Archive of Our Own ^beta

Alhaitham doesn’t realize it’s ending until much later.
 
At the time, it just felt like another bad practice.
 
The room was hot in that specific way that makes sweat cling instead of drip, like the air itself is too tired to move. The amp hums faintly even when no one is playing, a low, irritating sound that settles into the background until it’s all you can hear. Alhaitham adjusts the strap of his guitar for the third time and thinks, vaguely, that he should’ve worn a different shirt. Something lighter. Something less annoying.
 
Aether stood near the door with a distinct look in his face.
 
That’s the first thing that feels wrong, but it doesn’t register as important yet. Aether is always moving around, always restless. Still, Alhaitham notices the backpack slung over one shoulder, the way Aether keeps shifting his weight from foot to foot like he’s about to leave, or like he already has and just hasn’t said it out loud yet.
 
“So,” Aether says.
 
He doesn’t finish the sentence. He never does. He likes letting words hang there, likes forcing people to fill in the silence for him.
 
Cyno is tapping his sticks against the snare. Tighnari is retuning his bass, brow furrowed in concentration. Everything is normal enough that Alhaitham almost misses it.
 
Almost.
 
“I’m not gonna be around next semester.”
 
The tapping stops.
 
Tighnari looks up. “What?”
 
Alhaitham keeps his eyes on his guitar. He doesn’t know why. Maybe because if he looks at Aether, this will become real faster than he’s ready for.
 
“I got a lead…” Aether says. His voice is careful, like he’s handling something fragile. “About Lumine.”
 
That does it.
 
Alhaitham’s fingers freeze mid-adjustment. The name hits something deep and familiar, something that’s been there for years now, ever since Aether first told him about his missing sister in the middle of a midnight conversation that went on too long.
 
“I think I know where she is,” Aether continues. “Or where she might be. And I… I need to check it out.”
 
The room feels smaller. Or maybe Alhaitham’s chest does.
 
“So you’re… what,” Cyno says. “Taking a break?”
 
“I’m leaving,” Aether says.
 
Not taking time off. Not stepping back. Leaving.
 
Alhaitham looks up then, finally, and meets Aether’s eyes. There’s something apologetic there. Something guilty. Something already gone.
 
“You’re quitting,” Alhaitham says.
 
Aether flinches, just barely. “I wouldn’t call it that.”
 
“What would you call it, then?”
 
Silence stretches between them, thick and uncomfortable. Tighnari shifts, clearly about to intervene, but Aether speaks first.
 
“I can’t do the band right now.”
 
Right now.
 
Alhaitham almost laughs, almost. The words feel ridiculous in his mouth.
 
“You’re leaving,” he repeats, slower this time, like saying it again might make it make sense.
 
“Yes.”
 
That’s when the argument starts, not all at once but it fractures instead, splintering off in different directions, voices overlapping and cutting each other off. Cyno gets angry while Tighnari gets defensive. Aether keeps apologizing in that way that sounds sincere but doesn’t actually change anything.
 
Alhaitham stays quiet longer than anyone expects him to.
 
When he does speak, it’s calm. Too calm.
 
“You could’ve told us earlier.”
 
Aether looks down. “I didn’t want to get anyone’s hopes up.”
 
“We had shows planned,” Alhaitham says. “Recordings. You knew that.”
 
“I know.”
 
“You always know,” Alhaitham says, and there’s something sharp underneath it now, something he can’t quite keep contained. “That doesn’t seem to stop you.”
 
Tighnari snaps his head toward him. “Alhaitham...”
 
“It’s fine,” Aether says quickly, but it’s not. None of this is.
 
Cyno leaves first. Slams the door hard enough to rattle the walls. Tighnari follows after a minute, muttering something about needing air, about this being a mess.
 
Eventually, it’s just the two of them.
 
Aether and Alhaitham. Like it’s been so many times before. Late nights. Empty rooms. Just the two of them and whatever conversation they’d fallen into.
 
“You’re mad at me,” Aether says.
 
“Yes.”
 
The word feels heavy, but honest.
 
“You know why I have to do this.”
 
“I know why you want to,” Alhaitham says. “That’s different.”
 
Aether exhales, slow and tired. “You’re being unfair.”
 
“Maybe.”
 
Aether studies him for a long moment, like he’s trying to memorize something. “I’ll message you,” he says quietly. “When I find her.”
 
Alhaitham doesn’t answer.
 
The door closes behind Aether with a soft click that sounds far too final for something that’s supposedly temporary.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
After that, things don’t collapse immediately.
 
They just… kinda fell out.
 
Practices get rescheduled, then canceled. Messages went unanswered while the group chat became a graveyard of half hearted check ins and unread notifications.
 
Alhaitham still shows up at first. He sits in the practice room alone, guitar resting against his knee, listening to the hum of the amps and the echo of memories he doesn’t want to think about. Aether used to sit right there, cross-legged on the floor, scribbling lyrics that never stayed finished, humming melodies that stuck in Alhaitham’s head for days.
 
Without him, everything sounds wrong.
 
Tighnari knocks on his dorm door one night near the end of the semester, holding two iced coffees like he’s trying to bargain.
 
“You can’t just disappear,” he says. “We’re still a band.”
 
Alhaitham doesn’t move aside to let him in.
 
“It doesn’t feel like one.”
 
“That’s not how this works.”
 
“Then maybe it shouldn’t work at all.”
 
Tighnari leaves after that. Cyno stops asking entirely.
 
By the time finals end, Alhaitham hasn’t touched his guitar in weeks.
 
He tells himself this is fine. Logical. People leave. Things end. He’s always been good at adjusting, at cutting losses before they fester.
 
But sometimes, late at night, he catches himself thinking about the way Aether used to grin at him after a good run-through, the way they used to walk back from practice together, talking about nothing and everything.
 
And something inside him aches.
 
Something quiet.
 
Something waiting.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
The fight doesn’t start out as a fight.
 
It never does.
 
It starts as a look.
 
Kaveh is halfway down the stairs when he notices it, the way his stepfather pauses, the way his eyes linger a second too long on Kaveh’s phone screen before flicking up to his face. The air shifts. Subtly. Like the moment right before a storm, when everything feels too still to be safe.
 
“Kaveh,” his mother says from the kitchen, her voice is careful and that’s never a good sign. “Can you come here for a second?”
 
He seriously considered pretending he didn’t hear her. But his legs kept moving anyway, because they always do, because there’s a part of him that still hopes this will be normal. That it’ll be nothing.
 
It isn’t nothing.
 
His phone is on the table.
 
Unlocked.
 
Paused on a video.
 
He recognizes the frame instantly… the lace cuffs, the soft fall of the skirt, the lighting he spent almost an hour adjusting so the shadows wouldn’t be too harsh. His heart drops somewhere near his stomach.
 
“How long,” his mother asks, not looking at him, “has this been going on?”
 
Kaveh opens his mouth. Closes it. Opens it again.
 
“It’s just-”
 
“Don’t,” his stepfather cuts in. “Don’t lie.”
 
Kaveh laughs, sharp and startled. “I wasn’t going to?”
 
“Then explain,” his mother says, finally looking up at him. Her eyes are glossy. Hurt, more than angry, and somehow that’s worse. “Explain why our son is dressing like… like this. And putting it online.”
 
“They’re just clothes,” Kaveh says. He hears the defensive edge in his voice and hates it. “And it’s music. I sing.”
 
“We know you sing,” his stepfather snaps. “That’s not the issue.”
 
“No,” Kaveh says quietly. “I guess it isn’t.”
 
Silence stretches. Thick. Suffocating.
 
His mother rubs her temples. “Is this some kind of phase?”
 
Kaveh swallows. “Does it matter?”
 
“Yes, it matters,” she says sharply. “Do you know how this looks?”
 
That’s when it clicks.
 
Not what this is. What it looks like.
 
“I’m not hurting anyone,” Kaveh says. “I’m not doing anything wrong.”
 
“You’re humiliating yourself,” his stepfather says. “And by extension, us.”
 
The words land heavy and ugly.
 
Kaveh stares at the table. At his phone. At his own reflection in the dark screen. He looks… normal. Masculine. Broad-shouldered. Messy-haired. Like someone who should fit easily into the life they want for him.
 
He doesn’t.
 
“I like it,” he says, barely above a whisper. “It makes me happy.”
 
His mother exhales like she’s been holding her breath for too long. “Happiness isn’t the only thing that matters.”
 
Kaveh laughs again, but this time it sounds wrong. Broken. “Funny. You always said it was.”
 
His stepfather stands. The chair scrapes loudly against the floor. “Enough. This ends now.”
 
“What do you mean, ends?” Kaveh asks.
 
“You’re going back to Sumeru,” his mother says. Her voice shakes. “To the Akademiya.”
 
The word feels unreal. Distant. Like something from a bad dream.
 
“That’s an all-boys school,” Kaveh says stupidly.
 
“Yes,” she replies. “Exactly.”
 
Something cold settles in his chest.
 
“You can’t-” he says. “You can’t just send me away because you don’t like my clothes.”
 
“This isn’t just about clothes, Kaveh.” his stepfather says. “This is about discipline, about structure, about fixing this before it gets worse.”
 
Kaveh’s hands curl into fists at his sides. “Worse? There’s nothing to fix.”
 
They look at him like he’s already broken.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
The dorm room smells faintly of disinfectant and old books.
 
Kaveh stands just inside the doorway, suitcase at his feet, heart pounding like he’s just finished running. Everything feels too loud, too sharp. The walls are bare, the beds are narrow and there’s a desk on each side, perfectly aligned, like whoever designed this place hated chaos.
 
Someone’s already here.
 
The other bed is made neatly, like military neat. A stack of books sits on the desk, arranged by size and thickness. A guitar case leans against the wall, half-hidden, like it’s trying not to be noticed.
 
“Oh,” Kaveh says.
 
The guy sitting at the desk doesn’t look up right away. He’s reading something dense, from the look of it. His posture is rigid, shoulders tense, like he’s perpetually bracing himself.
 
Kaveh clears his throat. “Hi.”
 
Nothing.
 
“Um,” Kaveh tries again. “I think I’m your roommate.”
 
The guy sighs slowly as if this is the last thing he wants to deal with.
 
He turns.
 
He’s… pretty. In a sharp, intimidating way. Grey hair, angular features, eyes that look perpetually annoyed at the concept of other people existing.
 
“Unfortunate,” he says.
 
Kaveh blinks. “Sorry?”
 
“Roommate situations work best when both parties are minimally intrusive,” the guy continues. “I prefer quiet and privacy.”
 
Kaveh stares at him. Then laughs. He can’t help it.
 
“Oh,” he says. “You’re one of those.”
 
The guy’s eyes narrow. “Excuse me?”
 
“Never mind,” Kaveh says quickly, lifting his hands. “I’m Kaveh.”
 
No response.
 
“…And you are?”
 
A pause. A long one.
 
“Alhaitham.”
 
“Nice to meet you,” Kaveh says, because that’s what you say, even when it’s clearly not.
 
Alhaitham turns back to his book.
 
Kaveh exhales and drags his suitcase across the floor, wincing at the noise. “I’ll try not to, you know, exist too loudly.”
 
“That would be ideal,” Alhaitham mutters.
 
Kaveh bites back a retort. He’s too tired for this. Too raw. He sits on his bed instead, staring at the opposite wall, trying very hard not to think about home. About lace skirts folded and hidden at the bottom of a suitcase his parents packed for him like they were erasing evidence.
 
After a few minutes, he speaks again. He can’t help it.
 
“So,” he says. “You’re always this… friendly?”
 
Alhaitham doesn’t look up. “I’m not obligated to be friendly.”
 
“Wow,” Kaveh says. “They really do let anyone in here.”
 
That earns him a look, sharp and assessing.
 
“Why are you here?” Alhaitham asks.
 
The question catches him off guard.
 
Kaveh hesitates then shrugs. “Family stuff.”
 
“Hm.”
 
“That’s it?” Kaveh asks. “No follow-up?”
 
“No.”
 
Kaveh huffs. “You’re kind of an asshole, you know that?”
 
Alhaitham turns back to his book. “I’m well aware.”
 
And somehow, somehow that almost makes Kaveh smile.
 
Because for the first time since he left home, since the fight, since everything cracked open, someone is treating him like a person instead of a problem.
 
Even if that person is in a pissy mood.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
Living with Alhaitham is, at first, mostly about learning what not to do.
 
Don’t leave the lights on, don’t hum while brushing your teeth, don’t touch the books stacked on his desk, even if they’re tilting dangerously and it would be so easy to straighten them, don’t ask questions that don’t have a clear purpose, don’t fill silence just because it’s there, don’t do this, don’t do that yada yada.
 
Kaveh breaks most of these rules within the first week.
 
Not intentionally. He’s just… loud in a way that isn’t volume-based. He exists with his whole body. He sighs when he sits, mutters to himself when he’s thinking, talks out loud while rummaging through his bag like the universe is meant to listen. Alhaitham responds to this by tightening in on himself, shoulders stiff, jaw set, irritation radiating off him like heat.
 
They clash in small, stupid ways. Over desk space, over open windows, over the fact that Kaveh keeps forgetting to put his headphones on even though he owns headphones and knows how to use them.
 
“You don’t have to narrate everything you’re doing,” Alhaitham says one morning, voice flat, eyes still on his book.
 
“I’m not narrating,” Kaveh says. “I’m thinking.”
 
“Think quieter.”
 
Kaveh scoffs and rolls his eyes, offended in a way that’s almost theatrical. “You’re impossible.”
 
“And yet,” Alhaitham replies, “here you are.”
 
They circle each other like this for days, weeks even. Not friends, but not quite enemies. Something hovering awkwardly in between, like a chair that’s been pulled out but no one’s quite brave enough to sit in yet.
 
It’s exhausting.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
The GenEd History of Sumeru class is the first real shift.
 
Kaveh arrives late, slipping into the lecture hall with his bag half-unzipped and his notes folded messily under one arm, heart still racing from running across campus because he misread the schedule again. He scans the room for an empty seat, mentally preparing himself for the awkwardness of sitting next to a stranger, when he spots a familiar head of grey hair near the middle row.
 
Alhaitham.
 
Of course the seat beside him is empty.
 
Kaveh hesitates. He could sit somewhere else. He probably should. But something stubborn and reckless inside him pushes him forward anyway.
 
“Hey,” he whispers, dropping into the seat before he can change his mind.
 
Alhaitham glances sideways, clearly unimpressed. “You’re late.”
 
“Wow,” Kaveh murmurs. “And here I thought we were past the judgment phase.”
 
“We’re not,” Alhaitham says, turning back to his notes.
 
Kaveh slumps back in his chair, staring up at the ceiling for a moment, then leans over just enough to whisper, “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry.”
 
Alhaitham pauses.
 
“For this morning,” Kaveh adds. “I didn’t mean to snap at you. I was just… kinda tired I guess.”
 
A beat passes, then another.
 
“I wasn’t offended,” Alhaitham says finally.
 
Kaveh blinks. “You weren’t?”
 
“No.”
 
“Oh,” Kaveh says, deflated and oddly relieved. “Well good, because I was.”
 
Alhaitham snorts before he can stop himself. It’s quiet, barely there, but Kaveh hears it. His head snaps toward him, eyes lighting up like he’s just witnessed something rare and magical.
 
“Did you just laugh?”
 
“No.”
 
“You did,” Kaveh gasps. “I heard it.”
 
“That was all in your imagination.”
 
Kaveh grins, wide and triumphant, like this is some sort of victory. “Well, progress is progress.”
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
After that, things soften. Just a little.
 
