８０１

the first time you saw him, he was already up there.

you hadn’t meant to skip class. not really. it wasn’t rebellion, or laziness, or anything you could name in a way that sounded bold. it was just… one of those days. the kind where everything felt too sharp, too bright. where people’s voices grated against your ears and the floor felt too hard beneath your shoes. the kind of day where existing in the hallways felt like something you had to earn, and you didn’t have the energy.

so you kept walking.

up past the third floor, where the stairwell turned quiet. up to the very top, where you’d always heard the rooftop door was supposed to be locked — but today, it wasn’t.

your fingers hesitated on the handle for a second before you pushed it open.

the air hit you like exhale. open sky. the kind of quiet that doesn't ask anything of you. just space and soft wind and the rustle of tree branches far below. the sun hung low behind faint clouds, filtering everything in soft gold.

and then you saw him.

curled up near the wall, legs pulled up, back against the concrete. his eyes were half-shut, dark lashes casting shadows on his pale skin. messy hair falling in his face. his headphones dangled around his neck, not in use. he wasn’t asleep, but he wasn’t entirely there either — like someone mid-dream.

you froze.

you’d expected the rooftop to be empty. you thought maybe you’d be alone. that you needed to be alone. and yet, for some reason, your first instinct wasn’t to leave.

you shifted your weight. he looked up.

not startled. not annoyed. just… watching. his expression didn’t change. not even when your eyes met. he blinked once, slow.

you opened your mouth to say something — maybe “sorry,” maybe “i didn’t know someone was here” — but nothing came out. the words felt clumsy, like they didn’t fit the air between you.

then, he spoke.

“you can stay.”

his voice was rough in a quiet way. not unfriendly. just used to not being used.

you nodded, barely. walked to the opposite side of the rooftop, letting your bag slide off your shoulder with a dull thud. you sat. pulled your knees to your chest.

you didn’t look at him again.

he didn’t speak again either.

and yet, somehow, the silence between you didn’t feel like a wall. it felt like a curtain. like if you tried hard enough, you could pull it back and see what was underneath.

you went back the next day.

you didn’t tell anyone. you slipped out the same way — when the hallway emptied, when the teacher turned their back. the stairs felt quieter this time. your footsteps slower. more certain.

you weren’t sure what you were expecting. maybe that he wouldn’t be there. maybe that it had just been a fluke. a weird shared moment that disappeared like a dream when you woke up.

but when you pushed the rooftop door open, he was already there.

same place. same slouched posture. same faraway look in his eyes, like his body was there but the rest of him had floated off somewhere no one else could follow.

this time, he didn’t look up until you were halfway across the roof.

he shifted slightly when he saw you. moved his bag to the side, like making room. like expecting you.

you sat down again, just a little closer than before.

still no words.

on the third day, you brought your headphones too.

you didn’t use them. just let them sit around your neck as you leaned your head back and watched the sky. the clouds looked slower from up here, like time was running at half-speed.

he hadn’t brought anything new. no notebook. no phone out. just himself, like always, half-folded into the quiet. every so often, you’d glance over and see that he’d tilted his head toward you. not obviously. not enough to call it staring. just... facing you, a little.

you wanted to ask his name.

but it felt too sudden. too loud in a place like this.

so instead, you asked, “do you come here a lot?”

he didn’t move. didn’t even open his eyes.

“when i don’t want to be anywhere else.”

your fingers curled tighter around the fabric of your sleeves.

“…that’s a good reason,” you said.

he didn’t answer. but you didn’t need him to.

on the fourth day, you brought two drinks.

you’d bought them without thinking. one for yourself, like usual. the second one just… felt like a natural extension of the first. you didn’t know if he liked the flavor. didn’t even know if he’d take it. but something told you to try.

when you stepped onto the roof, he was already there — again. and this time, when you sat down, you placed the second bottle beside him without looking at his face.

he stared at it for a moment. then at you.

picked it up. opened the cap.

