"For there is nothing hidden that will not be disclosed, and nothing concealed that will not be known or brought out into the open."
— Luke 8:17
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Thalia
No matter what she tried she could still feel the blood on her palms.
Still see the blade.
Still feel the girl's silence — like a scream trapped in stone.
And then—
"Hey."
A voice, gentle but firm. Real.
Thalia blinked, her breath catching as her
vision settled back into the here and now. The courtyard, the music, the people. Caleb stood in front of her, eyebrows knit together in concern, his glass of something amber forgotten in his hand.
"You alright?" he asked, keeping his voice low. "You kinda spaced out for a minute."
She opened her mouth. Closed it. The weight of the memory pressed behind her eyes like a migraine waiting to bloom.
"I'm fine," she lied, smiling too quickly. "Just—heat, maybe. Too much noise."
Caleb studied her. His gaze didn't push, but it lingered. Patient. Careful.
"You want some air?" he offered. "We can ditch this scene for a few minutes. There's a side path by the hedge wall. Quiet. No drunk history majors trying to debate Atlantis."
That pulled a weak smile from her — the barest flicker. But it helped.
She nodded.
"Yeah," she said softly. "Fresh air sounds good."
Caleb gave a nod, motioning for her to follow. As they stepped away from the crowd, the sound of laughter and clinking glasses faded behind them. The stone path beneath their feet wound between rose bushes and low lanterns, dim enough to blur the edges of the night.
Thalia shoved her hands into her jacket pockets, pulse still unsteady.
But for the first time all day, the air didn't feel like it was closing in.
Not yet.
Not with him beside her.
They walked in easy steps.
No destination. Just distance from the noise, from the people, from the pressure of pretending everything was fine.
The hedge garden wrapped around them like a softer world. Distant music faded into a murmur, and the party lights dimmed behind trees whose branches swayed like silent sentinels. Gravel crunched underfoot. A moth circled the flickering lantern above the gate, drawing lazy arcs in the air like it had nowhere else to be.
Thalia exhaled, her breath fogging in the cool night.
Caleb watched her from the corner of his eye. "You really okay?"
She kept walking. Then stopped. "Define 'okay.'"
He gave a crooked half-smile. "Breathing. Upright. Not currently haunted."
Thalia let out a sharp, unexpected snort. She laughed, too loudly, then clapped a hand to her mouth. "Sorry. That wasn't funny."
"No, it was," Caleb said, grinning. "Two out of three's not bad."
They reached a low marble bench veiled in ivy and old stories. She sat first, curling her knees up and hugging them. Caleb didn't press too close. He stayed a step away, hands in his coat pockets, head tilted toward the moonlight, as if listening to the breeze.
But his eyes kept returning to her — not prying, just present.
"You ever feel like…" she began, then paused. The words weren't cooperating. "There's something just under the surface. Like another version of you, watching from behind the glass. And sometimes… she moves before you do."
Caleb didn't flinch or frown.
He just nodded slowly. "Yeah. Like a memory that doesn't belong to you. Or an instinct that knows too much."
Thalia looked up, startled not by his understanding, but by the ease of it — the way he didn't question her sanity or try to fix the strangeness. He just accepted it, like she was describing the weather.
"That version of us," he added, "is usually trying to keep us from falling apart."
She blinked. "You think so?"
"I do," he said. "I think we leave pieces of ourselves behind to watch over the rest. When things get too heavy to carry."
The wind picked up, brushing through the hedges like a whisper through cathedral halls.
"You ever feel like there's a weight on your back you can't name?" she whispered.
Caleb looked down, his expression softening. "Every day."
The silence that followed wasn't awkward. It was quiet in the way only something shared could be — a fragile pause that neither tried to fill. The moment stretched between them like a suspended breath, and for once, neither of them felt the need to run from it.
They watched the leaves dance in the breeze, backlit by lantern glow. Somewhere beyond the gates, a siren cried. Distant. Detached.
Still, neither moved.
Thalia let her head fall lightly against Caleb's shoulder. He didn't flinch. He just let her stay there.
No promises.
No confessions.
Just warmth.
And in that stillness, for just a heartbeat, the world didn't hurt.
"You ever think," Caleb began after a beat, "that we're all just faking it? Like… university, adulthood, ambition — the whole 'figure yourself out by twenty-one' nonsense?"
Thalia hummed. "If anyone's got it figured out, I want their notes."
He laughed — that easy, genuine kind of laugh that made the space between them feel smaller. "Same. I'd bribe the hell out of them for a PDF."
She smiled against his shoulder, her voice quieter. "I think I stopped trying to 'figure it all out' when I realized half the people giving advice are just winging it better."
"Or louder," Caleb added.
"Exactly."
They both fell into a soft chuckle, the kind you only share with someone who's close enough to touch something real but polite enough not to break it.
Caleb leaned back on his palms, gazing up at the scattered stars. "So what made you
choose folklore?"
Thalia tilted her head. "What makes anyone choose the weird majors? I liked myths. Old stories. Ghosts and witches and names people forgot how to pronounce."
"You know," Caleb said, mock-thoughtful, "that's both incredibly on-brand for you and slightly terrifying."
She nudged him lightly with her knee. "What about you, history boy? You planning to be the next dusty professor with elbow patches and an unhealthy obsession with the Roman Empire?"
He shrugged. "Guilty. Minus the elbow patches."
Thalia gave him a sidelong glance. "You don't seem the academic type."
"Oh?" he arched a brow. "What type do I seem?"
She opened her mouth. Then hesitated. "I don't know… like you belong somewhere louder. Maybe politics."
He groaned, dramatic. "God, no. That's the family business."
Thalia blinked. "Wait — really?"
"Yup." He sighed. "Naval grandfather, minister uncle, MP mother. I'm the weird one with dusty books and too many questions about the Thirty Years' War."
"That explains Cassandra," Thalia muttered.
Caleb smirked. "Ah, yes. The Duchess of Passive Aggression."
She snorted. "You know she calls you 'her Caleb' when you're not around?"
He rolled his eyes. "She also called me 'future husband' once in Year Two. In front of my actual girlfriend at the time."
Thalia choked. "No."
"Oh yes. My ex still sends me passive-aggressive memes about it."
They laughed again, easier now, the tension unraveling between them like a thread pulled loose from a worn tapestry.
Then, quiet.
Not the strained kind — but something gentler. A lull where the night pressed close, cool and silver-lit. The air between them hummed with words unspoken.
Caleb's voice softened. "You always keep people at arm's length, Thalia?"
She stilled, the question slipping past her guard before she could throw it back.
"I…" She inhaled, slow. "It's safer that way."
He didn't flinch. Didn't press. Just nodded, eyes still on the stars. "Fair. But sometimes safety's just another kind of cage."
She looked at him then — really looked.
And for a moment, she wondered if he'd always been this close, or if the night had drawn them together like magnets, like inevitability.
He met her gaze. Warm. Steady.
But never demanding.
And for just a flicker of a second, Thalia thought about closing the space between them.
She didn't.
But she didn't pull away either.
They let the silence sit again.
Then she whispered, "I don't know what I'm running from."
Caleb's answer came without hesitation. "Then I'll wait with you till you do."