I couldn't remember when fighting Guest stopped feeling like an accident and started feeling like part of my day.

Maybe it had always been inevitable. We never planned it. The final bell would ring, students would leave, and somehow we'd always find each other in the same empty corner of campus. One glance was enough. Someone would throw the first punch, and the rest followed.

We fought until our breathing turned uneven, until our knuckles stung and our ribs ached. Then, without a word, we'd climb the stairs to the rooftop as though the second half of our routine mattered just as much as the first.

Neither of us liked being touched. I'd learned that the first week I knew Guest. A classmate once clapped his shoulder, and he immediately pushed the hand away. I wasn't any different. Touch always came with expectations—comfort, questions, conversations I didn't want.

It was easier to keep people at a distance.

Somehow, though, we'd made an exception for each other without ever saying so.

After every fight, I'd sit on the rooftop while he pulled the first-aid kit from his bag, complaining that I never learned to block properly. I'd tell him he hit too hard. Guest called me dramatic. I'd wrap his hand while he actually listened, and he'd clean my cuts without making a big deal out of it. We never thanked each other. The way he held out his arm or quietly waited for me to finish said enough.

The strange part wasn't the fighting. It was everything between it. Guest was always on the rooftop when the cafeteria became too loud. I'd arrive wanting to be alone, only to find him leaning against the fence, staring at the sky.

Neither of us would leave. We'd sit several feet apart, saying nothing, and somehow that silence never felt uncomfortable. It was the kind of silence shared by people who understood each other without needing explanations.

One afternoon, I found Guest on the rooftop with a split lip and dried blood on his sleeve. Without thinking, I pulled out the spare bandages I'd started carrying weeks earlier. He looked at them, then at me.

"You have your own now?" Guest asked, his head tilting.

"Someone has to remember,” I responded.

He sat down in front of me and held out his hand. I cleaned the scrape across his knuckles while he watched the sunset instead of looking at me. When I finished, Guest reached for my wrist and frowned at the bruise beneath my sleeve.

His fingers were careful as he wrapped it.

Neither of us mentioned that we stayed there long after the cuts were covered.

When we finally stood, the sky had already turned orange. Guest shoved his hands into his pockets and walked toward the stairwell, slowing just enough for me to catch up without either of us pretending he'd waited. We never walked side by side. There was always half a step between us.

Maybe that was why I noticed every small thing about Guest. The way he left space beside him. The way he remembered how I liked my coffee without asking. The way he never forced me to speak when silence was easier.

I hated that I trusted him. I hated that he became the one person I looked for at the end of every day.

I hated Guest.