The night was darker than most.10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDaO8CqLAuD
Smile stood on the balcony of his penthouse, high above the sleeping city, where the wind howled like a memory and the world below glowed like it was trying to forget its own sadness.10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡIVcArG9otM
He had made up his mind.10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmXeOTNYmWI
Not out of drama. Not out of weakness.10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡyfy61YxWW0
But out of exhaustion.
He had lived too many lives in one lifetime.10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzrSxJJKeTH
Fought too many battles no one saw.10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡX0BieTBtxv
And felt too little joy for a man who had gained so much.
He stepped closer to the edge—10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡwIlXncxPWH
And then he heard it.
A voice.
Not loud. Not grand.10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7vZocNaFXI
Just warm, human, and oddly misplaced in a moment like this.
“Hey... you're kind of ruining the sky for the rest of us.”
He turned.
Standing at the rooftop entrance was a young woman, leaning casually against the rail, a coffee cup in hand, eyes bright and untamed like she belonged to a world far better than his.
Happy Kingston.
That was her name.10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmRnoTZT1Yc
And it sounded so impossible, it nearly made him laugh.10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxp2kpVrWK1
But he didn’t.
He simply blinked and stepped back from the edge.
“Don’t you know me?” he asked, tone cold but curious.10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVBglmM9wWA
“You’re that serious guy from the magazines, right?” she said, sipping her coffee. “The one who never smiles. Kind of ironic, don’t you think?”
He didn’t answer.10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVJkXQxiFna
She didn’t leave.
Over the next few weeks, they met again—first by coincidence, then by routine.10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZWntqRhWEN
She worked in the building. A freelance designer. Laughed too loud in elevators. Spoke her mind in a world that preferred silence.10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQs0pUX35aC
And Smile, despite himself, kept listening.
He didn’t know why he allowed her near.10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡMAH7DdkhEW
Maybe it was the way she didn’t treat him like a god or a ghost.10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡsYBVemPsn4
Maybe it was because she didn’t ask about his pain, but still understood it.
She nicknamed him “Raincloud.”10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡq8dJfrWG93
He didn’t tell her to stop.
He began to look forward to her presence.10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ1gr1xa7ZAH
The sound of her boots on the marble hallway.10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgkriud3E8J
The way she danced when no one was watching.10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTWuQTGUdqV
The way she said “life’s hard, but laughing’s free.”
For the first time in years,10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTHQ8LL8RFT
he talked.10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ09owVG7RYQ
About the past. About his parents. About Elda. About the town of Alexandra.10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡlj1jgKYwRG
About everything he had buried beneath steel, silence, and success.
And Happy?10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8CGlnN3UCp
She didn’t fix him.10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvs803qFzy8
She didn’t offer solutions.
She just listened.10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡIkTVfDqZH1
And with each word he spoke, he felt something shift inside.10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡwZUQe8ZF4l
Like a rusted lock turning slowly, painfully—finally—toward opening.
One night, under the stars, she told him,10Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡn2NGvK7FXT
“I think you’ve spent so long surviving, you forgot what living feels like.”
And in that moment, he realized something terrifying and beautiful:
He was beginning to feel again.
He was falling in love.
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