Forty-eight hours felt like forty-eight years.
Aria tried to focus on work. She had deadlines, meetings, a presentation on sustainable
housing that she'd been preparing for weeks. But her mind kept drifting back to the bookstore,
to Ethan, to the way he'd looked at her like she was something worth understanding.
She checked her phone too often. No messages. He hadn't texted, and she hadn't either, both
of them caught in that strange dance of new connection where every gesture feels weighted
with meaning.
"You seem distracted," her colleague Marcus said during lunch. They were sitting in the break
room, surrounded by half-eaten sandwiches and architectural journals. "Something going
on?"
"No," Aria lied. "Just tired."
"You're always tired." Marcus studied her with the careful attention of someone who'd known
her for five years. "But this is different. You seem... I don't know. Less tired? Or differently
tired?"
She wanted to tell him. Wanted to say, I met someone. In a bookstore at midnight. We talked
until dawn and now I can't stop thinking about him. But saying it out loud would make it real,
and making it real meant it could break her.
"I'm fine," she said instead.
Marcus didn't look convinced, but he let it go.
That night, Aria stood in front of her closet for twenty minutes trying to decide what to wear. It
was ridiculous. They were just meeting at a bookstore again. It wasn't a date. It was two
insomniacs sharing terrible coffee and conversation.
So why did it feel like everything depended on this?
She settled on jeans and a sweater—casual, unremarkable, safe. Then changed into a dress.
Then back to jeans. Then added a scarf. Took off the scarf. Stared at herself in the mirror and
tried to remember who she used to be before grief hollowed her out.
The Aria before Lily died had been confident. Vibrant. She'd laughed easily and loved
fearlessly and believed the world was full of beautiful possibilities.
The Aria staring back at her now was a shadow. Careful. Guarded. Afraid of her own
heartbeat.
She left early, anxiety pushing her out the door before she could change her mind. The walk
to the bookstore felt longer than it had two nights ago, every step heavy with anticipation and
dread.
What if he didn't show up? What if he'd changed his mind? What if this whole thing had been
a moment of temporary insanity for both of them, and now in the harsh light of reality, it meant
nothing?
But when she rounded the corner, she saw him.
Ethan was standing outside the bookstore, hands in his pockets, looking up at the sky. Even
from a distance, Aria could see the tension in his shoulders, the way he shifted his weight
from foot to foot. He was nervous too.
Somehow, that made her feel better.
"Hey," she said as she approached.
He turned, and his face did something complicated when he saw her. Relief and worry and
something else she couldn't quite name.
"Hey." His voice was rougher than she remembered. "I wasn't sure you'd come."
"I wasn't sure you'd be here."
They stood there for a moment, two people who barely knew each other but understood each
other completely, neither sure what to do next.
"The bookstore's locked tonight," Ethan said finally. "Owner's visiting family upstate. I should
have checked. I'm sorry."
Disappointment crashed through Aria. "Oh."
"But there's a diner a few blocks from here. 24-hour place. Terrible coffee, but probably better
than what we had last time." He paused, uncertain. "If you want."
She should go home. Should cut this off before it became something she couldn't control. But
looking at him—really looking at him—she saw the same loneliness she carried, the same
desperate need for connection that made sleep impossible and silence unbearable.
"Okay," she said. "Let's go."
The diner was exactly what she expected: bright fluorescent lights, cracked vinyl booths, a
waitress who looked like she'd seen everything and was unimpressed by all of it. They slid
into a booth near the window, and Aria realized this was different from the bookstore. More
exposed. More deliberate.
More like a date.
They ordered coffee. Pie. Neither of them was particularly hungry, but ordering gave them
something to do with their hands.
"I've been thinking about what you said," Ethan began. "About feeling like you're living life on
low volume."
"Yeah?"
"I think I've been doing the same thing. For three years, I've just been... existing. Going
through the motions. Pretending I'm okay when I'm not."
Aria knew that feeling intimately. "It's easier than the alternative."
"What's the alternative?"
