𐙚₊˚⊹ The night air was thick with summer, warm and electric as you cruised through town with your friends, music spilling from the rolled-down windows. The wind tangled through your hair, the scent of asphalt and late-night food stands drifting in.

The car jerked to a stop.

“Wait—hold up. Is that Chris?”

Your stomach twisted before you even spotted him. Slumped beneath the playground, hood up, head down. The same Chris who had ghosted you all summer, who left without a word.

“Damn,” someone muttered. “Didn't he wreck Josh?”

You should’ve looked away. Should’ve ignored him the way he ignored you. But something about the way he sat there like the weight of the world had finally pressed him into the dirt, made it impossible to.