Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

You may leave your requests in the comments. Your wishes are my command.

Just nothing weird people, trying not to make this wild like their age difference ;/

It’s gonna be all aged up unless u want an AU where in high school they are [roughly] the same age (this in the romantic aspect cause I’m really not into writing a relationship between a 13 and 17 yo) It may also be platonic if you like that better. (In the platonic they may have whatever age you guys desire.)

There can be explicit or mature ones, but as adults.

I’m a bit of a slow writer, but what I lack in productivity I make up for in quality.

Thanks a lot for stopping by! <3

(Ignore the grammar mistakes please it’s 1 am and English is not my first language.)

Chapter Text

Val is not prone to jealousy.

So when molten iron sears her guts, when her heart pulses with plasma and her brow creases despite the smiles encircling her, Val seriously considers what’s happening to her.

Feeling a spark of irritation as arms wrap around Riley is not normal; frowning when someone makes her laugh isn’t either—much less glaring as silken fingers slide across her shoulders, and Riley only smiles because that’s how gentle she is.

It stirs something deep within her, something stifled and echoing that she senses it weighing her heart during small interactions. And in the quiet, it rattles her whole, frying her brain until terror is the only thing her sensitive mind can comprehend.

It rams her skull, shakes, whispers unintelligible words in her sleep until she wakes. And even then she can feel them sliding down her cervical, clinging to the back of her teeth, lying in her chest—temple to the feeling.

Deeply seeded, they take root.

And she has come to feel them, the roots, coating bronchi, clogging her oesophagus, tugging at her heart until she feels it dropping into her stomach, poised to be digested.

It doesn’t take her long to figure out who they writhed for.

Still, that doesn’t make the feeling go away. And God, does she hate it.

It’s one of those days when Val is alone with Riley on the track long after practice is over, and the rest of the team has left.

They’re coming out of the locker room, having over-practiced, and Riley abruptly recalling she had an outing with some friends.

The hallway to the exit is so narrow—hemmed in by bleachers and track barriers—that their shoulders collide and their hands brush.

Val feels cold knuckles brush against hers and almost stumbles, feels a shoulder bumping against her teasingly, and her throat goes dry at the thought of how easy it would be to pin Riley against the barrier and beg for the brush of lips.

Val’s tempted to grab Riley’s hand, intertwine their fingers and see if her hand fits in hers as she has so long pictured.

It’s hard to refrain, especially with Riley’s cheeks tinted pink, hair wet from a shower, and semi-dry bangs stuck to her forehead. Still, the chance slips away when Riley anxiously tries to fix them because I got a pimple in the middle of my forehead this morning, and I really don’t want it to show.

And it’s easy to breathe after that, laughter making its way through her pharynx. She exhales the air clogged in her lungs and breathes.

Still, it’s not until they’ve crossed the doors that she says, voice barely audible over the hum of an engine, “Not even a pimple could make you less pretty in my eyes.”

Riley’s cheeks flush a bright shade of red, her mouth opens in a silent gasp, and her blue eyes tremble. She takes a breath, and Val feels the lack of oxygen even in the fresh air. “Val, I—”

“Riley!”

And there she is, stepping out of a car, her nightmare epitomised in all her glory. She strides forward with confident steps, straight black hair swaying in the breeze and framing piercing green eyes.

When she catches up to them, having broken the tension hanging in the air, she embraces Riley. And it lasts, it lingers, it remains. And through it all, Riley looks at her, stormy seas sweeping her until she feels herself sinking. And Val has to avoid her gaze because she’s never been good at holding her breath.

And the roots twist, morph into seaweed and tug. They pull until the hug ends, and Val’s knuckles can’t whiten any more.

“Ready to go?” the girl asks, and Riley doesn’t answer.

It’s seconds later, when Val feels the storm clear, when Riley’s eyes no longer burn a hole in her skull, that she hears Riley hum.

Riley has her arm intertwined with the girl’s when Val’s eyes deign to rest on them. And Val can’t help but clear her throat because she may take Riley with her, but Val won’t leave without a name to curse when she stares at her ceiling at night.

“Oh, yeah,” Riley says, voice husky with a hint of awkwardness. “Val, this is Amy. Val, Amy. Amy, Val.”

“Val?” Amy says, surprised. “The Val?” A smile. “I’ve heard a lot about you! Riley is to blame, of course.”

“Really?” Val says, smirking. Riley blushes.

“Oh, God, Amy, please stop,” Riley groans, mortified.

“She’s told me what a good friend you are. Kind and supportive. The ultimate best friend.”

And Val notices how she squeezes Riley’s arm, the slight narrowing of eyes. Her smile falters, dulls, and she feels the roots pierce her heart.

“Anyway, we should get going. We'll be late, Riley.”

“Right,” Riley says, looking at the floor and shooting glances at Val, who looks at her with her folded arms.

They’re about to reach the car when something in Val snaps. It makes her hastily stride toward them and call out before she can think twice, “Hey, Riley!”

Riley turns, confused, letting go of Amy’s arm. “Yeah?”

When Val stops, she’s breathing the same air as Riley. Val can see the tremor in her pupils as she scans her face, hear the slight stutter of her breath and see the tiny grey specks in her blue eyes.

Val cups her chin between her forefinger and thumb and tilts her head up, making Riley stare at her as she arranges her bangs. “Can’t forget our little friend, can we?”

Riley shakes her head quickly, and her voice comes out as a squeak when she says, “No, we can’t.”

“Good.” Val smiles. “I’ll see you tomorrow, then.”

Riley nods, and it’s only then that she realises she hasn’t let go of Riley’s chin.

And just because the jealousy has removed her common sense, Val releases her chin and brings her mouth close to Riley’s ear. She says, just for the two of them, “Don’t miss me too much.”

She hears Riley swallow, breath coming in ragged rasps. And it’s not until Val’s cheek brushes against hers as she pulls away that she hears Riley say, voice hoarse, “Not possible.”

Val smiles, cheeks flushed. She can feel Amy’s glare on her, and it only broadens her grin. “See ya, Minnesota!”

And for a moment, the roots ease.

The next time she sees them side by side is in the library.

They’re strolling the aisles, Riley’s eyes flitting between her hand and the towering columns of books, while Amy trails behind her like a lost puppy.

It’s just bad luck that when Riley finds the book, she can’t reach it. And before Amy can step in to help her, Val is already on it.

She stretches out behind Riley, chest pressing gently against her back, and she hums a familiar tune under her breath, just loud enough for Riley to recognize her.

(She had once confessed, flustered, when Val had covered her eyes and asked, ‘Who am I?’, that it wasn’t hard to guess, as she’d recognize Val’s voice even if she lost her memory.)

She peeks at Riley’s palm and then turns to the shelf. She finds the book in a matter of seconds, and once it’s in her hand, she asks, “Looking for this, Minnesota?”

“Yeah, but finding you was a bonus.”

The look on Amy’s face is priceless.

It’s raining. Large droplets of water pour down, and Val can hear them thundering against the roof.

They are supposed to be at home, resting and sheltering from the hurricane. Yet, she isn’t surprised by the education system’s decision to keep classes in session despite the storm.

She’s leaving the building, umbrella and car keys in hand when she sees Riley arguing with Amy outside. She cautiously approaches them.

“—Thanks, but I don’t want to bother.”

“It wouldn’t be a bother, Riley. Really.”

“Everything okay, Minnesota?” Val asks, disrupting the conversation.

Riley smiles, nodding, and Amy glances over at her. “Yeah, Amy was just offering to drive me home.”

“And as I’ve been telling you, it wouldn’t be a problem to give you a ride.”

Riley frowns, a little frantic. “I live a long way from your house, Amy. And honestly, I have no problem walking.”

“It’s not safe.” Amy’s arms are folded, and for once, Val agrees with her.

“Amy’s right, Riley,” Val chimes in, and Riley turns to look at her, a frown forming. “You could get sick.” After a pause, she opens her umbrella and adds, “C’mon. I’ll give you a ride. Your house is on the way to mine anyway.”

When Riley hesitates, Val arches an eyebrow at her. Amy even nudges Riley toward her, and when Val looks at her funny, Amy shrugs and merely says, “She needs to get home safely.”

“Thanks,” Val mouths.

Amy nods, walking away. “Take care of her for me.”

Val grabs Riley by the waist and pulls her against her, eliciting a shriek from Riley. Riley puts a hand on her shoulder to steady herself, and Val feels an electric current run through her as Riley’s eyes land on her lips.

“Ready to go?”

“With you? Always.”

And her heart shudders, and the roots grow. Riley’s fingers tighten on her shoulders with growing confidence, and her smile, though shaky, broadens. Riley’s looking at her from under her lashes, blue eyes almost black, and Val lets herself hope.

It’s hard not to when she feels roots weaving through her skeleton and flowers branding her bone marrow—when her throat closes, leaves encasing her lungs, and she can think of little else but breathing in the air Riley exhales.

“We should go,” Val says finally, her eyes still locked on Riley’s lips because her self-control has limits, and resisting the allure before her is too much to ask. “Before the rain gets worse.”

“We should,” Riley murmurs, voice so low and husky it makes Val shiver. And with a nervous smile, Riley says, “But you’re looking especially pretty right now, staring at me like that, and I’m not sure I want to move.”

“Finally!” someone shouts, draping her arms over their shoulders. “Have you two confessed your deep and undying love already?” Dani says, and when they both blush, she adds with exaggerated frustration, “Still not? Man, you guys have been at it for years already. Wait—did I ruin the moment?”

“Damn,” says Ayesha, who came out of nowhere with Mae. “All this time, I thought you two were already together!”

“What?” Riley says, blushing furiously.

“Kiss already!” Mae cries out, hands crushing her cheeks. “I’m tired of the lesbian yearning.” This is followed by a chorus of agreement from people passing by.

“Yeah, well, it’s hard to do when you’ve already ruined the moment, girls. Thanks a lot,” Val says as she practically drags a red-faced Riley away.

“We love you too!” Dani shouts.

“Do you really like me?” Riley asks, mere minutes before they reach her house.

Val doesn’t waver. “Of course.”

Bonus One

(It’s easy to like you, Val confesses to her one day as they watch the sunset. You’re the oxygen my being has been longing for.

Riley doesn’t quite understand but still smiles and names constellations that remind her of Val when the subject comes up.)

Bonus Two

There’s a moment between Val laughing over Riley’s silly attempts at flirting and kissing her nose, that Val thinks, I’m about to fall in love.

And then she does. And Val knows the bud has bloomed when Riley grabs her neck, pulls her down for a kiss, steals her cotton candy, and runs away.

Chapter Text

It sears her throat—the rush of alcohol down her oesophagus and the memory of crystallised blue eyes. It ignites her lungs and floods her eyes. It chars into the back of her eyelids and haunts her when her eyes shut.

(Look, I’m sorry about that… It’s nothing. Just, forget it—)

And she is homesick. Homesick for a person-shaped home. With blond hair and blue eyes that, in the right light, remind her of that summer day they bought ice cream and talked until dusk.

And her name coils, and her name takes root. It rattles her mind until the alcohol isn’t the only reason why she’s giddy. Riley, Riley, Riley, her mind whispers, cries between quivering teeth and broken chords.

The sound is rackety, so much so that she barely hears the boy calling. Noah, Val hears through the fuss. He’s asking for her name. And Val almost blurts Riley—it hovers, lingers in the tip of her tongue—ever the first syllables her mind forms.

“Val,” she replies after a few seconds, when she can taste her own name on her tongue. Noah immediately starts spouting terrible puns and tells her about a concert he once performed for his stuffed animals.

And all is well—though her date stood her up at the bar, and the guy next to her isn’t the company she was hoping for. Everything is fine. Everything is perfect.

Except it isn’t.

Because her eyes sting and her throat boils. And with every drink running through her blood, her mind strays to places it shouldn’t roam.

(Riley, hey! Wait, I didn’t mean—)

Noah has been drawing closer, bit by bit, and Val only notices when her face is only inches from his. He’s taking on this gleam in his eye, expectant, hopeful. Val is trying her best not to throw up on him.

Suddenly, though, an arm around her shoulders, a hand cupping her chin and pulling her face up to meet blue eyes.

“Hey, love,” she says, kissing her forehead and stepping between her and Noah. “Sorry I’m late, but some guys from Social got held up and dragged me along with them.”

Hand entwined with hers—so easy the slip of fingers between hers—water trickling through crevices to form a home where it was never meant to seep.

“You,” she breathes, drawls, nay, syllables borne out of a place lodged deep in her stodgy chest and strewn mind. “Riley.”

She’s certain she must look like a fool—mouth parted, eyes wide. But how can she not? She’s never known how to be anything but raw when it comes to her.

(Riley, hey! Wait—)

“Yeah, me,” she says in response, something like the ghost of a smile tugging at the corners of her lips. “Riley.”

“Hi,” Val breathes, silly, optimistic, and utterly smitten.

“Excuse me, who are you?” Noah interrupts, not unkindly. But Val can’t pull her eyes from Riley. Beautiful, beautiful Riley Andersen.

