Dave Lizewski had always chased after love like it was some elusive myth — something bright, cinematic, and just beyond reach. The kind of thing that struck fast, like a lightning bolt. That’s how he talked about it, at least. He’d always said he’d know when he met “the one.”

And you’d listened — always.

Since the first time he fell for the girl with purple nail polish in eighth grade, since the comic shop crush, the mutual friend who “maybe, possibly looked at him twice,” and especially since Katie. You sat through every theory, every fantasy he built out of nothing. You were his sounding board, his cheerleader, his “person.”

You knew everything about him. How he talked with his hands when he got excited. How he got nervous and over-explained things. How he used humor when he was hurting. He, in turn, knew your late-night snack rituals, your favorite movie quotes, the look on your face when you were trying not to cry.

The two of you had practically built a second home in each other’s lives. He didn’t knock anymore. You had a drawer at his place. He could find the light switch in your room in the dark.

But despite everything, he never noticed the way you looked at him when he wasn’t paying attention.

And now, after his heart had been broken by Katie—again—he was in your room like always, sitting on the floor against your bed while you sat above him, cross-legged, listening.

“I thought she was it,” he said, his voice a little hoarse. “I thought if I just tried hard enough, she’d see me.”

He exhaled, leaning his head back against your bed. “I keep screwing this up. I keep picking people who don’t actually want me. Or maybe I just want them to want me so bad that I start imagining things.”

Something shifted in the air when he added, “And I always end up here.”

You looked down at him, unsure if he meant to say that out loud.

He didn’t notice your reaction at first. He was thinking—brows drawn, fingers fidgeting with the sleeve of his hoodie. “I mean, it’s weird, right? How every version of me—post-breakup, hopeful, embarrassed, pissed off—I always come to you.”

He looked up at you slowly. “Why is that?”

You shrugged lightly. “You’re comfortable here.”

“Yeah, but it’s more than that.” His voice lowered. “I’m not like this with anyone else.”

He paused, eyes flickering toward the pictures on your corkboard. There were photos of you two from middle school, from a Halloween party where he dressed as a very tired Spider-Man, from your first Comic-Con. Little pieces of your friendship, frozen in time.

“I think I’ve been taking that for granted,” he said, almost to himself.

You froze.

He stood, not all the way, just enough to shift and sit beside you on the bed now. Closer. He glanced sideways, the silence pulling taut.

“I used to think love was about the moment. Like, something big. Fireworks. The rush. But maybe I’ve been so busy looking for the explosion that I missed… everything else.”

You felt him turn toward you fully now.

“Maybe it’s not supposed to hit you all at once. Maybe it’s slow. Quiet. Like… like showing up after school every day. Or remembering how someone takes their tea.”

His hand brushed yours—barely. But it was enough to make your heart stutter.

“I keep thinking about it now,” he went on, softer. “All the times you’ve been there for me, without me having to ask. You’ve never made me feel like I had to earn your love.”

Your breath caught. He didn’t notice. Not yet.

He was lost in the thought, eyes on your hand now resting inches from his. “How many times have I looked at you and not really seen you?”

“And what if…” he began again, slowly, carefully, like the words were unfamiliar in his mouth. “What if the thing I’ve been searching for wasn’t out there?”

He looked up. Right at you.

“…What if it’s been here all along?”

You didn’t answer. You couldn’t—not yet.

Because he was still figuring it out.

He studied your face like it was new to him. Or like he’d been looking at it his whole life but only just now understood something.