The café grew quieter as the sun slipped behind the clouds, painting the world in soft, fading gold. Elara stirred her untouched drink, watching the tiny ripples form and disappear.
Adrian's eyes were on her the whole time, as if he were trying to memorize her all over again.
"So," she finally said, breaking the silence. "Why now?"
He took a deep breath. "I wasn't supposed to come back this soon. But… my mom got sick. I came home to take care of her."
Elara's fingers froze on the mug. His voice carried a weight she hadn't heard before — tired but sincere.
"I'm sorry," she said quietly.
He nodded. "Thanks. She's getting better now."
For a moment, neither of them spoke. The hum of the coffee machine filled the space between them, along with the echoes of three missing years.
Then Adrian leaned back in his chair, gaze soft but steady. "I wanted to see you before I lose the courage again."
Elara frowned. "Lose the courage?"
He looked down, running a hand through his hair — a gesture she still remembered too well. "I thought leaving was the right thing to do. I thought distance would make it easier to forget."
Her heart sank. "Did it?"
He met her eyes then — raw, honest. "No."
That single word hit harder than she expected. Her pulse quickened, and all the things she had kept locked away in her letters began to surface — the anger, the longing, the quiet hope that he might someday say exactly that.
Elara looked down, hiding the tremor in her hands. "You could've written. You could've called."
"I did," he said softly.
She looked up. "What?"
"I wrote letters too," he admitted, a faint, broken smile forming. "But I never sent them."
The world seemed to pause.
Elara's breath caught in her throat. The irony, the coincidence — it was almost too much. She stared at him, unsure whether to laugh or cry.
"Letters you never sent," she whispered.
He nodded. "Yeah. Guess we were both cowards in our own ways."
Something inside her cracked open. She wanted to tell him everything — about the wooden box under her bed, the stack of envelopes sealed with her heart, the words she never had the courage to give him.
But she couldn't. Not yet.
So instead, she smiled faintly. "Maybe we just needed time."
"Maybe," he said, holding her gaze. "But time didn't change the way I feel."
Her chest tightened. There it was — the truth she'd been waiting for, and yet she wasn't ready to believe it.
Outside, the rain began again — gentle, forgiving, like the world was giving them a second chance.
Elara reached for her cup and whispered, almost to herself,
"Then maybe this time, we finish the letters we started."
Adrian smiled softly. "Together?"
She nodded.
"Together."