His hand lifts, slow, giving me every chance to move. When I don’t, he cups the side of my neck and rests his forehead against mine.
It’s the same way we breathed together yesterday, only now it feels heavier like a confession and forgiveness all tangled together.
“I got your text,” he murmurs.
“Yeah.” My voice cracks. “You believe me?”
He nods. “Yeah, baby. I believe you.”
Something in me unclenches. I breathe out, and the space between us disappears. And when he leans into me, the kiss is quiet, barely there, tasting like coffee and exhaustion and relief.
When he pulls back, I can feel my heartbeat in my throat.
He doesn’t ask me to stay. He just takes my hand and leads me to the couch.
We sit there for a long time. Not talking. Just holding on.
Later, after the sun’s gone and the room’s gone blue with dusk, I turn toward him.
“I want to go,” I say.
He frowns. “Go where?”
“The redwoods. The treehouse thing. I want to go with you.”
He blinks, like he’s not sure he heard me right. “You sure?”
“No.” I laugh softly. “But I think that’s the point, right? Something to push myself towards.”
“Okay,” he squeezes my hand. “Then we’ll go.”
Something in the air shifts—it’s small but certain.
Maybe this is what healing looks like. Not some grand, “Look, I’m cured” moment. It feels more like a choice to keep showing up, even when things are hard. When the future looks so vague, but you push yourself to keep moving forward.
I endup staying for dinner, anyway. It started raining pretty hard, and I wasn’t ready to leave him. We eat leftovers after he takes a shower, and I stay. We watch the same half-finished horror movie from last night, our legs tangled under the fuzzy blanket.
He doesn’t say, “I love you,” again, and I don’t, either.
We don’t need to.
I just hold his hand, my fingers laced between his.
When I finally head back to the dorms, the rain’s stopped, but the streets still shine with it. The air smells clean, like Mother Nature trying to reset the balance of everything.
Halfway home, my phone buzzes in the console.
Miguel
Drive safe. Text me when you get in.
I hit the voice-to-text button.
Caleb
I will.
Then, after a pause?—