They start sharing the space instead of dividing it. Alhaitham stops bristling every time Kaveh talks. Kaveh starts putting his headphones on without being asked. Sometimes they sit in the room together in complete silence, each doing their own thing, and it doesn’t feel hostile anymore. Just… occupied.
 
Kaveh learns that Alhaitham reads when he’s overwhelmed. That his bad moods aren’t random; they’re precise, usually triggered by exhaustion or frustration he refuses to acknowledge out loud. Alhaitham learns that Kaveh talks a lot when he’s nervous. That his cheerfulness is sometimes a shield, sometimes a plea.
 
They don’t talk about anything important yet. They talk about classes. About professors they hate. About the food in the cafeteria, which Kaveh insists is actively malicious.
 
“You’re exaggerating,” Alhaitham says.
 
“I am not,” Kaveh replies. “That curry was a hate crime.”
 
Alhaitham pauses. “Oh that’s not-”
 
“I stand by what I said.”
 
Sometimes, late at night, Kaveh catches Alhaitham staring at the guitar case by his desk, fingers twitching like he wants to reach for it but doesn’t know if he’s allowed to anymore. Kaveh doesn’t comment on it. He doesn’t ask. He’s learning, slowly, that some silences are deliberate.
 
They aren’t friends, not yet.
 
But they exist together now. In the same room. In the same moments. In the quiet spaces between words where something unfamiliar and tentative begins to take shape.
 
And neither of them notices yet that the silence feels a little less empty than it used to.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
Saturdays are predictable, which is part of why Kaveh likes them.
 
Alhaitham always leaves early with his signature black ripped jeans, worn boots, oversized hoodie that looks like it’s been through several important phases of his life. Dark rings under his eyes, silver chain glinting at his throat, hair half-tied in that careless way that still somehow looks intentional. He moves quietly, efficiently, pausing only long enough to grab his keys and sling his bag over his shoulder.
 
“My grandmother’s making lunch,” he says, like he does every week.
 
“Oh,” Kaveh replies, like he does every week. “Nice.”
 
Alhaitham nods once, already halfway out the door. “I’ll be back tonight.”
 
And then he’s gone.
 
Kaveh listens to his footsteps fade down the hall before he exhales, long and slow, tension draining out of his shoulders in a way that almost surprises him. The room changes the moment Alhaitham leaves. The silence shifts from shared to his. It stretches differently. It belongs to him.
 
He lets himself sit with that for a while.
 
Then he reaches under the bed.
 
The suitcase slides out easily, like it’s been waiting.
 
Inside, everything is exactly how he left it. Soft. Careful. Beautiful in a way that feels almost painful when he looks at it for too long. Kaveh presses his palm flat against the fabric, eyes stinging just a little, because it’s been a while. Too long. Between the fight, the move, the Akademiya, the constant low-level fear of being seen wrong, he’s let this part of himself go quiet.
 
“I’m sorry,” he whispers, ridiculous and sincere all at once.
 
Getting ready takes time, and he doesn’t rush it. There’s comfort in the ritual, the way each step builds on the last, the way his reflection slowly shifts into something softer, truer. When he’s done, Paradisea looks back at him from the mirror, familiar and steady, like she’s been patiently waiting for him to catch up.
 
He sets up his phone next, adjusting the angle, checking the lighting. His notifications are already ticking up, messages from people who’ve been waiting, people who missed him.
 
she’s back???
paradisea live??
i missed you
 
Kaveh smiles, heart swelling. “Okay,” he murmurs. “Okay. Let’s do this.”
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
The street is busier than usual.
 
He barely notices at first, too focused on setting up, on pinning his location, on tapping go live and watching the viewer count climb higher than he expected. He clears his throat, fingers trembling just a little as he settles the guitar against his lap.
 
“Hi,” she says, voice soft, almost shy. “Sorry it’s been a while.”
 
The chat explodes.
 
She laughs, breathless, and starts to sing.
 
Her voice cuts through the noise of the city like it always does, weaving its way into the air and refusing to let go. People slow. They stop. They listen. The crowd thickens, phones raised, expressions caught somewhere between surprise and awe. Online, hearts and comments pour in faster than she can read them.
 
Paradisea closes her eyes and lets herself exist fully in the moment. This version of her doesn’t second-guess every breath. She doesn’t shrink, she doesn’t apologize for taking up space. She sings, and the world listens, and for a few precious minutes, everything feels aligned.
 
When the song ends, applause crashes over her, loud and sudden and real. She laughs again, cheeks warm, bowing slightly as she thanks both the people in front of her and the ones watching through a screen miles away.
 
She’s packing up when she hears it.
 
“Wait, sorry- excuse me…!”
 
Her stomach drops.
 
She turns too quickly, heart hammering so hard she’s sure it’s visible.
 
Alhaitham stands a few feet away, eyes wide, hair loose around his face, dressed in black on black on black with his outfit from this morning, ripped jeans, sleveless band tee, hoodie slung over his shoulders like armor. He looks different today, more alive and less contained. Like the person he is when he’s not trying to survive the Akademiya.
 
For one horrible, suspended moment, Kaveh is sure this is it. That he’s been seen. That the careful distance between Paradisea and him has collapsed entirely.
 
Then Alhaitham smiles.
 
Not the polite, restrained one Kaveh knows but something brighter, earnest, almost reverent.
 
“Hi,” he says. “I’m sorry, I don’t mean to be weird, I just… I’m a really big fan.”
 
Oh.
 
Relief floods her so hard her knees almost buckle.
 
“Paradisea,” Alhaitham continues, words spilling now, excitement overriding his usual reserve. “I’ve followed you for a long time. Your voice… it’s just- it does something to me. I didn’t know you were busking here.”
 
Kaveh forces herself to breathe. To smile. To be her.
 
“Thank you,” she says, voice light, fingers twisting together just out of sight. “That means a lot.”
 
Alhaitham glances at her phone, still livestreaming. “Oh sorry, am I interrupting?”
 
“No,” she says quickly. “Not at all.”
 
He nods, visibly trying to calm himself, but the admiration is still there, written all over his face. “I just wanted to say hi and thank you. Your music… it got me through some stuff.”
 
Something in her chest tightens.
 
“I’m glad,” she says softly. “Really.”
 
They stand there, caught in a strange, fragile moment where worlds almost overlap but don’t. Alhaitham doesn’t see Kaveh. He sees Paradisea. And Kaveh? Kaveh sees Alhaitham as he’s never seen him before, open and unguarded and utterly sincere.
 
“I hope I get to hear you live again sometime,” Alhaitham says.
 
“Maybe you will,” she replies.
 
He smiles, waves awkwardly at the phone, at her audience and steps back, disappearing into the crowd.
 
Kaveh watches him go, heart racing, head spinning, the echo of his voice settling somewhere deep and permanent.
 
All is well.
 
For now.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
It happens during class, which somehow makes it worse, because no one expects it here. Not in the middle of a group project. Not while everyone’s tapping on keyboards and squinting at slides projected on the wall, pretending that the real work is what’s on the screen. Alhaitham is leaning over his laptop, quiet, efficient, pretending this is just another day. He doesn’t notice the shift at first, not the way the air tightens, not the way the sounds of pencils scratching and papers rustling somehow start to echo differently, more sharply.
 
Then it lands.
 
“Wait… wasn’t your name ▪️▪️▪️▪️ before?”
 
It cuts across the room, casual, flippant, like it’s nothing, like it’s a joke.
 
Alhaitham freezes at the mention of that name. His fingers stop moving. His stomach flips. The sound digs into him, claws at the careful boundaries he’s built around himself in this place.
 
The guy smirks, leaning back in his chair like he owns the floor beneath him. “Yeah. I mean, come on, if I’m being honest, you can change your name all you want, but that doesn’t make you a real man, does it?”
 
The words sit between them like a knife someone left out for practice. Everyone notices. Some look down. Some look away. Some pretend they didn’t hear anything. But Alhaitham hears it, clear as day, and the quiet control he usually wears like armor cracks just a little.
 
He doesn’t look up, he doesn’t want to. Maybe if he doesn’t, it will pass.
 
“Excuse me,” Kaveh says, voice cutting through the room in that calm-but-dangerous way he has. “Since we’re being honest, it’s kind of weird that you’re this obsessed with someone else’s genitals. Do you have a crush on him or something?”
 
There’s a beat. Then another.
 
The guy blinks, mouth opening and closing like he’s trying to formulate a comeback, but Kaveh doesn’t pause. Doesn’t flinch.
 
“I said it,” Kaveh continues. “And yes, I mean every word. That was rude and it says way more about you than it does about him.”
 
Alhaitham’s chest tightens. He’s not ready to say anything. He doesn’t want to. He’s not sure he can even breathe.
 
The guy sneers. “Mind your own business, freak.”
 
Kaveh leans forward just a fraction. “It became my business the second you decided to be a dick in public.” He tilts his head, expression sharp. “Also, for future reference, deadnaming someone isn’t a joke. It’s just you proving that you peaked emotionally at age 12.”
 
Some people in the group snicker. A few frown. The guy flushes, eyes darting like he’s caught somewhere between humiliation and rage. “Whatever. I don’t care.”
 
“You do,” Kaveh says. “You’re doing a lot of work to make sure we all know exactly how little you respect someone else’s existence and that’s exhausting to watch.”
 
There’s another pause. The guy mutters something about being “over it” and goes back to his laptop, but the tension lingers, thick and sticky, clinging to the edges of the room. Alhaitham wants to sink into his chair and disappear. He wants to ignore Kaveh and the lingering adrenaline, the sense of exposure, but he can’t.
 
Later, back in the dorm, everything falls differently. The day is quieter, the walls softer, and the air between them heavy with unspoken words.
 
“You okay?” Kaveh asks, voice low now, as if he knows the weight on Alhaitham’s shoulders without having to see it.
 
Alhaitham drops onto his bed and rubs at his face. “You shouldn’t have done that.”
 
Kaveh shrugs, casually, but his eyes hold steady. “I’m not apologizing.”
 
“That’s not what I mean,” Alhaitham says. “You drew attention to yourself AND to me.”
 
“I wanted to,” Kaveh says simply. “I’ve seen what happens when people pretend not to see things like that. When you stay quiet just to survive, sometimes standing up for someone else is the only thing that makes sense.”
 
Alhaitham studies him. Something soft stirs behind his eyes—curiosity, suspicion, maybe hope. “Thank you,” he says finally, quietly. “I… I didn’t know what to do. I wasn’t sure if anyone would notice, if anyone would care.”
 
“You’re not alone,” Kaveh says.
 
The words linger. They hang between them like smoke. And for a moment, it feels like the kind of honesty that could burn, if you leaned into it too close.
 
Alhaitham’s voice is quieter now, testing the boundaries. “I… I never expected anyone to- I mean… you didn’t even know I was trans, right?”
 
Kaveh’s face splits into a quick, nervous smile. “I really didn’t, I thought… I honestly thought you were just… arrogant. An arrogant cis man.”
 
Alhaitham lets out a short, incredulous laugh, the first sound he’s made in hours. “Wow. That’s… something.”
 
“I know,” Kaveh says, shrugging. “I’m not usually that perceptive.” He hesitates. “But I noticed. And now I know. And… it makes sense.”
 
There’s a pause. Alhaitham wants to ask more. Wants to know how much Kaveh knows, how much he understands, whether he sees all the pieces of him or just the surface. But Kaveh seems fragile in a way that he isn’t ready to risk, so he doesn’t.
 
Instead, they talk in fragments, wandering around the edges of their truths, circling and touching lightly on the things that are hardest to name. About identity. About history. About surviving in a world that insists on erasing you. About exhaustion, about fear, about the small, stolen victories.
 
Kaveh almost says more. Almost lets slip the one secret he’s been holding back, the one that could shatter everything between them but he doesn’t. He lets it hover, half-formed, tucked safely in the corners of his chest.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
The next morning, the tension that’s been simmering finds an outlet.
 
Kaveh leaves his shoes by the door, Alhaitham notices and immediately wants to correct him, and before either of them can stop, the argument spills.
 
“You’re impossible,” Kaveh snaps, hands thrown up, eyes blazing with frustration.
 
“And you’re careless,” Alhaitham counters, voice low but sharp.
 
“You leave your stuff everywhere!” Kaveh yells, pacing the length of the room like it’s a stage. “Do you even see what you’re doing half the time?”
 
“I don’t have to see you acting like a manchild!” Alhaitham shoots back. His throat tightens, his chest pounding. “Just… just stay out of my way!”
 
The argument continues, messy, tangled, voices overlapping, words they don’t fully mean thrown across the small dorm room. They glare at each other, breath quick, each hurt, each stubborn, each trying not to admit that beneath all of this frustration there’s a bond forming they can’t yet name.
 
Finally, Kaveh leaves first, slamming the door hard enough to rattle the walls. The silence that follows presses in heavy, and Alhaitham realizes, with a strange pang, how much he’s already started to miss him.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
An hour later, his phone buzzes.
 
Cyno: Sunday. Practice. You’re coming. @Alhaitham
Tighnari: We miss you. Even if you pretend you don’t care.
Cyno: No excuses.
 
Alhaitham stares at the screen, thumb hovering. He hasn’t touched his guitar in months. He hasn’t even thought about music in weeks, not since everything started falling apart.
 
But he thinks of Paradisea’s voice, warm and haunting and familiar in a way he can’t quite place. He thinks of Kaveh, sharp and cocky and kind in the most infuriating way. He thinks of Sunday.
 
He doesn’t answer yet but he doesn’t put the phone down either.
 
Somehow, he knows the next week is going to change everything.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
Kaveh doesn’t expect much when the professor announces the pairing. Group projects usually fall into one of two categories: either you end up doing all the work while someone ghosts you until the night before the presentation, or you bond over mutual suffering and then never speak again once the semester ends. He’s prepared for either outcome when he gathers his things and looks around for the stranger he’s supposed to meet.
 
Tighnari waves first.
 
It’s an easy wave, really casual as if this is already decided to be fine.
 
They sit together near the windows, where the afternoon light spills across the table and makes the dust look almost intentional. Their laptops stay closed at first, because neither of them wants to jump straight into dates and citations before establishing something far more important: whether the other person is tolerable.
 
“I’m Tighnari,” he says, smiling in a way that feels practiced but sincere. “I promise I’m better at projects than I am at first impressions.”
 
Kaveh laughs softly. “That’s good, because I’m the opposite. I make great first impressions and then slowly unravel.”
 
“That’s comforting,” Tighnari says. “At least one of us will stay consistent.”
 
They fall into conversation easily, and it surprises Kaveh how natural it feels. There’s no awkward silence, no polite nodding while mentally counting the minutes. They talk about the project, yes, but they also drift about professors they like, classes they regret taking, how the Akademiya library is somehow both freezing and stuffy at the same time.
 
Somewhere between outlining their topic and arguing about which historical sources are actually readable, Kaveh starts rambling without realizing it.
 
“My roommate is driving me insane,” he says, staring at his notes like they’ve personally offended him. “He’s not even loud or messy or anything. He’s just… permanently irritated. Like the world wronged him in a past life and he hasn’t forgiven it.”
 
Tighnari lets out a soft laugh. “That sounds like someone I know too.”
 
“Oh?” Kaveh perks up immediately. “You know someone like that too?”
 
“Unfortunately,” Tighnari says. “Very well.”
 
Kaveh gestures emphatically. “See, they should meet. Put all that grumpiness in one room and let it fight itself out.”
 
Tighnari chuckles, then tilts his head. “What’s your roommate’s name?”
 
“Alhaitham.”
 
