The track didn't start with a melody; it started with a texture.

It drifted from Reyhaan's desk speaker—low enough to stay contained within the four walls of his room, lower still so it wouldn't creep down the hallway of his parents' house.

Untitled. Unfinished.

He let the loop run. There were no lyrics, no vocals. He wasn't ready for that layer yet. But the skeleton of the piece was there, stitched together from fragments he had collected over the last few weeks: the metallic clink of a spoon against a ceramic mug, the hum of bicycle wheels on pavement, the reverb of a door closing in an empty stairwell.

It sounded less like a song and more like a place. Something made of pauses. Memory. Air.

And tonight, it felt almost whole.

Reyhaan leaned back in his chair, the scarf loose at his neck, hoodie still on. He hadn't changed since coming home from the fest. His body hummed with a low-grade exhaustion, but his mind refused to power down. His voice didn't ache as much today—a small mercy. But the habit of withholding speech had grown into a second skin. Protective. Necessary.

He looked at the waveform on the screen, jagged peaks and long, flat valleys.

Today hadn't been loud, but it had been full. Brimming, in the quiet way good things often are.

The cookie stall under the fairy-lit tree had somehow become the gravitational center of the fest. Between the paper crowns, the glitter paint, and Maya's theatrical shouting about "emotional calories," people had come for the spectacle and stayed for the feeling.

And it had been theirs.

Kian insisting on the Chili-Choco 'Fire' cookies despite Maya's threats of a lawsuit. Maya designing QR codes that looked like magic sigils. Aria coming up with the concept: flavor as memory.

He smiled, remembering his own contribution. Don't explain it. Let them figure it out.

And the stories baked into those trays... they felt like inside jokes made tangible. Like Maya's 3 a.m. lavender-fueled script crisis. Kian's disastrous flirting attempt in front of Professor Meijer. Aria's first test batch—imperfect, slightly scorched, but entirely hers. And the tin at the back, the one with coconut and raisin that tasted like home. He had named it simply: Ours.

He could still hear the specific pitch of Aria's laugh when Kian accidentally scanned the wrong code and pulled up a video of Maya arguing with a coffee mug.

Later, around the fire, the energy had shifted. The frantic pace of the day dissolved into embers. Kian and Maya had vanished with the coordination of a heist crew, leaving him and Aria by the warmth.

They had sat shoulder to shoulder, trading marshmallows and conversation that didn't require effort. He thought of her profile in the flickering light, her gaze steady on the flames. She didn't try to fill the gaps in the conversation. She honored them.

You don't have to explain everything, you know. To everyone.

He hadn't realized how heavy the burden of explanation was until she lifted it off him.

She was like that—a presence that didn't push, but expanded the room so you could breathe. She didn't stare at the cracks in the pavement; she just walked beside you so you didn't trip.

He looked at his music journal lying open on the table. A single line was scrawled across the page in black ink: She didn't ask, and that felt like trust.

He let that sit for a moment.

Then, he reached for his laptop and clicked open the chat app. Two missed pings from Lucian and Silas. He'd mentioned the group to them—the classmates, the project. The bookstore girl, the dramatic one, the tall one who spoke in podcast voice. He hadn't given them names yet. Naming things made them fragile.

He hit "Call."

They answered with the speed of people who had been waiting.

Lucian appeared first, wrapped in a thick hoodie, curled sideways on his couch like a cat that paid rent, clutching a chipped mug. "Finally. The cookie celebrity emerges."

"Long day," Reyhaan said, voice raspy but functioning.

Silas's screen lit up next—desk tidy, lamp angled with surgical precision, glasses perched on his nose. "So we've seen."

Lucian smirked. "Jay nearly went live with a post called 'Baking Through the Breakdown.'"

"I'm blocking all of you," Reyhaan muttered, though the threat lacked heat.

"Too late. We're famous," Lucian drawled. "Again."

Reyhaan rolled his eyes but couldn't fight the smile. "It was a student fest. Low stakes."

"And yet," Silas arched a brow, "you went viral. Not for the band. Not for your voice. But for a cookie stall with QR codes and cryptic poetry."

"It wasn't cryptic."

"It was a little cryptic," Lucian argued. "The roasted green tea one? That one made me want to journal."

"It made someone draw a cookie with legs," Reyhaan replied, chuckling.

There was a pause in the audio feed, a brief lag. Then Lucian leaned in slightly, thumb rubbing the rim of his mug. "They're good people?"

