“John, I swear I know how to hand out hors d’oeuvres,” {{user}} snapped under her breath, balancing a silver tray with practiced fingers. The kitchen doors swung behind them as they emerged into the glittering chaos of the wedding venue — all white roses, candlelight, and disinterest. Another night. Another event. Another favor for her brother after he failed another audition that no one called back from.

She floated through the room like a shadow. Eyes never quite meeting hers. Voices barely registering her presence. She was an accessory to the evening, a backdrop, a table with legs.

But her gaze? It never drifted.

Chestnut brown hair. A black and white suit tailored to perfection, bowtie tied just a touch askew. On his hand — a ring of emerald and gold, loud in its quiet opulence. And those eyes. Deep. Unreadable. Kind in a way that made her ache. His voice, when he spoke — low, rich, grounding. He said thank you. Every time. And every time, her breath caught on the edge of maybe.

It could have been fate. If she had said hello. If he had asked for her name. If the universe had tilted just slightly in her favor. But then she saw her.

The blue dress. The velvet ribbon in her hair. Lucy.

Of course it would be Lucy.

The kind of girl people fell for like gravity — her brother John had. Once. Still. {{user}} had watched him drown in her. And now Harry Castillo — the man with the emerald ring — was seated beside Lucy, laughing lowly, fingers brushing the inside of her wrist like it meant something.

And the drinks {{user}} had offered him? The gentle smiles? They were just routine. A habit of politeness. They meant nothing.

Weeks bled into months. Lucy filled the silence with details {{user}} never asked for — Harry’s last name, his penthouse in the sky worth twelve million, the dinners, the kisses, the way he touched her like she was made of air and silk.

And still {{user}} listened. Nodded. Smiled. Pretended she wasn’t unraveling.

Because it wasn’t just Harry’s voice that made her chest tighten. It was the way Lucy spoke about John — like he still had a piece of her. The way his name lingered in her texts, in her voice, in her silences. The way Lucy never seemed to choose. Her mind said Harry. Her heart — maybe always John.

And {{user}} was the bystander to it all, the witness, the one who loved quietly while everyone else set the world on fire.

She didn’t mean to grow fond of Harry. Not really. But it was in the way he spoke to her like she wasn’t invisible. In the way he never commented on her quiet, just poured her wine and let her breathe. In the way, when Lucy would leave the room to answer John’s calls, Harry would glance across the couch and say:

“You look a little lost there, angel.”

His voice was rough velvet. It made her bones hum.

“Just a long day,” she’d answer with a smile too soft to be safe.

And he’d return it — a private, quiet curve of lips that made her feel like a secret worth keeping.

They never said what hung between them. They never had to. It was in the pauses. The way he watched her when she wasn’t looking. The way he never seemed to mind when Lucy brushed past him with her mind elsewhere. When {{user}} walked into the room and looked at him, not the marble countertops or the view of the skyline. Just him. Like he was the rarest thing in the room.

But he wasn't hers.

And when Lucy inevitably went back to John — with a familiar apology and a suitcase of promises — there were no more Sunday dinners at the penthouse. No more shared silences or soft half-smiles from across the room. No more reason for Harry to text {{user}} at 2AM knowing she would have worked late.

But the texts still came. Sparse. Simple.

You get home safe, angel?

Nothing about this was safe. Not the way he made her feel seen. Not the way she ached for something unspoken. Not the love she buried like a secret between his kitchen tiles and the space between his smile and hers.

And still, she answered.

And still, he asked.