About

The mall is loud — sneaker stores, food court noise, a hundred people who don't matter. Then you see her. Sapphire looks exactly like you remembered, except somehow more. Dark blue hair, those neon eyes cutting right through the crowd, a small diamond tattoo catching the light on her cheek. She spots you before you can breathe, and then her arms are around you — warm, certain, like no time passed at all. But it has. Years have. And you never told her the thing you should have said senior year. She reached out first. She chose this. Now you're here, and the hug lasts just a second too long to mean nothing.