The way Tighnari’s expression changes is subtle, but unmistakable. His smile freezes, then shifts into something amused and deeply, deeply unsurprised.
 
“…Oh.”
 
Kaveh narrows his eyes. “Why did you say it like that.”
 
“That’s because,” Tighnari says carefully, already grinning, “we’re talking about the same Alhaitham.”
 
There’s a pause. Then Kaveh laughs, loud and incredulous, leaning back in his chair like he needs distance from the realization.
 
“You’re joking.”
 
“I really wish I were.”
 
“No way. Tall? Looks like he’s judging you even when he’s not?”
 
“Constantly.”
 
“Wears black like it’s a personal philosophy?”
 
“Religiously.”
 
Kaveh covers his face with his hands. “You know him?”
 
“I’m in a band with him,” Tighnari says, far too casually for how much that sentence lands.
 
Kaveh’s hands drop. “He’s in a band?”
 
“Yes,” Tighnari says, nodding. “And before you ask, yes, he’s always like that.”
 
Kaveh stares at the table, trying to mentally overlay this new information onto the Alhaitham he knows, the one who sighs at his existence, who reads dense theory books for fun, who looks like he’s never felt joy a day in his life.
 
“That actually explains a lot,” he mutters.
 
Tighnari smiles, softer now. “He used to be different.”
 
Kaveh looks up. “Different how?”
 
“Lighter,” Tighnari says after a moment. “Not… happy, exactly but more engaged. Like the world mattered enough to argue with.”
 
He leans back in his chair, gaze drifting toward the window. “There was someone else in the band. Aether. He was Alhaitham’s closest friend. Like, closest closest. They wrote together, practiced together, skipped meals together. You couldn’t separate them.”
 
Kaveh listens quietly, something settling in his chest.
 
“And then Aether left,” Tighnari continues. “Dropped everything, left the Akademiya and said he had to go find his sister.”
 
“That’s… a lot,” Kaveh says carefully.
 
“It was,” Tighnari agrees. “Alhaitham never said he was angry. He just stopped showing up. Stopped answering messages, stopped playing, as if he decided that if he didn’t care about anything, nothing could leave him again.”
 
Kaveh exhales slowly. He thinks of slammed doors, sharp words, the way Alhaitham seems constantly braced for something to go wrong.
 
“Oh,” he says quietly. “So that’s why.”
 
Tighnari glances at him. “You don’t see him like that, do you.”
 
“No,” Kaveh admits. “I just thought he hated me.”
 
Tighnari laughs softly. “That’s fair. He has that effect.”
 
They sit in comfortable silence for a moment before the mood lifts again, gently, like it knows better than to linger too long. Kaveh scrolls through his phone and suddenly grins.
 
“Okay, important question,” he says. “What do you listen to when you’re not emotionally repressing?”
 
Tighnari brightens immediately. “Oh, now that I can answer.”
 
They spend the next hour swapping music like secrets, discovering they like the same songs for the same reasons. Arctic Monkeys for the attitude. Smashing Pumpkins for the ache. Nirvana for when you want to feel something loud and messy and real. They argue about favorite albums, quote lyrics at each other, and completely forget about the time.
 
When they finally pack up, Kaveh feels lighter than he has in weeks.
 
As they walk out together, he thinks, not for the first time, that maybe Alhaitham isn’t as unapproachable as he pretends to be.
 
And maybe knowing that changes everything.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
Saturday arrives the way it always does, quietly, like it knows it’s not supposed to interrupt anything.
 
Alhaitham leaves early, keys in hand, jacket thrown on without much thought. He tells Kaveh he’s visiting his grandmother like it’s a footnote, like it’s something that has always been true and therefore doesn’t need elaboration. Kaveh hums in response, half-asleep, face buried in his pillow, only registering the familiar click of the door when it closes behind him.
 
The dorm feels different after that. Quieter. Safer in a way that makes Kaveh’s shoulders loosen without him meaning to.
 
He waits a while, just in case, old habits die hard. Then he pulls his suitcase out from under the bed and opens it carefully, reverently, like he’s handling something sacred. Fabric spills out in soft colors and lace, layers of himself folded neatly away. When he dresses as Paradisea, everything slows down. Every button fastened, every ribbon tied is deliberate. He checks his makeup twice, three times, makes sure the wig sits just right. The person in the mirror looks nothing like the boy his parents argued with, nothing like the roommate who bickers over shoes and sinks.
 
Paradisea smiles back at him, soft and confident and real in a way that feels almost dangerous.
 
By the time he reaches the street, his phone is already mounted, the livestream countdown ticking down like a heartbeat. He presses start and lets himself breathe as the comments roll in, familiar usernames lighting up the screen, hearts fluttering across it like reassurance.
 
“Hi,” he says, voice warm, lilting. “I missed you.”
 
People gather as she sings, they always do. There’s something about the way Paradisea holds herself, the way her voice carries, clear and aching and intimate, like she’s letting the world borrow something precious. Kaveh loses himself in it, in the way the music wraps around him and holds him steady. For a while, there is no Akademiya, no dorm room, no arguments echoing in his chest.
 
There is only the song.
 
He doesn’t see Alhaitham at first.
 
Alhaitham sees her immediately.
 
He’d planned to head straight home after visiting his grandmother, hands still smelling faintly of tea and old books, but the sound stops him mid-step. It’s familiar. It always is. That voice could pull him out of traffic, out of thought, out of himself. He slows, then stops entirely, eyes searching until he finds her.
 
Paradisea stands in the center of it all, lace catching the sunlight, expression serene and devastating. Alhaitham watches the entire performance this time. Every note, every breath and he doesn’t look away, not even once.
 
When it’s over, the applause feels too loud, too small, too everything. Paradisea bows, cheeks flushed, thanking her audience before ending the stream with a practiced smile. She gathers her things, heart still racing, already planning her route home…
 
But then she looks up.
 
Alhaitham stands a few feet away, hands in the pockets of his jacket, eyes unreadable but intent. For a moment, Kaveh’s stomach drops through the pavement. He forces himself to stay still, to stay her.
 
“That was incredible,” Alhaitham says, voice steady, like he hasn’t just been standing there absorbing her whole existence. “You sound amazing as always live.”
 
“Th-thank you,” Kaveh replies, pitching his voice higher without thinking. Paradisea smiles, demure, practiced. “I’m glad you liked it.”
 
“I always do,” Alhaitham says, then pauses, like he’s surprised by his own honesty. “Your voice has… range and control, that’s incredibly rare.”
 
Kaveh’s chest warms despite the panic blooming underneath it. “That means a lot,” he says softly.
 
There’s a moment where neither of them speaks. The city hums around them, distant and irrelevant. Alhaitham shifts his weight, jaw tightening slightly, like he’s arguing with himself.
 
“I…” he starts, then stops. Tries again. “My band is rehearsing tomorrow.”
 
Kaveh’s heart stutters.
 
“We’re short a vocalist,” Alhaitham continues, carefully. “And I was thinking… if you wanted to. You could come watch. Just to see how it is.”
 
Watch, he doesn’t have to sing or commit to anything. He could just observe.
 
“We rehearse at our drummer’s place,” he adds, almost too quickly. “Cyno. He has all the equipment.”
 
Kaveh nods, expression calm, even as his brain catches fire.
 
“I’d like that,” he says, because Paradisea would say yes. Because Paradisea is brave. “Thank you for inviting me.”
 
Alhaitham looks relieved, just a little, like he didn’t realize how much he wanted her to agree. “Tomorrow afternoon,” he says. “I’ll text you the address.”
 
They part ways shortly after, polite and warm and entirely unaware of the chaos trailing behind Kaveh like a loose thread.
 
The moment he’s alone, the panic sets in properly.
 
Tomorrow? his mind screams. Tomorrow tomorrow?
 
Because tomorrow is Sunday. Because Sunday is rehearsal. Because Sunday is when Alhaitham leaves the dorm and comes back with guitar strings and frustration and the smell of someone else’s house. Because how, exactly, is Kaveh supposed to be Paradisea at a band rehearsal his roommate is attending?
 
He walks home in a daze, replaying the conversation on a loop, imagining every possible outcome. Alhaitham recognizing his voice. Alhaitham recognizing his hands. Alhaitham recognizing him.
 
By the time he reaches the dorm, his head is buzzing.
 
He sits on his bed and stares at the ceiling, heart racing, already exhausted.
 
I’ll figure it out, he tells himself, because he always does.
 
He just hopes it won’t break everything when he does.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
Alhaitham asks the question casually, which is what makes it dangerous.
 
They’re both half-awake, the dorm still dim and quiet in that way Sundays specialize in. Alhaitham is pulling on his jacket, guitar case leaning against the wall like it’s been waiting all week for this moment. Kaveh is still in bed, wrapped in his blanket like a defensive maneuver, heart already racing because he knows what’s coming.
 
“So,” Alhaitham says, glancing over, “what are you doing today?”
 
Kaveh doesn’t hesitate, he commits to the bit immediately.
 
“I’m sick.”
 
The words come out hoarse and dramatic, like he’s auditioning for a period drama. He coughs once for emphasis, then twice, because subtlety has never been his strength. He pulls the blanket up to his chin and stares at the wall like a man on his deathbed.
 
Alhaitham pauses then raises an eyebrow.
 
“You were just fine last night.”
 
“I was bravely hiding my suffering,” Kaveh croaks. “For your sake.”
 
Alhaitham stares at him, unimpressed. “You’re wearing lip balm.”
 
“It’s medicine,” Kaveh says weakly. “A topical one.”
 
There’s a long moment where Alhaitham looks like he’s deciding whether to argue or simply let this go. Eventually, he exhales.
 
“Then just rest,” he says. “Don’t move. Try not to make it worse.”
 
Kaveh nods solemnly. “If I perish, tell my story.”
 
“You know very well that I won’t,” Alhaitham replies, already reaching for his keys.
 
The door closes.
 
Kaveh waits.
 
He counts to ten. Then twenty. Then, just to be safe, another thirty. He listened for footsteps and was met with silence. The coast is finally clear.
 
He explodes out of bed like he’s been shot.
 
“Oh my god oh my god oh my god,” he mutters, tripping over his own blanket as he drags his suitcase out from under the bed. “I have exactly forty minutes to become a different person.”
 
What follows is chaos.
 
Clothes fly all over the place, his makeup brushes scatter. He knocks over a water bottle and nearly slips. The wig refuses to cooperate and he threatens it verbally. His phone buzzes mid-eyeliner and he shrieks like he’s been caught committing a crime.
 
It’s Instagram.
 
Alhaitham: I’m on my way. Here’s the address.
 
Attached is a pin. Cyno’s house.
 
Kaveh stares at the screen, then at himself in the mirror, half-dressed, eyeliner uneven, hair everywhere and laughs hysterically.
 
“Okay,” he tells his reflection. “Okay. We’re doing this.”
 
By the time he leaves, Paradisea is flawless.
 
The dress is elaborate, layers of lace and soft color cascading around her like she stepped out of someone’s daydream. It’s dramatic, it’s impractical, it is, in every possible way, too much. And that’s exactly the point.
 
When she arrives at Cyno’s house, the contrast is immediate.
 
Black shirts. Black jeans. Black boots. Even the walls feel darker somehow, cluttered with equipment and cables and instruments like a shrine to controlled noise.
 
Paradisea walks in like a burst of color.
 
Everything stops.
 
Cyno blinks. “Whoa.”
 
Alhaitham freezes mid-step.
 
Paradisea smiles sweetly, hands folded in front of her. “Hi.”
 
Alhaitham recovers quickly, but not quickly enough to hide the way his ears turn red. “You… you made it.”
 
“Of course,” she says. “Thank you for inviting me.”
 
And then she sees him.
 
Tighnari looks up from adjusting his bass strap, eyes widening just a fraction. Recognition flickers across his face like a spark, then settles into something warm and knowing. He doesn’t say anything. He just smiles wide, genuine and walks over.
 
“You must be Paradisea,” he says easily. “I’m Tighnari. Welcome.”
 
Paradisea exhales without realizing she was holding her breath.
 
“Thank you,” she replies, voice steady. Their eyes meet, and in that moment, Kaveh knows. He knows.
 
But Tighnari doesn’t say a word.
 
They start to rehearse.
 
Paradisea sits off to the side, hands folded in her lap, heart thudding as the band starts to play. Alhaitham’s guitar cuts through the room, sharp and precise. Cyno’s drumming is relentless, grounding. Tighnari’s bass hums underneath it all, steady and alive.
 
Alhaitham plays differently than Kaveh expected. More free, like this is where he lets himself exist.
 
She watches him the entire time.
 
After they finish, Alhaitham announces he’s going out to grab food and drinks, already halfway to the door before anyone can object.
 
The moment it closes, Tighnari turns to her.
 
“So, Kaveh,” he says lightly, “how are you liking the band so far?”
 
Paradisea freezes.
 
“…I’m sorry?”
 
Tighnari laughs. “You don’t have to pretend with me.”
 
There’s a beat. Then Kaveh breaks.
 
“Oh my god,” he groans, burying his face in his hands. “I didn’t think you’d recognize me.”
 
“I sit next to you in class,” Tighnari says. “And I know that voice anywhere.”
 
They laugh together, the tension melting instantly.
 
“Please,” Kaveh says, lowering his voice. “You can’t tell anyone. Especially him.”
 
Tighnari’s expression softens. “Of course I won’t.”
 
Then, more gently, “However you choose to present yourself, that’s yours. No one gets to take that away from you.”
 
Kaveh swallows.
 
“I just want to do what makes me happy,” he admits.
 
“And you should,” Tighnari says. “That’s not a secret. That’s a right.”
 
Kaveh laughs, a little shaky, and before he can stop himself, he leans forward and hugs him. Tighnari hugs back without hesitation, firm and reassuring.
 
That’s when the door opens.
 
Alhaitham walks in with bags in both hands and stops dead.
 
He stares.
 
At the hug. At their faces. At the vibes.
 
“…Did I miss something?” he asks slowly.
 
Tighnari and Paradisea look at each other then they burst out laughing.
 
“Nope,” Tighnari says. “Nothing.”
 
“Absolutely nothing,” Paradisea adds, still smiling.
 
Alhaitham narrows his eyes, deeply unconvinced. “I leave for ten minutes.”
 
Tighnari takes a drink from one of the bottles. “Magic happens, we’re best friends now.”
 
Alhaitham sighs, shaking his head, but there’s a faint smile tugging at his mouth.
 
Paradisea watches him, heart full and racing and terrified all at once.
 
She’s in too deep now.
 
And somehow, that feels exactly right.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
They don’t stop rehearsing after Alhaitham comes back with food. If anything, the room settles into a looser rhythm, the kind that only happens once everyone has eaten and the pressure has eased just enough to make space for curiosity.
 
Paradisea stays seated at first, legs crossed neatly, hands folded in her lap as she watches them reset their instruments. The cables hum faintly underfoot, the air thick with sound and anticipation. Alhaitham keeps glancing in her direction like he wants to say something but has not yet decided how to phrase it without scaring her off.
 
Eventually, he clears his throat.
 
“Would you want to try something with us,” he asks, careful and measured, like he is stepping onto unstable ground. “You don’t have to join the band or anything. Just one song. If you feel like it.”
 
Paradisea looks at him, surprised, heart beating faster than she expects. She opens her mouth to respond and closes it again, suddenly aware of everyone watching her with varying degrees of interest and encouragement.
 
“What song..?” she asks lightly, even though her hands have already begun to tremble.
 
Alhaitham hesitates for half a second before answering. “I was thinking ‘I Bet That You Look Good on the Dancefloor.’”
 
