By the time Penelope walked back across the street, the porch was empty. Veronica and Callie had left, probably assuming she'd disappeared into the mystery boy's orbit—and they weren't wrong.
She climbed the steps slowly, her heart still buzzing in her chest like a held breath. Every detail from the last hour flickered behind her eyes: the notebook, the storm, the way Julian had looked at her like she wasn't just someone, but something.
She didn't sleep much that night.
Not because she was overthinking—but because, for once, she wasn't.
The next morning, her phone lit up with a message from an unknown number"You left your bracelet."
—Julian
She blinked.
She hadn't even realized it was missing.
"I'll come get it," she replied.
"Cool. I'll be out back."
That became their place.
Not a park. Not a café. Just the back steps of a half-empty house, where time didn't rush and nothing had to be explained. Where he wrote and she watched the sky and neither of them asked too much.
It was quiet there.
But it wasn't silence.
It was the space between two people learning to trust the shape of each other.
And somehow, that felt louder than anything.