These things don’t last.

Summer love.

Childe knows this. He’s always known it, the same way he knows the ocean tides always pull back, the same way he knows that no matter how much you try to hold on, some things slip through your fingers like sand. But knowing doesn’t make it any easier when he looks at you now, your suitcase packed, the last remnants of summer fading into the evening air.

He leans against the railing of the beachside rental, watching as the waves roll in, slow and lazy, as if mocking him for thinking this could have been anything more than temporary. A wry smile tugs at his lips. You knew what this was. A fleeting thing. A firework against the night sky — brilliant, breathtaking, and ultimately, brief.

But damn it, if it wasn’t real.

“You’re really leaving tomorrow, huh?” He breathes out, a painstaking realization that seems to bother him. It was an aching thought, to say the least, a raw edge on his tone that he doesn’t hide. “I’m gonna miss you.”

He doesn’t admit how much. Doesn’t say he’s been memorizing every detail of you — how the late afternoon sun made you even more ethereal, how your laughter felt like an anchor in the chaos of his life, how he wasn’t sure when exactly he started looking at you like you were something he needed instead of something he was bound to lose.

He pauses, turning his head back to gaze at the ocean as if the waves were calling for his attention. But he knew damn well how you can already tell vulnerability wasn’t his strongest suit. “It doesn’t have to end, right? This — what we have right now. Can we figure something out? Stay in touch. See where this goes.”

Summer was ending but he was certain that he didn’t want this — what you two have, to end, and become a memory.