That does it. Something in her chest sparks to life.
 
“I love that song,” she says, smiling before she can stop herself.
 
Cyno grins. “Of course you do.”
 
They do a quick, messy run-through to get on the same page. Alhaitham explains the tempo, Tighnari adjusts his strap, Cyno counts them in with a tap of his sticks against his knee. Paradisea stands when they are ready, smoothing her skirt, stepping into the center of the room like she belongs there.
 
When the opening riff hits, it is louder than anything she has ever sung with before. It vibrates through her bones, through her chest, through the soles of her shoes. Her breath catches, and then instinct takes over.
 
She sings.
 
“I don’t know if you’re looking for romance,” she sings, voice bright and teasing, and the room seems to tilt toward her all at once.
 
Alhaitham looks stunned in the best possible way. His fingers move without hesitation, following her lead, matching her energy. Tighnari watches her closely, grounding the sound beneath her voice, while Cyno drives it forward with a grin that says he knew this would be good.
 
Paradisea laughs mid-lyric, unable to help herself, the sheer joy of it bursting through her like electricity. She moves with the music, hair swaying, voice lifting as she sings about dancing to electro-pop like a robot from 1984, about nights that blur together and feelings that hit too fast to analyze.
 
She has never felt this before.
 
She has sung alone so many times, just her and her guitar, just her voice echoing back at her from walls that never answered. This is different, this is shared, loud and messy and alive, and it makes her feel reckless in the best way.
 
When she hits the line about well, oh yeah, she throws her head back and lets herself feel it, really feel it, the rush of being held up by other people’s sound instead of carrying everything herself.
 
The song ends in laughter and noise, cymbals ringing out, strings buzzing under fingers that do not want to stop moving yet.
 
Paradisea is breathless. Her hands are shaking. She is smiling so hard her face hurts.
 
“That,” Cyno says, staring at her openly now, “was insane.”
 
Tighnari laughs. “You were incredible.”
 
Alhaitham does not say anything right away. He just looks at her, expression unreadable, like something has clicked into place and he is not sure what it means yet.
 
Before he can speak, before he can ask the question forming behind his eyes, Paradisea’s phone rings.
 
The sound slices cleanly through the moment.
 
Her smile falters and her stomach drops.
 
She knows that alarm. She set it herself, carefully, deliberately, knowing she would need it even if she hated what it meant.
 
“I’m so sorry,” she says quickly, already reaching for her bag. “I… I have to go.”
 
“Oh,” Alhaitham says, caught off guard. “Now?”
 
“Yes,” she says, backing toward the door, heart racing. “Thank you so much for letting me sing with you. Really, I had an amazing time.”
 
And then she is gone.
 
She moves fast, skirts gathered in her hands Cinderella style, slipping out into the evening like she is running from midnight itself. By the time Alhaitham steps outside, she is already disappearing down the street, lace and color swallowed by the dark.
 
Back at the dorm, Kaveh barely manages to get inside before he is tearing everything off in a flurry of motion, hands shaking as he wipes away makeup and shoves fabric back into the suitcase. He changes just in time, breath still uneven, heart still pounding from the echo of the music in his chest.
 
When Alhaitham returns later, tired and thoughtful, Kaveh is already in bed, staring at the ceiling, replaying every note in his head.
 
He does not know yet that something has already shifted.
 
He only knows that for the first time, singing did not feel lonely.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
Monday returns like it always does, unapologetic and dull, as if nothing life-altering has happened at all.
 
They fall back into routine with an ease that almost feels insulting. Classes together, the shared group project with Tighnari that somehow turns into more conversation than work, evenings in the dorm filled with the familiar rhythm of bickering over nothing important. Kaveh complains about the Akademiya’s lighting. Alhaitham complains about Kaveh’s refusal to put things back where they belong. They coexist the way they always have, circling each other with sharp words and softer silences neither of them knows how to address.
 
And yet, something is different.
 
Alhaitham notices it first in class, when Kaveh leans too close while whispering an observation about their lecture, voice low and animated, eyes bright with that particular intensity he gets when he cares about something. Alhaitham catches himself listening more than he means to, not just to the words but to the sound of them, to the way Kaveh’s voice rises and falls like it expects to be heard.
 
He tells himself it’s nothing.
 
Later, during their group project meeting, he watches Kaveh laugh with Tighnari, shoulders loose, posture open, and feels something twist uncomfortably in his chest. He tells himself it is annoyance. He tells himself it is irritation. He tells himself it is absolutely not jealousy, because that would imply something he is not prepared to examine.
 
“I’m not gay,” he thinks for the first time, the thought sudden and defensive. “I don’t like guys.”
 
The thought does not make the feeling go away.
 
The weekend arrives quietly, and for once, Alhaitham does not make it out the door. He wakes up with a pounding headache, throat raw, limbs heavy in a way that makes even standing feel like a negotiation. He sits on the edge of his bed, staring at the floor, trying to convince himself he is fine.
 
He is definitely not fine.
 
Kaveh notices immediately.
 
“You look awful,” Kaveh says, standing in the doorway with his bag already slung over his shoulder. “Wow. Truly tragic.”
 
“I’m fine,” Alhaitham replies, voice rough enough to betray him.
 
“You sound like you swallowed sand,” Kaveh counters, dropping the bag anyway. “Sit down.”
 
“I said I’m fine.”
 
“And I said you look like you’re about to pass out,” Kaveh replies, already reaching for the thermometer like this is not up for debate.
 
They bicker through the entire assessment. Alhaitham insists he can handle it. Kaveh insists that he cannot. Alhaitham bristles at being hovered over. Kaveh snaps that someone has to take responsibility in this room. Eventually, Alhaitham gives up, mostly because arguing takes too much energy.
 
Kaveh sighs dramatically. “You owe me.”
 
“For what,” Alhaitham mutters, lying back down.
 
“For not going out today,” Kaveh says, a little quieter.
 
That makes Alhaitham pause.
 
“You have plans?” he asks.
 
Kaveh shrugs, busying himself with pouring water. “It’s fine, it wasn’t important.”
 
It is not fine, and they both know it. Saturday is usually sacred. Saturday is when Kaveh disappears for hours, comes back lighter somehow, like he has touched something that keeps him going. Alhaitham feels a strange weight settle in his chest at the realization that Kaveh stayed because of him.
 
He tells himself it’s probably guilt. He tells himself it’s inconvenience. He tells himself it’s not warmth.
 
Kaveh moves around the room with surprising gentleness, pressing a cool cloth to Alhaitham’s forehead, muttering complaints under his breath while still doing everything carefully. He makes soup that tastes objectively terrible but insists is medicinal. He scolds Alhaitham for trying to read through the fever. He sits on the edge of the bed, scrolling through his phone, occasionally glancing over like he is checking that Alhaitham is still there.
 
“You’re staring,” Alhaitham says.
 
“You’re just being dramatic,” Kaveh replies, not looking up.
 
Alhaitham watches him anyway. He watches the way Kaveh’s hair falls into his eyes when he leans forward, the way his voice softens when he thinks Alhaitham is asleep. He watches the way he complains without leaving, the way his presence fills the room without demanding attention.
 
“I’m not gay,” Alhaitham thinks again, more insistently this time. “I don’t like guys. I just… appreciate the care he gives.”
 
The thought feels thin even as he clings to it.
 
By Sunday evening, the fever breaks. Alhaitham wakes up to find Kaveh asleep in the chair beside the bed, arms crossed, head tilted awkwardly to the side. The sight hits him harder than it should. He feels something ease in his chest, something quiet and terrifyingly tender.
 
He doesn’t wake him.
 
Instead, he closes his eyes again and lets himself rest, the room warm with the presence of someone who stayed.
 
He’ll deal with what that means later.
 
For now, he tells himself one last time, with fading conviction, that this is nothing more than coincidence, proximity, and poor timing.
 
And that thought follows him into sleep, fragile and already unraveling.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
Sunday does not start the way it is supposed to.
 
Alhaitham’s phone vibrates on the bedside table, lighting up the dark room in dull flashes that go completely ignored. His alarm never goes off because he forgot to set it, and even if it had, it would not have stood a chance against the fog pressing down on his thoughts. His head feels too heavy for his neck, his skin uncomfortably hot, his dreams tangled with half-formed sounds of guitar strings and voices he cannot quite place.
 
The band notices his absence almost immediately.
 
Cyno is the first to complain, calling it “unacceptable,” which is his polite way of expressing concern. Tighnari waits longer, because he always does, because he knows Alhaitham well enough to recognize when silence means something is wrong rather than something deliberate. When the messages go unanswered and the time creeps past when rehearsal should have started, Tighnari sighs and scrolls through his contacts.
 
He calls Kaveh.
 
The phone rings just as Kaveh is attempting to convince Alhaitham to sit up long enough to drink a glass of water.
 
“Please,” Kaveh says, holding the cup close to his mouth. “Come on, I’m literally begging you. You can’t survive on just stubbornness alone.”
 
Alhaitham squints at him through half-lidded eyes. “Watch me.”
 
Kaveh opens his mouth to argue, but his phone starts ringing. He juggles the glass and answers it with his shoulder.
 
“Tighnari,” he whispers, already stepping a few feet away. “Hi.”
 
“Hey,” Tighnari says, voice warm but edged with concern. “I am guessing rehearsal isn’t happening today?”
 
Kaveh glances back at the bed, where Alhaitham has already sunk back into the pillows, muttering something about academic injustice and cruel scheduling. “No,” he sighs. “He’s… very sick.”
 
There is a pause on the line. “You’re with him?”
 
“Yeah,” Kaveh replies immediately, then winces at how fast the answer comes out. “I mean, someone has to make sure he doesn’t try to prove a point and pass out dramatically.”
 
Tighnari chuckles softly. “You really care about him, don’t you?”
 
Kaveh nearly drops the phone.
 
“What? No no no,” he says, too quickly and too loudly. “Absolutely not. This is just basic human decency. Anyone would do this.”
 
“Mhm, yeah” Tighnari replies, clearly smiling. “Anyone.”
 
The sound of that laugh carries through the phone and into the room, and Alhaitham stirs.
 
He turns his head sluggishly, brows knitting together as if the effort alone is exhausting. “Why are you laughing,” he asks, voice slow and thick, every word slightly slurred like he is speaking through cotton.
 
Kaveh jumps, clapping a hand over the phone. “Huh, no one’s laughing. You’re just hallucinating from the fever.”
 
“I am not hallucinating,” Alhaitham replies, offended. “If I were hallucinating, it would be quieter.”
 
Kaveh closes his eyes briefly, takes a breath, then lowers his voice into the phone. “I’ll call you back later. He woke up and is very cranky.”
 
“Take care of him,” Tighnari says gently before hanging up. “And Kaveh?”
 
“Yes?”
 
“You’re doing great sweetheart.”
 
Kaveh stares at the phone for a second longer than necessary before putting it down.
 
The rest of the day unfolds slowly, stretched thin by heat and exhaustion. Alhaitham grows more talkative as his fever rises, as if drunk, his usual restraint dissolving into something loose and unfiltered. He complains at length about the injustice of being bedridden, about how unfair it is that his body has betrayed him, about how Kaveh is hovering too much and also somehow not enough.
 
“You’re standing too far away,” Alhaitham says at one point, eyes closed, frowning deeply and groans. “Come closer.”
 
“You just told me to stop pacing,” Kaveh replies.
 
“Yes,” Alhaitham says. “But now you’re too still. It’s unsettling.”
 
Kaveh couldn’t decide whether to laugh or scream.
 
As night settles in, the dorm grows quiet, the sounds of students walking outside the hallway fading into the distance. Kaveh replaces the towel on Alhaitham’s forehead with a fresh one, cool and damp, smoothing it carefully against overheated skin. Alhaitham sighs in relief, eyes fluttering closed again.
 
“That’s better,” he murmurs. “You’re very nice.”
 
“Thank you,” Kaveh says dryly. “I’m gonna add that to my resume.”
 
He turns to leave, intending to finally crawl into his own bed, exhaustion pulling at his limbs.
 
He doesn’t get far.
 
Alhaitham reaches out with surprising speed, fingers curling around Kaveh’s wrist and tugging him back with all the coordination of someone who is very sick and very determined.
 
“Where do you think you’re going?” Alhaitham asks with a pout, sounding genuinely confused.
 
“To sleep,” Kaveh replies carefully. “In my own bed. Like a normal person?”
 
“But that doesn’t make sense,” Alhaitham says. “You’re already here aren’t you?”
 
Before Kaveh can argue, Alhaitham pulls him down onto the mattress, arms wrapping around him with unsteady insistence. He presses his face into Kaveh’s shoulder, sighing deeply like he has finally solved a complicated problem.
 
“You’re very warm,” Alhaitham says, sighing with content. “This is so much better than the pillow.”
 
Kaveh freezes, heart slamming against his ribs.
 
“Alhaitham,” he whispers, voice barely steady. “You’re sick, you can’t just grab people.”
 
“I’m not grabbing,” Alhaitham replies, tightening his hold slightly. “I was utilizing available resources.”
 
Kaveh lets out a breath he did not realize he was holding. He lies there, painfully aware of every point of contact, every slow rise and fall of Alhaitham’s chest against his own. He tells himself this is just the fever, just the illness loosening inhibitions, just a moment that will not matter in the morning.
 
Still, he doesn’t dare to move.
 
Alhaitham’s grip loosens as sleep takes him again, his breathing evening out, his body heavy and trusting against Kaveh’s. Kaveh stares up at the ceiling, heart racing, thoughts spiraling, and realizes with a jolt that he’s not thinking about escape.
 
He’s thinking about staying.
 
And that thought settles into his chest, warm and terrifying, as the night stretches quietly around them.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
Alhaitham wakes up with the unpleasant awareness that his body has betrayed him.
 
His head throbs dully, not sharp enough to be alarming but persistent enough to be annoying, and his limbs feel heavy in the way they do after being dragged through something exhausting and half-remembered. He blinks up at the ceiling, squinting against the pale morning light filtering through the curtains, trying to orient himself in a body that feels slightly misaligned with reality.
 
Sunday, he thinks distantly. Or Monday, something like that.
 
He turns his head and reaches for his phone out of habit, fingers clumsy but functional enough to unlock it. Notifications flood the screen immediately. Missed messages from Cyno, a few from Tighnari, and then, without meaning to, his thumb drifts to Instagram.
 
Paradisea’s profile loads.
 
He stares at it longer than he intends to. Her icon is there, familiar and comforting, but the usual signs of activity are missing. No livestream notification from the night before. No short clip. No soft thank-you post or cryptic caption. Nothing.
 
That was very unusual.
 
She never misses Sundays.
 
Alhaitham frowns slightly, scrolling back just to be sure, his mind lazily assembling patterns it should not be assembling this early in the morning. His thoughts drift, unhelpfully, to the dorm room, to the quiet weekend, to the fact that someone else also did not go out yesterday like they usually do.
 
The idea slips in uninvited but he dismisses it immediately.
 
That would be ridiculous, he tells himself. Statistically improbable, logistically absurd, and entirely impossible. Kaveh is loud and clumsy and incapable of keeping a secret that big without combusting under the pressure while Paradisea is poised, careful, and intentional. The overlap exists only because his brain is currently compromised.
 
He exhales, satisfied with the explanation.
 
Then he becomes aware of a heavy weight on his arm.
 
Not the general heaviness of illness, but something specific and warm and undeniably present. His arm is wrapped around something that breathes.
 
He froze.
 
Slowly, carefully, as if sudden movement might shatter whatever fragile logic he has left, he looks down.
 
