It started with a whisper in the hallway.
By lunchtime, it was a full-on murmur.
By the end of the day, it was a wildfire — quiet but scorching.
Airi could feel the stares, not the obvious kind, but the ones that slithered behind her when she walked past. The ones that waited for her to trip. The ones hungry for stories.
"They say she was dating Masaki when he… y'know."
"She moved on fast, huh? Cold."
"I bet she was cheating even before."
Airi sat frozen at her desk during homeroom, the words bleeding in even when no one was speaking. That was the thing about gossip — it didn't need sound. It only needed permission to grow.
Ren heard it too.
From the boys near the lockers. From a classmate who wasn't whispering quietly enough. From his own friend Yuta, who didn't believe it — but still repeated it.
He cornered the likely culprit by the vending machines: Haruka. Masaki's older sister. Tall, sharp, and constantly two seconds away from either tears or knives.
"You've made your point," Ren said, teeth gritted.
She raised an eyebrow. "I don't know what you're talking about."
"You sent her the photo. You let this rumor spread."
She crossed her arms. "I didn't let anything. I just stopped covering for her."
"She doesn't owe you her grief."
Haruka's eyes flashed. "Masaki loved her."
"And she loved him," Ren shot back. "But grief doesn't mean she has to stay buried with him."
He didn't wait for her response.
Airi skipped her last class and sat alone on the rooftop again. She shouldn't have, but she scrolled. Her name was on social media now. Not tagged — no one was that bold. But vague enough that everyone knew.
"Girl who forgot her dead boyfriend.""Riverbank Girl.""Raindrop Witch." (That one actually made her laugh for half a second.)
The tears didn't come. But her chest felt like it was imploding.
Until Ren's shadow fell across the concrete beside her.
"I can break every phone in this school," he offered.
She didn't look up. "Wouldn't help."
"No. But it'd feel really good."
She gave him a small smile, then held out her phone. "Say something funny so I remember this isn't everything."
He sat beside her. Took her phone. Opened the camera.
"You're going to want to remember this moment for the documentary they'll make about our tragic high school romance," he said dramatically. "So smile like a girl about to fall in love with her emotionally unavailable, slightly reckless co-star."
She giggled despite herself.
Click.
The photo showed her looking straight at the camera, smiling with messy hair, eyes tired but real.
And beside her, Ren — leaning slightly closer than necessary, holding the phone like he'd protect it with his life.
She stared at the picture for a while.
Then set it as her lock screen.
The next day, someone stuck a note in her locker.
It said:"How do you sleep at night?"
She didn't tear it up.
She left it taped there.
And underneath it, she wrote in black ink:"Better than you."