My Romance Life System

The bus pulled away from the resort, engine humming low. Kofi stared out the window at pine trees blurring past, his reflection pale against the dark glass. The campfire still burned behind his eyes.

'God, I'm such an idiot.'

He kept replaying it, hearing his own voice like it belonged to someone else, those three statements hanging there in the air. He'd wanted to tell her something real, something about how the last few days had felt, but instead he'd picked the stupidest possible way to do it and ruined everything.

Across the aisle, Nina sat with her arms crossed, staring at the seat back in front of her like she was trying to burn a hole through it.

'What the hell am I supposed to do with that? Was he joking? Because it wasn't funny. And if he wasn't joking, then what? He just confessed? In front of everyone? Why would he do that to me?'

Her thoughts kept circling back to the same impossible place. The air between them had been so easy an hour ago, full of laughter and jokes, and now it felt thick enough to choke on.

Jake cleared his throat from the seat behind Kofi, leaning forward to whisper to Ruby, though his whisper carried in the quiet bus.

"So that was... weird."

Ruby pulled a book from her bag and opened it to some random page, angling her whole body away from the drama. She didn't answer, just pretended to read about ancient Mesopotamian farming techniques like they were the most fascinating thing in the world.

Thea watched them all from her seat next to Kofi.

'They're all broken. They don't know how to talk to each other at all.'

She looked down at her hands folded in her lap. Her world was quiet and lonely, but it was simple. This world with friends and feelings and games that weren't really games was dangerous territory she didn't understand.

Kofi shifted in his seat, the small movement breaking the stillness. He glanced at Thea.

"You okay?"

The question was quiet, just for her. She looked up from her hands, surprised.

"I'm fine."

He nodded and went back to staring out the window. Him checking on her, even while drowning in his own disaster, was strangely comforting. A thread of normal in a moment that felt anything but.

The hours crawled by. Nobody spoke. All the easy friendship from the trip had evaporated, leaving behind this awful silence. When the bus finally rumbled back into town, the boring familiar streets of their neighborhood were a relief.

The bus pulled up to the school, other students stirring awake, chatter and energy returning as they grabbed their bags. Kofi's group stayed frozen in their bubble of awkwardness.

Ms. Lail stood up at the front.

"Alright everyone, we're here. Make sure you have all your belongings. Your parents should be waiting in the main lot. Have a great rest of your weekend."

Kofi stood and grabbed his duffel from the overhead rack without looking at anyone. Thea followed, her movements small and careful.

Jake and Ruby got up next, Jake giving Kofi a look that mixed pity with intense curiosity. Kofi ignored him completely.

He and Thea were first off the bus. The air was cool, sun already getting low. He didn't wait for the others, just started walking with Thea trailing behind like a shadow. He heard Nina's voice behind them, sharp and clear as she directed Jake and Ruby somewhere, but he didn't turn around.

He just needed to get home. Needed the quiet of his apartment where he didn't have to think about the mess he'd made.

They walked in silence. Thea kept her distance, head down, gripping her new duffel bag tight. When they reached the apartment building, he unlocked the main door and held it open for her, his movements stiff and automatic. They rode the elevator up without a word.

He unlocked the apartment door and stepped inside, dropping his bag on the floor with a heavy thud. The quiet rushed in to meet them.

Thea walked straight past him to her room, the door closing behind her with a soft click.

He was alone again.

He stood in the entryway for a long time, the apartment's silence pressing in on him. He'd wanted to tell her he was happy. He'd wanted to tell her he was scared. He'd wanted to tell her something.

He'd just wanted her to know she was the reason for both.

He let out a long breath and walked into the living room, collapsing onto the couch and burying his face in his hands.

'Complete and total idiot.'

Nina walked home alone. She'd sent Jake and Ruby away with quick, efficient commands, her usual teasing energy replaced by something cold and businesslike.

'This is such a mess. A huge, unfixable disaster.'

She kicked a loose stone on the sidewalk, sending it skittering into the street. Her mind was still churning. If the lie was that he loved her, then what did that mean? Was he trying to be dramatic? Testing her somehow?

'He was telling you the truth. The only way he could figure out how.'

Thea's words from last night kept coming back. The simple certainty of a fourteen-year-old girl who saw things with a clarity that Nina, for all her social skills, completely lacked.

'He's happy and he's scared. And both those things are about me.'

The thought terrified her. It was a weight she hadn't asked for and didn't know how to carry. She was supposed to be his pillar, the strong one, but right now she felt like she was about to collapse.

She reached her house and let herself in, the familiar comfort of home doing nothing for the chaos in her head.

"Nina? Is that you, dear?" Her mom called from the kitchen. "How was the trip?"

"Fine. Just tired."

Her voice came out flat and unconvincing even to herself. She went straight up to her room and closed the door, leaning back against it with a heavy sigh. She looked around at her fashion magazines and cute plushies. It all felt like it belonged to someone else, some girl who cared about things that seemed ridiculous now.

She flopped onto her bed and pulled out her phone, thumb hovering over his contact.

'What do I even say? Sorry my existence is causing you an existential crisis? That's a bit much for a text.'

She typed out a message, then deleted it. Typed another one. Deleted that too.

Finally she just sent three words.

Nina: Are you okay?

She tossed her phone onto the bed and stared at the ceiling. The three dots appeared almost instantly, blinking for a long moment. Then they disappeared.

Her phone went dark. He hadn't answered.

Cold dread settled in her stomach.

'He's not answering. I broke him. I actually broke him.'

Kofi saw the message. Saw the dots appear and disappear. He stared at his phone, thumb frozen over the keyboard.

'What am I supposed to say? Yeah, I'm great, just emotionally imploded in front of all our friends, how about you?'

He couldn't do it. Couldn't find the words. He turned his phone off and tossed it onto the couch.

He stood up and walked into the kitchen, opening the fridge to stare at its well-stocked interior. He wasn't hungry.

He closed the fridge and went to his room, shutting the door behind him. He sat on his bed and just sat there. The apartment's quiet felt like a heavy blanket, and for the first time since Thea moved in, it felt lonely again.

He had a sister who wasn't his sister. He had a friend who wasn't just a friend. And he had no idea what to do with either of them.

The bonfire had burned everything down, and now he was sitting in the ashes, waiting for something to grow back or for the wind to blow it all away.

His phone was still in the living room, Nina's message still unanswered. Outside his window, the sun kept sinking lower, painting everything orange and red like the fire was following him home.

'Tomorrow,' he thought. 'I'll figure out what to say tomorrow.'

But tomorrow felt impossibly far away, and the words he needed felt even farther.

In her room, Thea sat on her bed with her new clothes still in the duffel bag. She could hear the apartment's silence through the walls, could feel Kofi's misery like a weight in the air. She pulled out her phone and looked at the photo Ruby had taken of them all by the lake, everyone laughing, everyone together.

'They were happy then,' she thought. 'Just yesterday they were all so happy.'

She set the phone down and started unpacking her clothes, folding each item carefully and putting it away. The routine helped, gave her hands something to do while her mind tried to process everything that had happened.

'He told the truth,' she thought, hanging up the jacket Nina had helped her pick out. 'And now everyone's scared of it.'

She understood being scared of the truth. She'd been scared of it her whole life. But watching them all run from it, watching them hurt each other because they didn't know how to handle something real, made her chest ache in a way she didn't have words for.

She finished unpacking and sat back on her bed, the apartment still painfully quiet around her. She thought about going to check on Kofi, but what would she say? She barely knew how to comfort herself, let alone someone else.

So she stayed in her room, both of them alone in their separate spaces, the echo of the bonfire still burning between them all.