Almost Love, Then Everything - Chapter 31: Chapter 31

It started with a storm.
Not a violent one—just a steady, persistent rain that kissed the city in waves, tapping against windows and gliding along rooftops. It softened the sound of everything, like the world had turned its volume down to a hush.
Inside the library, the air was warm and dry, carrying the smell of old paper, ink, and the faint scent of lemon-scented floor polish. Fluorescent lights flickered above rows of dusty shelves, but in the far corner—beneath a window fogged with condensation—the light was low and golden. That’s where Leah sat. Waiting.
She was early. She always was when it came to Jade.
Outside, people rushed by with umbrellas. Inside, time felt slower.
The table was tucked between the poetry section and a wall of tall windows. A small haven. Jade had called it “our spot” once, casually, but Leah had remembered it for days after. “Our.” Like it meant something. Like maybe it could.
When Jade arrived, soaked around the edges and breathless, Leah couldn’t help but smile. Her hair was damp and curling slightly at the ends. Her cheeks were flushed from the wind. And when their eyes met across the table, there was a pause. A flicker.
Something unspoken.
Jade dropped her bag beside the chair and sat down, shaking the rain off her sleeves. “It’s really coming down.”
“I noticed,” Leah said, sliding a cup of tea across the table without explanation. “Brought an extra.”
Jade blinked. Then smiled, soft and surprised. “You always do that.”
“What?”
“Think ahead.”
Leah shrugged. “Just a habit.”
But it wasn’t.
It was Jade.
They were supposed to be studying—some literature assignment about unreliable narrators and metaphorical weather. The irony wasn’t lost on Leah as the storm outside deepened.
Books were open. Highlighters lay untouched.
Instead, they leaned toward each other, talking about everything but the assignment. Small things. Ridiculous things. The worst books they were forced to read in high school. The weird things people whisper in libraries. Whether ghosts would read if they could.
Leah was laughing at something Jade had said—a stupid joke about Hemingway and hauntings—when she realized how close they were. Their hands were almost touching on the table. Her pinky hovered just a breath away from Jade’s.
And Jade was looking at her.
Really looking.
Not through her. Not past her.
At her.
Leah’s laughter died on her lips, caught somewhere between joy and something deeper.
Their smiles faded—but not because the moment had soured.
Because it had changed.
Everything slowed.
Even the rain, somehow, felt quieter.
Jade’s eyes lingered. Leah could feel her pulse in her throat, in her fingertips. Every part of her was suddenly hyperaware—of the slight shift in Jade’s breathing, the way her fingers flexed subtly against the tabletop, the tilt of her head as if trying to decide something that couldn't be said aloud.
Leah swallowed.
The words she could say—“What?” “Is something wrong?” “Should we get back to work?”—none of them would have been true.
Because she didn’t want to change anything about this.
Jade’s hand inched closer.
Leah’s breath caught.
And just like that, the world shrank to the space between them.
There wasn’t a kiss.
Not yet.
But there was the idea of one.
The almost.
It lingered between them, unspoken but undeniable. Leah’s gaze dropped to Jade’s lips for a fraction of a second. When she looked back up, Jade was already watching her, eyes soft, wide, afraid and hopeful all at once.
And they leaned.
Not much. Just a tilt. A pull.
Leah’s hand turned, palm open.
Jade’s fingers brushed hers.
It was the gentlest touch Leah had ever felt—and somehow, the most electric.
Then—
A book fell. Just a few shelves over.
Not loud. Not dramatic. Just enough.
The moment shattered like a bubble catching wind.
Leah blinked. Jade sat back just slightly, her cheeks burning pink. She looked down at her tea. Leah did the same.
The air between them was still charged. But different now. Less a current, more a hum.
For a long moment, neither spoke.
Finally, Jade whispered, “Sorry. That was… I wasn’t trying to—”
“You didn’t do anything wrong,” Leah said quickly.
They both looked up again. And for the second time that day, they just stared.
Minutes passed.
They tried to focus after that. Really, they did.
Jade opened her notebook. Leah read a few lines. But it was like trying to read through fog. Every word blurred. Every glance held too long. Every breath felt like it belonged in a different story.
One they hadn’t started yet.
They left the library together, walking side by side under a shared umbrella. The rain had turned softer again, barely more than a mist.
Jade held the umbrella between them. Their hands bumped. Neither pulled away.
Outside, under the soft glow of the streetlight, Leah turned to her.
“You felt it too, right?”
Jade hesitated. Then nodded. “Yeah.”
They stood there for a moment, silent.
Leah could’ve kissed her then.
But she didn’t.
She wasn’t ready. Not yet.
But she wanted to be.
That night, Leah lay in bed with her phone on the pillow beside her. Jade’s contact lit up her screen—just a single message:
“We were close, weren’t we?”
Leah stared at it for a long time before typing back:
“Closer than I’ve ever been.”
No reply came. But it didn’t matter.
Because it wasn’t the kind of moment that needed closure.
It needed time.
And the next time?
Leah knew she wouldn’t lean away.
Sometimes, the most powerful love stories don’t begin with grand gestures.
They begin with the silence before a kiss that doesn’t happen.
With the heat of almost.
The promise of someday.
The kind of moment that replays in your mind days after—softly, secretly, like a secret you almost shared but didn’t.
Not yet.
But soon.