(And she’s so so close).

“I’m her girlfriend,” Riley says with finality and turns her attention to Val.

Riley blocks Noah from her line of sight, and he seems to know he doesn’t stand a chance. He walks away with a sigh and an expression that indicates this has already happened to him.

Val couldn’t care less about him when blue eyes look solely at her. And her hand Riley hasn’t removed and Val hasn’t let go. And it’s almost perfect until Riley gives her a sad smile.

“Hi,” she repeats and hopes she can say it many more times. (Hi, sorry. I wanted to talk about, well, you know—) She smiles at her, and can only hope it’s charming and not goofy. “How have you been?”

“Fine,” she says, graciously, and gives her a friendly, if awkward, smile. “And you?”

“Great, now that you’re here.” Val sends her a meagre excuse of a wink.

Riley snorts, says, “Flirty much?”

Val nods excitedly, gives her a dopey grin. “Just for you.”

She says that proudly—like it’s something worthy of boasting.

(I’m sorry, then, for—misunderstanding, really—).

The twitch of a smile, the pinch between eyebrows. She can see walls being built behind glassy eyes. If they were not already up.

They have always been crystal. Fragile, brittle. Easy to tear down should Val ever want to. One sharp word, one wrong step, and they’d shatter. Val doesn't need to question why.

She knows. Oh, how she knows.

Sometimes, she thinks it might be better if she didn’t. Wishes she didn’t. Better to stay blind. To forget.

When she lies awake, sweat soaking through her blue sheets—not from heat, but from cold, that which sinks into one’s bones—she wishes it. When her hair sticks to her forehead, her ribs aching as if they’ll cave under her lungs—she prays for it, again and again and again.

When someone’s arm circles her waist, when a girl leans close to whisper in her ear, when she’s sitting across a table, laughing at a joke Riley would have told—because, somehow, it’s always someone like Riley, in one form or another.

When her apartment feels vast—too much space, too much silence—and the walls press in, closer than they should. When her bed is cold, hollow, stripped of anything that might feel like home.

Oh, how sometimes she wishes she didn’t know.

But not now. Not here.

Not when Val can sense her hesitation to leave, the linger in Riley’s fingers before they pull away. The ache is just a touch too familiar. Val squeezes her hand—just once—and lets her go, because some things she can’t afford, not if she hopes to appease her hope.

More for not deserving it than not wanting it.

Val turns to take her drink, the glass nippy, grounding. It prickles against her digits. Tears and cries at her to say something. Her gaze flickers—just barely—as it always does. Riley’s staring at her hand as though it’s betrayed her. Riley shakes her head and draws her shoulders down like she can will herself into ease. Settling back into her chair in that way that’s meant to look effortless but doesn’t.

Val sets the glass down. Turns fully. Looks at her.

Riley squints, her lips twitching in that almost-smile Val’s seen too many times to count. “You’re drunk.” There’s something in her voice, a note Val can’t quite place—not with the way her head feels like it’s made of cotton and static.

“I’m absolutely, totally, definitely not drunk. At all.” Val pauses for dramatic effect, lifting a hand as though to swear an oath. “Like... not even a little bit.”

Riley snorts, eyes digging deeper into hers. It makes her heart somersault.

“How many drinks have you had?”

“Not at all,” she says, again, her head spinning as she lifts a hand, fingers fumbling as she tries to count. “One… two...” She trails off, losing track. In Riley or in her thoughts, she doesn’t know. “Water and soda,” she finishes with a decisive nod, as though that answers everything.

“What?”

“Yes, water and soda. And if I’m lucky—” Her grin spreads, crooked and mischievous, as she leans closer—“you.”

Riley reddens, her gaze darting away, and Val feels the pout forming before she can stop it. Without thinking, she cups Riley’s chin, coaxing her face back toward her.

“Hi.”

The pinch of eyebrows, the slight lean back.

“Hi.”

(Hi, sorry. I wanted to talk about, well—)

“You’re too beautiful for me,” she declares, trying to wink. Both her eyes close. She takes it as a triumph.

“What?”

“Yes, yes you are.” Val sniffs, looking at her intently. “Too beautiful. Unfairly beautiful. Like, someone-should’ve-warned-me-beautiful.” She nods.

“Yeah, right.” Riley stands, her chair scraping softly against the floor. “Let’s get you out of here. You’re not thinking straight. And God knows I’m not either.”

Val sways slightly, looking up at her with exaggerated offence. “Let my gay thoughts be. Thinking straight is—” she hiccups, cutting herself off mid-sentence—“not possible when it comes to you.”

Riley’s lips press together like she’s trying not to laugh, her hands finding Val’s waist to steady her. Val barely registers the warmth before the realization hits her like a lightning bolt.

Oh God. Riley’s taller than her.

Her eyes widen, flicking up to meet Riley’s, and for a moment, she forgets how to speak. Forget the static in her head—her thoughts have all but evaporated. It’s just Riley, her hands firm, her gaze searching.

“Well?” Riley’s voice is a little breathless, and Val can’t tell if it’s from exasperation or something else.

Val opens her mouth, then closes it, blinking rapidly. “You’re tall.”

“Uh-huh,” Riley says, smirking now, but there’s a faint pink creeping up her neck. “And you’re drunk.”

“And you’re... pretty,” Val mumbles, the words tumbling out before she can stop them. She leans into Riley’s touch, her head tipping slightly to the side. “This is very unfair.”

Riley sighs, but her hands don’t move. “Let’s go.” She leaves some cash on the bar and guides her out.

The night air slams against her exposed skin, makes her hair stand on end, makes her gasp and huddle closer to Riley. Riley’s hand slid to rest on her shoulder, and Val, in her inebriated state, quarrelled her disapproval. Riley, for her part, did not change the position of her hand.

And so, they walk.

Small puddles of water are sprinkled about the streets. Val endeavours to hop, albeit wobbly, into each one, and her boots splash against the cold water. She stumbles—more than once—but Riley is there, keeping her upright before she can topple over.

And Val’s laughing, giddy, in the alcohol and the presence beside her, and she’s burning, in every touch, in Riley’s smile, sometimes shy, sometimes bold.

But always warm.

(Always enough to make her hope.)

And so she burns, all the same, in every fleeting touch, in every fleeting look.

Because, for now, Riley is here.

And it’s too easy, isn’t it? Too easy to let her hopes rise when Riley is there, catching her just before she shatters against the ground. Too easy to feel something bloom, something reckless, something she has no right to nurture.

Because Val never learns.

She’s made an art of pruning herself, hasn’t she? Of cutting away the parts that threaten to grow wild, unruly, dangerous. But how does one sever a habit when it wears a familiar smile? When it’s polluted with a little resentment but cushioned by longing and love?

And therein lies the problem.

Because Riley isn’t just a bad habit. Riley is something else entirely.

And no matter how much Val might want to, no matter how much she tries, Riley will never be something to leave behind—will never be something to forget.

Riley comes and goes like the rain, brief and unexpected, yet so fundamental. And Val—foolish, aching Val—is always there, arms wide open, welcoming the storm even as it drenches her to the bone. Ready to drown in it if that’s what it takes.

It’s a beautiful kind of drowning, she thinks.

But rain never stays. It moves on, leaving behind soaked streets and heavy skies.

And it’s a shame, Val thinks, that in the end, it always has to go.

Val is pulled from her thoughts by the faint strains of a song, dripping through cracked walls and glowing windows. It’s muffled, tangled with the murmur of people laughing, shouting, and chattering, but the melody is unmistakable. It makes her heart float and her eyes sparkle.

She turns to Riley, stepping away just enough to give her room—an escape, should she need it. “I love this song,” she says, in answer to the flicker of confusion on Riley’s face—Val holds out her hands to her.

She knows Riley too well. Knows how shy she can be. Knows the way hesitation sits like a shadow on her lips. But she also knows this: Riley has never been able to tell her no.

Except this time, Riley hesitates. She shifts on her feet, gaze flickering down, her lips twitching in a nervous smile.

(I’m sorry, then, for—).

Val doesn’t waver. Instead, she steps closer and places one hand on her own chest, her other hand remains raised, waiting. Her eyes gleam with mischief as she bows, dropping her voice into a comically bad British accent:

“May I have this dance?”

And Riley laughs—really laughs—and her hand slides into Val’s.

And so they dance.

Val’s fingers tangle with Riley’s, her other hand finding its place on her shoulder. And they don’t really dance, they just jump and twirl, take big steps back and forth, bump and laugh until they’re dizzy and still, they keep on until the song’s finished.

And then, they don’t let go.

Not yet.

They stay there, chests pressed together, breaths uneven. Val’s fingers stay tangled with Riley’s, her heart thudding louder than it has any right to.

For a moment, everything stills. The laughter fades into something quieter, something brittle. But then Riley notices it—how close they are, how little space there is between them. Her breath hitches, her face flushes. She takes a step back, her hand slipping from Val’s.

Val doesn’t try to stop her. She just stands there, her chest aching with something that feels too big to name.

“Let’s go,” Riley says and places her palm on her lower back to guide her. “Before we do something we’ll regret in the morning. Or at least, something you will.”

I wouldn’t, she means—begs to say. It lays on her tongue and pushes against her teeth until she can feel them grinding. But she doesn’t—she doesn’t because she knows that it wouldn’t change anything. It wouldn’t change Riley’s cautious smile. So, she nods and keeps walking, soaking up any hint of heat that seeps through the layers of fabric.

It isn’t until they’re standing in front of a door—a simple, unassuming door attached to a modest three-story house with two bikes crammed into a garage built for one car, with stairs that creak underfoot, and a resident spider in the corner of them (which earns her a startled yelp Val would prefer go unmentioned)—that she wonders for the first time where she is.

“Wait,” Val blurts as Riley reaches for the handle. She blinks at the house, her mind foggy. “Where are we? This doesn’t look like my apartment.”

“That’s because it isn’t.”

She attempts to wander in, but Riley stops her in her tracks.

“Shoes off,” Riley mutters. “And don’t even think about wandering around—you don’t even know where you’re going.”

“Not much of a place to go, if we’re being honest,” she quips, earning herself a sharp look from Riley that lingers for a few seconds too long.

Ignoring the comment—barely—Riley crouches down to untie her shoes. “That—” she says, tugging one boot off—“is because—” she switches to the other—“I don’t know where you live.”

Before the words fully land, Riley is already undoing Val’s laces. And as if to apologize, Val says, “Don’t worry, neither do I.” She ruffles Riley’s head like the Team™ used to when they still called themselves Firehawks.

Riley straightens, brushing past her. “Now that,” she teases, heading down the hallway without looking back, “is worrying.”

Val stays rooted to the spot. Riley pauses and turns back toward her.

“Come on,” she says, the edges of her voice filled with so much patience it makes her want to cry. “I’ll grab you a glass of water. You can crash here tonight.”

Riley leads her to a couch far more comfortable than it looks before disappearing from view.

Val lets herself sink into the moment, just for a few minutes. She takes in the space: papers scattered across the coffee table, a jacket carelessly thrown on the couch. Val picks it up, frowning when the scent hits her—this one doesn’t belong to Riley. She sets it aside, her brow refusing to smooth.

A bookshelf catches her eye, crowded with textbooks and novels, their spines worn and pages undoubtedly dog-eared. There are pictures, too. Faces she doesn’t know, caught mid-laughter, and there, in the middle of it all, Riley.

The silence is comforting. The walls don’t shift; don’t lean in to cage her. And the air—oh, the air—carries the scent of the sea, salt and brine, and something else. Something she can’t name but knows all the same. Something that is unmistakably Riley.

And the truth is, she knows exactly where she is.

She’s exactly where she’s always wanted to be.

Riley reappears, a glass of water in hand. She entwines her free arm with Val’s. She doesn’t resist as Riley guides her toward the bedroom.

The details of the room blur in her drunken haze. She catches glints. A purple quilt. Trophies. A nightstand overflowing with things that feel unapologetically Riley. They flash by and fade just as fast. Riley presses the cool glass into her hands and watches the floor as she drinks.

Riley lends her a pair of pyjamas before leaving the room with a Yell if you need anything.

Val, however, has never been one for grace when alcohol courses through her veins. She yanks at the pyjama pants, hopping on one foot—misses—then the other—misses again—then the inevitable happens.

Her foot catches. Gravity takes over.

The resounding thud is followed by a rather pitiful groan as she lands on the cold floor, sprawled out in a heap of limbs.

It doesn’t take long.

Riley, being Riley, knocks on the door first. Rather frantic. “Everything okay in there?”

A grunt is all Val can manage.

There’s a lull, then Riley again, more pressing. “Okay. I’m coming in.”

Another grunt.

The door creaks open, hesitant. And that’s how Riley finds her: flat on her back, trapped in the offending pyjamas, clad in nothing but her underwear.

Riley stiffens. Her mouth opens as if to say something, but the words never come. The look on her face teeters between bafflement and sheer regret, an inner monologue of Why? and How? writ large across her features.

Val props herself up slightly, meeting Riley’s gaze with a grin too tipsy to be anything but concerning. “Like what you see?” she slurs, aiming for sultry. It’s undermined by the hiccup that tails and the fact that she’s still lying on the floor.

