ARIA'S POV.
I told myself the fundraiser meant nothing.
It was just another campus obligation, another box ticked. Ethan standing beside me didn't have to mean anything more than coincidence. I had survived worse than awkward proximity.
But my body hadn't gotten the memo.
I felt him before I really saw him—his presence registering in that quiet, unsettling way reserved for people who once knew you too well. Not close enough to touch. Not far enough to ignore.
I hated that it still affected me.
What unsettled me more was how careful he was.
He didn't crowd me. Didn't lean in. Didn't try to make himself familiar again. Every movement was deliberate, restrained, like he was constantly checking himself.
That should have eased me.
Instead, it made me notice him more.
We worked side by side, efficient, polite. When our hands brushed, he apologized immediately. When our shoulders came close, he shifted away first. No teasing. No charm. No performance.
Just… awareness.
It was harder to hate someone who wasn't trying to win.
When he said he was trying—not to push, not to make things harder—I believed him. Not because of his words, but because of his silence afterward. He didn't follow them with excuses. He let them stand on their own.
Still, belief didn't mean safety.
I left as soon as we were dismissed, my heart beating too loudly for something I claimed didn't matter.
Later that night, alone in my apartment, I replayed the way his voice had sounded—lower, steadier. The way he hadn't reached for me when the chance had been there.
Change was unsettling.
Ella noticed the shift before I named it.
"You're thinking about him again," she said the next day, not accusing. Observing.
"I'm thinking about myself," I corrected. "And how much energy it takes to pretend he doesn't exist."
She hummed. "That's not nothing."
No. It wasn't.
Over the next few weeks, it happened again. Not constantly. Just enough.
Passing each other near the library. Standing in the same coffee line. A mutual friend's birthday where we existed on opposite sides of the room, stealing glances we didn't admit to.
He never approached me.
That was the thing.
If he had, I would've shut it down immediately. The restraint left room for curiosity to slip in where anger used to live.
One afternoon, rain trapped us under the same awning outside a campus building. I arrived first. He showed up seconds later, stopped short when he saw me.
"I can move," he said.
I shook my head. "It's fine."
We stood there, listening to the rain hammer against concrete, the air cool and close. He stared straight ahead, hands in his pockets like they might betray him if left free.
"You don't have to be afraid of me," I said quietly.
He exhaled. "I'm not afraid of you. I'm afraid of hurting you again."
That honesty caught in my chest.
"I'm not fragile," I said.
"I know," he replied. "That's what makes it worse."
We didn't touch. We didn't smile. But something softened anyway.
When the rain slowed, I stepped away first.
"Take care, Ethan."
"You too, Aria."
I walked home with my thoughts louder than my footsteps.
That night, I realized the slow burn had begun—not with longing, but with restraint. With the tension of two people standing close to a fire and choosing not to reach for the heat.
I didn't know if I would ever trust him again.
But I knew this:
Indifference would've been easier.
And the fact that it wasn't… meant something.