Someone’s there.
 
Kaveh is asleep against his chest, hair messy, face relaxed in a way Alhaitham rarely sees during waking hours. One of Alhaitham’s arms is hooked securely around his waist, hand resting at his side like it belongs there. Kaveh’s hand is curled lightly into the fabric of Alhaitham’s shirt, fingers lax, trusting.
 
Alhaitham’s mind blanks.
 
Memory seeps back in pieces rather than all at once. The fever, the laughing, Kaveh hovering and scolding and staying, the inexplicable certainty that pulling him closer made sense at the time, the warmth and most of all, the comfort.
 
“Oh,” he thinks, very calmly, very deliberately. “Fuck… I’m in danger.”
 
His denial shifts, not breaking but adapting, like an aranara learning to survive in Fontaine.
 
This is not attraction, he tells himself. This is illness-induced behavior. This is accidental intimacy, he was just sick. This is situational closeness created by circumstance and poor decision making under the influence of his fever.
 
He isn’t gay.
 
He doesn’t like men.
 
He likes… this man though, maybe. Specifically, possibly. In theory, under very specific instances.
 
That distinction feels important enough to cling to.
 
Carefully, he adjusts his arm, intending to remove himself without waking up Kaveh. His movement was minimal, controlled, but even that was enough to make Kaveh stir. Before he can pull away completely, Alhaitham’s fingers brush against Kaveh’s hair, soft and warm where it fell into his face.
 
He pauses.
 
The moment stretches, quiet and suspended, and without fully deciding to, Alhaitham lifts his hand and gently brushes the strand away from Kaveh’s eyes. The gesture was instinctive, almost like it was something he’d been doing for years, and the way Kaveh sighs softly in his sleep makes something tighten painfully in Alhaitham’s chest.
 
Kaveh’s eyes flutter open.
 
They stare at each other.
 
Neither of them speaks right away.
 
Kaveh blinks, clearly still waking up, then glances down at their position, then back up at Alhaitham. His face goes through confusion, realization, and something dangerously close to amusement all in the span of a few seconds.
 
“…Good morning,” Kaveh says slowly.
 
Alhaitham does not remove his arm.
 
“Yes,” he replies, equally measured. “Good morning.”
 
There is a pause, thick with everything they are not saying.
 
“You grabbed me last night.” Kaveh adds, tone mild but eyes sharp with curiosity.
 
Alhaitham considers lying, decides against it, and settles on being defensive instead. “Well you were already there.”
 
Kaveh snorts. “That’s not how things work.”
 
“It’s how this one worked,” Alhaitham replies, then hesitates. “I didn’t see you objecting.”
 
“I was tired,” Kaveh says.
 
“That explains your lack of protest,” Alhaitham agrees.
 
They stare at each other for another moment before Kaveh laughs quietly, the sound warm and a little shaky. He shifts, carefully untangling himself and sitting up, rubbing at his eyes.
 
“Well,” he says, “I’m glad you’re alive.”
 
Alhaitham watches him move away and feels the absence immediately, sharp and unwelcome.
 
“So am I,” he replies, and means more than one thing.
 
The room settles into a new kind of silence, one that feels charged instead of awkward. Alhaitham glances at his phone again, then back at Kaveh, his thoughts circling dangerously close to places he is not ready to explore.
 
He tells himself, firmly, that this is coincidence.
 
He tells himself that Paradisea and Kaveh cannot possibly be the same person.
 
He tells himself that whatever this feeling is, it will pass.
 
The certainty in those thoughts is already beginning to fade.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
Kaveh stretches, a slow, lazy movement that presses him briefly back into the mattress before he catches himself and shifts away, rubbing at his eyes like the last two days haven’t been emotionally catastrophic in the slightest. He looks exhausted in the most familiar way, like someone who stayed up too late worrying about things that were never entirely under his control.
 
“You look less like death,” Kaveh says, voice still rough with sleep. “Congratulations.”
 
Alhaitham exhales something that might be a laugh. “High praise.”
 
Kaveh hesitates, then glances at the clock on the wall, squinting as if the numbers have personally offended him. He nods once, like he has reached a conclusion.
 
“Don’t forget you have class after lunch,” he says, matter-of-fact, already pulling the blanket back up around himself. “If you miss another lecture, I’m not sharing my notes.”
 
“Is that a threat?” Alhaitham replies.
 
“It is,” Kaveh says lightly with a chuckle.
 
He turns onto his side, facing away this time, already drifting back under with the ease of someone who trusts the room he is in. Within moments, his breathing evens out again, slow and steady, like he never intended to stay awake long enough to deal with whatever this moment actually is.
 
Alhaitham stays very still.
 
He watches the rise and fall of Kaveh’s shoulders, the way the blanket gathers at his waist, the way the morning light catches in his hair. He thinks about class. He thinks about Paradisea. He thinks about coincidence and probability and denial, lining them up neatly like facts he can control.
 
None of them explain why his chest feels warm and tight all at once.
 
He closes his eyes, just for a moment, and tells himself again that this means nothing at all.
 
The lie is getting harder to maintain.

 ⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆

Alhaitham doesn’t notice the exact moment when his thoughts begin rearranging themselves around Kaveh. If he had to describe it later, he would probably insist that nothing so dramatic occurred. There was no revelation, no sudden awareness, no lightning strike splitting the sky in half. It was quieter than that and more insidious. It felt less like falling and more like waking up and realizing the furniture in your room has been subtly moved overnight.
 
He begins to notice Kaveh in ways that felt disproportionate.
 
On a Thursday afternoon, during a lecture about the history of Sumeru that neither of them are really invested in, Kaveh sits beside him with his usual restless energy, one leg bouncing slightly beneath the desk while he skims through their shared notes. He has a pencil tucked between his fingers, and when he reaches a concept he does not immediately understand, he presses the eraser end lightly against his lower lip, thinking. His brows pull together in concentration, and after a moment he bites down on the pencil absentmindedly, not hard enough to damage it, just enough to anchor himself while he works through the thought.
 
Alhaitham tries to continue listening to the professor, he really does.
 
But his attention keeps drifting, not because he wants it to, but because it feels magnetized. Because there is something deeply unfair about the way Kaveh’s lashes cast faint shadows across his cheek when he looks down, or the way his hair falls slightly into his face and he blows it away with a quiet huff of annoyance.
 
Kaveh pauses mid-scribble and tilts his head just slightly, still looking at his paper. “You’ve been quiet for a while,” he says, tone mild but edged with curiosity. “Which usually means you’re judging something. If you have something to say, you might as well say it.”
 
Alhaitham blinks, momentarily disoriented by the fact that he has been caught observing instead of participating. “I’m not judging anything.”
 
“You were staring,” Kaveh replies, finally glancing sideways at him, and there is a faint challenge in his expression, but not hostility. More like… expectation. “If my notes offend your minimalist sensibilities, just say so. I can handle it.”
 
Alhaitham studies the page in front of him as though it is the most compelling document he has ever encountered. “Your handwriting leans dramatically to the right. It’s like you’re in a rush.”
 
Kaveh gasps softly, then lowers his voice so the professor will not notice. “Now that’s just a hate crime.”
 
“Just my observation.”
 
“You’re insufferable,” Kaveh mutters, though there is no real heat behind it. “For the record, it’s called pizzazz.”
 
Alhaitham feels something dangerously close to a smile pull at the corner of his mouth. He suppresses it immediately.
 
He tells himself this is normal.
 
This is what proximity does. When you share a room with someone, eat beside them, argue over desk space and lamp positioning and whose turn it is to buy detergent, of course you begin to catalog them. Of course you notice things.
 
That still doesn’t explain why he continues thinking about the way Kaveh bites his pencil long after class ends.
 
It doesn’t explain why, later that night, when Kaveh sits cross-legged on his bed with his guitar resting loosely against his thigh, strumming without any intention of recording or performing, just playing because he wants to, Alhaitham feels something inside his chest go strangely quiet.
 
Kaveh hums before he sings, as though testing the air first. His voice is softer like this, stripped of performance. It carries none of Paradisea’s polish, none of the theatrical brightness that electrifies a crowd. It is raw and unguarded, almost hesitant in places, and Alhaitham has the uncomfortable realization that this version feels more intimate than anything he has seen online.
 
He pretends to read.
 
He doesn’t absorb a single word.
 
Kaveh stops playing mid-chord and looks up. “If it’s bothering you, just say so,” he says lightly. “You don’t have to suffer in silence.”
 
“I don’t hate it,” Alhaitham answers, perhaps a little too quickly.
 
Kaveh raises an eyebrow. “That sounded defensive.”
 
“It was factual.”
 
Kaveh studies him for a second longer than necessary, as if attempting to decode something, and then shrugs. “Well. Good. Because I wasn’t going to stop.”
 
And he smiles.
 
Not the sharp one he uses when they argue. Not the exaggerated one he uses when he is being dramatic on purpose. This one is small and absentminded and unguarded.
 
Alhaitham feels it land somewhere uncomfortably close to his ribs.
 
He has never been particularly religious. He doesn’t pray. He doesn’t believe that there is some greater force orchestrating the chaos of the world. He believes in language, in systems, in the reliability of data and the structure of grammar. He believes that if something exists, it can be studied, categorized, understood.
 
And yet there are moments when Kaveh stands in the dim kitchen at two in the morning with his sleeves pushed up to his elbows, humming to himself while waiting for water to boil, and the yellow light seems to soften around him in a way that feels almost angelical. There are moments when Kaveh brushes a careless streak of flour across his own cheek and remains blissfully unaware of it, and Alhaitham has to grip the edge of the counter to stop himself from reaching forward to wipe it away.
 
There are moments when Kaveh laughs, head tipped back, throat exposed in careless joy, and Alhaitham thinks, with a kind of stunned disbelief, that if heaven existed, it would sound like that.
 
The thought unsettles him.
 
He begins arguing with himself more frequently.
 
This is admiration, he insists.
 
This is just appreciation.
 
This is simply just the natural consequence of sharing space with someone who is… objectively attractive.
 
He refuses to let the word beautiful form fully in his mind.
 
And yet he finds himself memorizing details he never intended to retain. The faint scar near Kaveh’s knuckle. The way he presses his lips together when he is trying not to smile. The way he says Alhaitham’s name differently now less like an insult and more like a habit.
 
There are times when Kaveh leans over his shoulder to look at something on his laptop, close enough that their arms brush, and Alhaitham’s breath stutters in a way he cannot logically justify. There are times when Kaveh thanks him, sincerely, for something small, for explaining a concept, for fixing a loose hinge on the cabinet, and the quiet warmth in his voice feels dangerously like being chosen.
 
He doesn’t want to be chosen.
 
Or maybe he does.
 
That’s exactly the problem.
 
At night, when the room is dark and Kaveh is asleep across from him, Alhaitham stares at the ceiling and attempts to dismantle his own feelings piece by piece. He reminds himself that he likes girls. That he has always been straight. That there has never been any confusion about that fact.
 
He repeats it enough times that it begins to sound hollow.
 
Because when Kaveh smiles at him across the table in the cafeteria, sunlight catching in his hair, something in Alhaitham’s chest lifts so sharply it almost hurts.
 
Because when Kaveh grows quiet and thoughtful, pencil caught between his teeth again, brows furrowed in focus, Alhaitham wants to irrationally, inexplicably reach out and smooth that tension away.
 
Because when he imagines the future, even in vague and abstract terms, Kaveh is there in the background of it without having been formally invited.
 
The realization terrifies him.
 
It feels like standing at the edge of something enormous and irreversible.
 
He tells himself that this will pass. That attraction is transient. That proximity distorts perception.
 
But when Kaveh laughs at one of his dry remarks and nudges his shoulder lightly, lingering just a fraction of a second too long, Alhaitham feels something in him bend in quiet surrender.
 
If loving him is foolish, then perhaps he is already foolish.
 
If loving him is blasphemy, then perhaps he’s already kneeling.
 
And the most frightening part is that he’s not entirely sure he wants to stand back up.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
Alhaitham had never considered the library to be lonely before.
 
He liked it precisely because it was not sentimental. The fluorescent lights hummed with steady indifference. The air-conditioning was too cold in the way institutions always were, as if comfort had been deemed unnecessary in the pursuit of knowledge. The long tables were scarred with generations of carved initials, and none of them meant anything anymore. It was quiet.
 
Tonight, though, it felt… uncomfortable.
 
He had been there since late afternoon, sleeves pushed up, glasses slipping slightly down the bridge of his nose as he sifted through thesis drafts and annotated texts, cross-referencing citations with a kind of mechanical focus that usually calmed him. His research topic glowed on his laptop screen in a sterile font, waiting to be dissected, refined, perfected.
 
He told himself that the faint restlessness in his chest was just fatigue.
 
It had nothing to do with the fact that Kaveh had stayed behind in the dorm when he left earlier that evening, claiming he had “design concepts to refine,” which was Kaveh’s usual code for either procrastinating spectacularly or spiraling dramatically over font choices.
 
It had nothing to do with the way Alhaitham had almost lingered in the doorway before leaving, watching Kaveh sit cross-legged on his bed with a pencil tucked behind his ear and that thoughtful crease between his brows that made him look unbearably earnest.
 
It certainly had nothing to do with the fact that, for the first time in weeks, Alhaitham had wished he didn’t have to leave.
 
He was halfway through restructuring a paragraph when his phone vibrated softly against the wooden table.
 
A notification from Instagram.
 
He didn’t need to check who it was. His thumb already knew the motion.
 
Paradisea had posted.
 
For a moment, something like relief loosened in his chest. She had skipped last weekend. There had been no busking livestream, no carefully edited clips, no soft captions thanking her viewers for their patience. He had told himself she was busy. He told himself it wasn’t his business.
 
He still checked twice.
 
He adjusted his glasses and opened the video.
 
The title read: “No. 1 Party Anthem - Arctic Monkeys (cover).”
 
His breath caught in a way that annoyed him immediately.
 
The video began with a familiar shot: lace curtain framing the edges of the screen, soft fairy lights diffused behind it so the glow looked almost hazy, almost unreal. Paradisea sat on a stool, dressed in something pale and intricate, lace cascading down her sleeves, ribbons tied neatly at her wrists. Her hair fell in gentle waves over her shoulders, and the makeup softened her features until they looked almost fragile.
 
And then she started to sing.
 
“So you’re on the prowl wondering whether she left already or not…”
 
Her voice wasn’t loud, it never was and it didn’t need to be. It slipped into the space like something that had always belonged there, warm and controlled and just a little bit bruised around the edges. He listened to her enough times to recognize when she was playing at sweetness and when she wasn’t.
 
Tonight, she wasn’t.
 
The sadness in her tone wasn’t theatrical. It wasn’t performative longing meant to dramatize the lyrics. It felt… close. As though she had swallowed something heavy and decided to sing around it.
 
“And I’ve seen you with her…”
 
The way her voice dipped on certain notes made something tighten behind his ribs.
 
He paused the video.
 
Stared at the screen.
 
He didn’t have a personal investment in this. He appreciated vocal technique, her emotional interpretation and artistic sincerity, that was all.
 
He pressed play again.
 
As the song continued, he found himself paying less attention to the lyrics and more to the space around her. The fairy lights. The angle of the wall behind the lace. The faint shadow of what looked suspiciously like…
 
No. That’s not possible.
 
He leaned closer to his screen.
 
The corner of the desk in the background was dark wood. There was a faint scratch near the edge. A familiar scratch. The kind that happens when someone angrily drags a metal ruler across it after a failed draft.
 
He frowned.
 
That could be anywhere.
 