"Yeah." Reyhaan hesitated, testing the weight of the admission. "Yeah, they are."

Silas folded his arms, watching him through the pixels. "The girl you mentioned... Aria?"

He didn't answer right away.

"Quiet bookstore girl?" Lucian prompted.

Reyhaan nodded slowly. "That's her."

Silas tilted his head, curious but careful not to pry too hard. "Still feel like you can talk to her?"

"More than that." Reyhaan glanced away from the camera, looking at the waveform on his own screen. "With her, I don't feel like I'm translating myself. You know that feeling? Where someone listens like they already have the context?"

Lucian's expression softened. "Yeah. I do."

"She asked me nothing about the band. Not once. I think she knows—all three of them probably do. But they don't treat me like a headline. They don't treat me like I'm broken or interesting. Just... a person."

Silas adjusted his glasses. "That's rare."

"Yeah. She..." Reyhaan exhaled, searching for the right phrasing. "She has this way of saying things that stick. Not advice. Just... observations, laid down gently. No pressure to agree. Just offered."

"Like you're not being watched?" Lucian suggested.

"Exactly."

The connection hummed with a comfortable lull. It wasn't awkward. It was the shorthand of years.

Then Lucian leaned forward again. "You trust her?"

Reyhaan watched the pulsing light of his screen—the track still looping silently. A quiet guitar thread folding back into itself. "Yeah," he said. "I do."

Silas glanced away, then back. "Have you told her? About... the rest?"

"No." Reyhaan's voice dropped. "Not yet. She doesn't ask."

"That's not the same as not deserving to know," Lucian stated, kindly.

"I know."

Another pause. Then Silas asked, gently, "Does it feel good? This thing... starting?"

Reyhaan nodded. "It feels slow. But right."

Lucian smiled, lifting his mug in a toast. "That's the best kind."

Reyhaan looked toward the window. The city outside was a blur of amber and shadow—just like the track playing behind him.

Lucian's voice, warm and tired, threaded through the speakers. "Then start when you're ready. But don't miss it waiting for perfection."

"I won't," Reyhaan replied. "I'm not hiding."

Silas nodded. "Good."

Because tonight, Reyhaan didn't feel like a version of himself. He just felt present. With her, he didn't need subtitles for his silence. And maybe that was how healing began—not in answers, but in being allowed to stay quiet and still be seen.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Campus hadn't gotten louder—just tighter. The air felt pressurized, like a rubber band pulled to its limit, waiting to snap.

Finals loomed. Study rooms overflowed with the smell of panic and cheap deodorant. Students moved with tunnel vision, sprinting between labs and vending machines, chasing documents, extensions, and caffeine. Daylight barely made a difference anymore; hours blurred under whiteboards and fluorescent exhaustion.

"This is it," Maya declared, slamming her pen onto the table with a dramatic thwack that made a nearby student jump. "This is how I die. Drowning in final assignments, buried under a mountain of coffee-stained lecture slides."

Kian didn't even blink, his eyes glued to his code. "You're writing a screenplay, Maya. My compiler just told me it 'refuses to recognize happiness as a variable.' I'm literally arguing with a machine."

Reyhaan, halfway through highlighting yet another section of notes, raised an eyebrow without looking up. "Pretty sure your machine has a point."

Kian pointed his pen at him. "Et tu, Brute?"

"I mean," Reyhaan said, shrugging, "you did name your code 'final_final_FINAL_2plswork.' That's not confidence. That's a cry for help."

Maya snorted. Aria, seated beside Reyhaan, hid a smile behind her mug of lukewarm tea.

"I just want to go back to the beginning of the semester," Maya groaned, dragging her face across her notebook. "Back when life was simpler. And deadlines didn't eat my soul."

"Oh yeah," Kian chimed in. "When we thought 'group project' meant 'bonding' and not 'mutual emotional breakdown.'"

"I miss when the most stressful part of my day was finding the right tram stop," Aria added softly.

Reyhaan turned toward her, amused. "Wasn't that just last week?"

"Yes. But now the tram stop is symbolic."

The table held the pause for one second before all four of them dissolved into laughter.

It was nearing dusk, and the common area outside the media lab looked like a blast zone—laptops open, snack wrappers multiplying, someone's coat draped dramatically over a broken chair like a fallen soldier. The air smelled of stress and leftover vending machine coffee.

