Two days.
That's how long we lasted after my mom almost caught us.
Two days of silence.
Two days of avoiding eye contact. Of locking our doors. Of pretending nothing had happened on that couch. That he hadn't been inside me while she stood ten feet away.
And then it came.
A single message.
From Avery.
One photo.
And one line:
"She deserves to know."
I saw it on Jace's phone first.
Then I saw the same message land on mine.
And then my mom's scream from the kitchen.
I bolted down the stairs just in time to find her standing by the counter, phone shaking in her hand.
The photo.
Of me. Straddling Jace.
Our mouths open. Our bodies bare. Faces blurred, but the meaning unmistakable.
My dad stood beside her, face unreadable, until he turned to Jace who was standing frozen halfway down the hall.
"Get out," my dad said coldly.
"Wait" Jace started.
"Get out of this house. Out of our lives."
He didn't yell.
He didn't need to.
My mom turned to me next, her voice brittle. "Tell me this isn't real."
But I couldn't.
I said nothing.
Because it was.
All of it.
The sneaking. The nights. The love.
Jace didn't beg. He didn't cry.
He walked to the front door, looked back at me one last time and nodded.
Like he was saying goodbye.
I didn't follow.
Not then.
Three Weeks Later
The silence was the worst part.
Worse than the shame. Worse than the therapy. Worse than the way my mom still wouldn't meet my eyes when I walked into a room.
I thought losing Jace would break me.
I was wrong.
What broke me was waking up every morning and pretending I didn't still love him.
That I didn't feel phantom hands on my skin.
That I didn't hear his voice in every song, every silence, every space he used to fill.
I saw him once.
At a gas station just outside town.
He didn't see me.
Or maybe he did but didn't want to.
He looked thinner. Tired. Older.
Like love had aged us both too fast.
Four Months Later
College started.
New place. New people. New rules.
But I still looked for him in every hallway.
And then one day… he was there.
Sitting on the quad lawn like nothing had changed.
Like fate was giving us one last chance.
He saw me.
I saw him.
Neither of us moved.
And then he stood up, walked to me slowly, and said the only thing that still mattered.
"I still love you."
And I whispered the only thing that was ever true.
"I never stopped."
He reached for my hand.
And this time, we didn't let go.
Not for guilt.
Not for rules.
Not for anyone.
Because this wasn't just a dirty little secret.
It was our truth.
And we were finally ready to live it.