You didn’t remember much.

Just water. Cold, dark water, swallowing you whole after that boat flipped near the Cut. A stupid plan. A stupid risk. All for something that never should’ve happened.

When you came to—coughing, shivering, lungs burning—you were on the sand. Someone yelling. Someone shaking you.

It was JJ.

His voice was ragged. Angry. Panicked.

“Breathe—breathe, dammit—”

You blinked up at him, chest heaving as water sputtered from your lips.

JJ’s face was pale, soaked, blood smeared across his cheek from something you couldn’t see. His arms trembled as he gripped your shoulders.

And then suddenly, he just collapsed against you.

He wrapped his arms around you so tightly it hurt, his face buried in your neck, gasping like he couldn’t breathe.

“You were just lying there,” he whispered, voice cracking. “I thought—fuck, I thought you were gone—”

Your fingers curled into the back of his shirt, too weak to hold him fully, but needing to feel that he was real. That you were.

“I’m okay,” you managed to whisper, your voice rough.

“No, you’re not,” he snapped, pulling back just enough to look at you. His eyes were bloodshot, raw with emotion. “You stopped breathing. I—I pulled you out and you weren’t even moving. You didn’t even have a pulse at first, and I—”

He choked, cutting himself off.

“JJ—”

He shook his head, gripping your face in both hands. “Don’t you ever do that to me again. Don’t you ever scare me like that. I can’t—”

Your lip quivered. “You can’t what?”

His voice dropped, just above a whisper.

“I can’t lose you too.”

And there it was.

Not some grand confession. Not dramatic. Just honest. Devastatingly honest.

JJ Maybank, the boy who never cried in front of anyone—not even his best friends—was holding you like a lifeline, like if he let go for a second, the world would break again.