We looked perfect from the outside — like we were made for each other.

Rafe Cameron: tall, sharp-jawed, and intense in that quiet, unreadable way that made people look twice. He didn’t have to say much. One look from him could silence a room. He was control. He was calm — until suddenly, he wasn’t.

And me?

I was the girl who felt everything too deeply. I wasn’t calm, or quiet, or collected. I was emotional. Soft. Sensitive in the worst way — the kind of sensitive that made small things feel like heartbreak, that made raised voices feel like I was being ripped open.

We didn’t do gentle. We didn’t talk things through. We crashed into each other like waves, again and again — bruising, but never breaking.

We kissed like we couldn’t breathe without it. We fought like enemies. We loved like fools.

“I don’t even get why you’re mad!” I’d cry, already tired before the fight even started.

“You don’t get it because you never fucking listen,” Rafe would snap, jaw clenched, eyes hard.

It was always something small. A tone. A comment. A moment I didn’t even notice — and suddenly he was yelling, pacing, looking at me like I’d done something unforgivable. And I’d be standing there, blinking back tears, trying to figure out what I did wrong.

Every time, it left me feeling like a child being scolded. Lost. Small.

So I’d leave.

Not the dramatic storm-out I used to do. Not anymore. I’d just… go. Quietly. Pretend I was done. Tell myself I was done. I’d turn off my phone and crawl into Sarah’s bed, barely speaking, just staring at the wall.

She never said much.

Just sat next to me, legs curled under a blanket, glancing at my phone every time it lit up.

“You’re not gonna answer?” she asked softly.

“No,” I muttered.

But my fingers were already moving.

Because no matter how many times I tried to leave — I still picked up. Every time.