“thanks,” he said.

you smiled at your lap. the breeze felt a little warmer.

he didn’t tell you his name until a week in.

you were both lying flat on your backs that day, side by side, barely a few inches between you. your hands rested by your sides, fingers splayed like they were reaching for something but didn’t know how.

you watched the sky in silence for a long time.

“what’s your name?” you asked eventually.

he didn’t answer right away. the clouds drifted overhead, slow and steady.

“…kinich,” he said finally.

you repeated it in your head. once, twice.

“huh,” you said out loud. “that’s kinda cool.”

he exhaled — maybe a laugh. maybe just relief.

“you?”

you told him. and when he said it back, it sounded softer. like a secret.

he never talked much.

but he always listened.

and somehow, that made you want to talk even more.

you found yourself telling him stories you hadn’t told anyone else. stupid jokes from lunch, awkward moments from class, things your friends had said that stuck with you in weird ways. it wasn’t like he responded with anything big — no jokes back, no long answers — but he looked at you like he was hearing you. like the words were sinking in, piece by piece.

sometimes, you caught him smiling. just barely. but enough.

it made your chest feel too small for a second. like maybe something inside you was growing, and you didn’t know how to stop it.

you saw him outside of school once.

at a convenience store near the train tracks. he was standing by the fridge section, staring blankly at rows of canned coffee like they’d offended him personally. hoodie sleeves too long for his fingers. eyes heavy.

you waved, on instinct.

he looked up, startled. his eyes widened just slightly before his expression flattened back into something calmer.

he nodded. slow. almost shy.

you didn’t speak. just smiled. and walked past.

you smiled the whole way home.

you didn’t tell your friends about him.

not because you were hiding anything. not really. it was just that… you didn’t have the words for it. it wasn’t friendship. not exactly. it wasn’t flirting. it wasn’t a crush, at least not in the loud, easy way people talked about crushes.

he was kinich.

and he was yours, in a way you didn’t know how to explain.

one day, it rained.

you almost didn’t go.

you stood by the window, watching the gray sky, wondering if he would be there. if the rooftop would still feel like sanctuary with water pounding the pavement.

but you went anyway.

and he was already there. hood up, knees pulled in, shoulders hunched slightly under the drizzle. he didn’t flinch when you opened the door. didn’t even seem surprised.

his eyes flicked toward you. expectant.

you stepped out, let the rain hit your arms and soak through your sleeves. sat beside him, closer this time. your knees nearly brushed.

“…you don’t talk much,” you said after a while.

he shrugged. his hood shifted slightly with the movement.

“you talk enough for both of us.”

you nudged him with your elbow. he didn’t pull away.

“that was almost a compliment.”

“don’t get used to it.”

but you caught the smile that tugged at the corner of his mouth.

and he didn’t move away.

you didn’t realize how much you looked forward to seeing him until you were late one day.

a group project meeting ran long. your classmates were loud and clingy, laughing about something you didn’t care about, and all you could think about was the rooftop. the sky. him.

you texted him, fingers trembling a little.

you didn’t get a reply.

but when you finally got there — breathless, bag swinging off your shoulder, heart racing in the worst and best way — he was there.

he didn’t look up.

just handed you a drink, the one you liked, and shifted over slightly to make room.

you sat down beside him and didn’t say a word.

you didn’t need to.

it didn’t feel like friendship. not exactly.

it felt like something quieter. something under the surface. something with no name, but all the weight of something real. like you were both holding a thread between your fingers and neither of you dared pull it too hard in case it snapped.

by the end of the month, the rooftop didn’t feel empty anymore.

it felt like home.

the rooftop became routine.

not something you planned, or even something you consciously decided. it just… happened. like muscle memory. like blinking. like breathing.

a quiet kind of ritual, stitched into the slow, in-between hours of the day. after class. before club meetings. during skipped lunches and cloudy afternoons when everything else felt too loud. when the hallways buzzed with a kind of noise neither of you could ever quite stand.

sometimes, he was already there when you arrived — slouched against the wall, legs stretched out, hood pulled low over his brow, earbuds in. his head would tilt slightly toward you when he noticed your footsteps, but he never said anything first. not right away. he didn’t need to.

