Rebecca

The knock came exactly seven minutes after you'd sent the text.

I'm bored. Come save me.

You barely had time to unlock the apartment door before it swung open to reveal Becca standing there with one eyebrow raised.

"You know," she said, slipping past you with the confidence of someone who'd been there dozens of times, "one of these days I'm going to ignore your dramatic messages."

"You say that every time."

"And yet," she sighed dramatically, setting her backpack on the floor beside the couch, "here I am."

She wasn't wrong. She was almost always there.

Four years of friendship had a way of blurring the line between being invited over and simply...showing up. Your apartment building had become just as familiar to Becca as her own house. She knew which elevator squeaked on the way to the fifth floor, which vending machine on the first floor refused to take dollar bills, and exactly how hard your apartment door had to be pulled before it actually latched.

"You hungry?" you asked.

"I was hoping you'd ask." she replied with a smile.

"You literally ate before coming over."

"I can eat twice."

"That's concerning."

"It's talent."

You rolled your eyes, already heading toward the kitchen.

"I've been here enough to earn shared custody of your pantry."

"You absolutely have not."

"You keep saying that, yet you keep buying the cereal I like."

"...That's circumstantial."

"Mhm."

A grin spread across her face as she leaned against the counter, watching you search through the cabinets.

She looked different than she had when the two of you first met. Older, obviously, but not in the way people usually meant. It was in the little things—the way she spoke without second-guessing herself, how easily she laughed now, how comfortable she seemed in her own skin. The awkward uncertainty that used to follow both of you through high school had faded into something steadier.

You'd changed too.

Maybe that was why the friendship had lasted.

Neither of you had stayed the same person, but somehow you'd grown in the same direction.

The afternoon drifted by without much effort.

A movie played in the background that neither of you really watched. You argued over whether pineapple belonged on pizza, played three rounds of a game Becca insisted she wasn't competitive about despite celebrating every victory like she'd won a championship, and wandered down to the lobby just to grab snacks from the vending machines because, according to Becca, "walking makes food taste better."

By the time you made it back upstairs, the sun had settled low enough to paint orange streaks across the apartment walls.

"Looks nice," Becca murmured, standing by the living room window.

"It does."

For a while, neither of you said anything.

The room grew dimmer by the minute, shadows stretching across the floor until the warm colors outside gave way to blue, then gray.

Eventually the first streetlights blinked on below.

Becca let out a quiet breath.

"...I forgot how late it was."

You looked at the window. The reflection staring back had begun to replace the view outside.

"Yeah."

Night wasn't exactly a favorite for either of you.

It wasn't that either of you were afraid of the dark. It was more that nighttime had always felt...heavier somehow. The apartment became quieter, the hallway outside emptier, the city sounds more distant. Thoughts that were easy to ignore during the day seemed to find room to settle once everything slowed down.

Without really thinking about it, Becca wandered over and sat beside you on the couch. Close enough that your shoulders brushed. She nudged your arm lightly with hers.

"...You okay?”