She had told them both.. Mian and Musi.. about her and Avet.. handed them that truth like she handed them everything, without holding anything back.. trusted them with it completely..
And they had taken that trust and used it as a door.. through which they delivered, regularly and without apology, everything they found wrong..
There was one more thing that sat strangely in all of this..
When Mian or Musi said the word.. your boyfriend.. Denita flinched a little each time.. not because she did not want what she and Avet were.. she did, quietly and completely.. but because the word felt too large for where they were.. too official, too declared, too much like something that needed to be announced to a world she was not ready to announce it to..
They were something.. she knew that.. she had said yes and meant it and the warmth of it lived in her chest like a small steady light.. But boyfriend felt like a word that belonged to a louder kind of love.. and what she and Avet had was not loud.. it was the quietest, most careful thing she had ever held.. and she was not ready yet to put a word on it that the whole world could pick up and examine..
She just wanted to hold it a little longer..
Quietly.. the way she held everything that mattered most..
The lockdown did not end dramatically either.. it just.. loosened.. like a fist slowly opening.. restrictions lifted in small steps and people stepped back into the world a little cautiously, a little blinking, like coming out of a long sleep into too much light.. School was announced for the following Monday..
Denita read the notification and sat with it for a moment.. two years.. two full years of her room and her ceiling and her phone and now suddenly Monday was going to mean something again.. She texted Avet.. School is opening.. He replied in seconds.. I know.. weird right.. Very weird.. she typed back.. There was a pause and then he sent.. I will see you there.. Four words.. completely ordinary.. and yet Denita read them twice..
It was a few days before school reopened that she first saw him on the street.. She had been living on Langshi Street for some months now.. had walked its length many times.. knew which pavement stones were uneven, knew the corner shop that opened too early and the one that closed too late.. knew the row of old trees that dropped leaves in a particular unhurried way she had grown fond of.. She was walking back from Mian's house one morning, still half asleep, when she saw someone running at the far end of the street.. Not jogging.. actually running.. with the kind of form that does not happen accidentally.. focused, deliberate, each stride like it had somewhere important to be.. And then the person turned at the corner and she saw the face.. It was Avet.. She stopped completely on the pavement.. He had not seen her.. he ran past the end of the street and disappeared around the bend.. gone as quickly as he had appeared.. leaving Denita standing there in the early morning with a strange feeling she could not immediately name.. She stood there a moment longer than she needed to.. then walked home and said nothing about it to anyone..
When school finally reopened the new class was different in its arrangement.. new seats, shuffled rows.. and Avet ended up one desk ahead of where Denita and Mian sat.. One desk ahead.. which meant if he turned even slightly he could see her.. and if she looked up from her notebook she would find the back of his head.. and sometimes, the side of his face when he turned to say something to someone nearby.. He turned more than was strictly necessary.. Denita noticed but said nothing.. she was good at noticing things and saying nothing.. Sometimes their eyes met.. properly.. the kind of eye contact that lasts exactly one second too long to be accidental.. and then one of them would look away and the class would continue as if nothing had happened.. Mian, sitting right beside Denita, noticed all of it.. every single time.. and stored it away with the patience of someone building a very compelling case..