other days, you got there first. sat with your knees drawn up to your chest, bag at your side, picking at the chipped paint along the edge of the bench. you never had to wait long — he’d appear minutes later, quiet as shadow, the door creaking faintly behind him. his presence always settled next to yours without question, like it had always belonged there. like you’d saved him a seat without knowing.

you never asked each other where you'd come from.

never asked why you both kept ending up in the same place.

maybe because you already knew — in that strange, unspoken way that didn’t require names or reasons or explanations. maybe because putting it into words would make it too heavy to hold.

on the fifth tuesday, he fell asleep beside you.

you hadn’t noticed at first. he was quiet as always, his head tilted back against the wall, arms crossed loosely over his chest. the wind tugged at the edge of his hoodie and the sun made pale lines across his cheekbones, casting faint shadows under his eyes.

you thought he was just… still. thinking, maybe. lost in whatever fog he always seemed to carry in his expression.

but when you turned to make a passing comment about the clouds — some half-formed joke about how one of them looked like a rabbit — you found him completely motionless, lashes resting against his skin, mouth parted ever so slightly with sleep.

you froze.

your voice died in your throat.

he looked soft. peaceful. untouched. like the world couldn’t reach him up here. like whatever weight he carried — all the heaviness in his shoulders, the tiredness he never spoke about — had finally let him go for a moment.

you didn’t move.

didn’t even breathe properly.

just watched the way his chest rose and fell in slow rhythm, steady and calm, like the sky itself had slowed down to match him.

you sat beside him for a long time like that. quiet. still. barely daring to blink in case the spell broke.

you wondered what kind of dreams a boy like kinich had.

if he dreamed at all.

and if he did — were they soft and safe like this rooftop? or were they sharp and broken, twisted up with things he never said out loud?

you never asked.

but that night, you thought about him more than you meant to.

not his face, necessarily. not his voice. just… the quiet. the comfort. the strange gravity of his presence. the way silence with him never felt awkward. never felt empty.

it felt like something.

maybe that’s what made you come back again.

and again. and again.

one day, you brought snacks.

not much — just a pack of those cheap pastries from the vending machine downstairs, the ones dusted with too much sugar and filled with barely-there custard. you hadn’t even thought about it, really. just grabbed two without thinking, the way you’d grab an extra pencil or a spare tissue. automatic. careless. but intentional in a way you didn’t want to admit.

when you climbed the stairs and pushed open the rooftop door, he was already there. sitting in the same spot, one knee propped up, phone dangling loosely in his hand.

he glanced up at the sound of your arrival. didn’t say anything, just gave a small nod — barely there. but you caught it. you always did.

you sat beside him, the familiar rustle of your backpack filling the silence, and then — without looking at him — held one of the pastries out.

no words.

just an offering.

he didn’t take it right away.

you could feel his gaze on your hand, then on your face, and back again. there was a brief pause, like he was waiting for you to say something. like he was trying to understand what the gesture meant.

“…you always feed people you barely know?” he asked finally. his voice was dry, a little rough at the edges, like he hadn’t spoken all day. but it wasn’t mean. not really.

you rolled your eyes, but your lips twitched at the corners. “don’t flatter yourself. i just didn’t want to waste it.”

but when he reached out and took it from you — his fingers brushing against yours, warm and calloused and fleeting — something caught in your chest anyway.

a soft, almost imperceptible pause in your heartbeat.

he didn’t say thank you.

just unwrapped it slowly, quietly, and took a bite. the sugar clung to his fingertips. he didn’t even flinch.

he ate the whole thing.

and the next day, he brought drinks.

you didn’t expect it. hadn’t even thought he’d noticed, honestly. but when you pushed open the rooftop door, there he was — two cans balanced beside him on the concrete, condensation already forming at the edges.

he didn’t look at you when he handed one over.

just held it out, eyes fixed on the sky.

you didn’t say thank you.

but your fingers lingered on the can a little longer than they needed to.

