Her lips parted like she wanted to ask something else, but I beat her to it. “The bike doesn’t ask anything from me. Doesn’t expect me to be better than I am. It’s just noise and movement. No past. No future.”
She was quiet for a moment, then, in a gentle voice, said, “That sounds lonely.”
I almost laughed. Not because it was funny, but because it wastrue.And I’d gotten good at pretending it didn’t matter.
“I do lonely well,” I said.
Mya shifted closer, lying on her side now. Her hand still held mine, but her thumb had started tracing slow circles across my skin, tracing one of my many tattoos. I hated how good that felt.
“I think I’m dangerous to myself sometimes, too,” she said.
I didn’t move, didn’t speak. I just wanted to listen. It was truly the only thing I’d ever been good at. Especially when people are unraveling and don’t know they’re doing it.
“I’m not likethat,” she continued. “But I’m exhausted all the time. I wake up already behind.”
Her hand pulled away for a second. I could see the way her wheels were spinning. Almost like she was calculating exactly how much she should say. It was like she regretted saying anything, but I grabbed her hand again. Gave it a small squeezeand then held it loosely to give her the choice to take it back, but hoping she wouldn’t.
And when she didn’t? Fuck, I felt something I hadn’t felt in years.Alive.
Her voice was barely a whisper when she finally spoke again. “When I was a kid, I learned how to take up less space.”
I looked at her, but her eyes were already glossy as she looked back at me. “I was the easy one. The helper. The quiet girl who didn’t ask for anything unless she really needed it. Which was… almost never.” Her lips curved into a humorless smile. “That’s how you survive in a house where everyone’s already tired. You learn not to be one more thing.”
The breath left my chest like a punch, to think of her as a child, feeling like she took up too much space.
“I didn’t realize until recently how much I still do that. I shrink, I back down. I apologize for existing too loud.” Her voice cracked, just a little. “I say sorry when I don’t need to. I let people interrupt and talk over me. I don’t correct them. I just… let it go.”
Her fingers curled into mine now, like she’d been waiting for someone to do that all her life.
“I don’t want to be that version of me anymore,” she said, softer now. “The version that disappears to keep the peace.”
“You don’t have to be small here.” I promised her.
“You say things like that,” she murmured, “and I believe you.”
I tucked a strand of hair behind her ear again. “You can take up space, Mya.” I wanted to say so much more, like in my bed. In my life. In my head. But this was never going to work, and when the sun came up, Mya would leave my life as fast as she came into it.
“You still show up every day for other people,” I pointed out. “Even when you’re barely holding yourself together.”
She nodded. “Because if I stop… I’m afraid I won’t start again.”
God, I knew that feeling.
“You’re not broken, Mya,” I told her, hating how true it felt. “You’re just tired from carrying too much for too long. There’s a difference.”
“People don’t usually say that,” she noted.
“Most people don’t know what it feels like,” I said. “But I do.”
And we just… stayed there for a moment. Holding hands in the dark like it was the only thing that actually made sense in this fucked-up world.
She wasn’t light because she was bubbly or cheerful or “easy.” She was light because shechoseto keep glowing, even with her head being loud. Even when no one noticed.
“I didn’t mean to say all that.Again.”
“I’m glad you did.” And I meant that.
When she looked at me this time, it wasn’t curiosity or pity in her eyes. It was recognition. The kind of understanding you don’t find in strangers. The kind that says,I see the mess in you, and I’m not running from it.And honestly, that terrified me more than anything else.