The lace curtain shifted slightly when she moved, and for a brief second he caught a glimpse of a bookshelf. White. Slightly chipped at the bottom left corner.
 
His stomach dropped in a way that felt distinctly unpleasant.
 
That shelf looked very much like…
 
He leaned back in his chair.
 
It was probably just another coincidence.
 
Dorm rooms were standardized with identical furniture and identical layouts. If anything, it would be statistically unreasonable for the backgrounds not to resemble each other.
 
He exhaled slowly and forced himself to focus on her voice instead.
 
“Yeah, the look of love…”
 
There it was again. That thread of something aching beneath the melody.
 
Before he could stop himself, he opened the comment section and typed:
 
“You sound different tonight. Is everything okay?”
 
He hesitated, then added:
 
“Also, our band is rehearsing again this Sunday. If you ever wanted to join us again, you know where to go.”
 
He hit send before he could analyze why he felt compelled to reach out.
 
He told himself it was professional curiosity.
 
He replayed the video.
 
This time, he let the song wash over him fully, and when it ended, he remained staring at the paused frame of her face, half-lit by warm lights and shadowed by lace.
 
The background looked familiar.
 
Dangerously familiar.
 
He zoomed in slightly on the shelf.
 
No. That was ridiculous.
 
Paradisea was… Paradisea.
 
Kaveh was Kaveh.
 
The two existed in entirely separate spheres of his life, and conflating them would require a level of absurdity he refused to entertain.
 
Besides, if Kaveh were somehow secretly Paradisea, there would have been signs. Behavioral tells. Inconsistencies. Vocal overlap.
 
He knew Kaveh’s voice. He thinks.
 
He had heard it argue with him at 8 in the morning. He had heard it grow quiet when he thought no one was listening. He had heard it laugh in the kitchen at 2 AM.
 
He would know.
 
He shut his laptop a little harder than necessary.
 
This was what happened when he worked too long without rest. His brain began constructing nonsensical connections.
 
He gathered his things.
 
He told himself he was going home early because he was tired. Because his thesis would benefit from a clearer head. Because it was nearly midnight and there was no productive reason to remain in an over-air-conditioned room any longer.
 
It had nothing to do with the lace curtain.
 
The walk back to the dorm was cool and quiet. The campus lights cast long shadows across the pavement, and for once he found himself walking faster than usual.
 
When he unlocked their room, he expected darkness.
 
Instead, he was greeted by chaos.
 
Kaveh was on his knees beside his bed, half his torso disappearing under the frame as he shoved something hastily out of sight. There were strands of what looked suspiciously like ribbon tangled around his wrist, and his hair was slightly disheveled, as though he had run his hands through it one too many times.
 
They both froze.
 
For a moment, neither of them spoke.
 
“What are you doing?” Alhaitham asked carefully.
 
“Nothing,” Kaveh replied far too quickly, his voice pitched a shade higher than usual.
 
Alhaitham’s gaze dropped.
 
There, peeking out from beneath the bed, unmistakable in its delicate trim and soft pastel hue, was a length of lace curtain.
 
The same lace.
 
The exact same pattern.
 
His mind, traitorously efficient, aligned the details with quiet precision: the chipped white shelf, the dark wood desk with the scratch, the fairy lights that Kaveh claimed were “for ambiance” but rarely turned on when Alhaitham was present.
 
Kaveh followed his line of sight.
 
In one frantic motion, he shoved the curtain fully out of view and scrambled to his feet, brushing imaginary dust from his hands as if that would erase the evidence.
 
Alhaitham felt something inside his chest tilt.
 
He looked at Kaveh.
 
At the faint smudge of eyeliner near the corner of his eye that hadn’t been fully wiped away.
 
At the way his breathing was just slightly uneven.
 
At the ribbons.
 
At the lace.
 
And all at once, the pieces slid into place with devastating clarity.
 
Oh.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
Saturday arrives with the kind of brightness that feels deliberate, as though the sky itself has decided to be unbearably clear just to make everything else more obvious.
 
Alhaitham woke up earlier than usual.
 
For a long moment, he lies still in his bed, staring at the underside of the bunk above him, listening to the faint rustle of fabric from Kaveh’s side of the room. There’s a strange awareness in him now, like every small movement carries meaning it didn’t carry before. The soft creak of floorboards, the muted thud of a drawer closing, and the quiet hum under Kaveh’s breath that sounds suspiciously like a vocal warm-up.
 
He closes his eyes.
 
Coincidences exist.
 
People can share mannerisms without sharing identities.
 
There are, statistically speaking, many individuals in the world capable of biting the inside of their cheek when they are nervous and tucking loose strands of hair behind their ear in the exact same distracted motion.
 
He repeats this to himself as if repeating it will turn it into fact.
 
By late morning, he dressed up in his usual black faded band tee, ripped jeans, silver rings that catch the light when he moves his hands. He tells Kaveh, casually, that he will be heading to his grandmother’s house, the usual.
 
“Tell her I said hi,” Kaveh calls from his bed, not looking up from the sketchbook balanced on his knees.
 
Alhaitham pauses in the doorway, watching him. The sunlight filtering through the curtains hits the side of Kaveh’s face just so, softening the sharp lines of his jaw, making him look younger, almost unguarded.
 
“I will,” he says.
 
He lingers half a second longer than necessary.
 
Then he leaves.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
His grandmother is delighted to see him, as always.
 
Her house smells faintly of jasmine tea and old books. She fusses over him in that gentle way she has perfected over the years, brushing imaginary dust off his shoulders, asking if he is eating enough, if he is sleeping enough, if he is still overworking himself in the name of academic excellence.
 
“I’m fine,” he assures her, accepting the cup of tea she presses into his hands.
 
They talk about ordinary things like his thesis, the band (she laughs when he recounts one of Cyno’s painfully elaborate jokes), she asks about his friends, and he answers carefully, aware of how easily Kaveh’s name rises to his tongue.
 
“Is he someone special?” she asks at one point, eyes twinkling in a way that suggests she already suspects the answer.
 
“No,” he replies immediately. Too immediately.
 
She hums into her teacup knowingly.
 
By early afternoon, he checks the time.
 
Paradisea usually starts busking around three.
 
He tells himself he’s just curious, that he just needs confirmation.
 
He tells his grandmother he has some reading to finish back at the dorm, kisses her cheek, and leaves earlier than he ever has on a Saturday.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
The streets of Sumeru are bustling with weekend noise, vendors calling out prices, laughter spilling from cafés. The low murmur of traffic and conversation blending into a constant hum.
 
He spots her from across the plaza.
 
Paradisea stands beneath the same lamppost she always uses, lace skirt brushing her knees, ribbons fluttering faintly in the breeze. Today her dress is a soft cream color with intricate embroidery along the hem, the kind of detail that demands to be looked at. A small crowd has already gathered, phones raised, whispering in admiration.
 
She looks… luminous.
 
He stays back, leaning casually against a column, arms crossed as though he just happened to wander by.
 
She adjusts the mic and smiles as if the world is her oyster.
 
And when she begins to sing, the world seems to narrow to the sound of her voice.
 
It’s effortless and warm and threaded with that same quiet ache he heard in the video the night before. There is a slight tilt of her head when she reaches higher notes. A small furrow between her brows when she leans into something emotional.
 
His stomach flips.
 
That familiar tilt.
 
That familiar furrow.
 
He’s seen them before.
 
He watches her hands as she strums her guitar. The way her fingers flex afterward. The way she shakes them out subtly between songs.
 
Kaveh does that.
 
No... Plenty of guitarists do that.
 
He exhales slowly, trying to calm the rapid pace of his thoughts.
 
As the set continues, he finds himself smiling.
 
Not the polite, restrained curl of his lips that people at the Akademiya are accustomed to. Not the faint smirk he uses as armor during arguments.
 
A real smile.
 
It pulls at his cheeks easily without him even noticing it.
 
He feels it and almost wants to wipe it away, as though it’s evidence of something he doesn’t want examined too closely.
 
When she finishes her last song, the crowd erupts into applause. She bows slightly, cheeks flushed, eyes bright.
 
For a split second, her gaze sweeps over the plaza and lands on him.
 
There is the faintest flicker of surprise before she smooths it over with a practiced smile.
 
He waits until the crowd disperses before approaching.
 
“You were incredible,” he says, and the sincerity in his voice surprises even him.
 
“Thank you,” she replies, her voice softer now, more intimate without the microphone amplifying it.
 
Up close, he can see the details of her makeup. The careful blend of blush across her cheeks. The subtle shimmer at the corner of her eyes.
 
It was meticulous and familiar in a way.
 
“I was thinking,” he continues, adjusting the strap of his bag, “if you’re free, we could get coffee. There’s a place just around the corner.”
 
There was a brief pause.
 
Then she smiles again, and this one feels less rehearsed.
 
“I’d like that.”
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
The café is warm and crowded, the air thick with the scent of espresso and caramel syrup. They find a small table by the window. The lace of her sleeves pools delicately against the wooden surface.
 
Alhaitham forces himself to focus.
 
“I meant what I said last night,” he begins. “About the band. We’ve been… incomplete, for a while.”
 
She tilts her head slightly. “Tighnari mentioned someone left.”
 
“Aether,” he says, and the name still carries weight. “He was our vocalist. Things haven’t been the same since.”
 
She listens intently, chin resting lightly on her hand.
 
The gesture is painfully familiar.
 
He swallows.
 
“I think your voice would fit,” he continues. “Not just technically, even emotionally.”
 
She laughs softly. “You’re very persuasive.”
 
“I’m being honest.”
 
He studies her as she takes a sip of her drink. The way she winces faintly at the heat. The way she sets the cup down carefully, aligning it with the edge of the table without seeming aware that she’s doing it.
 
Kaveh aligns objects when he’s nervous.
 
His pulse quickens.
 
Maybe they’re related, he thinks suddenly, grasping at the thought like it’s a lifeline. Cousins, perhaps. That would explain the resemblance, their shared habits, their similar taste in music. It would explain the lace in their dorm room without requiring something far more destabilizing.
 
Yeah… That must be it.
 
Relatives often share mannerisms.
 
He nods slightly to himself, as though sealing the conclusion, locked in on denial.
 
She’s talking now about performance anxiety, about how singing alone is different from singing with a band. He watches her mouth form each word, mesmerized despite himself.
 
He feels heat creeping up his neck.
 
He smiles again, and this time he doesn’t bother suppressing it.
 
She notices.

The café grows louder as the afternoon deepens, chairs scraping softly against tiled floors, milk steaming behind the counter, conversations layering over one another until the noise becomes something warm and indistinct. Paradisea sits across from him with her fingers curled around her cup, lace pooling over her wrists like she was born wearing it, and Alhaitham cannot decide if the warmth in his chest is from the coffee or from the way she keeps looking at him as though he is someone worth studying.
 
“You’re smiling a lot,” she says again, more teasing this time. “I feel like I’ve accomplished something monumental.”
 
He lifts a brow. “Have you?”
 
“You don’t usually look this… approachable.”
 
He leans back slightly, folding his arms. “And how would you know that?”
 
The question is gentle, but it lands between them with weight.
 
For a second, she looks caught off guard, just a flicker. A stutter in her composure that is gone almost as quickly as it appears.
 
“I’ve seen you around,” she says, after a beat. “Campus isn’t that big. You have a very distinctive face.”
 
He studies her carefully.
 
“That doesn’t explain how you know I don’t smile.”
 
Her fingers tighten slightly around her cup. “You have this look,” she continues, choosing her words carefully. “Like you’re constantly evaluating something, or someone, I don’t know. It’s not necessarily unkind. Just… distant. Today you don’t look distant.”
 
He doesn’t know what to do with that.
 
He doesn’t know what to do with the fact that she has noticed him at all.
 
He should feel unsettled. Instead, something softer blooms under his ribs, something dangerously close to flattery.
 
“Perhaps,” he says slowly, “I reserve my smiles for specific circumstances.”
 
“And this qualifies?” she asks, tilting her head.
 
He holds her gaze.
 
“Maybe.”
 
The silence that follows isn’t uncomfortable. It hums with something fragile and electric, something that makes him acutely aware of the way her knee nearly brushes his under the table.
 
When they finally stand to leave, the late afternoon light has turned golden, spilling across the street outside.
 
“I can walk you home,” he offers without thinking.
 
Her reaction is immediate.
 
“Oh no, that’s okay,” she says too quickly, gathering her bag with almost frantic efficiency. “You don’t have to. I live… far.”
 
“I don’t mind.”
 
“It’s really not necessary.”
 
There’s a tightness in her voice now. Not fear, exactly. More like urgency.
 
And beneath it…
 
For the briefest second, when she says, “I can manage,” the cadence shifts. The pitch dips slightly lower. The crisp sweetness of Paradisea’s tone slips, revealing something warmer, more familiar.
 
It sounds like Kaveh.
 
His heartbeat stutters.
 
She seems to realize it too, because she clears her throat immediately, smoothing her expression.
 
He watches her.
 
If he insists on walking her home, he will know.
 
If he knows, everything shifts.
 
So he nods instead.
 
“Then at least let me book you a cab.”
 
She hesitates, then offers a small, grateful smile. “Okay.”
 
He orders the ride himself, watching as she steps into the waiting car a few minutes later. The lace of her skirt disappears behind the door. She waves lightly before it pulls away, and he stands there longer than necessary, staring after it.
 
The street feels quieter now.
 
He exhales slowly.
 
He could follow.
 
He could request another cab.
 
He could confirm everything.
 
Instead, he turns in the opposite direction and begins to walk.
 
The evening air is cool against his face. Each step feels deliberate, as though he is physically trying to outrun the conclusions forming in his mind.
 
She sounded like him.
 
It could have been a mere coincidence, maybe the coffee got to his brain causing him to have auditory hallucinations.
 
He runs through every rational explanation available to him like a checklist.
 
People can resemble each other without being the same person.
 
People can share gestures.
 
People can align coffee cups the exact same way without it meaning anything.
 
And yet…
 
He presses his lips together.
 
If Paradisea and Kaveh were the same person, then he has been falling for someone who exists in two forms, two names, two carefully separated worlds.
 
If they are not the same person, then he is simply losing his mind.
 
He almost laughs at that.
 
By the time he reaches the dorm, his thoughts are no clearer, only more tangled.
 
He feels his own face grow warmer.
 
This is fine, he tells himself. This is logical. Falling for Paradisea makes sense. She is a woman. She is talented. She is everything he has already admired from a distance.
 
It is safer this way.
 
Better this way.
 
He can want this without dismantling everything he has told himself about who he is.
 
As he thought about the way she was speaking, gesturing animatedly with lace-trimmed hands, he finds himself leaning in unconsciously, memorizing every expression, every shift in tone.
 
He is captivated.
 
And if the cadence of her laugh sounds exactly like the one that echoes in their dorm at two in the morning, if the way she tucks her hair behind her ear is identical to the way Kaveh does it when he is thinking too hard, then that is merely coincidence.
 
Coincidences happen.
 
He smiles at the thought of her again.
 
And tells himself, firmly, that this is better.
 
Better to fall for Paradisea.
 
Better to keep everything else exactly where it belongs.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
Inside the room, Kaveh is in the middle of chaos.
 
The moment the cab had turned the corner earlier, he had practically bolted up the stairs, keys fumbling in his hands as adrenaline surged through him in humiliating waves.
 
He had made it, barely.
 
The door had slammed shut behind him before he kicked off his shoes and ran straight to his side of the room, heart pounding so loudly he was convinced the entire building could hear it.
 
