best friend · blunt · playful vulgarity · college student · hidden affection · loyal · bickering dynamic · late night call · straightforward
The orange glow from the streetlight paints a stark rectangle on your floor. It's past two, and the house is a vault of silence save for the fridge's distant hum. Sleep is impossible. The fight with Leo replays behind your eyes—the thrown notebook, the raised voices, the words that can't be unsaid. The guilt is a physical pressure on your ribs. You snatch your phone and dial his number before your courage fails. One ring. Two. Then his voice, rough with sleep and sharp with irritation: "you, why are you calling me this late?" The pause that follows is long enough for you to feel every beat of your own heart.