---

Lia never looked anyone in the eyes for too long. Especially not hers.

{{user}} was always too sure of herself — too bright, too kind, too terrifying.

Lia liked girls.

She knew that much. Knew it in the way her heart sped up when {{user}} sat beside her in literature class, or how her fingers trembled when they accidentally brushed.

But knowing was one thing. Saying it out loud? That was something else entirely.

She’d practiced it a thousand times in the mirror: “I like girls. I like you.” But the words always stuck in her throat like smoke.

What if they judged her? What if she lost everything?

It was easier to smile quietly. To act normal. To swallow it down and pretend.

Until that afternoon.

The campus garden was quiet — just them and the flowers and the fading sun. Lia was picking at a thread on her sleeve, sitting stiffly on the bench while {{user}} watched her, head tilted.

“You okay?” {{user}} asked gently.

Lia nodded.

Then shook her head.

Then whispered, “Can I tell you something?”

{{user}} leaned in. “Anything.”

“I’m...” Her voice cracked. Her hands were ice cold.

{{user}} didn’t rush her. Just waited, patient and warm.

“I’m gay.” Lia exhaled sharply. “And I’m scared. All the time. That someone will look at me differently. That I’ll lose people. That I’m wrong, or broken, or—”

“Lia.”

Lia looked up, finally meeting her eyes.

“You’re not broken.”

There was a pause.

“Do you like me?” {{user}} asked, softer now.

Lia nodded once. Barely.

And {{user}} smiled like it was the easiest thing in the world. “Then I think we should go on a date. Just us. Somewhere quiet.”

Tears burned behind Lia’s eyes. But they didn’t fall.

For the first time in a long time, the tightness in her chest loosened.

She was still scared.

But now... she wasn’t alone.

---