"Admitting that we're not okay. That we might never be okay again. That the people we were
before everything fell apart are gone, and we have to figure out how to be these new versions
of ourselves." She stared at her coffee. "I'm not ready for that yet."
"Me neither."
The waitress brought their pie—apple, with ice cream slowly melting into golden pools. They
ate in silence for a while, comfortable in the way only people who've shared their damage can
be.
"Can I tell you something?" Aria said suddenly.
"Of course."
"I haven't told anyone about Lily in months. Not really told them, I mean. People know she
died, but they don't know her. They don't want to know her. They want me to be over it
already." She felt tears threatening and blinked them back. "But when you asked me about
her, when you actually wanted to hear about who she was... it felt like she existed again. Just
for a moment."
Ethan reached across the table, hesitated, then gently covered her hand with his. The touch
was electric and terrifying and perfect.
"She did exist," he said quietly. "She still does, in you. In your memories. In the way you carry
her with you."
A tear escaped, rolling down Aria's cheek. She didn't wipe it away.
"I'm afraid," she whispered.
"Of what?"
"Of forgetting her. Of moving on. Of being happy again and it meaning she didn't matter."
"Being happy doesn't mean she didn't matter." Ethan's thumb traced gentle circles on the
back of her hand. "It means you're still alive. Still here. Still capable of feeling something other
than pain."
"Is that why you're here?" she asked. "With me? Because you want to feel something other
than pain?"
He was quiet for a long moment, his eyes searching hers. When he spoke, his voice was
barely audible over the diner's ambient noise.
"I'm here because for the first time in three years, I met someone who understands what it's
like to be drowning. And I thought... maybe we could drown a little less together."
It wasn't a declaration of love. It wasn't a promise. It was honest and broken and real.
And it was exactly what Aria needed to hear.
They talked until the diner started filling with early morning workers. Talked about everything
and nothing. Their childhoods. Favorite books. Worst jobs. Dreams they'd given up on and
dreams they still carried despite knowing better.
Ethan told her about his photography, how he'd wanted to be an artist but ended up taking
corporate headshots to pay the bills. How his camera used to feel like an extension of himself
but now felt like a stranger's tool.
Aria told him about her architecture, how she'd wanted to design homes that felt like
sanctuaries but instead she revised floor plans to maximize profit.
They were both living lives they'd settled for rather than chosen.
"Do you ever think about starting over?" Aria asked. "Just... leaving everything behind and
becoming someone new?"
"Every day," Ethan admitted. "But I'm too afraid."
"Of what?"
"That even if I started over, I'd still be me. Still carrying all of this." He gestured vaguely at
himself, at the invisible weight they both carried. "You can't outrun yourself."
"No," Aria agreed softly. "You can't."
When they finally left the diner, dawn was breaking properly, painting the sky in shades of
pink and gold. They stood on the sidewalk, neither wanting to say goodbye.
"Same time tomorrow?" Ethan asked, and there was hope in his voice. Fragile and desperate
hope.
Aria wanted to say yes. Wanted to keep meeting him, keep talking, keep pretending that two
broken people could somehow make each other whole.
But she also knew how this story ended. She'd learned it with Lily. Nothing good lasts.
Everyone leaves. Love is just another way to guarantee future pain.
"I don't know if this is a good idea," she said carefully.
Ethan's face fell, but he nodded. "I understand."
"I just... I can't lose someone else. I can't do it again."
"I'm not asking you to lose me." His voice was gentle but firm. "I'm asking you to take a
chance. To see where this goes. No expectations. No promises. Just... this."
"And what is this?"
It was the question he didn't ask. The question hanging between them, unspoken and
terrifying.
"I don't know," Ethan said honestly. "But I know I haven't felt this alive in three years. And I
think you feel it too."
He was right. She did feel it. That dangerous spark of possibility. That terrifying whisper of
maybe.
"Okay," she heard herself say. "Tomorrow. Same time."
Ethan smiled—that small, genuine smile that made her heart do impossible things.
They parted ways at the corner, walking in opposite directions. But Aria looked back once,
and found him looking back too.
And she knew, with certainty and terror, that something had already started.
Something that would change everything.