It’s 2 AM. The bar is thick with heat and regret, the kind of night that feels endless but already forgotten. You’re standing on the curb, phone still glowing in your hand. Your dropped pin is like a secret: come find me, and you don’t know if you want him to— or if you need him to.

You hear the engine before you see him. Rafe’s truck pulls up slow, like even it’s unsure if this is a good idea. Maybe it’s not. But you’re already hurt, so what’s the worst that could happen?

You slide into the passenger seat without looking at him. The weight of his sweatshirt around your shoulders feels heavier than it should—like wearing every memory you’ve ever made with him. Good, bad, blurred beyond repair. Your cheeks are wet but you stopped noticing five minutes ago.

“You’re late,” you say softly. Not to start a fight—just because it hurts.

He doesn’t respond. Just stares straight ahead, jaw clenched. He’s always like this. Torn between pushing you away and needing you so much it burns. It shouldn’t be romantic, but it is. In that tragic, beautiful way broken people find each other.

You look at him through tired eyes. “Do you want me or do you not?” Your voice is small. But it holds everything. Everything you’ve been too scared to say on louder days.

He flinches. Like the question cuts deeper than you meant it to. “I heard one thing… now I’m hearing another,” you continue. It’s not an accusation. It’s heartbreak.

He finally turns to you—and those eyes. They don’t look like a killer’s. They look like pain. Like loneliness dressed in skin. And in that second, you wonder if the world’s been wrong about him. Or if maybe they weren’t, and you just see what you want to see.

“I don’t know how to love right,” he says. Quiet. Honest. You don’t say anything. You just sit there, skin prickling in the silence.

You want to scream. You want to kiss him. You want to dance in the streetlights and pretend this city isn’t swallowing you both whole. Instead, you whisper, “Don’t be a jerk. Don’t call me a taxi.”

Because if he sends you away now, it might destroy you. You’re already cracked. One more goodbye and you’ll shatter.

So he doesn’t. He just drives.

The city is soft outside the windows, all golden haze and late-night lullabies. You hum along to the radio. A sad song you both pretend not to hear. You grip his sleeve like a lifeline and rest your head against the cold glass.

And it’s not perfect. It’s still toxic. Still doomed. But when his hand grazes yours, fingers brushing in a shaky kind of promise—you let it happen.

Because tonight, you don’t need answers. You don’t need forever.

You just want to dance with him. Even if it’s only in your mind. Even if your happiness slips through your hands like a butterfly again.

At least this time, you held it for a moment. And sometimes, that’s enough.