Like a Love Song ¹

Back at the House

The lock clicked.

Jun heard it.

He stood just inside the hallway, wrapped in an old hoodie, barefoot on the creaking wooden floor. He hadn't said another word after that last biting remark. Hadn't tried to stop them either. Just let the silence swallow everything.

Then the quiet.

The kind that comes when a door closes and stays closed.

He moved to the window, the one overlooking the front steps, just in time to see Ares brush snow from Eira's shoulders and wrap his scarf around her neck. She was laughing — soft, radiant, the kind of laugh she used to save for him. Or maybe he just imagined it that way.

He watched them walk down the path. Slow. Close.

He didn't realize his hands had curled into fists until he felt his nails dig into his palm.

Locked in.

Not literally, but it felt that way.

The house that had once felt alive with music and banter and midnight snacks now sat still. The living room was dim, the kettle forgotten, and the walls echoed more than they used to. His eyes moved to the mug on the counter — hers. The one with the chipped lip and a fading sticker that read "Introvert Fuel."

He picked it up.

Held it for a long moment.

Then set it back down with a soft clink.

Sat on the couch with a blanket he didn't need.

And whispered to the empty room, "I should've said something sooner."

By the Lake

The sky was sinking into shades of lilac and honey when Eira and Ares reached the lakeside again. The same path, but it felt entirely different now — like the air knew what had shifted between them.

They didn't speak right away. Just walked, hands brushing, hearts a little louder than before.

Eira exhaled slowly. "Wow."

Ares smiled beside her. "Right?"

They walked in silence for a while, their boots crunching softly over the packed snow. The lake stretched out before them like a dream, the island chapel in the center bathed in soft gold from the fading sun.

Eventually, Ares broke the quiet. "He doesn't like me."

Eira glanced up. "Jun?"

He nodded, hands tucked into his coat pockets. "I get it. I wouldn't like me either."

She winced. "It's not that—well. Okay, maybe it is that. But it's also more complicated. Jun's… protective."

"I noticed." Ares hesitated, then added, "Do you want it to be complicated?"

Eira stopped walking. "What do you mean?"

"I mean us." He turned to her, his voice gentler now. "This. It's real, right? I'm not imagining the look you give me when you think I'm not watching?"

She bit her lip. "That look?"

He smirked. "The one that says, 'I'm not in love with you, but I'm about five minutes from falling.' That one."

She laughed, caught off guard. "You're annoyingly perceptive."

"And you're quietly terrifying."

They kept walking, shoulders brushing, the cold nipping at their cheeks but warmth blooming between them like something neither of them knew how to stop.

e replied. "Do you know how many times I rewrote the second verse of Sky Between Us just because you said the bridge felt 'emotionally uneven'?"

"Oh my God. You actually took my notes?"

"You're terrifying," he said seriously, "but very correct."

They passed a food stall near the water — a winter pop-up glowing with fairy lights. The chalkboard read:

Blejska Kremna Rezina — Lake Bled's Cream Cake

Best Served with Snow & Someone to Share It With

Eira raised an eyebrow. "How cliché do you feel like being?"

Ares smirked. "Extremely."

They sat on a wooden bench, legs tangled, snow gently falling now — lazy, drifting flakes like someone shaking powdered sugar from the clouds.

She handed him a fork. "Okay, international pop star. Tell me the truth."

"About?"

"Relationships. All of them. Every disaster. Go."

He blinked. "Every?"

"I need context. I'm doing background checks now. Maya's orders."

He laughed, mouth full of flaky custard and cream. "Okay… um. First girlfriend? Age sixteen. Broke up with me because I wouldn't skip school to go to a Shawn Mendes concert."

"Understandable."

"Rude."

"Next?"

"There was someone during the first tour. She liked the stage version of me more than the real one. Said I was too quiet off-camera."

Eira softened. "You are kind of quiet."

"Yeah," he said. "But you talk enough for both of us."

She kicked his boot under the bench. He grinned.

"What about you?" he asked gently.

Eira sighed. "One boyfriend in uni. He loved my writing, but not when I was better at it than him. Said I was 'emotionally overdeveloped.' Whatever that means."

Ares frowned. "Sounds like a loser with a thesaurus."

She smiled, curling a bit closer to him. "Maybe. But it taught me what not to settle for."

