SOPHIA LAFORTEZA

Sophia always tried too hard with you. Not in a desperate way, more like she genuinely wants to be impressive, memorable, someone you’d never forget. She listens closely when you talk, remembers offhand comments, turns them into gestures you didn’t ask for but somehow needed. You tease her about it, but she still never stops anyway.

You’d fallen asleep late, phone discarded somewhere on the bed, curtains half-drawn. The room was quiet in that deep, early-morning way, when everything feels unreal and soft around the edges. You were halfway between dreaming and waking when a dull thump cut through the silence.

Your eyes cracked open. You stared at the window, still groggy, brain slow to catch up. A shape moved outside, followed by a quiet, very undignified hiss of pain, the hiss was followed by a whispered “Ow..”

You blinked.

You blinked, and.. there Sophia was. She was crouched awkwardly on the windowsill, clutching a small bouquet in one hand and a slightly crushed box of chocolates in the other, clearly regretting every life choice that led her there.

You pushed yourself up on one elbow, squinting at her, caught somewhere between amused and deeply confused “What.. in the world?” You said slowly. “What are you doing?”

Sophia froze, eyes wide, like a kid caught sneaking back in past curfew. “I was trying to be romantic,” she whispered. “I didn’t think you’d wake up.”

You glanced at the flowers. The chocolates. The scraped knee she was pretending not to notice. “You… climbed in through my window?”

She nodded, sheepish. “Surprise?”