Play me right

He was already there

The message came before the line made sense.

Skye didn’t notice it immediately—not because it wasn’t important, but because she had already been staring at the same sentence for too long, her thoughts circling it in a slow, frustrating loop that refused to break.

She walked away. It looked fine. That was the problem.

It looked like something she had written a hundred times before—controlled, safe, distant in a way that didn’t leave marks. The kind of line that didn’t hurt anyone. The kind of line her readers were starting to hate.

Her fingers hovered over the keyboard, unmoving, while the cursor blinked beside the sentence like it was waiting for her to admit something she didn’t want to.

“Why does this feel so fake…” she murmured quietly.

The room didn’t answer. It never did.

The ceiling fan turned lazily above her, pushing warm air in uneven circles, while the faint noise of the city slipped through the half-open window beside her desk.

Everything felt normal. Familiar. Except her story. Except the way that one line refused to sit right no matter how long she looked at it.

Her phone buzzed.Then again.Then again.This time, she noticed.

Her gaze shifted toward the screen lying beside her laptop, lighting up again and again as notifications stacked faster than she could ignore them.

She hesitated before picking it up, already knowing what she would see before the screen even unlocked. Comments. Always comments.

darkluv: Don’t make her weak again

inkobsessed: If she leaves him I’m done with this story

moonlitreads: Why do you always pull back at the last moment??

obsession_queen: Make her stay. Just once.

anonymous_09: You won’t. You never do.

Her thumb slowed as she scrolled. Each message landed a little heavier than it should have.They weren’t wrong.That was the problem. Her jaw tightened slightly.

“Like it’s that easy…” she muttered under her breath.

Another notification appeared.

rhea_reads: You keep stopping right where it starts to matter. Let it hurt for once.

Skye froze. Not visibly. Not dramatically. But something inside her stilled.

“…of course you’d say that,” she whispered.

Rhea always said things like that—like she could see straight through whatever Skye was trying not to admit.

Skye locked her phone and placed it beside her laptop, a little more carefully than necessary, as if handling it differently might change the weight of the words she had just read. It didn’t.They stayed.

Her eyes drifted back to the screen.

She walked away.

The cursor blinked. Waiting. Judging.

Skye leaned forward again, her fingers hovering over the keyboard before pressing backspace.

The sentence disappeared. Just like that.Too easily. And the second it was gone—something felt wrong. Not loud. Not obvious. Just a quiet shift. Like she had erased something that wasn’t supposed to be erased.

Her brows pulled together slightly as she stared at the empty space.Then, slowly, she started typing again. No overthinking this time. No planning. Just instinct.

She didn’t walk away.

Her fingers stopped. Her breath slowed.That wasn’t what she meant to write. She knew it immediately.

Her eyes scanned the line again, slower this time, like she was trying to catch it doing something wrong. It didn’t. It just sat there. Certain. Unapologetic.

And worse—it felt right.Too right.

“…no,” she whispered, barely audible, her fingers tightening slightly against the keyboard. “That’s not what I—”

She stopped. Because she couldn’t finish the sentence.That’s not what what? What she planned? Or what she actually wanted?

The thought lingered. Uncomfortable. Unanswered.

Her phone buzzed again.This time, it wasn’t a comment. It was a message. Unknown user.

No profile picture. No bio. No posts.

Just a name.

_miles

Skye frowned slightly.

“…who even are you?”

She opened it.

Better.

The word settled into the quiet. Soft.Too soft.

Her eyes flicked instantly back to her laptop.

She didn’t walk away.

Then back to the message.

A slow, subtle awareness moved through her chest—not fear, not panic, just something that made her pause longer than she should have. He knew. Not guessed. Not reacted randomly. Knew.

Her fingers moved before she could think too much about it.

Do I know you?

Seen.

Immediately. Of course.

The reply came without delay.

Not yet.

Her stomach dropped slightly. Not enough to scare her. Just enough to make her aware of it. The kind of awareness that doesn’t fade once it’s there.