Riley’s cheeks darken instantly, and she whirls around so fast Val barely registers the movement. “Val! Can you—can you please cover up?”

Val shrugs, or at least tries to. “I mean—” Another hiccup. “I tried.”

“How did this even happen?” Riley asks.

Val blinks up at her from her unceremonious spot on the floor. She opens her mouth, then closes it. The truth is, she doesn’t remember. She tells Riley as much.

Riley sighs, long and weary. Her hand rises to pinch the bridge of her nose. “Okay. Okay.”

Her eyes burn, clog with water, and her vision blurs. Her throat tightens, and suddenly, the air is too sharp, too jagged. She tastes salt on her lips and feels water running, cleansing as it goes. She sniffs and finds that she can’t really breathe, so she does so between trembling lips.

And Riley won’t look at her.

“I’m sorry,” Val whispers, voice breaking.

Riley turns to look at her, her expression softening. She steps closer, hasty yet tentative—like she’s unsure if she’s moving too fast or not fast enough. “No, no—don’t cry,” she says, her voice gentle now. “I’m the one who’s sorry. She kneels beside Val, the distance between them shrinking. “You’re drunk,” Riley adds, the corners of her mouth twitching, though the humour doesn’t quite reach her eyes.

“I am,” Val says, nodding. Riley nods back.

It’s an apology wrapped in layers. It’s an apology for things Riley can’t—or won’t—say out loud. But it’s also the kind that cuts, sharp and raw—the kind that makes her lungs scrape against her ribs. It rips a sob from her body.

Riley turns to look at her, a little skittish; a little quieter. “Come on. Let’s get you ready for bed.”

Riley helps her to her feet, hands taking her arms and pulling her up. The momentum and her twitchy feet send her stumbling forward—straight into Riley’s chest. It gives her an excuse to let herself rest there—it’s not one she feels guilty for.

Riley’s hands shift to her waist. Her head dips, her nose brushing Val’s neck, and the warmth of her breath fans across her skin. It tickles, but not enough to make her move.

And Riley lets her linger there. She lets her linger in her arms. She doesn’t push her away, doesn’t retreat from the way Val’s frame blends against her own. Riley lets her stay long after she’s stopped shaking and her sobs have subsided. Long after Val—still a bit tipsy—starts to sway them from side to side.

And her heart no longer beats erratically. And she can breathe easier than she has been able to in years. Her chest feels light, and she couldn’t care less that the cold bites at her skin or that the room still spins. But then, a shiver rolls down her spine. Riley feels it, and the moment snaps. She steps back—not far, but enough to change the air between them. It isn’t distance so much as a shift.

Riley stoops to pick up the discarded pants from the floor, shaking them out before handing them back to Val.

“Here,” Riley says.

Val reaches for the pants, swaying just enough to make Riley grab her arm again. Then she passes her the shirt, and Val fumbles—has been fumbling for some time now. But Riley doesn’t laugh when Val sticks her arm through the wrong sleeve twice. She doesn’t look down, either; her gaze stays fixed on the ceiling or her face, her cheeks tinted a shade of red that’s impossible to ignore.

When Val finally gets the shirt on, Riley steps back again, nodding as if to say, There. Done.

Before Val can fully process the moment, she finds herself laid down, the comforter drawn snugly around her.

“Goodnight,” Riley says.

The words are barely out of her mouth before she leans down, pressing a featherlight kiss to Val’s forehead. It happens so fast that it seems accidental—like something Riley couldn’t stop even if she tried. It makes both of their cheeks ignite.

Riley starts to pull away, but Val catches her hand.

“Stay,” she murmurs, her voice thick with sleep.

And Riley hesitates for the second time tonight. But like Val, she slips into bad habits.

Val makes room for her and pulls up the covers. Slowly, Riley climbs into the bed. It’s too small for two people—elbows brush, legs tangle—but they make do.

Riley is stiff beside her. Her breath is measured and shallow. Val takes Riley’s hand and places it on her waist. The touch sends a jolt through Riley, her body locking up even tighter.

The silence is thick—too thick. And Val’s mind, clouded by alcohol, betrays her.

Words pulled from her bone marrow. Words that have long scratched at the edges of her ribs. Sweet as ambrosia they are. Searing as molten iron they come. They scar her throat, her heart, and the silence between them.

She doesn’t mean to speak.

(Riley, hey—)

(Look, I’m sorry—)

“I miss you.”

Riley stares at her, blinking, mouth half open in a silent gasp—it’s the faint whisper of the exhale against her lips which makes her say again, “I do. All the time.”

Riley doesn’t reply—not in words, anyway.

It’s in the way her shoulders slowly slack after minutes that feel like hours. It’s in how she stops retreating to the farthest edge of the bed, as though trying to escape without really leaving. It’s in how Riley’s breaths lose their sharpness.

It’s in the quiet surrender when Val shifts, rolling over to press her back against Riley’s chest, and she doesn’t pull away—doesn’t stiffen or flinch. She stays, allowing intimacy, allowing this.

Allows the warmth that lingers between them.

It’s in how Riley’s hand rests, featherlight, just above her hip. It’s in how her breath brushes Val’s neck.

And for the first time in far too long, the world feels a little less heavy.

And when her eyes finally close, she slips into a sleep she hasn’t known in years, the kind of sleep where she feels, even if briefly, safe.

It’s morning when the sunlight filters through the curtains, spilling gold across the room. Her head feels like a thousand conflagrations, her mouth is dry, and every breath feels like dragging air through a sieve.

Then she feels it: a touch, mild and tender. A palm sliding down her arm, shoulder to elbow, over and over—silk teasing raw skin.

“Hey—”

Val startles. Instinct kicks in before thought can catch up, and she twists sharply, rolling right off the bed.

She lands with a thud that makes her wince and look up, bewildered.

“Whoa, whoa. It’s okay. It’s all good. It’s me.”

Riley. Riley Andersen. Towering above her with her arms half-raised in a gesture of surrender, lips pressed together like she’s trying very hard not to laugh.

She feels a tug on her throat, feels her stomach coil viciously, and the sensation climbs her throat like a living thing, clawing its way up until there’s no holding it back.

She retches.

The room spirals around her, pain flaring in her ribs with each heave. The embarrassment doesn’t hit—not at first. Not through the piercing pain in her ribs, the choked gasps for air, or the pounding in her head. All she can feel is the relentless motion, the burn in her throat, the acute awareness of Riley kneeling beside her.

Riley’s hand gathers her hair, pulling it away from her face. The other hand moves in slow, rhythmic circles on her back, saying without words: I’m here. I’ve got you.

When it’s finally over, when her body feels emptied of everything except regret, Val leans back on trembling arms and surveys the damage.

The floor—mercifully not carpeted—is a blight. And her borrowed shirt? Speckled with puke.

“Oh God,” she rasps, burying her head in her hands. The twinge of shame digs harder than the hangover. “God, I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Riley says gently, though the grimace in her tone betrays her. There’s no harshness in it, no anger—just a grim resignation.

Val groans, a low sound born of shame.

“It’s about time I got around to cleaning up anyway,” Riley adds, half-smiling.

“I’m sorry,” she repeats, for she doesn’t know what to say now that her mind is clearer.

But Riley says, over and over again, as she helps her stand up and makes her take an aspirin, as she rubs her back and takes her into the bathroom to clean herself with fresh clothes in hand and a new toothbrush—It’s okay. It’s all right. You don’t have to worry. It’s okay.

Val wants to believe her—wants to let those words stitch her fractured heart back together. But she can’t.

Because the truth seethes inside her chest, raw and demanding. Because—

No, it’s not okay.

It’s not okay that I threw up on your floor.

It’s not okay that I miss you more than I should.

It’s not okay that it feels so good to be here by your side.

It’s not okay that I want to stay.

Her throat tightens painfully as the thoughts claw their way, hot and choking; her vision blurs, an ache forming behind her eyes.

It’s not okay that I want to wake up every day and see you.

It’s not okay to love you when all I seem to do is hurt you.

No, Riley, it’s not okay.

But she doesn’t say that. She doesn’t because she’s selfish. Because to say it aloud would mean risking the only thing she has left. Riley.

And the thought of losing Riley hurts more than any hangover. It hurts so much that her knees weaken, and she stumbles slightly, catching herself on the sink.

It doesn’t take Val long to emerge from the bathroom. Her teeth brushed, her face fresh, and the borrowed clothes clinging stubbornly to her still-drying skin. She holds the soaked shirt in her hand—her half-hearted attempt to rinse it in the sink having left it worse for wear.

Hanging it on the towel rack and tossing the pants into a laundry basket, she steps out. The aroma hits her first: warm and sweet, pancakes sizzling in a pan. Then, the whispered clattering of plates drifting from the kitchen.

She rounds the corner to find Riley standing by the stove, flipping a pancake. She’s trying too hard, Val can tell—her movements conscious, like she knows she’s being watched and aims to impress. It makes Val smile.

“Take a plate,” Riley says, her voice casual, as though this were any ordinary morning. She doesn’t look up, only gestures with the spatula toward a small stack of pancakes already waiting.

Val picks one up, grabs the other beside it, and carries them to the small table with two chairs. It’s modest, almost intimate—just two chairs. She clears her throat. “Got any honey?”

“Yeah,” Riley replies. “In the fridge.”

Val opens the fridge, the cold air dashing across her cheeks, and her hand hovers for a moment before spotting the honey tucked behind a jar of something unidentifiable. She retrieves it and closes the door.

There’s an ache in her chest she doesn’t expect. This—this is all so startlingly normal. Breakfast. Small talk. The faint sound of the stove clicking off. It all feels routine, like something that should be, could be.

And yes, she stands awkwardly at times, not knowing where to turn to grab silverware or glasses. She’s a guest here, after all, but there’s a peculiar peace in everything. Each action, each breath, feels poised in something that isn’t just comfort—it’s home.

As she sits at the table, she watches Riley move out of the corner of her eye. Riley’s back is to her, and Val lets herself indulge: she memorizes the way her shoulders relax, the slight tilt of her head, the way sunlight from the window catches the flyaways in her hair.

Riley carries the pan to the counter, sliding the last pancake onto a container, writing a note on a sticky pad and attaching it, before finally taking the seat across from her.

For a second, neither of them speaks. Val busies herself with pouring honey onto her pancakes while Riley cuts hers.

“So,” Riley says eventually. She leans back slightly in her chair, her fork twirling absently in her hand. “Feeling human again?”

Val lets out a short laugh, though it catches in her throat. “Getting there,” she says, poking at her pancakes. The words she wants to say—thank you, I owe you, I’ve never felt this safe—are knotted tight in her throat. Instead, she fumbles for something lighter. “I probably owe you a new shirt.”

Riley’s lips twitch in a faint, fleeting smile. “Don’t worry about it. It’s just a shirt.” Her eyes flicker to Val’s, lingering for a moment too long.

Val looks away first, breaking eye contact as she focuses on cutting her pancake. “Still,” she mumbles. “You didn’t have to do all that... last night, I mean. I was kind of a mess.”

“You were fine,” Riley says. “I’ve seen worse.”

Val risks a glance up at her, finding Riley watching her, her gaze full of something—patience, maybe, or care. She makes her feel seen in a way no one else ever has.

And then, gingerly, Riley says, “You don’t have to keep apologizing, you know.”

Val’s laugh is a low, tired thing, too bitter, too sober—but there’s a strange vehemence in her tone when she says, “But I do. I really, really do.”

Riley’s brow furrows, the fork in her hand faltering mid-air, but before she can respond, Val presses on.

“What I did to you...” Her voice trembles; her eyes sting. “What I did to you was not okay, Riley. It was not okay.”

The air between them grows tense and feeble, but Val continues. Her voice cracks, the words coming faster. She’s afraid she’ll stop if they’re not spoken all at once.

“I will never forgive myself for hurting you. Not ever. And I want you to know how much I regret it—how sorry I am. I never wanted to hurt you. Not you.”

She doesn’t even notice she’s crying until she feels the tears streaming down her cheeks. Her breath catches, shallow and ragged, and suddenly, the headache returns—harsh and pounding, like a punishment.

She squeezes her eyes shut, presses her fingers to her temples, tries to will it all away—the headache, the guilt, the expanding feeling of growing rotten.

“Val.”

Riley’s voice is firm. It slashes through the fog and Val’s sporadic heartbeat.

When Val blinks her eyes open, she finds Riley leaning forward, elbows on the table. Her jaw is clenched, her face unreadable.

“Stop,” Riley says, demands.

“I—” Val starts, but Riley shakes her head sharply.

“You don’t have to keep doing this. I hear you, okay? I hear you, and I believe you.” Riley exhales, her shoulders falling. “But I need you to hear me, too.” And she looks so tired, looks ten years older than she is.

Val swallows hard, her throat thick with tears, but she nods.

“What happened... it’s done. It hurt, yeah.” Riley’s lips press together for a moment, her eyes flickering with something—pain, acceptance, maybe both. “But I’ve had time—time to think, time to feel, time to figure out what I want to do with all of that. And I’ve decided that I don’t want to carry it anymore. I can’t.”