"I used to think love was supposed to be a storm," Eira said, poking at the flaky pastry. "All chaos and butterflies and yelling across airports."

Ares tilted his head. "And now?"

"Now?" She smiled. "Now I think it might just be someone showing up with a blanket and the right kind of silence."

Ares took a thoughtful bite, then nodded. "You're dangerous with words. It's probably why I kept all your voice notes."

She looked at him, stunned. "You did what?"

"I mean, they were accidentally poetic half the time. You once called a bridge 'the musical equivalent of a held breath before a kiss.' I had to keep that."

Eira buried her face in her hands, laughing. "I was so dramatic."

"I liked it." He bumped his shoulder against hers. "I like you."

The stars were just beginning to prick the indigo sky by the time they returned. Snow crunched beneath their boots, the kind that squeaks gently, like it's trying not to disturb the hush that had fallen between them.

They didn't talk much on the walk back.

Not because there was nothing to say—

—but because the silence between them had grown warm. Comfortable. Weighted with something unspoken but undeniable.

Eira's fingers were curled around Ares's inside her pocket, his thumb brushing against her knuckles in slow, lazy arcs. The air was crisp and smelled like pine and chimney smoke, and her cheeks were flushed—not from the cold, but from the way he kept glancing at her like she was his favorite line in a song.

They reached the front door, steps dusted in a thin layer of glittering snow. The porch light flickered on, bathing them in soft gold. The rest of the world held its breath.

Eira fumbled with the keys, breath hitching every time Ares got too close behind her — which he did on purpose, obviously, the menace.

"You're doing that thing again," she said as the key finally turned.

"What thing?"

"The intense pop star stare."

He leaned in slightly, voice teasing, "I only have one face."

"Liar."

She opened the door halfway.

But before she could step inside, Ares caught her hand.

"Wait."

She turned, heart stuttering. "What?"

He looked at her like the whole world had narrowed to just this one moment. Just this one person.

"I don't want to go in yet."

Eira blinked. "Why not?"

Ares stepped closer, his hand cupping the side of her face, thumb brushing along her cheek like she was something delicate and precious. She could barely breathe. The scent of him. The quiet. The way her heart threatened to explode right through her coat.

"Because," he whispered, "I think this is the part where I kiss you."

She couldn't speak. Couldn't think.

Eira paused.

Ares did too.

They stood facing each other, half-smiling, eyes locked in the kind of silence that wraps around your spine and says don't ruin this. Her heart was beating so loud she was sure he could hear it. He probably could. He always noticed things like that.

His voice broke the stillness, barely a whisper.

"Can I kiss you ?"

The way he said it—gentle, reverent, like a question he already knew the answer to but didn't want to assume—sent goosebumps racing down her arms.

Eira nodded, slow. Her breath visible between them.

And then—

He stepped closer.

So close the tips of their noses brushed. So close her hands had nowhere to go but up—fingers curling into the collar of his coat, tugging him in like gravity had made the decision for her.

The first brush of his lips was hesitant. Feather-light. A ghost of a promise. The kind of kiss that tasted like winter and cinnamon and a thousand almosts finally giving in.

She sighed into it—soft, melting—her entire body tipping forward into the feeling. Into him. His hands came up to cradle her face, thumbs grazing the edges of her cheekbones like she was something delicate and luminous.

When they broke apart, barely an inch, both of them were breathless.

Then came the laugh—hers, bubbling and shy and uncontainable. He grinned too, leaning his forehead against hers, both of them giddy like teenagers sneaking out past curfew.

"That," she whispered, "was unfairly good."

"I've been rehearsing," he murmured, voice low, the edges of it curling into her like smoke.

She laughed again, the sound unsteady and full of wonder. "Do it again?"

"Gladly."

And this time, it was slower. Deeper. The kind of kiss that wasn't just about lips meeting lips, but about everything unsaid being written into skin. He kissed her like she was a lyric he'd spent months trying to write—and now he finally understood the melody.

Her hands were in his hair, and his were sliding down to her waist, holding her like she was something he couldn't believe he was allowed to touch.

They didn't notice the door creak behind the curtain.

Didn't see the sliver of warm hallway light slip through.

Jun stood there, motionless in the dim hallway light, a shadow among shadows.