Yearning — that’s what you two did. A lot of it.
Shauna never quite admitted what she wanted — not from you, not from Jackie, not from Jeff. But you? You always knew. You wanted her. Desperately. Silently. Stupidly.
You ached for her like it was instinct. Like it was stitched into your bones. Every glance she tossed over her shoulder, every time she said your name and didn’t mean anything by it — it melted you. Broke you apart and put you back together in the same breath.
And your yearning wasn’t sweet or subtle. It was loud in the quietest ways — how you watched her too long, how you laughed at things she didn’t mean to be funny, how you followed her out of rooms like a shadow you didn’t know how to shake.
But you never crossed the line. Never touched unless she offered. Never said the things you wanted to scream.
Lottie’s birthday was being held at some overgrown country cottage her father had paid for. It was more house than any of you needed — echoing halls, creaky stairs, a fountain in the garden that never quite stopped dripping.
You followed Shauna outside as she carried the hand-painted vase she’d spent a week making. A gift for Lottie. Her brow was furrowed, her voice clipped as she scolded you for riling up the kids again.
“You don’t think, ever. You just charge in like it’s all a game.”
She knelt by the fountain. You knelt opposite her. You weren’t listening — too focused on the way the light curled around her, how she looked half-statue, half-storm.
You reached to help. A knock. A slip.
The handle cracked.
Then — the vase tipped, spun, and fell into the water.
“Seriously?” she snapped.
“I didn’t—” you started, uselessly.
But she was already standing, already pulling off her flannel. And then, before you could stop her —
She dove.
Headfirst. Full-body.
The water swallowed her whole. You blinked, stunned, holding the broken piece like it was part of your chest.
When she surfaced, soaked and breathless, vase in hand, you looked only at her face. Never her shoulders, slick in the sun. That was the line. You didn’t cross it.
She climbed out wordlessly, water pooling at her feet. Flannel back on. No words. Just gone.
You sat on the fountain’s edge, broken handle still in your hand, and lowered your fingers to the water.
Because she had been in it. And for now, that was all you had.
You didn’t sleep.
You wandered the house, weaving between passed-out friends and empty bottles. Eventually, you climbed to the attic. You didn’t know why — just chasing breath in a place with none left.
Up there, you found it: a tub of clay, half-dried but usable. You didn’t think. You just started working.
Cross-legged on the cold floor, you put the vase back together It wasn’t perfect — you weren’t perfect — but it held. You left it under the bare bulb to dry, waiting until it felt solid enough to carry.
At dawn, you pushed open her bedroom door.
She was asleep — curled beneath the covers, the towel from earlier crumpled on the floor. Her hair still damp. Her breathing even.
You stepped inside like you weren’t supposed to be there. You set the vase on the desk near the window, handle turned inward.
Then you looked at her one last time. Just long enough to memorize the moment.
And slipped out.
No noise. No evidence.
Just the hope she’d find it in the morning — and know, in some quiet, wordless way, that you were trying to put something back together.
And in the morning, she walked into your room with the vase in hand.
She didn’t yell. Didn’t ask what the hell you were thinking.
She just stood in the doorway, tired and damp-eyed, and said:
“Did you fix it?”
Like she already knew.
Like maybe it mattered.