Chapter Nine: Somewhere Nobody's Looking
Saturday morning was made of gray sky and soft wind.
Kira hadn't left the house in two days. She'd spent Friday curled beneath a blanket, drawing lines that went nowhere. Her mother hadn't noticed. Or if she had, she'd chosen not to ask.
So when Mina messaged her—
"Come out with me. Just us."
—Kira stared at the screen for a long time before typing:
"Where?"
And Mina wrote back:
"Anywhere nobody's looking."
They met at the edge of the park. Not the popular side with the swings and paved paths, but the old trail behind the fence, where weeds overtook the benches and the trees made shadows deeper than they needed to be.
Mina had a backpack over one shoulder and a quiet in her eyes Kira hadn't seen before.
"You okay?" Kira asked.
Mina gave a lopsided shrug. "No. But I want to be."
They didn't talk after that.
They just walked.
Through tangled brush and dry leaves and the soft hush of branches overhead.
The deeper they went, the quieter the world became.
Eventually, they found a clearing with a broken-down picnic table and a blanket of wildflowers blooming stubbornly in the dirt.
Mina dropped her bag. "This okay?"
Kira nodded.
They sat.
For a while, they didn't speak.
Kira opened her sketchbook. Mina lay back in the grass and watched clouds drift overhead like they didn't care who watched them.
After a while, Mina turned her head. "What are you drawing?"
Kira held it up.
It was Mina—lying just like she was now. Eyes half-lidded. Hair spilling out like ink. A sky behind her, blooming with stormlight.
"You make me look softer than I am," Mina said.
"You are soft," Kira replied, then added, "Underneath."
Mina reached over and brushed her fingers along Kira's sleeve. "So are you. Even if you don't think so."
Later, they lay side by side on the blanket.
Kira rested her head against Mina's shoulder. Mina laced their fingers together, slow and deliberate.
The sky above was pale with sunlight.
And for the first time in weeks, Kira didn't feel like running.
Mina spoke first.
"Did you always know?"
"Know what?"
"That you liked girls."
Kira exhaled slowly. "I didn't have a word for it. I just… knew I felt too much and not enough all at once."
Mina nodded. "Same."
They were quiet again.
Then Mina said, "When I was thirteen, a girl in my building kissed me in the laundry room. She said it was a game. But I thought about it for a year."
Kira's breath caught.
"I wanted her to do it again. She never did."
"Mine was a camp counselor," Kira whispered. "She used to braid my hair. I couldn't look at her without forgetting how to speak."
Mina laughed—gently. "We were doomed from the beginning."
Kira smiled. "Or maybe just… waiting."
Later, Mina unzipped her backpack and pulled out two warm cans of soda and a sandwich cut in half.
They sat on the old picnic bench, eating quietly, watching the wind move the trees like they were sighing.
"I wish we could stay here forever," Mina said.
Kira nodded. "Me too."
But they both knew better.
The world would wait for them.
And it would still be cruel.
Still watching.
Still whispering.
Kira picked up her sketchbook again and began drawing Mina's hand.
The way her fingers curled.
The little scar on her thumb.
The chipped black nail polish.
Halfway through, Mina reached out and touched Kira's wrist.
"Can I ask you something kind of scary?"
Kira paused. "Okay."
"Have you ever… thought you'd always be alone?"
Kira didn't answer right away.
She just set her pencil down and looked away.
Then, barely audible: "Yes."
Mina squeezed her hand. "Me too."
They sat with it.
The heaviness of it.
Like something they'd carried alone for too long, finally set down between them.
Later, when the sun had started to sink behind the trees, Kira stood and brushed the grass off her jeans.
Mina reached up to her, fingers outstretched.
Kira took them.
And when Mina pulled her gently forward, when their bodies pressed together in the golden hush of the clearing, when Mina kissed her again—long and slow and full of everything they hadn't said—Kira let herself fall into it.
This time, she didn't think about being seen.
Didn't think about labels or laughter or fear.
Only Mina's breath against hers.
Only the way her name sounded like safety when Mina whispered it into the space between their mouths.
By the time they walked back, dusk was swallowing the path behind them.
The world waited.
But Kira's hand stayed in Mina's.
And for a little while longer, that was enough.
End of Chapter Nine