CHAPTER 12
The days after that night blurred together in a strange mixture of hope and anxiety.
Chen was everywhere now—woven into my routines, my thoughts, the quiet spaces of my life where I used to sit alone with my pain. It wasn’t intentional. It wasn’t even something we discussed. It just happened.
Morning texts. Random coffee deliveries to my apartment. Late-night phone calls where we said nothing and everything all at once. It felt dangerously easy—too easy—for someone like me who had learned the hard way that nothing easy ever lasted.
One evening, I was sitting on my bed, textbooks open in front of me but completely ignored, when my phone buzzed.
Chen: Come outside.
I frowned, glancing at the time. It was almost midnight.
Me: Are you serious?
Chen: Dead serious. Come on, re
