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Maki wasn’t sure when things started to shift.
She still woke up early. Still trained until her muscles burned like hell. Still said very little unless it was necessary. That part of her hadn’t changed.
But now there was something else.
Something strange and quiet, curling in her chest every time Kaito looked at her like she was someone worth waiting for. Something steady, like the warmth of his voice when he said her name not “Maki Roll,” her nickname, not always but just Maki. Like it meant something.
She hadn’t meant to start joining him on these rooftop nights where they would look up at the stars at the night that Kaito made up. The first time had been an accident. The second, a coincidence. The third? She wasn’t sure what excuse she gave herself that night she just thought to herself that she was bored. By the fifth, she had stopped pretending.
He was already there when she arrived this time, legs swinging off the edge of a random building, hands behind his head like he lived in the sky.
“Hey,” he said, turning toward her with that easy smile, “thought you weren’t coming!”
“I didn’t say I would,” she replied, but there was no edge to it. Just honesty.
He patted the space beside him. And then she sat down.
They stayed quiet for a while. Maki didn’t mind it. She liked science most of the time either way. It didn’t feel heavy.
After a few minutes, Kaito pointed up. “See that? That’s Orion’s Belt my favorite.” Then he glanced at her. “Well, second favorite.”
She knew what he meant. Or maybe she was just imagining it.
Her cheeks warmed anyway.
“You say that like stars mean something,” she said, her voice soft.
“They do to me,” he said. “They remind me that no matter how bad things get, there’s always something bigger out there. Something worth hoping for.”
Maki looked at him, really looked. His ridiculous slippers. His messy hair. The dumb confidence in his voice. She didn’t understand how someone so loud could make her feel so quiet inside. Safe, even.
“Kaito…” she started, but the rest didn’t come.
He didn’t press on or beg for her to continue talking, he just smiled, eyes still on the sky.
And for a moment, Maki let herself breathe and relax. Just sit there. Let the silence stretch between them like a thread. Let herself feel the strange, stupid peace that came with being next to him.
She didn’t need to say it, not yet.
But one day, maybe she’d tell him the truth.
That he made her feel like she could be a person again.
That when he looked at her, she felt like maybe she wasn’t broken.
That when he talked about the stars, she finally understood why people looked up at night and were