You smiled when Ghost told you. You even meant it, in a way — a bruised kind of love that made you want him happy, even if it meant carving a hollow in yourself to watch it happen.

"Good for you, mate," you said, clapping him on the shoulder like it was easy, like it didn't crack something small and important inside you. Like the best friend you were supposed to be. Like the best friend you had only ever been, too scared to ask for anything more.

He smiled back — real and rare — the kind of smile he never handed out freely. And he told you about her, voice low, almost shy. How she made him feel steady. Like maybe he wasn’t as broken as he thought. Like maybe he could still build something out of what was left.

You nodded, laughed at the right moments, said all the right things. And when he left — still talking, still a little lighter than usual — you stayed behind, letting the silence close in around you.

It wasn’t jealousy that sat heavy in your chest. Not anger, not bitterness. Just a slow, aching grief. A quiet sort of heartbreak for something that had never even been yours.

You told yourself it was better this way. That this was how it was always going to end. That your silence had been a kindness, even if it cost you more than you could admit.

So you started to pull away, bit by bit — carefully, so carefully. Answering slower. Laughing softer. Finding reasons to be somewhere else when he reached out. Nothing he would notice, not really. Just enough space to stop hoping. Just enough distance to let the wound scar over.

And when he smiled at you now, all full of something good and warm and bright — you smiled back. And you prayed he never saw the way it broke you.