Val stares at her—finds she can’t do anything but stare.

“I’m not saying it didn’t matter,” Riley continues, her voice tender like a bruise. “It did. It does. But holding onto it... it’s just hurting both of us now. And I don’t want that. Not anymore.”

Val opens her mouth to speak, to protest, to say something, but no words come. Her throat is too thick, her heart too raw. All she can do is nod along to everything Riley says.

Riley leans back, her chair creaking slightly. “So stop punishing yourself, Val. You don’t have to keep trying to make it right. Let me decide how I feel. Let me decide what to do with it. Just… let me handle it, okay?”

Val nods again, jerkily, swiping at her cheeks with trembling hands.

For a moment, neither of them speaks. The air is dense but not excruciating. The silence, for once, feels like it might actually hold.

And Val, like many times in these last few hours, feels the fuzziest stir of hope.

After the last plate is dried and put away, they settle into the living room. It’s small, which means the furniture is, too. When they sit on the couch, their thighs and shoulders brush together.

The low drone of a fantasy saga they agreed upon—after a playful fuss over what to watch—fills the room.

Gradually, almost imperceptibly, they begin to lean into one another. By the end of the second movie, they’re fully cuddled up. Val’s head is resting against Riley’s neck, and Riley’s arm is draped loosely around her shoulder.

As the credits roll, Val glances toward the jacket slung over the arm of the couch. Her curiosity finally gets the better of her. “So... whose jacket is that?”

Riley follows her gaze and smiles fondly. “Oh, that’s Bree’s. She left it here last week. She’s stopping by later to grab it.” She turns to her, her smile tilting into something more coy. “You could stay. Say hi. She misses you.”

Val feels her chest tighten at the thought of seeing Bree again. Riley’s looking at her expectantly, clearly wanting her to say yes.

And the thing is, Bree had been her friend, too, once. But after everything—after Val’s fallout with Riley—their friendship had soured. Bree had been firmly in Riley’s corner, and Val hadn’t blamed her for it.

She hesitates, her fingers fidgeting. She wants to stay—wants to so badly—but the idea of facing Bree fills her with dread.

Riley tilts her head, sensing her hesitation. Knowing where it’s coming from, knowing every part and subtle shift of hers. It scares her. It makes her want to flee; it makes her want to stay. “Bree’s... well, Bree,” she says with a small laugh, her tone light but not dismissive. “But I think it might be good. For both of you.”

But Val shakes her head. “I do want to,” she says, quickly, sincerely, because she does want to. If not for herself, then for Riley. “I really want to, but I can’t.”

Riley’s expression doesn’t change, but Val can see the subtle flicker of disappointment in her eyes. It stings.

“I have things to do,” Val continues, her voice a bit too rushed, too emphatic. “Essays to finish, lessons to read... I shouldn’t have even stayed this long. But, well—” She leans back slightly, trying to lighten the mood. She throws Riley a wink at the end, one that is indeed a wink and not a blink in disguise. “It’s impossible not to, considering you.”

Riley laughs softly, shaking her head, but she is blushing, and Val smiles at that.

“Well,” Riley says, the corners of her lips quirking up. “I am pretty hard to resist.”

“You really are,” Val replies, wiggling her eyebrows. Riley only laughs harder and shakes her head again.

“It’s all right. I get it,” Riley replies when her laughter dies down and Val has pulled away. It takes more effort than Val would like to admit.

“But tell her I said hi,” Val says.

Riley nods. “I will.”

She stands and follows her to the door to see her off, all gentlemanly.

“Really? The door thing?” Val teases. “You know you don’t have to do that.”

Riley blushes even more. She grumbles something about how she’s just trying to be nice, and if she keeps it up, she might as well go without a goodbye hug.

That shuts Val up. She steps toward the door slyly, waggling her eyebrows as she spreads her arms wide.

Riley narrows her eyes in mock disdain, but there’s no resisting it. She steps forward, sighing dramatically, but pulls Val into the hug anyway.

And when Val finally leaves—after pressing a light, lingering kiss to Riley’s cheek and seeing her furiously blush—it doesn’t feel like the end. It doesn’t feel final.

And for now, that’s enough.

Chapter Text

It started innocently enough—a quip here and there in the mornings, sometimes in the evenings, in front of the bathroom mirror. Often accompanied by finger guns and, on occasion, a cheeky wink.

Riley blushes every time, crimson spreading like wildfire, but she doesn’t linger. She never lingers.

She flees, letting those moments tumble from her grasp as if holding them might make her complicit in a truth too raw to cradle with her trembling hands.

But habits—oh, habits—they creep. Like cracks spider webbing through stone, this one slips its fingers into the seams of Riley life, splitting it apart. Beneath her feet, the ground shifts. What was once solid now splinters, and from these fractures—tiny and insistent—wildflowers begin to bloom, soft against the jagged edges. They break through the veil she’s so carefully drawn—the veil that hides all that shouldn’t be.

It rattles her from within, shaking her to the marrow, leaving her standing amidst the ruins of something she never meant to build, let alone ruin. Leaving her standing among the wreckage, in the lush, ill-kept grass where her foundations once stood.

She doesn’t try to tame it. She lets the grass grow, fester, spill over into a surplus of doubts that claws at her ankles. It’s easier that way. Easier to hide behind the overgrowth than to confront it. Easier to turn away than to kneel, dig trembling hands into the earth, and wrestle with roots so gnarled and obstinate they seem stitched into her very sense of self.

Because deep down, Riley knows the truth—knows that no matter how fiercely she pulls, how deeply she digs, those roots will always rip their way back. They are not just part of the soil. They are part of her.

So she doesn’t try. She doesn’t fight.

She runs.

She finds new ground—smooth, barren, obedient in its infertility. Sterile in its uniformity. And for a while, she thrives in the emptiness. But even the firmest ground splits. It always does. And when it does, Riley flees, again and again and again—because fleeing feels safer than staying.

And it’s no surprise, really, when the habit worms its way into the school bathroom.

Riley takes precautions, of course—she always does. She peers under the stall doors first, scanning for shadows that might betray unwelcome company. Then, she cracks the door to the hallway, her ears straining for the faintest shuffle or cough, her eyes darting for any sign of someone lingering too close. Occasionally, she even makes obnoxiously loud, exaggerated fart noises to see if they’ll stir anyone into revealing themselves.

Once she’s absolutely sure she’s alone—and only then—does Riley let her mask slip. Only then does she allow the tiniest crevices to form, so subtle that even she might not notice them—even if she knows the truth is something she must bury, not hold.

It’s only then, standing before the mirror, that Riley starts flirting—with herself, the idea, the endless possibilities.

She cycles through smirks that don’t quite fit, winks that land awkwardly, an air of nonchalance that’s anything but.

Pick-up lines, scavenged from endless online scrolling, spill from her lips. She tests them like shoes, hoping one might fit. Hoping—no, praying—that one of them will make Val giggle or—better yet—blush.

“I’m learning about important dates in history, wanna be one of them?”

Riley winces, shaking her head. Undeterred, she pivots to another.

“Are you a hockey puck? Because I’d chase you around all day.”

This time, she goes for a finger gun, but she fumbles, nearly jabbing herself in the eye.

She goes so far as to try a few in Spanish.

“¿Podrías prestarme un… uh… diccionario? Es que al verte me he quedado sin palabras.”

“Pasas tanto tiempo en mi mente que debería cobrarte renta.”

The effort is noble; the execution is tragic. Her pronunciation isn’t just bad—it’s catastrophic. It’s a crime against the Spanish tongue, so clumsy it turns smooth romance into a comedy show. It’s less suave Casanova and more like a toddler learning tongue twisters.

(We don’t talk about that part. Or any of it, really.)

Because no one can ever know about this. Not about the bathroom rehearsals. Not about the cheesy pick-up lines.

And definitely not about how Riley—awkward, blend-into-the-background, never-quite-cool-enough Riley—has the biggest, most ridiculous, absolutely hopeless crush on Val. A crush so enormous, so absurd, that it curls itself around Riley’s ribs like a vice.

Not on Val. The Val. The kind of girl who belongs in poetry, in love songs, in stories with happy endings. Val, who moves through the hallways as if they were drawn on a map made just for her, leaving a trail of admirers in her wake. Val, the captain of the hockey team. The most popular girl in their class—if not the entire school. And, as far as Riley is concerned, an actual, walking daydream.

And Riley? Riley, who is always a shade too awkward, too invisible, too nothing—looks at Val and feels like a salamander in search of rocks to hide under. She feels small, out of place, as if the world around her is just too bright, too loud, too full for her to fit comfortably within.

But Val—Val is different. Val is gravity. A force so indisputable, so vast, that Riley finds herself tugged from her safe, shadowed space, powerless to resist, yet cursed to orbit forever from afar.

Yeah. No one can ever know.

But, of course, peace—so fragile in its momentary bliss—is never meant to last.

And Riley should have seen it coming. She really, really should have

(—should have never practiced those stupid lines in the locker room)

But it’s a mistake, isn’t it? And mistakes—oh, they always find you.

No matter how many precautions she takes—no matter how careful she is, you can only toy with fate for so long before it bares its teeth. And honestly? She has no one to blame but herself.

Because practising pick-up lines—pick-up lines—in the locker room, of all places? It’s like inviting disaster to RSVP. Worse still, it’s the locker room. The one where Val, without fail, will walk in for their morning hockey practice.

But Riley had been early. Too early. The kind of early that made the world feel like it was hers alone. The place was quiet, bathed in the soft glow of fluorescent lights. The air was still, save for the squeak of her sneakers on the tiles and that muted hush that only early mornings bring.

It was peaceful

Deceptively so.

Riley had let her guard down, soothed by the quiet—a rookie mistake. The first of many. The second? Believing, even momentarily, that her bad luck might have called in sick that day.

Because fate—fate has a sense of humour.

And then there was the mirror.

Big. Spotless. And staring back at her. It didn’t judge, didn’t flinch.

The locker room was still empty. Just Riley and her reflection.

“It’ll be fine,” she muttered under her breath. The words felt flimsy, as easy to tear apart as wet paper. Saying them aloud didn’t make them real. It only made them hollow.

She perched herself on the bench, the cool metal pressing against her palms, her sneakers tapping nervously against the tiles.

And that’s how her ending begins.

“So, Val,” she starts, voice pitching higher in forced confidence as she leans forward, elbows balanced precariously on her knees. Her reflection stares back, unsparing.

“I was thinking—no, no, no.” She waves her hand as if shooing away the words. “Too blunt.”

She tries again, gesturing as though Val’s really there, sitting across from her. “Hey, I couldn’t help but notice how amazing you were today.” A pause. Her brows knit together. “Not that you’re not always amazing, because you are—just, you know—”

Riley groans, collapsing backwards and dragging her hands down her face in a futile attempt to scrape off the mortification lodged deep in her skin. But there’s no escaping it. It clings to her like barnacles on a whale.

“Why can’t I not be a walking disaster?” she mutters, sliding sideways into a theatrical sprawl across the bench.

The mirror offers no mercy. It’s a cruel thing, her reflection. Riley peeks at it and winces. Her hair juts out at angles sharp enough to violate safety codes, her face is tomato-red from sheer self-inflicted humiliation, and a stubborn smear of toothpaste sticks defiantly to her cheek.

She scowls. “Really selling the charm, Andersen.”

Still, she doesn’t stop.

Riley shoves herself upright. She plants her feet, squares her shoulders, and tries again. And again.

She’s relentless. Stubborn. Maybe a little unhinged.

Then she ups the stakes, deciding to practice her look. Not just what she’ll say to Val but how she’ll look at her.

“Don’t look at her so intensely, Riley,” she mutters to her reflection, pointing like a drill sergeant on a caffeine high. “You don’t want to weird her out. Just… be cool. Casual.”

She tests it out, tilting her chin and narrowing her eyes in what she hopes is a breezy, indifferent gaze. The result is… not promising. Somewhere between a startled deer and someone, please, this girl is not okay.

Riley groans, rubbing at her temples. “Casual, Riley. Casual! Not ‘paralyzed with terror’.”

The door slams open, the sharp crack of metal against tile ricocheting through the locker room like a gunshot. Riley’s whole body jerks, her arms flailing for balance as the bench beneath her threatens to upend her entirely.

Her gaze snaps up, and she freezes. There, framed in the doorway, stands the janitor—mop slung over his shoulder like an old war weapon. His eyes, narrowed and staunch, lock onto hers.

“Yer here early,” he grunts, his voice thick as gravel. “A wee bit too early, don’tcha think?”

Riley’s throat tightens as his eyes scan the room, a casual sweep, before his gaze lands squarely back on her, pinning her in place.

“Where’s yer mate?” he adds, scowling. “The one ye’re always stuck to like glue?”

It’s a question she shouldn’t care about. But she does. The nerves don’t settle. They quadruple. Riley’s pulse hammers, her cheeks blaze. ​​The silence between them stretches until Riley finally finds her voice—or rather, it finds her—all on its own.

