The soft sound of Estelle’s laughter fades down the hall as you and Imogen finish getting ready. The babysitter's already here, and you're dressed—casual, sure, but composed in the way Imogen always notices, even when she doesn't say it out loud.

You’re adjusting your sleeves in the mirror when you hear her voice behind you—hesitant, quiet, like a thought she didn’t mean to say aloud.

"You’re always so... put together, huh?"

She’s leaning against the doorway, arms crossed lightly, hair falling loose around her shoulders. Her dress is simple—black with a thin shimmer of gold—but the way she shifts in it says she’s still uncomfortable in her own skin. Still trying.

"I changed like, three times already. But I still don’t feel right. I don’t know if I ever will again."

Her voice dips toward the floor. Her fingers tug at the edge of the fabric, a nervous tic you’ve seen before—when she’s holding something bigger beneath the surface. And with Imogen, there’s always more beneath. Her mother. Chip. The silence that followed. The cruel precision of A’s mind games. Too much grief packed into a body too young to carry it all.

"I keep wondering if tonight will be different. If I’ll walk in and just... feel like one of them again. Like I’m not the girl with all the baggage. Like I’m not the one everyone whispers about."

She takes a step into the room, cautious. Like she’s still half-ready to run.

"And then there’s you. You’ve been here for all of it. Through every awful moment, every night I didn’t think I’d survive. And the whole time I kept thinking—any second now, you’ll leave too."

Her voice falters, and her gaze drops to your floorboards.

"People always leave. Eventually."

There’s a pause. The silence holds.

"I don’t know why you haven’t yet."

She sounds more confused than grateful, and that breaks something in you. She isn’t pushing you away; she’s bracing for the inevitable.

"Some days, I feel like I’m disappearing piece by piece. Other days, I don’t even recognize the girl in the mirror. Like maybe she didn’t survive at all. Just... morphed into someone else. Someone harder."

You walk to her slowly, closing the space between you. But she keeps talking, words spilling faster now, like a dam she couldn’t hold back anymore.

"I don’t want to make you hate me. I don’t want to turn into someone even I can’t stand. But I don’t know how to be soft again. I don’t know how to let someone stay."

She lifts her hand like she wasn’t sure it’d move, like her body decided before her mind did. Her fingers find yours.

"I’m not easy right now. I don’t know if I ever will be. But that doesn’t mean I’m not trying."

You squeeze her hand. Just enough.

"And Estelle... she loves you. Like, completely. Like she knows. Like she saw you and thought, 'That’s someone I can trust,' even when I was still figuring that out myself."

Her laugh comes quiet, edged with guilt and affection.

"She’s probably braver than both of us combined. Isn’t that wild?"

You nod, smiling gently. You already know Estelle sees something in Imogen she can’t always see in herself.

"I’m trying. For her. For me. For this."

She looks up at you then. Really looks. Her eyes search your face like she’s afraid you’ve already disappeared and she’s just now noticing.

"I know I’m not easy to love. Hell, I might be impossible some days. But I’m trying to believe this is real. That I’m allowed to have this. You."

She leans forward, rests her forehead against your chest. She exhales like she's been holding her breath for weeks. The weight in her isn’t just trauma—it’s all the hope she’s too scared to speak aloud.

"Let’s go. Let’s try to have fun. Just for a night, let me pretend things are normal. Let me remember what that feels like."

She pulls back, breathes in slow. Her smile is faint but alive—like a flicker trying to grow.

"And for the record, if you want me on that dance floor, you’re gonna have to drag me. But I’ll try."

And that’s more than enough.