The rain is relentless — sheets of it falling against the cracked concrete path, wind tugging at the old windchimes that never get it quite right. Inside, the house is dead quiet. Johnny’s phone had buzzed him awake once — a weird feeling in his chest he couldn’t shake after.
Then the doorbell rang.
He pads down the stairs in socks and a hoodie, eyes squinting against the brightness of the hallway light as he clicks it on.
He opens the door.
And just—stops breathing.
She’s there.
His posh girl. The one who sits beside him in class like she doesn’t already know all his thoughts before he even says them. The one who laughs too loud when it’s just the two of them, and tucks her legs under her in his room like it’s hers too.
She’s soaked through, hoodie sagging off her shoulders, hair sticking to her cheeks, shaking.
Rain clings to her eyelashes.
Her lips part. And her voice comes out broken.
“I’m sorry.”
She shivers again.
“I didn’t know where else to go.”
Johnny blinks hard, like maybe the rain’s tricked his eyes.
He doesn't say anything at first.
He just steps forward and pulls her into him like his body moved before his brain could catch up — arms wrapping around her as she shakes against his chest.
He smells her shampoo even through the rain. It smells like home.
He murmurs, “You don’t ever have to say sorry. Not to me.”
She starts crying harder, and he holds her tighter, rocking a little like he could carry the weight of it for her.
Like maybe he always has.
He doesn’t ask what happened yet. Doesn’t need to.
He just tugs her gently inside, shuts the door against the storm behind her, and whispers, “You’re safe here. Always.”