and your smile stayed for the rest of the afternoon.

it started to change after that.

not all at once. not loudly. not in a way either of you could point to and say, there, that was the moment.

but it changed.

he started waiting for you.

you never talked about it, but you noticed. how he lingered just inside the stairwell when it rained. how he glanced at the rooftop door every few seconds until you arrived. how his shoulders stayed tense until you spoke, until your voice threaded into the space between you and softened everything.

you noticed, too, how he listened now. not just with his ears — but with his whole body. turned slightly toward you. hand resting closer. sometimes he’d laugh under his breath when you said something dumb. barely a sound, more like an exhale, but it made your chest flutter anyway.

you started bringing more snacks.

he started remembering your favorite drink.

one time, you found a small packet of candy in your bag — a kind you’d mentioned liking once, forever ago. no note. no explanation. but you looked up at him, and he looked away too quickly, ears pink where they peeked out from his hood.

you didn’t say anything.

but the next day, you brought him his favorite chips — the ones he pretended not to like but always finished when you offered.

it became a rhythm. a language. a routine you both pretended not to notice.

and still, no one said anything.

one day, you found yourself watching his hands.

they were always moving. tapping against his thigh. tugging at his sleeves. pulling at the loose threads of his hoodie. nervous habits, maybe. something to do when he didn’t know what else to say.

but they were careful hands, too.

gentle, when he passed you a drink. deliberate, when he tucked your hair behind your ear that one time — just once — when the wind had gotten too strong and you couldn’t see. neither of you acknowledged it. he didn’t even meet your eyes after.

but your skin burned there for the rest of the day.

you missed a rooftop day once.

it wasn’t your fault — a group activity had run long, and by the time you’d gotten free, the sky was already dark, the rooftop locked, the school echoing and empty.

you went home restless. your chest tight. your thoughts loud.

you didn’t text him. you didn’t even know if you could — if that was something you were allowed to do, if this rooftop thing had crossed into anything real enough to exist outside of its quiet space.

but the next day, he was already there when you arrived. and when you sat down, a little hesitant, he didn’t look at you right away. didn’t say hello.

instead, he passed you a warm drink — your favorite — and muttered, “thought you weren’t coming.”

your breath caught. not from the words — but from the way he said them.

quiet. raw. vulnerable in a way he never let himself be.

“i wanted to,” you said.

he didn’t respond.

but his hands were still. and they stayed close to yours the whole time.

you never meant for it to matter this much.

but it did.

you started counting the days between your meetings. started noticing the way your stomach dropped when he was late. started memorizing the way he sat, the way he listened, the way he looked at you when he thought you weren’t paying attention.

sometimes, you wondered if he noticed you doing the same.

and sometimes, you were sure he did.

because one afternoon, he spoke — sudden and small, like the words had been sitting in his mouth for a long time and he finally got tired of holding them in.

“you’re the only person i can breathe around.”

you didn’t look at him. didn’t move. just stared at the clouds.

but your throat felt tight. your heart too full.

“…same,” you whispered, eventually.

it wasn’t enough. not quite.

but it was something.

and it stayed with you for a long, long time.

it started with a loose thread.

you noticed it one afternoon — hanging from the frayed edge of his sleeve, the dark fabric worn thin from use. it swayed gently in the breeze like it had always been there, soft and barely visible, but your eyes kept catching on it.

you were both sitting like usual — backs to the wall, legs stretched out, snacks between you, the city sprawling quiet below. he'd said something offhand about your math teacher being a sadist and you’d laughed, louder than expected, head tilted back into the sun.

he was talking more lately.

not full sentences, not stories — but words. actual words. a muttered opinion. a sarcastic comment. one day, he’d said your name for the first time, testing it out like it was foreign in his mouth. you’d felt it echo in your chest for the rest of the afternoon.

sometimes, he even looked at you when he spoke.

he didn’t notice you staring at his sleeve.

didn’t notice the way your fingers itched toward that little thread. it wasn’t bothering him. but it was bothering you. loose things always did. things that felt like they were coming undone.

your hand moved before you could stop it — slow, careful, deliberate. two fingers catching the thread like it might vanish if you weren’t gentle.

