The Fear of Falling
387 Words
The sketch Ethan gave her sat on her bedside table, right beside her lamp. Every night, Amara told herself she’d put it away, but every morning she woke up to find herself staring at it again — at the way he’d drawn her smile, soft and unguarded.
It had been two weeks since he gave it to her, and in those two weeks, she’d grown used to his presence in ways she never expected. The sound of his voice, the warmth in his smile, the calm he brought with him — it all felt like home.
But that was exactly what scared her.
Love had never ended kindly for anyone she knew. Her parents’ marriage had fallen apart before tragedy took them. Every love story she’d seen around her ended in heartbreak. So she told herself not to hope, not to feel — but her heart refused to listen.
That afternoon, Ethan came by again, his usual seat by the window waiting for him.
“You seem quiet today,” he said after a while, studying her face.
Amara forced a small smile. “Just tired.”
He tilted his head. “You’ve been tired a lot lately.”
She looked down. “Maybe I just think too much.”
“About what?”
“About things that don’t make sense,” she said softly.
He smiled faintly, as if he understood. “Like how sometimes, what we want most is the thing we’re most afraid of?”
Her eyes lifted to his. For a moment, the world outside the café faded — the rain, the people, the sound of cups clinking. It was just them.
“I don’t know what I’m doing,” she whispered.
“You don’t have to,” he said gently. “Just be here.”
Something in his tone made her chest ache. She wanted to believe him — to believe that it could be simple, that love didn’t have to hurt. But a part of her still feared that if she let herself fall, there would be no one to catch her.
When Ethan left that evening, Amara lingered by the window long after he was gone, tracing the raindrops with her fingers.
Her heart whispered his name — softly, like a secret she wasn’t ready to tell the world yet.
- Writer