“Uh, yeah. She’s not here yet,” Riley says, her voice pitching up in a crack that could rival a preteen boy’s.

The janitor’s brows furrow further, but he doesn’t press. With a short, noncommittal nod, he turns on his heel and trudges away, his mop swaying like a pendulum.

The silence rushes back in. Riley doesn’t realize she’s been holding her breath until it escapes in a shaky exhale. Her shoulders slump, the tension leaving her in waves.

“Okay,” she mutters to herself, voice barely above a whisper as if the walls have ears. “That could’ve been worse.”

She grips the hem of her hoodie, tugging it straight. It grounds her, smooths out her nerves one wrinkle at a time until the ground beneath her feet feels solid once more.

With a deep breath, she rolls her shoulders back, trying to summon even a fragment of the confidence she keeps rehearsing. “You’ve got this,” she tells her reflection, her voice steadier now, though she doesn’t quite believe it yet. But she says it again, a little louder like she’s trying to convince both herself and the glass. “You’ve got this.”

And maybe, just maybe, if she says it enough times, it’ll feel true.

“Okay. Take two.” Her voice shifts into a serious tone as she looks straight ahead. “Val, I’ve been thinking—” She stops short, grimacing at her own words. “Nope, too formal. Sounds like I’m giving a TED talk.”

She inhales deeply and tries again, fingers tapping rhythmically on her knee. “If I could rearrange the alphabet, I’d put U and I together—nope, too cheesy.”

And that’s when it happens.

“What’s cheesy?”

The voice—her voice—comes from behind her.

Riley’s breath catches, a sudden, tart gasp that feels like it might escape her throat in an embarrassing squeak. A chill sweeps through her body, every muscle locking in place.

Slowly, dread curling in her stomach, Riley turns.

And there she is.

Her heart skips—no, it outright halts.

Val.

The world narrows until it’s just her and Val—like a spotlight has been cast on them, and everything else fades into the background. It’s just Val. Just this.

She’s standing in the doorway, looking effortlessly stunning in her hockey jersey, her bag slung casually over one shoulder. She surveys Riley with a mix of curiosity and amusement in her gaze—eyebrows arched in that way that never fails to make Riley’s pulse trip over itself.

Riley’s heart doesn’t even race—it gives a still, terrified thud.

“Were you…” Val tilts her head slightly, her lips twitching as she tries to suppress a smile. “Practicing pick-up lines? On yourself?”

Riley’s blood runs cold. She wants to disintegrate right there, to sink into the floor and disappear from existence. This is a nightmare, a terrible, mortifying nightmare, and she’s living it in real time.

“I—no! What? That’s ridiculous,” Riley stammers, hands flailing as if they could somehow explain this ridiculous, humiliating mess. “I was just… uh… warming up. For practice. Yeah. Verbal warm-ups. Gotta keep the mind sharp, you know?”

The words spill out in a frantic rush, each one worse than the last. She mentally slaps herself, wishing she could take back every word, every awkward twitch of her fingers. But it’s too late. She’s here, and so is Val.

Val stares at her, unblinking, her gaze narrowing ever so slightly. Something flickers across her face—an emotion Riley can’t quite read in the split second it flashes by.

“Oh,” Val breathes, her intake strange, offbeat as if struck by a sudden realization. “You were practising pick-up lines.”

Riley’s life, it seems, ends right there.

Val steps forward, closing the gap between them with that effortless stride, stopping just half a meter away. And it’s too close, too real, too much.

Val’s lips twitch into a half-smile like she’s trying very hard to lighten the mood. She leans in just a fraction more. “Pick-up lines, huh?” she says, syrupy yet cutting, like the edge of a blade dipped in honey. “Care to share?”

Riley opens her mouth to respond, but the words jam up in her throat. They press against her chest, too big, too wrong, too real. Her brain completely short-circuits.

“I… uh, I mean… there’s nothing really to share,” Riley stammers, her voice barely more than a breath—air that shatters before it fully forms. “Just, you know, a little practice for… I don’t know… if I ever need to, um… use them. On someone. Else.” Her words fall flat, scraping the silence like a rough stone.

Val moves closer still, and the space between them folds in on itself. There’s no room, not for air, not for breath. The air seems too thin, too dense. Riley feels it then—the heat, like molten lava surging through her veins, fiery and inexorable. It severs her breath, leaves her gasping for air that suddenly feels heavy, electric. She tastes it on her tongue, sharp enough to sear her tongue. It burns, yes, but she doesn’t recoil. Once bitten, it fills her, spreads and cracks until she feels alive.

“Oh yeah?” Val's voice is soft, almost teasing, her lips curling in that way that makes Riley’s knees feel like they might give out. “So… who’s the lucky person you’re practising for?”

The question falls—sharp. Cold. A guillotine’s edge. But it’s not the words that freeze Riley. No. It’s the way Val’s eyes glimmer like she’s already figured it out—like she’s already one step ahead.

She’s exposed now. Naked in the face of her own lies. Trembling on the edge of dissection. She’s laid bare on a table, ready to be expunged—ready to be peeled away like brittle bark.

And it’s not a secret anymore, is it? Not to Val. Not with that glint in her eyes—a shard of knowing, sharp as a scalpel. Riley feels it—feels herself split open beneath the ingot, a specimen of her own undoing, waiting for the final cut.

Riley feels the ground shift beneath her feet. “Uh… nobody,” she says quickly, too quickly, her words tripping over each other. “Definitely not you.”

She mentally slaps herself.

Val’s eyebrow arches, the corners of her lips tugging upward in a slow, almost predatory smile. “Not me, huh?” she repeats, leaning in just a little as if daring Riley to say something else. “Well, if you did want to practice on someone…” She trails off, leaving the rest hanging in the air, her eyes never leaving Riley’s face.

It’s a fine line between disaster and opportunity.

“I—uh—I have to go.”

The words spill out before she can stop them, and then her legs are moving before her mind can catch up.

It’s a knee-jerk reaction—flight, always flight. Her feet pound against the floor, her heart thrashing in her chest, her breath coming in quick bursts. She doesn’t look back. Not even once.

She can hear Val calling after her, the sound of her name laced with confusion, yes, but something else, too—something tender, something bruised. Something Riley can’t bear to face.

But none of that matters. Riley only knows one thing for certain: this is what she does.

She runs. She flees. She always has.

And she always will.

The days stretch thin, gossamer threads pull taut, the space between them expanding until it’s impossible to overlook how the air feels sharper, denser.

Beneath Riley’s feet, the concrete shifts, cracking open with an ugly sound, notches deepening as if the earth is waking, stretching. Vines—thick and twisted—creep and curl around her skin. Brambles claw at her, their thorns biting into her flesh, winding around her ankles like cold chains, binding her in place. She cannot escape them, cannot pretend the world beneath her is anything but hostile, waiting to swallow her whole.

And then, inevitably, the whispers come. They slither in behind her, trailing like ripples from a stone dropped in a stagnant pool. They don’t fade. They stretch—coil until she can no longer pretend she doesn’t hear them—until the weight of their gazes is sharper than the thorns that pierce her flesh.

Apparently, as the janitor had so bluntly implied, you couldn’t have one without the other. Riley and Val. Val and Riley. There was no divide—no clean separation between the two. The world had seen it. The world had noticed.

Now, their sudden distance becomes the marrow of whispers, a thing spun behind cupped hands and shared with furtive glances. But it’s not the whispers that tear at her. No. It’s Val. Always, always Val.

Val, who refuses to dissolve into the crowd. Who refuses to be ignored like the taste of salt on a wound; like the way skin stings when it’s peeled back too far. Like a rabid dog at your feet, fur matted, teeth bared, eyes burning with something wild she cannot name.

She keeps trying. Keeps asking. Keeps carving Riley’s name into the silence like it’s the only prayer she’s ever been taught. It’s a mantra, a hymn, a chant. One that doesn’t fade but settles in the spaces Riley thought she’d sealed shut. It bleeds soft as drizzle, eating away the dirt that lingers in the rifts of the forgotten stone wall.

And Riley—Riley, who has spent so much time hiding, whose footsteps have always danced on the edge of absence—isn’t ready for it. Not for Val’s grit, for the way her will burrows in like teeth through tender flesh—for the way it digs in like the roots busting through the gravel. Riley’s not ready for how it anchors her, for how it drills deep into the fractured ground she’s so carefully crafted.

There’s a strange sanctity to it, to the way Val says her name. Riley, syllables not spoken but offered—like a secret, a wish, an invocation. And the way her mouth wraps around her name, silky and deliberate—like it’s something holy.

There is something in the way it rolls off her tongue, quivers its way out of her throat with such care, with an intimacy so deep it gnaws at Riley’s bones. And it’s dangerous. The intimacy of it. It scares her more than the distance ever did. It makes her feel like she is meant to be cradled between cupped hands lest she leave and seek barren ground.

And that thought—that fragile, beautiful, utterly terrifying thought—wraps itself around Riley’s heart like an iron coil.

It makes Riley feel seen, and there’s safety in that. Safety that frightens her more than any peril ever could.

And that’s the paradox—Val’s love—Val’s attention—it makes her feel like she’s finally seen. Finally real. It makes her feel safe, but it petrifies her, too.

It’s enough to make her legs shake, make her lungs gasp for air. It’s enough to realize that she’s suffocating in the very thing that was meant to save her. It’s enough to undo everything. It’s enough to send Riley running again.

After the incident in the locker room, Val had cornered her. They needed to talk, she insisted, and couldn’t she please spare a few minutes? Maybe during recess? No, Riley couldn’t possibly. She had to help a friend with a biology assignment.

Again.

Then Val begged her not to miss their morning practice with that glint in her eyes—the one that made her heart ache. But Riley sidestepped that, too, spinning something about dog-sitting while a friend was out of town.

And again.

Even warning Riley, voice low and stout with frustration, that skipping practice could mean her spot on the team, did not move her. She almost faltered at that one. Almost. But no, she was busy.

Rebuffed at every turn, Val finally backed off.

The silence that followed should’ve tasted like freedom—should’ve rung with triumph. But it didn’t. No, it tasted like ash, like empty air. Hollow, aching.

And it’s inevitable, isn’t it? This, too, is just another thing Riley will have to run from. She will run—because running is all she knows. It’s instinct, reflex, the only certainty she’s ever clung to.

She runs. She always has. She always will. But the ground beneath her? It shifts, rearranges, pulls her down with it. And this time, there’s nowhere to hide. Not this time. Not from Val.

And that—oh, that—was Riley’s third mistake. Believing, in her fractured logic, that Val’s retreat was surrender.

It happens in the locker room, and it’s an end before anything else.

She should have known. Should’ve seen it, should’ve felt it coming. But she didn't. Exhaustion had dulled her edges—exhaustion from training, from running, from hiding behind walls that never seemed tall enough.

And it’s not just the running away that rakes her insides raw; that makes her want to vomit upon falling asleep and waking up. It’s not just the ceaseless flight that shreds her lungs into scraps of foil, sharp and thin and cutting. That was nothing.

No. It’s the ache of separation—the gnawing, relentless pain of it. It’s Val—the way their distance hollows her out—nibbles at her insides like a slow, deliberate rot. It wouldn’t stop. It couldn’t stop.

And what do you do with pain when it becomes you? When it braids itself into the sinews, curls its fingers around your ribs, weaves through your veins like a poison, and you can’t excise it without destroying yourself?

And where does a heart go when it can no longer call its ribs home? When between cupped hands is not welcomed, and the pressure of lungs is no haven?

And who, then, could tend to it, if not Riley? Who would?

It’s one thing to dissect yourself, she thinks. To tear at the seams of your own chest and drag out the heart from its cage, piece by piece, as though you could purify it, carve away all that’s broken until you’re smooth, palatable—a lump of clay ready to be moulded into something beautiful. Something safe. The kind of thing that could be loved. The kind of thing that would be easy to love.

But to let someone else wield the scalpel? To let someone else cut into you, to risk the negligence of their hands, the apathy of their gaze as they rummage through the ruin?

No. Cut her skin and let her blood spill, but let it be she who holds the knife; let it be she who twists it deep. Let her be the one to wrench herself open, piece by bloody piece and make art of the wreckage. Let it be hers to decide what stays, what goes.

Because people, Riley knows, don’t love the whole. They love the fragments, the cracks they can fit their fingers into. They crave broken things because broken things make them feel whole. They hunger for jagged edges they can sand down—shards they can glue together. They love the power of it. The ownership.

And wouldn’t that make her the kind of person someone could love instantly, effortlessly? Wouldn’t that make Riley a masterpiece worth the downfall? Someone captivating—a mosaic of rough edges that dared you to bleed, dared you to admire the way the light refracted off her shattered surface with bruised knuckles and bloody fingertips. Someone to stare at until formed, until whole, until finished. Until you think you’ve fixed it. Until you can say, “I love her.”

It’s exhausting—God, it’s exhausting, she thinks. The trying. The searching. The digging through the muck of who you are and praying for something real, something true to rise up, even when you’re not sure there’s anything underneath it all.