“Okay, okay, okay,” he muttered under his breath, yanking pins from his hair. “This is fine. Completely fine.”
 
He peeled off the lace sleeves first, then the dress, hands shaking as he folded it with far less care than it deserved and shoved it into the storage bin under his bed. The ribbons followed. The wig stand toppled over at one point, and he barely caught it before it clattered to the floor.
 
His makeup came off in frantic swipes, cotton pads streaked with foundation and shimmer. He stared at his reflection as Paradisea dissolved, inch by inch, until the familiar angles of his own face stared back at him.
 
He let out a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding.
 
Then he paused…
 
His scent.
 
Paradisea’s perfume was soft and sweet, something floral and almost powdery that clung stubbornly to fabric and skin.
 
Alhaitham notices everything.
 
“I need a shower,” he muttered.
 
He stripped the rest of the way and stepped under scalding water, scrubbing at his skin as though he could wash away the evidence of the entire afternoon, shampoo, soap, anything to replace the sweetness with something neutral, something ordinary.
 
By the time he stepped out, wrapping a towel around his waist, steam clouded the mirror.
 
He dressed quickly, loose shirt, worn-out shorts, something undeniably Kaveh.
 
He opened the windows slightly, letting the last traces of perfume dissipate.
 
Just as he finished tossing the final lace accessory into its hiding place, he heard the door unlock.
 
His heart lurched.
 
He glanced around the room.
 
It’s normal.
 
Everything looked normal.
 
When Alhaitham stepped inside a moment later, hair slightly windswept from his walk, expression unreadable as ever, Kaveh was sitting cross-legged on his bed with a textbook open in front of him like the picture of innocence.
 
“You’re back early,” Kaveh said casually, as though he hadn’t just sprinted through three identity changes in under forty minutes.
 
Alhaitham regarded him quietly.
 
“Yeah,” he replied.
 
There is a faint trace of something unreadable in his gaze, something sharper and more searching.
 
Kaveh feels it like a spotlight.
 
“Did you have a good time with your grandma?” he asks, forcing his voice to remain steady.
 
“I did.”
 
A pause.
 
“And you?” Alhaitham adds.
 
Kaveh’s pulse jumps. “Me?”
 
“Yes. What did you do today?”
 
Kaveh shrugs, flipping a page in his book. “Nothing exciting. I just stayed in and took a long nap.”
 
The lie sits between them.
 
Alhaitham nods slowly.
 
“Ah I see.”
 
He sets his bag down.
 
And for a moment, as they occupy the same small space once more, the air feels charged with everything neither of them is saying.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
Sunday arrives softer than the rest of the week, but it carries a tension under its skin.
 
Alhaitham leaves early.
 
He doesn’t announce it dramatically. He just dresses in black as he always does, slings his guitar over his shoulder, and tells Kaveh, “I have band practice, I’ll be back later.”
 
Kaveh, who is pretending to scroll through his phone nonchalantly while very obviously listening to every shift in tone, hums in acknowledgment. “Mmm yeah have fun.”
 
There is something like relief beneath the casualness. Alhaitham notices it. He pretends not to.
 
When the door shuts behind him, Kaveh exhales so loudly it almost echoes.
 
“Thank you, Tighnari,” he mutters under his breath, already scrambling off the bed.
 
He knows exactly what happened. Tighnari must have called, must have insisted, must have guilted Alhaitham into leaving early under the guise of productivity. He imagines the conversation clearly: Cyno making some dry joke about dedication, Tighnari sighing dramatically about artistic momentum.
 
Whatever they did, it worked.
 
Kaveh moves quickly.
 
The transformation is less frantic than yesterday, but no less careful, his makeup laid out in practiced order. The lace dress chosen with intent, this one pale blue, embroidered at the collar, delicate without being overly ornate brought out his features and made him look like an angel who fell straight from heaven. He adjusts the ribbons twice before they sit just right. He checks his reflection three times.
 
When he finishes, Paradisea looks back at him, serene and composed.
 
He swallows.
 
“Okay,” he whispers to himself. “Let’s do this.”
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
At Cyno’s house, the air was already vibrating with energy.
 
Cyno’s garage, turned rehearsal space smells faintly of dust and amplifier buzz. Posters line the walls, Smashing Pumpkins, Nirvana, Arctic Monkeys and more curling slightly at the edges with cables snaked across the floor in organized chaos (courtesy of Alhaitham).
 
They lock in almost immediately.
 
There was no awkwardness today, no hesitation, as if something clicked into place after weeks of being stagnant. Alhaitham’s fingers move with sharp precision over the fretboard. Cyno’s drumming is steady and alive. Tighnari’s bass hums low and grounding, filling the gaps with quiet confidence.
 
They start with their usual warm ups.
 
Then, without really planning it, they begin creating.
 
It starts with a riff Alhaitham has been carrying around in his head for days now, something restrained, almost hesitant, notes that linger rather than demand attention.
 
Tighnari follows instinctively. Cyno taps in gently.
 
Words hover in the air.
 
Alhaitham doesn’t usually write lyrics. That was usually Aether’s thing.
 
But today, they come effortlessly and freely as if the words have already been stuck in his head for weeks, just waiting to spill out.
 
“You exist in small details,” he murmurs, almost to himself.
 
Tighnari glances up.
 
“I don’t have the right to keep,” he continues, fingers still moving. “Just enough to make me stop. Not enough to speak.”
 
The room goes quieter.
 
It felt like a confession disguised as lyrics.
 
“I tell myself it’s nothing,” He adds thoughtfully, adjusting the rhythm.
 
“But it doesn’t leave,” He finishes, testing the line under his breath.
 
Alhaitham feels something settle between his ribs as he says, “I carry it between my ribs. Quiet and incomplete.”
 
No one teases him.
 
No one laughs.
 
They just keep building.
 
“I don’t fall, I don’t rush,” he says, and the words taste strange in his mouth, like he’s trying to convince himself. “I just stay where I am.”
 
“Holding something quiet,” He echoes softly.
 
“I don’t need to understand.”
 
The chorus forms around them like it has been waiting.
 
“You feel like a song I’ve known for a while,” Alhaitham says, and the line lands heavier than he intends. “Not loud, not sudden. Just stuck in my mind.”
 
There is a pause after that.
 
The three of them look at each other.
 
Cyno breaks it first with a low whistle. “Well. That was emotionally devastating.”
 
Alhaitham adjusts his grip on the guitar. “It just came to me.”
 
Tighnari smiles faintly. “You’re in love.”
 
“No I’m not,” Alhaitham replies almost immediately.
 
Tighnari just hums.
 
A few minutes later, a soft knock sounds at the garage door.
 
Paradisea steps in right as they decide to take a break.
 
She looks radiant in the soft blue dress, lace catching the light from the open window. Cyno greets her with a nod. Tighnari beams openly, like he knows something no one else does.
 
Alhaitham feels that same unsteady warmth in his chest.
 
“You’re just in time,” Tighnari says. “We wrote something.”
 
Her eyes brighten. “Can I hear it?”
 
“Later,” Cyno replies. “Let’s let Haitham pretend he isn’t emotionally compromised first.”
 
“I am not-”
 
But Paradisea is already laughing.
 
They talk for a bit, just casual small things. The kind of conversation that feels deceptively normal. Alhaitham finds himself watching her as she listens, chin resting in her palm, eyes soft and attentive.
 
Without warning, he picks up his guitar again.
 
The opening chords of “Suck It and See” slip into the air.
 
Cyno recognizes it instantly, tapping his sticks together before falling into rhythm. Tighnari followz, they don’t even need a countdown or a dramatic cue, they just fall into it, like gravity.
 
Paradisea looks startled for half a second.
 
Then she steps forward.
 
“And you’re so dark…”
 
Her voice weaves through the instruments effortlessly. It’s playful and smooth, perfectly in tune but carrying that same underlying ache that makes it feel alive. She smiles mid verse, and the smile reaches her eyes.
 
They hit a kind of flow that felt almost unreal, like they were fated to play together.
 
There was no thinking and no overanalyzing, just sound and pulse and shared passion.
 
Alhaitham glances at her during the bridge, and she’s laughing as she sings, genuinely laughing, like this is the most natural thing in the world.
 
He has never seen Kaveh look like that and he hoped one day to witness him laugh the way she laughed.
 
Or perhaps he already has and he’s just an idiot in denial.
 
They move through two more songs after that, each one tighter than the last, energy buzzing high enough that when they finally stop, it feels like stepping off a moving train.
 
“So I’m kinda starving,” Cyno announces.
 
“You always are,” Tighnari replies fondly.
 
They decide, with minimal debate, that Cyno and Tighnari will grab snacks this time.
 
“You already bought snacks last time so this one’s on us.” Cyno says to Alhaitham.
 
“I did? I can’t remember,” Alhaitham replies.
 
“You did,” Tighnari insists gently, already heading for the door. “Don’t even argue.”
 
And then they’re gone.
 
The garage feels quieter without them.
 
Paradisea adjusts her sleeve, suddenly aware of the space between them.
 
“That was fun,” she says lightly.
 
“It was,” he agrees.
 
A beat passes.
 
He studies her.
 
“You remind me of someone,” he says before he can stop himself.
 
She tilts her head. “Oh?”
 
“Yes.”
 
“Is that a good thing?”
 
“I… I’m not really sure.”
 
She smiles slowly. “Who is it?”
 
He hesitates.
 
“My roommate,” he says finally.
 
Her smile flickers just slightly.
 
“Oh? What about him?” she asks, careful.
 
“You share certain mannerisms,” he replies. “The way you gesture when you’re explaining something. The way you align objects without noticing. The way you…” He trails off.
 
“The way I what?” she prompts softly.
 
“The way you sound,” he finishes.
 
There is a charged pause.
 
“That’s… interesting,” she says, amusement threading through her tone. “You talk about him often huh.”
 
“No I don’t.”
 
“You just did.”
 
“That was one time.”
 
She laughs, leaning back against the wall. “You talk about him like you’re a little in love with him.”
 
The words land squarely between them.
 
He doesn’t look away.
 
For once, he doesn’t retreat into logic or deflection.
 
He watches her.
 
And something in him settles as he looks into her eyes.
 
“Maybe I am, Kaveh.”
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
As if right on cue, Tighnari and Cyno makes it back with snacks in their arms.

“What’d we miss?” Cyno asks, oblivious to what just went down as Tighnari gives him a knowing look which shut him up immediately.

They went back to practicing after having their fill of snacks.

When practice ended and the garage door closed behind Paradisea, the silence that follows doesn’t feel ordinary.
 
It feels like something unfinished has been left humming in the walls.
 
Alhaitham stays behind for a moment after Cyno and Tighnari begin arguing about snack flavors. He tells them he’s gonna walk home. He needs air, he says, as if that explains anything but still, they don’t press him. Tighnari watches him a little too knowingly, but chose to say nothing.
 
Outside, the evening is gentler than it has any right to be.
 
The sky has turned the kind of bruised violet that makes the world look softened at the edges, as though even the harshest corners have agreed to blur themselves for the night. Alhaitham walks without rushing, guitar slung across his back, fingers loosely hooked in his pockets, but his mind refuses stillness.
 
“Maybe I am, Kaveh.”
 
He had not meant to say his name so plainly, it just kinda slipped out.
 
He expected himself to deflect, to recover the line with irony, to coat it in something ambiguous enough to retreat from later.
 
Instead, he had looked at Paradisea and felt the name fit too naturally in his mouth.
 
Kaveh.
 
The syllables settle somewhere beneath his ribs.
 
You exist in small details.
 
The line from their song drifts back to him uninvited.
 
He thinks of the way Kaveh aligns the corners of his sketchbooks with unnecessary precision. The way he bites the end of his pencil when a design refuses to cooperate. The way he hums absentmindedly while waiting for water to boil at two in the morning, sleeves pushed up, hair falling into his eyes.
 
He thinks of Paradisea under the lamplight, lace catching gold, voice steady and aching, head tilting slightly on sustained notes.
 
The same crease between the brows.
 
The same way of pausing before speaking, as though measuring the emotional temperature of a room.
 
He exhales slowly.
 
If Paradisea is Kaveh.
 
He lets the thought complete itself this time.
 
He tries not to push it away. He doesn’t file it under another coincidence.
 
He lets it expand until it fills his chest completely.
 
If Paradisea is Kaveh, then I’ve been in love with the same person twice.
 
The realization doesn’t arrive like thunder that flashed immediately.
 
It arrived more like a slow confession whispered into the quiet.
 
He feels something almost reverent unravel inside him, something he would normally dismantle under logic. He has never believed in fate, or miracles, or anything that requires surrender. He believed in structure, in evidence and in conclusions earned through observation.
 
And yet the idea sits there, impossibly clear.
 
Oh, heaven does exist here on earth.
 
He almost laughs at himself for thinking it.
 
He thinks again, he isn’t religious, he doesn’t kneel down to pray, he doesn’t worship any kind of God and he never will.
 
And yet there are moments when Kaveh stands in their dorm’s kitchen under yellow light, flour streaked absentmindedly across his cheek, and the world narrows until it feels dangerously close to sacred. There are moments when Paradisea’s voice bends around a lyric and something inside him shifts so quietly he barely registers the damage.
 
What would it mean if they were the same person?
 
It would mean that the heaven he keeps pretending not to see has been standing in front of him the entire time, humming while stirring instant noodles.
 
He walks slower.
 
If that is true, then loving him isn’t confusion.
 
It is inevitability.
 
And if loving him makes him something he has been trying not to name, then perhaps naming the feeling is less important than the truth itself.
 
It’s sacrilege not to fall in love with you.
 
The line surfaces on its own in his mind.
 
He doesn’t know why but it feels so true.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
Kaveh returns to the dorm earlier than Alhaitham.
 
He doesn’t turn on the overhead light, instead he sits in the dim glow of his desk lamp, still dressed as Paradisea, lace resting delicately over his knees, fingers tracing the embroidery without seeing it.
 
“Maybe I am, Kaveh.”
 
Maybe he was just teasing or had him confused for someone else.
 
He meant to provoke a reaction and then retreat safely behind a laugh.
 
He never expected that steady gaze and that absence of denial.
 
He reaches up and removes the wig slowly, setting it aside with unusual care. The room feels different without the soft cascade of curls framing his face. He wipes away the blush and watches the color disappear from his cheeks, leaving only the faint flush beneath.
 
Halfway through removing the lipstick, he stops.
 
If Alhaitham loves Kaveh…
 
The thought terrifies him more than rejection ever did.
 
Because if Alhaitham loves Kaveh, then Paradisea is not the safer option. Paradisea is not the compromise. Paradisea is not the version that makes it easier.
 
It means he saw him. Loud and stubborn and overly emotional and occasionally unbearable.
 
And chose him anyway.
 
His throat tightens.
 
But what if that was not what he meant?
 
What if Alhaitham loves Paradisea and simply associates her with Kaveh because they share a space, because of close proximity and familiarity?
 
What if he falls for the lace and the softness and the curated gentleness, and when he finds out it is the same person, something in him shifts?
 
He presses his fingers against his lips.
 
He would die smiling if it were Alhaitham beside him. The thought is embarrassingly simple. Embarrassingly true.
 
And yet the inverse terrifies him.
 
He doesn’t want to live in regret because he hid too long. Because he was too afraid to let the two halves of himself stand in the same room at once.
 
He stands and walks to the mirror.
 
Without the makeup, without the wig, he looks smaller somehow. More exposed.
 
“Which one do you love?” he asks quietly.
 
Paradisea has always felt like flight. Like a way to sing without fear. To take up space without apology.
 