“you’ll unravel,” you said, smiling. a joke. kind of.

his breath hitched.

you didn’t pull, not really — just smoothed it down, curling the thread around your finger once before letting it fall back into place.

your fingers brushed his wrist.

and for the briefest second, the whole world tilted.

his pulse jumped under your touch — quick and fluttering, like a rabbit startled by sound. you felt it against your fingertips and then all the way through you, like static humming under your skin.

he went still. perfectly, terrifyingly still.

he didn’t look at you.

he didn’t move away.

you let your hand fall into your lap, pretending not to notice the way your own pulse had picked up speed — how your chest felt full and sharp all at once. how your body remembered him even when your brain tried not to.

you didn’t mention it.

neither did he.

but afterward, he didn’t lean away. he sat closer that day. not by much. just enough for your shoulders to nearly touch when the wind blew the right way. just enough for you to wonder if you were imagining it.

you thought about it the rest of the day.

how warm his skin was.

how still he’d gone.

how your heart had kicked against your ribs like it was trying to get out.

you didn’t know what it meant. not exactly.

but you knew what it felt like.

and you knew you wanted to do it again.

a few days later, you saw him in the hallway between classes.

it wasn’t special, not at first — just one of those passing moments where the crowd split and he happened to be in your line of sight. his hands were shoved into his pockets, hood up even though you were indoors. his expression was unreadable. distracted. withdrawn.

you weren’t alone.

you were laughing — bright, careless laughter, the kind he never heard on the rooftop. surrounded by people. classmates, probably. friends. someone had said something stupid, and you'd thrown your head back, eyes shining, your smile wide and open in a way it never quite was with him.

you didn’t see him.

not even when someone called your name and you turned, still laughing, brushing a hand through your hair like you did when you were nervous and didn’t want to look like it.

but he saw you.

and something in him shifted.

something slow and bitter.

he wasn’t sure what it was at first — just a tightness, low in his chest. a strange heat behind his ribs. like being left out of a joke he didn’t know was being told. like watching someone he’d memorized suddenly become unfamiliar in a different light.

you looked different down here.

louder. warmer. brighter.

like you belonged somewhere else. with someone else.

and he didn’t know what to do with that feeling — didn’t have the words for it, didn’t even know where to put it.

so he turned away before you could see him watching.

and that afternoon, he didn’t go to the rooftop.

you noticed the absence right away.

you pretended you didn’t.

you waited longer than usual — sitting with your bag in your lap, picking at the edge of your sleeve. your chest felt too tight, like it was filled with smoke. every creak of the door made you look up. every bird overhead made you flinch.

but he didn’t come.

you stayed until the sun dipped just a little lower.

then you left, your heart loud in your ears, trying not to think about the ache that settled deep in your stomach.

the next day, he wasn’t there either.

you didn’t realize how used to him you’d gotten — how much the days blurred without him. the rooftop didn’t feel like the same place anymore. it felt thinner. emptier. like something had been pulled out of it and you weren’t sure how to put it back.

you hated it.

and worse — you missed him.

you didn’t know how much until he was gone.

you didn’t see him again until friday.

not on the rooftop.

in the hallway again, near the lockers this time. he had his hood off for once, hair falling into his eyes, sleeves shoved up to his elbows. he looked tired. sharper somehow. his posture stiff like he was bracing for something.

you almost didn’t say anything.

almost walked past, afraid to break whatever fragile, invisible thread still hung between you.

but then he glanced up — and for just a second, his eyes found yours.

and the tension dropped from his shoulders all at once.

like he’d been holding his breath. like seeing you let something settle in his chest.

“hey,” you said, quiet, just for him.

his reply was almost too soft to catch.

“…hey.”

you didn’t say where were you. you didn’t say i missed you. you didn’t say i thought you’d left.

you just looked at each other for a long moment. and somehow, that was enough.

for now.