Skye leaned back slowly, her eyes still on the screen, rereading the words like they might shift into something more reasonable if she gave them time. They didn’t.

“What does that even mean…” she murmured, quieter now.

No reply.The chat went still. Like it had already said enough.

“Skye!”

The voice broke through the silence before she could think further.

She turned toward the door just as it opened without waiting, Rhea stepping inside like she always did—uninvited but completely expected, her presence filling the room in a way that felt both grounding and intrusive at the same time.

“You’re ignoring your phone again, aren’t you?” Rhea said, leaning against the doorframe, her eyes flicking between Skye and the laptop screen.

“I’m working,” Skye replied quickly.Too quickly.

Rhea raised an eyebrow.

“At ten at night? Again?”

Skye didn’t answer. She turned back to her screen instead, but the movement felt less like focus and more like avoidance.

Rhea noticed. She always did.

“You’re stuck,” she said.

Not a question. A statement.

Skye exhaled quietly. “…a little.”

Rhea pushed herself off the doorframe and walked closer, stopping beside her chair as she leaned slightly to read the screen.

“What’s the scene?”

Skye hesitated.

Then, reluctantly, “She’s supposed to leave.”

Rhea read the line. Silence stretched for a moment.

Then—

“She didn’t.”

Skye stiffened. “That’s not what I meant to write.”

“But that’s what you wrote.”

Skye turned toward her. “I didn’t decide that.”

Rhea tilted her head slightly, studying her.

“Then maybe you stopped controlling it.”

The words landed deeper than they should have.

Skye looked away first. Her phone buzzed again. Both of them noticed.

Rhea’s gaze dropped. “Who is that?”

“No one,” Skye said quickly, reaching for it. Too quickly.

Rhea noticed that too.

“‘No one’ doesn’t text like that,” she said lightly. “New reader?”

Skye unlocked the phone. Another message.

_miles

Don’t change it back.

Her breath slowed slightly. Her fingers stilled.

Rhea leaned in a little closer. “Okay… now I’m interested.”

“It’s nothing,” Skye said, locking the phone again.

“Mm,” Rhea hummed, clearly unconvinced.

“Come out tomorrow,” Rhea said suddenly, straightening up. “You’ve been locked in here for three days.”

“I’m fine.”

“You’re not.”

“I just need to finish this.”

Rhea watched her carefully.

“You’re not stuck because of the story.”

Skye didn’t respond. Because she knew that. She just didn’t want to say it.

Her phone buzzed again. This time, she didn’t wait. She unlocked it immediately.

_miles

You hesitate every time it starts to matter.

Her chest tightened. That didn’t feel like it was about the story anymore. Her fingers hovered before typing.

You’re reading too much into it.

Seen.

A pause this time. Just enough to make her wait.

Then—

No.

You’re just avoiding the part you feel.

Her breath stilled. That hit. Not loudly. But precisely.

“Skye,” Rhea said quietly.

She looked up.

Rhea was watching her now, not casually, not teasingly—carefully.

“What?”

“That’s not nothing.”

Skye didn’t answer. Because she didn’t have one that sounded convincing anymore.

Her gaze drifted back to the laptop.

She didn’t walk away.

The line hadn’t changed. It didn’t need to. It felt—fixed.

Her phone buzzed again. She didn’t look at it immediately this time. But she felt it. The pull. The awareness. Like something had already settled into place without asking her.

And for the first time—Skye didn’t delete the line. Because something about it no longer felt like a mistake. It felt like a direction.

And somewhere between the messages…

the silence…

And the quiet way her hesitation had started to disappear—Skye realized something she couldn’t explain.

He wasn’t just reading her story. He was guiding it.

Her phone buzzed again.This time—she picked it up without hesitation.

_miles

Good.

Her breath slowed. Her fingers didn’t move. Because this time—it didn’t feel like a stranger anymore. It felt like something that had already been there. Waiting.

And the worst part?

She wasn’t sure she wanted it to stop.