There was a rhythm to their lives now.
Classes in the morning. Crossed paths on campus. Study sessions that turned into late-night storytelling marathons. Texts that started as "What was the homework?" and evolved into "Did you eat yet?" and "I saw a dog that reminded me of you."
It was subtle. Natural.
But under the ease was a tension—quiet, insistent, pulsing.
Like a song that never reached its chorus.
Takara felt it most at night, when the apartment was still and his thoughts refused to sleep.
He'd catch himself staring at the crack under his door, wondering if Kayo was just as restless across the hall.
Wondering if they were both thinking the same thing.
Wondering how close "almost" could get before it turned into something real.
It was Thursday evening when Kayo knocked on his door with a notebook in hand and a strange look in his eyes.
"I rewrote the ending," he said.
Takara blinked, stepping aside. "You want to come in or…?"
Kayo entered without waiting for an answer.
He dropped the notebook on the floor, took off his jacket, and sat on the edge of Takara's rug like he'd done it a thousand times.
"Your version was too… optimistic," he said, flipping pages.
Takara raised a brow. "Oh, so now hope is a bad thing?"
"In fiction, it can be dishonest."
Takara sat across from him, their knees almost touching. "And what's your version?"
Kayo looked at him, eyes steady. "The one where they don't get together. Where timing screws everything up. Where silence wins."
For a moment, neither of them spoke.
Then Takara leaned back against the wall, folding his arms. "Sounds familiar."
Kayo's voice was quiet. "It's just a story."
"But it's also us."
Kayo didn't deny it.
They didn't work on the project that night.
Instead, Takara pulled out an old playlist they'd shared in high school, and they listened in silence, sitting across from each other on the floor. The hum of the city drifted through the window, muffled and distant.
Halfway through the third song, Kayo spoke.
"I almost texted you. That summer after graduation."
Takara looked up. "Why didn't you?"
"I didn't know what I wanted to say. And I thought… maybe it would hurt more to hear your voice than to remember it."
Takara's chest tightened.
"I thought about you all the time," he whispered. "I hated how quiet it got without you."
Kayo met his gaze. "I hated how loud everything else became."
It wasn't a confession. Not really.
But it was something.
A crack in the armor. A shimmer of vulnerability. The kind of moment they wouldn't have dared back in high school, when everything was raw and jagged and half-formed.
They weren't kids anymore.
And maybe that made it worse.
Because now they knew better.
Now, the weight of "almost" pressed harder against their chests.
A few days later, they presented their project in class.
Their piece, "Echoes," wove through memories and missed chances. Two voices narrating from opposite ends of a story that never fully touched.
By the time they finished reading, the room was silent.
The professor praised the emotional tension. Their classmates called it beautiful. Honest.
But all Takara could think about was the way Kayo had read that final line:
"I heard your voice in everything I tried to forget. And that's how I knew—I never really let you go."
They walked home in silence after class.
The kind of silence that was thick with unspoken truths.
At the elevator, Takara broke it. "Do you really believe in timing?"
Kayo didn't look at him. "I believe that sometimes people meet at the wrong time."
"And if we're at the right time now?"
Kayo turned then, eyes unreadable. "Then I'm scared."
Takara stepped closer. "Of what?"
"Of ruining it. Again."
The elevator doors opened.
Neither of them moved.
They stood there, inches apart, hearts racing beneath calm exteriors.
Takara swallowed. "Kayo…"
But the moment slipped.
Kayo stepped inside the elevator.
"I'll see you tomorrow," he said softly.
And the doors closed between them.