Fatigue seeps into every breath, every thought, because how does she uncover herself when she doesn’t even know if there’s a self to find? And she wonders, endlessly, if the masks are all there is.

And her heart—oh, her heart—it aches for something primal. It aches for teeth, for the raw scrape of hunger against its fragile walls, and she cannot fathom why. Why must it scream for ruin, for the sharp edge of a need that doesn’t care if it shatters her? Why must it beg to be devoured by someone whose hunger is cruel, fleeting—a gnashing void that only seeks to be sated?

And yet—yet—wouldn’t it be better for someone to shape her? Someone with steady hands and sharp eyes. Someone who could know her whole without her having to strip herself bare, to scrape and gouge? Eyes that would pick her from the crowd, who could look out over a sea of duplicates—every face bearing her features—and still know which one is her?

And yet, wouldn’t that be her undoing, too?

It’s a trap, she knows—sweet as poison, honeyed and slick with lies that slide down her throat like water. A love that wears no love’s face, a gift wrapped in razors.

And who would love a ghost stitched together with threadbare masks and borrowed laughter? Who would cradle the broken shards of someone so sunken, knowing the edges will exsanguinate? Who would dare?

Not Val.

And yet.

It feels like the ground cracks open when Val doesn’t just hold the pieces but moulds them—makes Riley from the wreckage. When Val, unshaken and adamant, meets Riley’s crookedness without retreating.

Because it shouldn’t be Val.

Val, who walks through life like she owns it. Val, who is certainty and solidity and everything Riley is not. Val, who should’ve turned away, should’ve left her there—splintered and unmade, a casualty of her own reckless hands. Should’ve known better than to press soft, vulnerable skin against shattered glass. Should’ve known better than to care for a girl built from chains and scorn.

But Val doesn’t walk away.

She steps closer.

She doesn’t just see Riley; she infiltrates her, suffuses the silence between them with a suffocating, deafening insistence. Val doesn’t offer her understanding of broken things—no, she confronts her with it, drags the fractures into the light and dares Riley to deny them.

It’s not pity in Val’s eyes, not compassion. It’s defiance. It’s fire. It’s a dare wrapped in flesh and bone, a refusal to let Riley bury herself in the safety of her own ruin.

As if she were worth it.

Worth the blood Val would spill to hold her together. Worth the scars Val would wear like tattoos—souvenirs. Worth the ache in her ribs every time she stitched herself to Riley’s fractured frame.

Worth every fracture Val would inherit for daring to stay.

And Riley, who knows only how to flee, who has built a life from the rubble of burned bridges and flimsy laughter, is paralyzed because Val doesn’t run.

Val stays.

And Riley, suffocating in her own fear, doesn’t know what to do when someone refuses to let her drown.

And when Riley’s back hits the cold lockers, the rattle feels final. There’s no room for running, not this time. The door is locked, and her body—god, her body—betrays her. Every limb is leaden, every muscle sunk in tar. Wet concrete pulls her under, presses her down, and she knows—knows—there’s no escape.

Fear isn’t what locks her in place. It’s the crushing immensity of fatigue—a weight so absolute it feels geological, tectonic. It’s impossible to run, so shackled is she, strata brushing against slumped shoulders. So when the team locks the door and leaves a resolute Val in front of her, Riley doesn’t try to flee, nay, and falls exhausted onto the bench—the same bench she’d sat on weeks ago, back when the air between them wasn’t this knife-edged thing.

“Riley,” she hears Val say. Shoes scuff the floor—one step, then two—and stop. She can see Val’s sneakers now, planted in the space between them. “We need to talk.”

But Riley doesn’t respond. Doesn’t even blink. Her breath feels caged, like if she lets it out, it’ll turn into a scream.

And still, Val is there. Immoveable.

And oh, how Riley wishes she could ignore her, could sink so far into herself that she vanishes entirely. But she can’t. She’s already cornered—by the locked door, by her exhaustion, by the resoluteness in Val’s tone.

Get it over with, she thinks. Just say it. Break me. Tear me down so there’s nothing left to carry. Say what you came to say. Shatter my ribs so I don’t have to feel my heart hammering out the same word again and again. Val, Val, Val.

“Riley,” she repeats, her tone sharpened. Edged. Demanding. It isn’t a question. It’s a command.

Isn’t it enough to break her heart? Must Val twist the blade and force Riley to meet her eyes while the world tilts, while the ground buckles beneath her ribs?

Riley glances up, and there they are—Val’s eyes. Brown like rain-drenched earth, rich and aching, too alive to bear. They’re not indifferent, no. Indifference would be a kindness. They expect. They demand. They strip her bare as though Riley herself had conjured this reckoning, laid the tinder, and struck the match.

Val is waiting—always waiting. For what, Riley doesn’t know. An answer? A confession? For her to finally crack herself open and let the truth bleed out? For Riley to say that which neither of them will survive hearing?

Don’t look at me like that, Riley thinks. Please, don’t make me say it. Don’t make me drag up what I’ve buried so deep it’s grown roots. You want to end this, don’t you? So do it. Take the blade, finish it, cut me down. Just don’t ask me to breathe life into it. Don’t make me carve it into words. Don’t make me give it life. You wouldn’t be that cruel.

But Val—Val is cruel. Not in her words but in her silence, her nearness. She crouches in front of Riley, her face soft but her presence excruciating. She feels like Atlas, cursed to bear the sky, shoulders trembling under a burden no one could share. Her hands, trembling, close over Riley’s, and the touch brands her.

Val’s fingers quake, her breaths hitch, and Riley knows. She knows. Val is begging. She’s been begging all along, hasn’t she? Begging in the cracks of her voice. In the way her hands refuse to let go.

But Riley—hasn’t she been begging, too? Longer than she wants to admit. Longer than feels fair.

She’s been on her knees, praying so hard the skin has split, leaving raw flesh against stone. She’s begged with ribs bruised from the strain, with lungs choked on water, with lips blistered from whispered prayers to a heaven that answers only with silence.

And she’s so tired. Tired of praying. Tired of the silence. Tired of hoping salvation might finally come when the only thing gods ever seem to do is watch.

No deity can return her to what she once was. But what does it matter now? What’s left of her—the broken, splintered pieces—is enough. Enough to lay bare at the feet of a god that breathes, that gives.

And what if that god has eyes like soil and skin like silk over tempered steel? What if that god promises no rebirth, no eternity, yet in every glance, every touch, grants creation, destruction, and something far beyond? What if that god is mortal?

Isn’t that the most sacred thing of all? What could demand more reverence than something fleeting, fragile, ephemeral? Mortality isn’t a flaw; it’s the closest we come to divinity. It demands worship because it’s meant to end.

Riley knows this. It’s intaglio into her, the knowing, as she kneels before Val—knees sinking into the dirt like it’s claimed her already, vines curling up her legs as if she’d been rooted there for centuries. Maybe she has. Maybe she’s always belonged to this ground, this moment. To Val.

Riley will never be home, not for her. And Val will never be hers to hold, to press into the hollow ache of her hands. Gods are not to be held. They’re meant to be worshipped—lifted higher, called to in the shivering dark, names spilling from lips that quiver with hope and fear.

And Riley—Riley is meant to bow. To crack herself open on Val’s altar. Riley is meant to break and call it holy. To fall apart and call it salvation.

And even then—she will hope. She will know. The breaking will cleanse her. The ruin will save her.

“Riley,” Val sighs, her voice heavy, laced with something Riley can’t name.

She is on her knees, stripped of all pretence, and Val’s hands cradle her face like she’s fragile—like she’s precious in a way Riley will never believe.

Riley’s nose stings, her lips falter, and her breath stutters. Kneeling here, raw beneath Val’s touch, Riley feels like glass held up to the sun—exposed, burning, and ready to break.

“Riley,” Val says, her voice soft—a balm and a blade in equal measure. “I need you to tell me why you're avoiding me.”

Avoiding her? Riley flinches—as if she could. That’s like blaming the tides for ebbing. Like saying shadows preclude the light instead of being born from it. It’s not avoidance—it’s survival. It’s breathing when your lungs feel like they’re caving in. It’s all Riley knows how to do—all she has left.

But Val doesn’t let up. She doesn’t step back. She never does. Her voice wavers only slightly. “I thought—” A breath, uneven and raw, trembling with too many things unsaid. “I thought we were friends. Or—or something.”

Something. That word. The way Val says it. Like it could stretch into a thousand meanings—like it could detonate and split the world down to its molten centre. It punches through Riley’s chest and wrenches her heart into her throat.

“I—” Riley tries, but the words snarl, caught in her throat. Her voice breaks—splinters into silence. She can’t. She can’t.

“Riley,” Val presses, and her voice bends, not sharp but soft, unbearably soft. Her brows knit together, not in anger but in tenderness, and that—that—is the knife’s twist. She’s not angry. She’s hurt. Hurt. And it’s all Riley’s fault.

“I’m sorry,” Riley chokes, the words brittle as dry leaves crushed underfoot.

She wants to crumple into the apology, to let it shield her, to let it be her escape hatch. But Val—oh, Val—she doesn’t let her go—doesn’t let her off that easily.

“Why?” Val demands—a whip-crack of sharp frustration. “Why are you running from me?”

And just like that, Riley’s grip slips. The dam breaks. Everything—fear, shame, the bone-deep ache of wanting—comes roaring out, too heavy to hold back, too wild to control.

“Because you’re you!” Riley snaps, her voice rising, cracking. “You’re Val. You’re—perfect. You’re the most popular girl in school. Everyone loves you. Everyone orbits you like you’re the goddamn sun. Everyone wants to be you or be with you, and I—” Her voice falters, but she can’t stop now. The words are clawing their way out, harsh and bloody, tearing at her throat as they tumble free. “And I’m just—this. I’m nobody, Val. I’m nothing. I can’t even look at you without—”

Her voice falters. She hears it—the slip, the slash of metal against a vulnerable neck. Her breath snags, tight and panicked.

But Val’s gaze doesn’t waver. If anything, it hones. “Without what?”

Riley shakes her head, retreating until the cold steel of the bench presses into her back. Her lungs seize, constricting, crushing. “Forget it. It’s a mistake,” she mutters. “I didn’t mean—”

“No.” Val shifts closer, her voice low and rough. “Finish it. Without what, Riley?”

Riley’s laugh is bitter, broken. “Without wanting everything I’ll never have,” she whispers, the words scraping her throat like glass. Her voice is small, trembling, frantic. “Without wanting you.”

The silence grows teeth, gnaws at the edges of Riley’s defences until nothing remains but frayed vocal strings. She keeps her head bowed, the weight of it too much to lift, the thought of meeting Val’s eyes too much to bear. Her breaths are shallow, caged things. She doesn’t dare let them deepen, doesn’t dare risk the rupture that might come if she breathes too hard.

She waits. Waits for Val to scoff, to laugh, to cut her down with something definitive. A sharp edge, clean and merciless. Something to end the agony of not knowing.

But nothing comes.

Her hands curl into fists, nails digging into her palms until the skin protests, crescents of pain blooming beneath her grip. It’s a feeble anchor, but it’s enough—barely. Just enough to push her gaze upward.

And then she sees her.

Val’s eyes catch hers, and Riley braces—every nerve braced for the cut, the sting, the tearing of her marionette strings. But the impact she expects doesn’t come. Val’s gaze doesn’t pierce, or shred, or sting like Riley thought it would. Instead, it cradles. It holds.

There’s no scorn in those eyes. No anger. Not even pity—pity she could swallow like bitter medicine, suffer its callous mercy and call it healing.

No, it’s worse.

It’s soft. A terrible, stifling softness. It washes over Riley like a tide, suffuses her blood and seeps into her flesh. It sinks into her lungs, crowding out the polluted air she’s so used to breathing.

It’s everything Riley has spent her life running from. It’s everything she cannot face.

“Riley,” Val says, her voice softer now, trembling in the places where her heart catches, where the words snag on their weight. “You are not nothing.”

Her eyes drop, snapping away from Val’s gaze as though staring too long might scorch her—might brand her with truths she isn’t ready to bear.

Because Riley knows what it is to burn.

She has burned before—felt flames lick at her edges, crawl beneath her flesh until they swallowed her whole. She knows how fire strips you down to your skeleton, leaves your skin blistered and raw, exposed to wind too cold to soothe. She knows the agony of being unmade—peeled back, layer by layer—until nothing is left but the barest frame of what was and the ache of her frailty.

And she cannot—will not—burn like that again.

She isn’t strong enough. Not now. Not ever. To let Val set her ablaze, to let those hands char her open and leave her smouldering, hollowed by a pain too vast to contain. To be left clutching at ash—left nestling that pain with nothing to salve it. Nothing to fill the space where fire once raged.

“How dare you say that to yourself?” Val continues, and her voice breaks just a little like the words cost her. It breaks as though the syllables have dragged themselves bloody across her throat. “How could you ever think this—us—is a mistake?”

