"It’s not like his bell," I murmured quietly, remembering his last clink clink.

Now, sitting across from me, was a new doctor.

She wasn’t the first one they’d assigned me. She wouldn’t be the last, I suppose.

She had her hands on the desk and an open notebook. She hadn’t written anything yet. She just looked at me with that expression they must teach them in medical school.

No expression, no judgment, no surprise — as if she had already heard everything.

Maybe I’m the most boring case she’s had in years.

With her hand, covered in a white glove, she switched on a lamp above me. Its white light hitting me directly in the eyes.

They all did the same thing.

They all liked making me angry.

"Miss Moore," she began, lacing her fingers over the notebook. "Tell me — how did it all start?"

I tried to smile a little. Not because the question seemed funny to me. It was more because of how complex and profound it was.

"It’s hard to say — I don’t really know where to begin," I answered, trying to keep my eyes open under the light. "It depends on whether you believe people are born being what they are, or whether they become it over time. And it gets more complicated if we factor in love as a reason."

"Where do you think it should begin, Miss Moore?"

"At the beginning, I suppose."

She nodded and picked up her pen.

I looked at the window to my right — the only one in the room. The glass had a small stain in the lower corner, a brown stain, like the coffee I used to clean up.

I closed my eyes, remembering the café — its smells, its sounds, its sensations. And without realizing it, I found myself in my happy place.

One year ago.

Chapter 1: My Perfect World I

Tuesday afternoons always smell different.

"It smells like burnt meat," I whispered, covering my nose with my hand.

I don’t know if anyone else has noticed. Not many people walk through alleyways. Most prefer the main streets — they’re faster and have a better view.

I understand their choice. It’s not comfortable to look at the cracks in the pavement or the graffiti on the walls, but it’s the loneliest path to my job.

I heard a branch snap behind me. A white cat with paws as black as shoes, climbing down from a tree with a yellow bird in its mouth.

"Along with some stray animals."

I arrived at Nolan’s café, four blocks from the student condominiums. It’s a good location — too good at certain times.

The neighbors chat and the students do their homework, a perfect balance. Though on Tuesdays no students come, or mostly they don’t.

"So today we just wait for neighbors."

The door bell always rings when someone comes in. Not one of those modern bells that sounds just like a microwave timer. This one is bronze, with a lovely sound that bounced off the walls.

Clink clink.

I couldn’t believe a sound like that existed — I thought they were only a sound effect from some editing program. "It was magical to discover that wasn’t the case."

There are many magical things I’ve discovered since then.

That was just under two years ago. I walked in through that door on a Thursday afternoon, and I never wanted to leave again.

"Now that I think about it—" I looked at the calendar, crossing off one more day.

"In two days it’s our anniversary," Nolan told me, putting on his leather apron. "A Thursday, two years ago, we met."

When I saw him, my feet moved on their own, drawing me toward him like a predator claiming its prey with a kiss — him offering his cheek as always.

"I could never forget it. That’s my favorite day, you fool."

"Mine too," he returned the kiss, his on my forehead. "We have a lot of work today, Ryne, so let’s not waste time."

I nodded, snapping into a military pose. "Yes, sir!"

I brought the chairs down one by one, setting each leg precisely on its marks on the floor.

Then the coffee machine, which starts up with a soft sound, like the sighs of a person waking up.

"Miss Bean, time to work."

Fwoooomm.

"Watch your language, Miss Bean — this is a family establishment."

When I finished my ordering and cleaning duties, I went to the door and flipped the sign, indicating that:

"We are officially open."

While I waited for Nolan to come out of the kitchen, I prepared his favorite coffee. I know it by heart: the exact temperature, the ratio, the timing, the brand of milk he likes. And carefully I left it on the counter on the right side — which is where he always sets his lunch and picks it up without looking before heading off to class.

I know because I watched him for weeks before I started doing it.

The things that matter deserve that care.

"And in that moment, did Nolan deserve that care?" the doctor asked, pulling me back as she wrote everything down in her notebook.

"To me, Nolan will always be the most perfect man in the world," I confessed, remembering the bell that Tuesday afternoon. "Nothing he did will change the way I see him."