Prologue
It began with a smile.
Not the one you find on a stranger's face in a random coffee shop, but the one that appears in pixels, bound so beautifully by golden light, shared innocently with no purpose.
But it changed a life.....or maybe two… it really did.
He was famous. Unreachable. A face she had no right to fall in love with. And yet, she did.
"It hurts that I can only stare at his photos", she sighed.
Initially, it was only admiration, a secret crush on a guy from another nation who had no idea she was alive. But days turned into weeks, and his pictures, his smile, even the spaces between his updates, started to become pieces of her own beat.
She just couldn't go a without taking a glance at the pictures of a stranger who felt so weirdly close to her heart.
"I'm so pathetic", she chuckled bitterly at her own stupidity.
The night went on and on, as if it had gobbled up the world itself. Laura was bent on her bed, phone cradled in her hand, flipping through the old feed for the hundredth time. Each photo, each post, each small like a lifeline she grabbed onto, though it squeezed her chest with a quiet, stubborn yearning.
There he was once more. Evan. Just an image, just a smile, just a view of a world she could only reach by touching it from afar. A life that appeared out of reach, and yet somehow irresistible, attracting something she couldn't define. The attraction was not rational. It was not safe. It was not supposed to be. And yet she felt it anyway.
Her room had a lingering scent of coffee and stale textbooks, leftovers from a day spent with nose buried deep in assignments she couldn't recall getting through. She would laugh if anyone could see her now—sitting alone, half heart in the real world, half in a dream that could never be hers.
A gentle trill of her laptop startled her. A message. A small recognition, a glimmer of contact, and the world had been made a little lighter for an instant. She smiled, then questioned herself.
Was it enough? Did it have any significance at all?
No.
That was the answer to her questions. But to her, that small act of recognition felt like she had him in her world already. Like a small part of his world had finally reached her.
Something she had been longing ever since she saw him.
Somewhere in the recesses of her mind, she was aware that she wasn't alone in this. Someone was always there, someone who chuckled at her terrible jokes, teased her for her late-night browsing, and in some strange way perceived all the things in her that she didn't expose to anyone else. But tonight, that someone wasn't there. Tonight, it was only her, the screen, and a name that kept her restless.
"Did I just ruin everything?", she murmured as she sat on the cold floor, leaning against the edge of her bed, staring at the texts she had sent to Aiden.
>"Aiden... please talk to me once?"
She typed, then deleted again, she typed again and after so much protesting, she finally sent it.
Laura didn't realize how long she stayed there before she finally hung up the phone, a still determination in her heart. The world outside was black, rainy, and out of reach, but perhaps, only perhaps, she would be able to find a means to live in it. Somehow. Someday.
And somehow, she would begin with maintaining her balance in the one world she could still reach out to, the one that she had with Aiden, her anchor in the still quiet storm of her own desire.
But now, the world she had with Aiden who stood by her in all the ways of life seemed to drift away as well. She blamed herself. And maybe, she indeed was the reason.
Aiden used to light up her ordinary days by not even doing much. And now she was missing the warmth, the solitude she had felt in his presence all these years.
For the first time ever, his absence felt uncomfortable and lonely. Like a part of her symphony was missing. As if her world was now nothing, but a fragile void.
Did he mean so much to her?
Well, yes. She felt nothing but emptiness filled inside her as she caught herself tangled in doubts, in questions she had to herself.
Did I make the wrong decision?
Did I take my foolishness for real?
Did I have to take it this far?
How do I fix this now?
Just then, a notification popped on her phone. And it completely distracted her from the thoughts of Aiden.
All it took was a notification. Just a notification from someone she was head over heels for was enough to drift her attention from the one who had done so much for her all these years.
She felt shameful. But it didn't help at all.
Author's Note
Hey everyone, thank you for checking out Somewhere Between Us. This story means a lot to me, and I hope it finds the right hearts.
I hope you enjoy it, leave a comment or a thought after a chapter. I would love to read how you feel about the story so far. It helps me grow and keeps the story alive.
Enjoy your time reading <3