The question slices through Riley, leaving her breathless, her chest tight with an ache she can neither name nor bury because she has thought it. Over and over. Worn it like a yoke—the weight of it buckling her shoulders, pressing her spine into curves it was never meant to have. A mistake. Riley is a mistake. And anything she touches must wither. That’s how it’s always been. That’s how it will always be.

But Val moves—slow, deliberate. Her fingers rise, featherlight, thumb and forefinger catching Riley’s chin. She tilts it upward, not forcing but coaxing.

And Riley, trembling, lets herself be guided.

And it’s in that touch that Riley knows. It’s too late.

She’s been claimed. Val’s name is etched into her, burned into the marrow of her bones, her name scrawled across the delicate scaffolding of her spine. Not an invitation. A verdict. A sentence handed down without consent, without warning. There’s no outrunning this. No escape from the permanence of something that’s rooted itself inside her.

Her lips part, a reflex, but no sound escapes. Her throat tightens, betrays her, and she can only sit there, stripped bare and defenceless.

“If you’ve made a mistake,” Val whispers as if tasting the words, “then so have I.”

Riley’s breath stumbles in her chest. Warm hands have travelled up and up until they lay on her cheeks. She can’t look away now—not from Val’s face, not from the way her grip remains steady, cradling Riley like something fragile. Something worth keeping intact.

“Don’t blame yourself,” Val says, and her voice doesn’t shake, “for something neither of us could escape.”

The words aren’t an apology. They’re not a plea.

They’re a truth. A damning, immutable truth that settles into Riley’s chest like an ache she’ll carry forever.

And it terrifies her.

But Val—oh, Val—clings, and there’s nothing soft in it. No hesitation. She pulls Riley in with the kind of force that feels inevitable, like gravity, like instinct carved into her bones. Riley doesn’t fight it. Not this time. Not now.

This time, Riley stays. Not because she’s cornered, not because the world is crumbling at her heels, but because she chooses it. Because this moment is something solid she can grip, something that won’t splinter under her fingers.

It’s clumsy, the hug. Crooked at the elbows, knees grinding into the floor. A jagged thing. Too tight in all the wrong places. But none of that matters. Because it’s everything. More than Riley ever dared let herself imagine. A salve smeared over a wound she thought would never scab, let alone heal.

And Val—she holds on like letting go would tear her apart. Like she’s bracing for the world to take Riley away again, and she’s daring it to try.

So they stay. For how long, Riley couldn’t say. Seconds stretch, snap, dissolve into nothing. Time spills into the cracks and vanishes, forgotten.

All she knows is the steady thrum of Val’s heart, the rhythmic push of her breath against her collarbone, the solid heat of her body anchoring her in a way she hasn’t felt in years. Maybe in her entire life.

And sure, the wounds are still there. Fractures that won’t heal, edges jagged enough to draw blood if you press too hard. But they’re talking now. Val’s voice isn’t a blade anymore. It’s a needle pulling threads tight, stitching together what’s been torn.

And knowing that Val feels it too—that thing—that raw, unbearable affection, it wraps around Riley’s chest like a lifeline, firm but not stifling.

This time—this time, Riley doesn’t have to run. Not anymore.

Chapter Text

Val proposes. And it is not a how but a series of whys.

It’s a Tuesday night. A nothing night. The kind of night that folds in on itself without fanfare. Just another square on the calendar. Just another page flipped.

But it’s also everything.

Because Val is on the balcony of her apartment, knees drawn to her chest, wrapped in a blanket she’s only half-clinging to. The metal beneath her hums faintly, cold where the fabric doesn’t reach. City air brushing at her skin, still warm from the inside lights. Sky all washed-out navy.

And then—

The familiar sound of footsteps, wood to metal, weight meeting steel. Not delicate. Never that. Riley walks like gravity means something to her. Like the world knows she’s here and shifts to meet her stride.

Two mugs in her hands. Steam curling into the night, thick and sweet, the scent of melted chocolate drifting between them. She leans down, presses a kiss to Val’s head—quick, gentle, habitual—and settles beside her, reaching for the other half of the blanket like it’s hers by right.

Maybe it’s hers. Maybe everything is.

“Brownies?” Val asks, her eyes glassy with delight. Her voice is small and sweet and already smiling. Riley doesn’t answer, not really. Just nods, eyes crinkling with the hints of adoration.

Val, grinning like a sinner with absolution, snatches one of the mugs before the answer fully lands with a greedy kind of glee and eats like she’s been deprived. There’s no real protest when Riley tries to steal the entire blanket—only a half-hearted tug-of-war, the ritual of it familiar.

The heat scalds her tongue, but she doesn’t slow down. Sweetness over pain. Always.

Riley chuckles—deep and quiet. That low hum that fills the space between them. That sound Val saves in her ribs for later. She reclaims more of the blanket in response, tugging with slow, smug satisfaction while Val makes a half-hearted fuss.

“Just you wait, you thief,” Val warns, seemingly indignant, mug already emptied like it never stood a chance. “You’ll surrender the blanket soon enough.”

“Val,” Riley says, eyes glinting, “you’re wearing my hoodie. And—” she bats Val’s hand away with a look of feigned betrayal, “—did you just try to eat my brownie?”

Val shrugs, unrepentant. The wind tousles her hair as she lifts her shoulders with slow, dramatic grace, the mischief spreading across her mouth like wildfire. “I had to try.”

And Riley—Riley just laughs.

They are grocery shopping, moving aisle by aisle. No skipping allowed. Riley insists—makes a show of it, even, reciting her reasons like gospel.

“This way we won’t forget anything,” she says, rearranging cans of chickpeas just to make space for nothing. “And we might discover something new. And I’m telling you—this is the fifth time I’ve passed aisle seven and your protein bars aren’t there, so unless they’ve been raptured—”

They could just ask someone. They both know that. They don’t.

Val knows that all of this isn’t about efficiency or novelty or some paranoid conspiracy about mislabeled shelves. It’s about time. Time with no work calls, no schedules. Just Riley, elbows on the cart like a child, feet occasionally lifting off the ground so Val is forced to steer them both through the waxy jungle of packaged goods and corporate jingles.

They’ve been here for over two hours. Walking. Laughing. Making a mockery of meal prep.

Val keeps sneaking high-protein desserts into the cart—bars, puddings, protein-infused brownies that taste like kale. Riley gags every time. Full-body reactions, cartoonish and genuine, face twisted in agony.

It’s adorable. Infuriatingly so.

Val would die before admitting that out loud.

But then they reach the fruit section, and Riley suddenly frowns. That full-body kind of frown, the one where even her elbows get involved. Begins patting herself down like a detective in a noir film. Jacket, jeans, hoodie pocket. Nothing.

Her eyes go wide.

“I can’t find my phone,” she says, horrified. Wide-eyed. Like the world’s ending in the fruit section.

Panic blooms. They comb through the cart. Peer under lettuce and quinoa and whatever weird yogurt Riley said they had to try (Spoiler alert: upon tasting it, Riley gagged). Double back to the bakery. Val even checks the freezer section where Riley had staged an impromptu soliloquy about frozen dumplings ten minutes earlier.

They end up in front of the bananas. Still no phone.

“Call me,” Riley says, hopeless.

Val does, barely even questioning it.

It rings once.

Just once.

And then Riley lifts a single banana—delicately, dramatically—and presses it to her ear.

“Yellow?” she says.

Like it’s the funniest thing she’s ever said. Like she’s been holding this goddamn joke inside her bones since birth. Like this—this—is the moment she’s been waiting her whole life to deliver.

And Val—

Val, who considers herself a relatively rational person, a grown adult, someone not prone to spectacle—

Hits her.

Not hard. Not really. Just a slap to the arm, the shoulder, whatever’s nearest.

“¡Estás pero mal! ¡Un p*to platano, Riley! ¿Qué diablos te pasa?”

Riley doesn’t understand a word. But she understands enough. The tone, the fury, the disbelief cloaked in fondness.

She doubles over laughing. Wheezing, useless. Wiping tears from her eyes.

“You’re gonna have to save those hits for the bedroom, babe.”

And she smirks.

The audacity.

Val stares at her. Eyes narrowed. Lips twitching in betrayal. “I hate you,” she says, and it sounds too close to I love you.

Riley grins. Like sunshine. Like crime.

Val hits her in the shoulder. Gently.

“You’re insufferable.”

“You laughed,” Riley says.

Val threatens homicide in three dialects. None of it matters.

Riley is banned from the fruit aisle for a month.

Minimum.

Riley accepts her sentence with grace. Mock bows. Promises change.

(Lies. All of it.)

And the next time they shop—because there will be a next time; Riley never misses the chance—she’s ordered to stay at least five meters away while Val inspects the fruits alone.

(Not that she listens. Not really.)

And Val—Val doesn’t mind.

Not when Riley looks at her like that.

Like even a grocery store can be holy ground if she’s there.

The van is overstuffed. Limbs tangled, snacks melting into wrappers, someone's foot where no foot should be, bags stacked to the ceiling, laughter crammed into every inch of Mae’s ancient beast of a vehicle. It smells like too many people and not enough windows.

They could’ve taken separate cars—should’ve, maybe—but then it wouldn’t feel like this.

Wouldn’t thrum with that particular kind of warmth: group playlists and stolen snacks, someone’s knee pressed against someone else’s arm, Dani yelling about pee breaks and losing that argument three times over. Mae swearing at the GPS. Riley with her legs over Val’s, singing off-key just to make her laugh.

It’s chaos. Cramped. Too loud.

Val doesn’t mind. Not even a little.

She’s missed it—missed them. The Firehawks in full, scattered by adult schedules and internships and the slow, quiet fracturing of growing older.

Even Riley’s been comet-like lately. Passing close. Burning bright. Then gone again. Mornings with half-sipped coffee. Nights with pixelated calls and static-stitched I love yous when Val is traveling.

So this?

This stupid trip. This pilgrimage to a half-rotted cabin in the woods, twice a year if they’re lucky—

It’s holy.

A breath caught in the throat. A moment bottled in amber and flannel and cheap beer.

The drive stretches long, hours dragging like tar, muscles aching from stillness and laughter and the refusal to stop for even a single restroom.

(“The more time we spend on the road, the less we have at the cabins,” Dani had said, victorious—she then eats her words at hour two, legs crossed, face pale with regret.)

They survive.

Barely.

But none of it matters when they get there.

There’s a swimming pool with questionable chlorine. A pool table missing a leg. A stereo that only plays 90s hits. Board games with broken boxes and cards drawn on in pen. Freezers stuffed with pizza.

Nothing works the way it should. Everything feels exactly right.

Val forgets the scores. Just remembers winning.

She and Riley always win. Always.

Val is ruthless. Riley pretends she’s not. It’s a system. It works.

At night, they sleep in piles. Heat-bent bodies. Socks lost. Someone’s foot on her calf. Someone snoring into someone else’s ribs. Riley’s head heavy on her shoulder. Val’s arm gone numb and never moved.

Then the last night comes.

The kind where no one says it’s over, but everyone knows. The kind of quiet that settles like dust. Too late, too tired, too much.

Goodbyes start early. Half-hugs. Sleepy promises. The kind of laughter that feels like a funeral.

Eventually, it’s just them.

Outside, night sprawls cold and moon-painted. Stars are bleeding out of the sky. They take blankets—more than they need. You’d think hockey made them immune to cold. It didn’t.

They curl into the grass. Into fabric. Into each other.

Away from the city’s smear of light, the stars actually show up. Glinting like bones buried in velvet. The whole sky breathing slowly.

Riley points out constellations, voice low like prayer. The kind reserved for churches. The kind reserved for this. Says things like “Cassiopeia” and “Orion” and “that one might just be a plane, actually.” Val barely listens. Watches her mouth instead. Watches her breathe.

Watches her.

At some point, Riley drifts. Her voice falters, dips, gives way to soft, steady snores that ruffle the space between them, nose wrinkling like a child. Val presses a kiss to her temple and murmurs, “Goodnight,” into her hair. She should wake her. Should herd them inside before the dew settles and their bodies stiffen like old tree limbs.

She doesn’t.

She stays.

Lets the stars blink a little longer. Lets her heartbeat slip under Riley’s ribs and stay there a while.

Morning finds them wrecked. Backs stiff. Bug-bitten and shivering. Riley’s sniffling. Val’s fevered. Their limbs creak like old houses.

They’re banned from driving duty.

The others make fun of them.

Val curls into the corner of the van with a blanket wrapped around her sins and Riley’s laughter tucked behind her teeth.

And still—

Still—

It was worth it.

They go to a drive-in theater. Not because of the movie. God, no. It’s some half-known title with actors Val vaguely recognizes from posters at bus stops—but because Riley said, “When will we get the chance again?” And that was reason enough.

The parking lot is uneven, half-gravel, half-forgotten asphalt. The car rocks with every inch forward, tires crunching like bone beneath weight. Val finds them a spot that isn’t quite centered, not quite angled right—but it’s good enough.

Riley slips out of the car—leaving behind the scent of shampoo and warmth and the echo of her voice—saying something about snacks and soda. She walks toward the concession stand like the wind knows her name. Like the night was built around her hips. Her stride. That slight bounce. That little wave. That everything.

