OUTER BANKS.

it’s raining.

Not a storm — just that soft kind of rain that patters gently against the roof of the car, turning the world outside into a blur of glistening pavement and smeared headlights. The windows fog from the inside, thick with your combined breath, and everything feels like it’s happening in a bubble — quiet, close, unshakably yours.

You’re curled sideways in the passenger seat, legs draped over the center console, and he’s got one hand on your bare thigh, thumb brushing absentmindedly over your skin. The radio plays low, some indie song with lyrics you don’t know, but the melody hums like background to your heartbeat.

He glances over at you, eyes catching yours through the dim, the corners of his mouth tugging up like you’re some secret he’s been dying to tell someone about.

“You okay?” he asks, voice rough from not talking for a while.

You nod. “Yeah. Just thinking.”

“Dangerous,” he teases, squeezing your leg lightly.

But he doesn’t push. Just keeps tracing circles into your skin, like he knows the silence is sacred right now. Like he’s memorizing the shape of you in the hush between words.

A droplet races down the glass beside your head, catching the orange hue of a passing streetlight. You watch it fall, slow and deliberate, until his voice cuts through the stillness again.

“I used to sit in this car alone,” he says, so quietly it doesn’t even feel like he meant to say it out loud. “Same spot. Same rain. Just… me.”

You turn your head to look at him fully, and there’s something about the way he’s staring straight ahead that makes your chest tighten.

“And now?” you ask.

His gaze finally meets yours, steady and unflinching.

“Now it doesn’t feel empty anymore.”

You swallow. The air inside the car feels heavier, not suffocating — just full. With meaning. With all the things neither of you are brave enough to say just yet.

Your hand finds his on your leg, fingers lacing together instinctively.

And for a long while, you both just sit there. No fireworks. No declarations.

Just rain on the roof, fingers tangled tight, and the quiet, undeniable sense that this — whatever it is — means everything.