"Okay, we need air," Reyhaan said, stretching as he stood, his back cracking audibly. "Actual oxygen. Before Maya starts writing her eulogy in screenplay format."

Maya held up her notes. "INT. LIBRARY – NIGHT. MAYA PERISHES UNDER THE WEIGHT OF UNREALISTIC EXPECTATIONS –"

"Not helping," Aria said with a small laugh, closing her laptop.

"C'mon," Kian said. "Let's walk. Get snacks. Maybe commit light academic fraud."

"Define 'light,'" Aria deadpanned.

"Anything under plagiarism," he replied.

Ten minutes later, they were out of the building and walking through the cobbled street two blocks from campus. The cold air was sharp enough to flush their cheeks, but not enough to drive them back inside. A row of warm yellow bulbs swung above them from awnings, casting everything in a sleepy, golden glow.

Footsteps echoed on the stones. Coats brushed. Someone's dog strutted past in a reindeer sweater—two months early and twice as proud.

Vendors called out half-heartedly, selling the last of their hot chocolate, sugar-dusted pastries, and roasted chestnuts. A busker played soft chords on a guitar near the corner. The music threaded faintly into the air, just enough to feel, not hear.

Reyhaan tucked his hands into his pockets, scarf snug around his throat. They hadn't fixed anything—assignments still loomed like storm clouds—but the walk shook something free inside him. Like a muscle he hadn't realized was tense had finally relaxed.

He glanced at Aria. She'd been smiling more lately. Laughing, too. Maybe comfort could be slow–earned in crumbs and quiet nights and jokes that didn't need punchlines.

Maya grabbed a chocolate-filled churro and let out a noise that was half moan, half religious experience. "This tastes like joy."

Kian took one, bit into it, and nodded solemnly. "A spiritual experience."

Aria shook her head, trying not to laugh. "I thought we were just going to walk."

"You thought wrong," Maya said with her mouth full. "This is now a soul-healing pilgrimage."

Reyhaan lingered near a waffle stand before offering Aria one, still warm, wrapped in crisp paper.

"Here," he said. "You need one too. For spiritual balance."

She blinked. "You're trying to bribe me into staying longer."

"Is it working?"

Aria hesitated, then took the waffle. "I'll stay ten more minutes."

Maya gave her dramatic puppy eyes. "Make it fifteen?"

Kian added, "We'll throw in free friendship for life."

"Tempting," Aria muttered. "But I already have that."

And just like that, the weight cracked. The night didn't feel like finals or pressure anymore—just four students wandering through golden light, sugar in their hands.

They passed a stall dusted with cinnamon steam and old wood. The vendor, an older man with a thick grey beard and the calm of someone who'd seen every form of student panic, leaned forward.

"Wait a minute." His eyes locked on Reyhaan. "Aren't you... Are you Reyhaan? From VYER?"

The world stuttered.

Reyhaan blinked. "Nope."

The man squinted. "You look exactly like him."

"I get that a lot," Reyhaan said, his face a mask of perfect seriousness. "But I'm Michael. I'm Mexican. I sell socks on Tuesdays."

Kian didn't flinch. "We're actually his band. Sock Pop."

Maya nodded, biting the inside of her cheek. "Our debut album drops next spring. It's called Thread Lightly."

Aria tilted her head, utterly calm. "My stage name is Woolfie."

The vendor stared at them like they'd just staged a collective hallucination. Eventually, he let out a slow chuckle. "Alright, alright. You kids are weird."

"We prefer niche," Reyhaan replied, grinning as they paid and walked away.

They didn't last more than half a block.

The moment they turned into the quieter street that curved back toward campus, Maya broke first—laughing so hard she nearly dropped her churro.

"I can't believe you said Michael!"

"He panicked," Kian said between fits of laughter. "And then committed."

"I feel bad for lying," Reyhaan said, wiping his eyes. "But also... that was absurdly fun."

"Exactly!" Maya nudged him. "Not everything needs to be heavy. You're allowed to mess around."

Aria, walking beside him, smiled gently. "You were really convincing, actually."

"I should've said I was from Peru."

She bumped her elbow lightly against his, then looked forward again with the quietest flicker of a smile. "Nah. You're definitely a Michael. From Mexico."

They kept laughing until they reached the university gates, looser now, like the cold couldn't get in.

Reyhaan let the moment settle in his chest. It wasn't the lie that warmed him. It was how easily they joined him in it—no questions, no fear of slipping the mask. Just laughter and light.