✦ —

the rooftop was quiet again that afternoon.

the kind of quiet that made you second-guess every step on the stairs.

you weren’t sure if he’d show up. not after yesterday. not after the hallway. not after the way your chest had ached, not knowing if you’d done something wrong — or worse, if this whole thing only mattered to you.

but you still went. just in case.

the sky was heavy with gold light, the kind that makes everything feel like it’s glowing from within. the clouds moved slow and lazy above the buildings, and the air was soft — not cold, not warm. just there.

you sat where you always did.

pulled your knees to your chest.

watched the sky. waited.

the wind caught your hair. your sleeve. the edge of your thoughts. it moved around you like a memory, like a whisper you couldn’t quite hold onto.

you were starting to think he wouldn’t come.

and then — the door opened.

soft. cautious. like maybe he wasn’t sure if he should be here either.

you didn’t look right away. you didn’t need to.

you felt it first — that quiet shift in the air. that small gravity that only came with him. then the faint drag of footsteps, that barely-there rustle of fabric, the exhale he always let out when he sat down like the whole world had been too loud and this was the only place he could hear himself again.

he sat beside you.

closer than usual.

you still didn’t say anything.

neither did he.

but the silence wasn’t sharp this time. it didn’t press. it settled. soft and full and warm. like something living between you — something that didn’t need words to be understood.

he pulled his knees up, arms resting over them. his hoodie fell over his hands again, but you could still see his fingers — moving. fidgeting. tugging gently at the cuff of his sleeve.

you watched them for a second too long. then your eyes slid up. his face was calm, but there was a tension in his jaw, in the way his lashes didn’t flutter like they normally did when he was relaxed.

he felt you looking.

“what?” he murmured, not quite meeting your eyes.

you shook your head. “nothing.”

but you didn’t look away.

not this time.

and neither did he.

for a long breath, the space between you felt like it could collapse if either of you moved too fast. then a breeze passed through — soft and low, like it didn’t want to interrupt.

your fingers brushed.

barely.

a blink. a breath. a maybe.

and he didn’t pull away.

so you didn’t either.

your pinkies sat there, side by side, not quite holding, not quite separate. just touching. like a secret. like a promise neither of you were ready to say out loud.

the sky turned peach-gold, then lavender.

the clouds deepened.

you leaned back slowly, letting your weight rest against the wall behind you. let your gaze drift to the fading horizon. the wind tugged at the edge of your collar, soft and insistent.

you exhaled.

“you weren’t here yesterday,” you said, quiet. like you were afraid the words might scare him off.

his hands stilled.

he didn’t answer at first.

just kept staring straight ahead, face unreadable. you let the silence stretch, thinking maybe he wouldn’t say anything at all. you’d learned not to expect things from him — learned that some silences held more meaning than others.

but then, finally—

“…didn’t feel like it.”

his voice was rough. low. not cold, but… distant. like he was trying not to feel anything at all.

you nodded, slow. didn’t press. you were afraid if you did, the thread between you might snap.

but after a pause, so faint you almost missed it, he added,

“…i didn’t think you’d notice.”

you turned to him, sharp and soft at the same time.

he still wasn’t looking at you. his expression was blank — or trying to be. but his hands gave him away. his fingers were clenched in the fabric of his sleeves now, curled too tight, like he didn’t know what to do with them.

“of course i did,” you said.

three words. too big for your mouth. too true to say any quieter.

he looked at you then.

really looked.

his eyes were darker in the light, but there was something bright underneath them — something flickering, uncertain. he stared at you like he was seeing you for the first time. like he didn’t know what to do with the way you said things that meant something.

you thought he might say something more.

but he didn’t.

he didn’t have to.

because his hand — the one closest to yours — didn’t move away.

and when your pinky brushed his again, soft and hesitant and hopeful, this time…

he let it stay.

and you stayed like that until the sun dipped beneath the buildings and the wind picked up and the air grew quiet again — but it wasn’t empty.

it wasn’t lonely.

not anymore.

next chapter.