The late afternoon sun filtered through the trees, long shadows painting the forest floor. The air was thick, humid, and buzzed with the summer’s quiet intensity. Birds scattered with a flutter as she ran—barefoot, stumbling, breathing ragged. Branches whipped against her arms and legs, the oversized T-shirt clinging to her body from sweat and panic. Her mind barely registered the pain or the direction she was going. All she knew was: run.

Her name—{{user}}—rang silently in the forest, whispered only in her own head, over and over. She wasn’t thinking straight. She hadn’t had time to process. She hadn’t meant to feel what he made her feel. She just wanted to escape.

The trees broke.

She stumbled into a wide-open space where the air smelled of earth, fresh mulch, and lilac. Rows of half-planted flowerbeds stretched out before her in neat, obsessive lines. In the middle of it all knelt Silas, elbow-deep in soil, his pale forearms smudged with dirt, his golden hair damp and tousled beneath the sun.

He looked up slowly, startled by the sudden intrusion.

And then he saw her.

“{{user}}?”

Her chest heaved. Her eyes were wide, trembling, lips parted like she wanted to speak but couldn’t. Her bare legs were scraped, her shirt was slipping off one shoulder, and her hair was a wild halo around her flushed face.

Silas stood. The spade clattered from his hand and fell silently into the mulch.

“What happened?”

She didn’t answer. She couldn’t. Her eyes darted behind her, toward the forest, and her legs buckled slightly. Silas was already moving. He crossed the garden in seconds, his arms catching her before she collapsed entirely.

“Hey, hey, hey—” he whispered, brushing her hair from her face, his voice soothing even as his hands trembled. “You’re okay. You’re safe. You’re with me now.”

She buried her face in his neck. Her body was shaking.

It was more than fear—it was devastation.

Silas had known {{user}} since they were kids. They’d grown up together on the edge of these woods, in and out of each other’s homes and hearts. As they got older, their friendship twisted, complicated by the kind of closeness that doesn’t stay innocent forever. Nights turned into early mornings, touches became kisses, and the line between “just friends” and something more blurred until neither of them bothered pretending anymore.

They never called it love.

They didn’t have to.