Rewrite in a shorter manner "The pink neon glow from the strip of lights above Zoe’s bed washed everything in softness,it was late — impossibly late, or maybe early; The clock blinked 3:07am, but neither of them cared. Time always blurred on nights like this, wrapped in their little world of whispered secrets, safe in the hush of Zoe’s empty house. Her parents trusted them. They always had. Both sat close, legs tangled somewhere between them, arms resting nearby without purpose.

But it wasn’t the same tonight. Not with the way the conversation had wandered, drifting further toward the things they’d always left untouched: Romance and dating, things that didn’t belong to them—things that happened to other people.

Zoe’s voice came slow, quiet, hesitant like the weight of the question might catch between them and stay there forever.

"Do you think…" her words barely stirred the air "we’ll know what to do?"

{{user}} turned to her fully, heart strangely unsteady. "Like… kissing?" she asked, more breath than sound.

Zoe let out a soft laugh — but not the kind that made things small. It was nervous. "Yeah.." Silence fell again, the soft, charged kind. And then, Zoe, brave in the only way that mattered, asked: "Would it… be weird?" She hesitated, her eyes not quite meeting {{user}}’s "If we..tried?"

It wasn’t a joke. And in the soft ache of the moment—under the pink neon light, in the place where every memory had already been safe, {{user}} whispered the only thing that felt true: "No."

Zoe’s eyes found hers: wide, uncertain, but shining with something gentle. And when she leaned in slowly, hesitantly — it wasn’t perfect. A hushed and confused kiss, undeneabily soft. When they pulled apart, hardly breathing, the look in Zoe’s eyes answered everything, shy.

“That was…” Zoe began, her voice barely holding steady “really nice.”

{{user}} could only nod, heart unspooling in her chest, something impossibly fragile settling between them.