Val stays behind. Adjusts the radio. Watches the sky spill slowly into dusk. A single star. Then three.

By the time Riley’s back, arms full of junk and joy, the screen is flickering to life. Popcorn’s too salty. Soda’s gone flat. Candy’s half-melted. Riley doesn’t seem to mind. Neither does Val.

They sit cocooned in the car, windows cracked, the muffled sound of other radios pulsing through the night like distant heartbeats.

Val doesn’t know what the movie’s about. Misses half of it. Misses most of it. She’s watching Riley—how she laughs. How her mouth curves. How the flicker of screenlight catches in her eyes, in the curve of her cheek. She gets lost, often.

And every time she does, Riley explains. Patient. Animated. Hands in the air between them, voice bright with delight. Her eyes glint. Her fingers gesture. She talks with her whole body.

Val listens. Or maybe she just watches. Same thing. It’s hard to tell the difference when the world shrinks to one person.

She thinks, I don’t care about the movie.

She thinks, I’d watch a thousand bad films if it meant watching you watch them.

Somewhere in the third act, Riley drops her hand between them. Doesn’t say anything. Doesn’t need to.

Val takes it. Of course she does.

And it’s not the kind of hand-holding that’s casual or idle. It’s not just two palms pressed together because there’s space to fill. No.

It’s a claim. A flag planted.

It’s Riley saying, I love you.

Outside, headlights flash. Someone honks. Someone else laughs loud, drunkenly. But the noise doesn’t reach them. Not really.

The screen blares something dramatic. Explosions, maybe. A chase scene. Val can’t tell. Riley’s thumb is brushing hers—slow, easy, real—and that’s all she cares about. All that matters.

She turns. Looks at her.

Riley’s not watching the movie anymore.

Her eyes are already on Val. Soft. Steady. Like she’s been waiting for Val to notice.

And Val does. Oh, she does.

She doesn’t speak. Doesn’t have to. She leans in. Inches. And Riley meets her halfway.

The kiss is quiet. No firework swell, no orchestra. Just lips. Warm. Intention. Salt on her tongue. Butter on Riley’s lip. Flicker-light on their cheeks.

When they pull apart, Riley smiles. It’s small. A little crooked. A little dazed.

“I thought you didn’t like romantic movies,” she murmurs.

Val laughs. Heart full.

“I don’t.”

A beat.

“But I like this part.”

They go to a space museum. Again.

A different one, sure, but Val doesn’t bother pretending it matters. Not to her. Not in the way it does to Riley.

It’s Riley’s idea—of course it is—and that’s the only reason it becomes Val’s, too. That’s how these things work. Riley says I want to, and Val says okay, and somewhere along the invisible seams of their stitched-together days, it becomes enough. More than enough.

They practically jog through the front hall, sneakers squeaking against the waxed tile. Riley’s ahead by a breath and a half, dragging them toward a sign about pulsars or gamma ray bursts or something equally incomprehensible in a font too eager.

“Slow down,” Val huffs, caught between laughter and a twisted ankle. “I haven’t even seen the rest yet. If I break my leg, you’re carrying me out of here.”

Riley glances back, all teeth and blush and too much sun for one hallway. “Sorry! It’s just—it’s this one! This exhibit’s only here for a few weeks and I need to show you—”

Val isn’t really into space. She never has been. She forgets the order of the planets with a religious consistency and once asked if Saturn or Jupiter was the one with the “funky dot thing.” But Riley had laughed—fond, a little pained—and told her again anyway. Told her the planets in order. Mercury to Neptune. Told her about their rings and their storms and how some moons might have oceans under their skin.

Val had nodded. Said, Cool.

But what she meant was: If you asked me to sink into Europa, I’d go gladly. I’d crack open for you and let the cold swallow me whole.

So Val listened. That’s what mattered. Not the facts, but the fire in Riley’s chest as she shares them.

And eventually, Riley slows. They reach the exhibit. Pulsars. Quasars. Some kind of celestial violence that Val doesn’t understand. Doesn’t need to. And Riley lights up like it’s her orbit they’re walking through, not a borrowed replica.

She doesn’t need a guide. She is the guide. Fingers point, mouth moves, words stack like constellations in midair—bright, scattered, beautiful if you trace the lines just right. Her joy burns hotter than the stars she worships.

Val tries to follow. Tries to keep up with the cascade of names and theories and gravitational this and lightyear that. Most of it goes over her head.

But Riley is incandescent, and that’s the point.

Val doesn’t know science. She knows this. Knows Riley’s pulse when she’s alive with it. Knows the shine in her eyes when joy overtakes language. Knows that if gravity let go, she would still fall into her, again and again.

Later, they loop through the rest of the museum. Riley keeps her promise: everything else, together. Three more hours. Endless explanations. A million words Val won’t remember.

But she’ll remember the look on her face. She’ll remember how Riley grabbed her hand near the comet exhibit, like it was instinct. Like muscle memory. Like it had always been hers. She’ll remember the way Riley whispered, “Can you imagine being out there?”

And Val—already unmoored—thinks: I am. I already am.

Val had errands to run. Groceries, probably. A few overdue things.

But this?

This is better.

She’ll forget the exhibits by next week. Forget the diagrams. The names. The dates.

She won’t forget Riley’s voice, lit with stardust.

Val had a car crash.

Not dramatic enough for headlines. No fire, no flip. Just late-night exhaustion and a street light that blinked too slow. Just a girl who couldn’t let herself stop until her slapshot was perfect, until the ice bruised her ankles and the world dimmed around her edges. Just her body begging her to stop and her brain refusing. Just Riley on the phone—please come home—and Val hanging up before she could say okay.

It wasn’t the crash that made the night dark. It was everything that came after.

Blood somewhere—everywhere—and the world blurring black around her. Her brain doesn’t process if the darkness is behind her eyes or leaking into them. Doesn’t know if the color on her hands is her own or borrowed from the night.

All she knows is that it’s cold. Cold seatbelt. Cold air. Cold hands. Her fingers twitch. Her eyes don’t. And it’s quiet. And she’s slipping.

She wakes to beeping.

Steady. Sterile. A line drawn through the silence. She’s got wires now. White sheets. Plastic smell. Her tongue is thick. Her ribs are worse. She tries to sit up—can’t. And beside her, Riley—folded into a shape no human body should take. Elbows tucked to knees. Spine curled. Her head’s in her hands. Her hands are shaking.

Val blinks. She doesn’t say anything. Doesn’t move. The darkness comes for her again before she can decide whether it’s real.

The second time, Riley’s gone—but not really. Her jacket’s draped over the arm of the chair. Her phone charger snakes from the wall. There’s a half-finished water bottle on the floor.

A nurse is there. Says her name is Dora. Says she lost a lot of blood. Says she’s lucky. Says she’ll need to stay. Says to rest.

Val doesn’t care. “Where’s Riley?” she asks, voice dry and cracking like thawing pavement.

“Cafeteria,” Dora says, checking something on a clipboard. “She hasn’t left that bench since they brought you in.”

Val closes her eyes. She doesn’t sleep, not really. Just folds into a silence that feels less like rest and more like hibernation. Time slips.

The third time, Riley’s back. Eating a croissant. It flakes in her lap. She sees Val awake and nearly chokes on it. Scrambles to her side, babbling—I was scared. I didn’t know. I love you. Are you okay?—a thousand variations on the same prayer. A plea for confirmation: You’re still here.

Val nods. Says something like, “I’m fine.” Lies, mostly.

Tells her to go to work. Riley laughs. Says she’s not leaving. Says work can wait. You can’t.

Three days pass. Val measures time in Riley’s presence. In nurses rotating. In painkillers numbing things that maybe shouldn’t be numbed.

Then Nurse Dora mentions a dance.

A stupid, small hospital event. For patients and loved ones. Val opens her mouth to politely decline because she knows Riley doesn’t really do dancing.

But Riley answers first.

“We’ll be there,” Riley says.

Val blinks. Really? But Riley is already thanking her. Already smiling.

Val thinks it’s just to avoid the follow-up. The insistence. Thinks nothing of it—until the evening arrives and Riley walks in with two dresses.

One in her arms. One zipped up over her ribs.

Val doesn’t argue. She lets Riley help her into the fabric, careful over the bandages. Lets her braid her hair. Lets her carry her down the elevator and into a room that smells faintly of antiseptic and someone’s cheap perfume.

The lights are too bright. The floor smells like bleach. Some kid is dancing with their IV pole.

The music is loud. Fast.

But when the slow song comes, Riley turns. Offers no warning. Just steps forward and places Val’s feet over her own. Hands gentle at her waist. Val’s arms around her neck.

They sway.

That’s it. Just sway. Left and right and back and forth and there’s nothing perfect about the motion but everything about it feels holy.

Val forgets she’s in a hospital. Forgets how close she came to dying.

Because Riley’s here.

And somewhere in the motion, in the softness, in the sound of Riley humming off-key into her shoulder—

Val realizes: this is the best she’s ever felt.

Bleeding, maybe. Bruised, definitely.

But happy.

God, she’s so happy.

Val’s panicking.

Not softly. Not metaphorically. Full-bodied. Heartbeat ricocheting in her chest like it’s trying to warn her of something ancient. Like prey seeing breath fog in the air and knowing it isn’t their own. Like something inside her is clawing at the walls saying go, go, go, even though there’s nowhere to run. Her legs are shaking. Her fingers won’t work right. She’s breathing like someone stole the instructions.

She’s trembling. From the cold, yes—it’s Minnesota and the wind has claws—but also from something deeper. Something marrow-level. It’s –11ºC (12ºF for the Americans), and the air hurts to breathe, and still it isn’t nearly as bad as what’s happening inside her.

She’s fallen at least six times. Maybe more. She’s lost count. The ice has her number. Keeps pulling her down like it’s got history with her. Ice skating is supposed to be her thing—has been for years—and it would be humiliating if anyone were watching. But no one is. It’s early. Too early. Pre-dawn stillness. No witnesses. No shame.

Besides, some of the falls are intentional. Not that she’d ever admit it.

Not that she has to. Riley already knows. Teases her every time, all breathless laughter and sharp grins. Not mean, just… Riley. Bright. Loud. The kind of laugh that presses buttons on Val’s ribcage. The kind that makes gravity optional.

And Val keeps falling. Over and over. Ice clinging to her like it wants to keep her. On purpose, sometimes. Not that she’d admit it.

She planned this trip. Minnesota, in the winter. Riley’s hometown. Riley’s old lake. A little frozen body of water where childhood still lingers at the edges. It had seemed romantic at the time. Now, Val just feels like she might throw up from nerves.

Because she’s going to propose.

Actually propose.

And that should be fine. They’ve talked about it before. Dreamed out loud about a future, about dogs and kitchen counters and what kind of mugs they’d share. They already have this, even. Val knows Riley’s going to say yes.

Still.

The ring in her pocket feels like it weighs as much as a galaxy.

Then she slips. Again. Hard. This one’s real—arms flailing, knees crashing, breath knocked out.

And she doesn’t get up.

Not right away.

One knee on the frozen lake, one breath caught mid-exit, one thought beating at the back of her throat like a drum: Now.

Her hand moves before her brain does.

She fumbles the little velvet box from her coat pocket. It doesn’t open gracefully. It sticks a little. She has to rip her glove off with her teeth just to get the damn thing open.

By the time she does, Riley’s stopped laughing.

Stopped skating.

Stopped breathing, maybe.

She’s just—frozen. Like the lake. Like time.

Eyes wide. Hands over her mouth. Her cheeks already red from the cold, but now impossibly redder. She’s blinking fast and her breath comes in fast clouds.

Val hasn’t even said anything yet.

Riley nods.

Once. Twice. Again. Like she’s short-circuiting. Like this is too much and just enough.

Still, Val has to ask. Because it matters.

And Riley smiles. Smiles so big it may just be the reason she suddenly feels all warm.

(It definitely is)

It’s the kind of smile that means yes. That means I do. That means, I am already yours. I have been this whole time. Like yes is a verb and she’s doing it with her whole body.

Val smiles back. Blinding. Irreversible.

And all at once, the cold doesn’t matter. The lake doesn’t matter. The ring could fall into the snow and she wouldn’t even notice.

All that matters is this: Riley in her arms. Riley nodding like she’s afraid this dream might vanish if she slows down. Riley laughing through her tears and pulling Val into her coat and whispering, “Yes. Yes. A million times yes. I love you.”

Val laughs. She can’t stop. She’s crying too. Doesn’t know if it’s from relief or joy or frostbite. Doesn’t care. Riley’s in her arms. Riley’s saying yes. Val’s never been warmer.

And later, she’ll think:

What if we never left this lake?

What if we just chose each other, over and over, every day? Said yes every morning, like a habit?

What if love wasn’t just vows or rings or kitchens with matching mugs—but this? You in my coat. Me on one knee. The world frozen but our hands so warm.

What if I gave you my last blanket corner and you gave me your worst jokes and we just called that marriage?

And it isn’t how Val proposes that has them both happily crying in each other’s arms.

It’s the thousand whys.