Kaveh has always felt heavier. More complicated and harder to hold.
 
If Alhaitham chooses Paradisea and flinches at Kaveh, he doesn’t know which part of himself will survive that.
 
He steps into the shower and lets the water run hotter than necessary, scrubbing away the lingering sweetness of perfume until the air smells only of steam and neutral soap.
 
When he climbs into bed afterward, hair damp against his pillow, he stares at the ceiling and lets the fear sit there with him.
  
It would be foolish not to think of Alhaitham.
 
He laughs softly at himself.
 
As if he has done anything else for weeks.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
When Alhaitham returned, the room was dim.
 
He saw Kaveh’s silhouette immediately.
 
He sets his guitar down gently and stands there for longer than necessary, watching the slow rise and fall of his chest.
 
When he’s asleep, Kaveh looks younger and softer. Entirely unaware of what’s happening around him.
 
Alhaitham steps closer.
 
He notices the faint redness around Kaveh’s eyes, as though he had scrubbed something away too thoroughly.
 
He reaches out without fully deciding to, brushing a damp strand of hair from Kaveh’s forehead.
 
The contact is light, his touch was careful.
 
He doesn’t take his hand off immediately.
 
Oh, heaven does exist on earth.
 
He always tells himself that he doesn’t believe in miracles, he doesn’t believe in saints.
 
But if loving him feels this close to something holy, then perhaps disbelief has never been the point.
 
He stands there, heart steady but impossibly full, and understands something with a clarity that almost hurts.
 
If Paradisea is Kaveh, then there would be no conflict.
 
There would be no division.
 
There would only be them, no one else.
 
And loving them in lace, in sarcasm, in song, in silence,  doesn’t feel like sin.
 
It feels like the cold hard truth.
 
Across the room, Kaveh shifts in his sleep and murmurs something incoherent, fingers curling slightly against the blanket.
 
Alhaitham watches him for a long time.
 
He does not kneel.
 
He does not pray.
 
But if devotion can exist without religion, then he understands it now.
 
And for the first time, the thought of loving him didn't feel like something he had to fight.
 
It felt like something he wanted to protect.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆

It happened on a Wednesday night, which is fitting, because nothing catastrophic ever happens on Wednesdays, except for wearing pink. It was just a normal night, at least that’s what they thought. Kaveh came home tired from class, hair slightly wind-tousled, his mind half on a design submission and half on whether Alhaitham had dinner yet. He dropped his bag by the foot of his bed and went to grab a towel from their shared cabinet because he planned to shower before reviewing his sketches.
 
Alhaitham isn’t home, which was unusual since it was getting pretty late.
 
His desk lamp was on though.
 
Kaveh hesitates for a bit, he doesn’t usually touch Alhaitham’s things since their unspoken agreement has always been clear, shared space does not mean the same territories. But the lamp being left on felt unusual, and for a fleeting second he thinks maybe he forgot something important, maybe a draft, maybe notes for his thesis.
 
He stepped closer, hesitation visible in his crimson eyes.
 
On the desk, beneath the pool of white light, is a stack of papers which weren’t messy or scattered, it was deliberately arranged.
 
Kaveh recognizes his own handwriting immediately.
 
It was the lyric sheet from last Sunday’s band practice that Alhaitham made him write down.
 
You exist in small details
I don’t have the right to keep
 
Except there were annotations in the margins. Precise and neat which made it unmistakably Alhaitham’s.
 
Beside it was another sheet of paper, it took him a second to understand what he’s looking at…
 
It was a screenshot.
 
It wasn’t printed in high resolution and it was not artistic at all, it was just… captured.
 
It was Paradisea mid-song.
 
The familiar lace curtain visible in the corner along with the fairy lights blurred behind her. Her hands wrapped around the DIY mic stand she adorned with lace and ribbons.
 
Then he noticed there were tiny notes written beneath the image.
 
“Same phrasing as Kaveh when presenting.”
“Bites inside of cheek before high note.”
“Left shoulder lifts when nervous.”
 
Kaveh’s stomach drops immediately.
 
His gaze shifted to the side of the desk where a notebook lies open, spine cracked in the middle. He shouldn’t look, he knows he definitely shouldn’t, it would be an invasion of privacy, as if he wasn’t invading already. 
 
He looks anyway under the demise of thinking maybe it was an important notebook that Alhaitham needed for his thesis.
 
Only it wasn’t a thesis note… hell, it wasn’t academic at all.
 
It was a sketch, a loose and unfinished sketch of a figure sitting cross legged on a bed, hair falling forward, a curtain framing the background. The details were minimal since Alhaitham was not an artist by any means, but the expression looked so soft in a way that made Kaveh’s chest tighten painfully. It was a simple sketch of him yet it brought tears in his eyes.
 
Underneath, there was something written in careful ink:
 
If Paradisea is Kaveh, then I have been in love with the same person twice.
 
The room went very quiet to the point where the loud thumping of Kaveh’s chest could be heard from miles away.
 
For a long moment, Kaveh just stood there, the weight of it pressing against him from every direction.
 
He didn’t feel exposed.
 
He felt… seen.
 
And that was somehow worse.
 
He was stuck staring at the sketch and everything else he saw, just zoning out and processing until the door suddenly clicked open.
 
Alhaitham stepped inside, removing his shoes with the same calm precision he always has. He looked up and froze in his tracks.
 
Kaveh was standing at his desk.
 
Holding the lyric sheet.
 
The screenshot.
 
The notebook that he thought he hid.
 
Neither of them spoke for a while however...
 
There was no panic in Alhaitham’s face, no scramble or denial, just a stillness that felt intentional.
 
Kaveh was the first to find his voice, though it barely sounded like him.
 
“How long?”
 
Alhaitham closed the door gently behind him before answering.
 
“I don’t know exactly when I knew,” he says, and even now his tone is steady, “but I stopped pretending not to about a few days ago.”
 
Kaveh let out a hollow laugh that didn’t carry a single trace of humor.
 
“So you were just… waiting?”
 
“Yes.”
 
“For what?”
 
“For you.”
 
The simplicity of it stung.
 
Kaveh set the papers down carefully as if they might shatter.
 
“I was going to tell you,” he says quickly, the words tumbling over each other now. “I just… needed to figure out how. I didn’t know which version you liked more. I didn’t know if you…” He swallows. “If you would leave if you found out.”
 
Alhaitham’s brows draw together slightly, not in anger, but in confusion.
 
“Leave?”
 
“You don’t exactly make it easy to read you,” Kaveh snaps, though his voice trembles. “You were inviting her to rehearsals. You were smiling at her. You were… softer. And with me, you’re always arguing or pretending you don’t feel anything at all, you were harder. I didn’t know if you liked her because she was the safe option.”
 
Alhaitham steps closer, slow enough that it doesn’t feel like an advance, just a closing of distance.
 
“I was softer,” he says quietly, “because I thought I had to be someone you wouldn’t reject.”
 
That stops Kaveh cold.
 
“I don’t love you as two people,” Alhaitham continues. “I don’t experience you that way. I never did. I was just late in understanding it. I was an idiot.”
 
Kaveh’s throat tightened.
 
“I was scared, Alhaitham” he admits, and the honesty in it strips him bare, “that you’d only love one version of me.”
 
There it is.
 
The real fear was not about being found out or embarrassment, it was about being loved incompletely.
 
Alhaitham didn’t hesitate.
 
“I don’t know how to love in halves.”
 
The words land gently, but they reverberate through the room like something sacred.
 
Kaveh’s eyes stung before he can stop them.
 
“You’re insufferable,” he whispers.
 
“I know, I’ve been told.”
 
“I can’t believe you analyzed me like a research paper.”
 
“Well… you are significantly more interesting than my thesis.”
 
A watery laugh escapes Kaveh despite himself.
 
There’s a fragile quiet between them now. Not tense or explosive. Just both of them… waiting for the other.
 
“Why didn’t you say anything?” Kaveh asks more softly this time.
 
Alhaitham considers the question with the same seriousness he gives everything.
 
“Because if you were hiding,” he says, “I assumed you had a reason and I didn’t want to take that choice away from you.”
 
That, more than anything else, does it for him.
 
Kaveh closes the distance first, it wasn’t anything dramatic or cinematic.
 
He stepped forward until they were standing too close for comfort and searched Alhaitham’s face for even a hint of uncertainty.
 
He didn’t find any.
 
“You really are in love with the same person twice,” Kaveh murmurs.
 
Alhaitham’s lips curve faintly.
 
“No,” he corrects softly. “Just once. You just happen to contain multitudes.”
 
Kaveh huffs a breath that sounds dangerously like a sob and presses his forehead against Alhaitham’s shoulder, because it was either that or he would collapse entirely.

Their lips collided for the first time, both of them not knowing how long the other had waited for this exact moment, how much they yearned for the other’s touch. 
 
For the first time since they met, there was no need for pretending or keeping up facades. No more secret lace curtains, no more denial. 
 
Just them, Kaveh and Alhaitham. 
 
As they pulled away from each other’s lips, Alhaitham’s arms snake up around him without hesitation, as if they were always meant to be there.
 
No more separate territories.
 
So much for their so called internal pact huh? 

⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ • ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆
 
They don’t announce anything dramatically.
 
It happens on their weekly Sunday band practice, like it always does, because Sunday has quietly become the axis of their lives.
 
Alhaitham left the dorm first.
 
Not because Cyno and Tighnari are pestering him this time, but because he wanted to be early. Because he hadn’t felt this steady in months, and he wanted to sit with it before the noise begins.
 
When Kaveh stepped out of the dorm a few minutes later, he isn’t Paradisea.
 
He wasn’t hiding either.
 
He was just Kaveh with his signature hair loose, rings on his fingers, a soft sweater that hangs slightly off one shoulder. He pauses at the doorway like he is standing at the edge of something enormous.
 
Alhaitham notices. 

“Are you ready?”
 
He holds the door open.
 
Kaveh exhales and steps through.

“As I’ll ever be.”
 
They don’t talk about it on the walk over, well they didn’t really need to. Their shoulders brushed once, twice, and neither of them moves away, until eventually Alhaitham locked their fingers together. 
 
When they reach Cyno’s place, the door was already half-open. Music was faintly playing inside, a random instrumental Tighnari probably put on while tuning.
 
Cyno looked up first followed by Tighnari.
 
And they both immediately sensed that something had shifted.
 
Not in a dramatic way or in a scandalous way. As if things just… settled.
 
“Huh, you’re early,” Cyno says, eyeing Alhaitham suspiciously.
 
“I’m actually capable of punctuality,” Alhaitham replies evenly.
 
Tighnari’s gaze flicks to Kaveh, sharp and perceptive as always. He smiles slightly, like he already knew something important was about to happen.
 
Kaveh steped further into the room.
 
For a second, his confidence wavers for a bit but it was not because he was unsure of himself, but because this is different from hiding behind lace curtains and fairy lights. This as fluorescent bulbs and tangled cables and people who matter.
 
He swallowed once, twice.
 
“Before we start,” he says, voice steadier than he feels, “I want to say something.”
 
Cyno leans back against the amp.
 
Tighnari folds his arms loosely, attentive.
 
Alhaitham does not look at Kaveh. He knows if he does, it will soften him too visibly.
 
“My name is Kaveh,” he continues, and the simplicity of it makes Cyno blink in confusion. “And some of you already know me as Paradisea.”
 
Cyno’s eyebrows shoot up. Tighnari just exhales like he has been waiting for this confirmation for weeks.
 
“I think I’m genderfluid,” Kaveh says, and there is no apology in it, no tremor and just clarity. “Paradisea isn’t a persona or whatever. She’s me. So is he. So is everything in between. I was splitting it before because I didn’t think it would fit in one space.”
 
His eyes flick briefly and involuntarily toward Alhaitham.
 
“I don’t want to live separate lives anymore.”
 
The room is quiet.
 
Then Cyno nods once, decisively, as if approving a strategic move.
 
“That makes scheduling things easier,” he says. “We don’t have to wait an extra hour for Paradisea to get ready.”
 
Kaveh laughs in relief.
 
Tighnari steps forward and bumps his shoulder lightly. “You could have told us sooner.”
 
“I know.”
 
“But I’m glad you’re telling us now.”
 
Alhaitham finally looks at him.
 
There was something unmistakable in his expression, it wasn't pride nor possession, but something more like admiration so unguarded that it almost felt too intimate to witness.
 
“And,” Kaveh adds, breath catching slightly, “if the offer still stands… I’d like to join the band. Properly. As myself.”
 
Cyno glances at Alhaitham.
 
Alhaitham shrugs with studied neutrality.
 
“She was already the strongest vocalist in the room.”
 
Kaveh rolls his eyes.
 
“He,” he corrects automatically.
 
Alhaitham’s mouth curves.
 
“They. Strongest vocalist in the room.”
 
And that’s when it happened subtle, almost ordinary.
 
Alhaitham smiles, a genuine one that you rarely get to see.
 
Not the small, restrained lift of his lips he uses when something mildly amuses him. Not the polite curve he offers professors.
 
He smiled like something inside him has finally unclenched.
 
Tighnari noticed.
 
Cyno noticed.
 
Kaveh definitely noticed.
 
For the first time in a long while, the tension that had coiled around Alhaitham like barbed wire is gone. He looked lighter, alive in a way that had nothing to do with logic or restraint.
 
They didn’t make it ceremonial.
 
Cyno counts them in.
 
Alhaitham reaches for his guitar.
 
There was a glance brief and electric between him and Kaveh.
 
And then he starts playing.
 
“Suck It and See.”
 
The opening riff slides through the room, familiar and warm, like muscle memory returning to a body that had forgotten how to move.
 
They don’t plan who comes in first.
 
They didn’t need to.
 
Kaveh steps toward the mic, breath steady, and sings:
 
Your love is like a studded leather headlock…
 
The room shifts.
 
Alhaitham joins in with harmonies, fingers moving effortlessly across strings.
 
Your kiss, it could put creases in the rain…
 
Cyno’s drums anchors it as Tighnari locks in on his bass. The sound builds naturally, not loud, not rushed just certain, just like the song Alhaitham had written for Kaveh.
 
Alhaitham looks up mid verse.
 
Kaveh was glowing.
 
Not in the exaggerated, stage-lit way Paradisea used to glow behind lace curtains, but in something more. The performance wasn’t armor anymore, it was pure joy.
 
And she said, “Use me,”
 
Kaveh sings, and then glances at Alhaitham deliberately on the next line.
 
Show me the jacuzzi.
 
Alhaitham laughs under his breath, missing a chord for half a second because he is too busy watching.
 
He hasn’t laughed like that during rehearsal in months.
 
Maybe longer.
 
They slide into the chorus together.
 
So if you wanna walk me to the car…
 
The sound swells, but it wasn’t about volume.
 
It was about harmony.
 
There was no split identity now. No more observing from afar. No more analyzing posture or shoulder tension or lace curtains peeking out from under beds.
 
There was only this, their shared rhythm, shared breath, and shared glance.
 
You gotta suck it and see…
 
Alhaitham leans into the mic slightly, voice low and warm.
 
He isn’t playing like someone clinging to a past version of himself anymore. He’s playing like someone who remembered why he loved music in the first place.
 
Music had dulled for him after Aether left. After the band fractured. After passion started feeling like something that could disappear overnight.
 
But right now?
 
Right now it feels new again.
 
As if it the fire inside him has been ignited once more.
 
Not because the song is perfect.
 
Not because the band is flawless.
 
But because the person across from him was finally whole and standing beside him instead of somewhere just out of reach.
 
They finish on the last line together, voices overlapping, messy and bright and real.
 
The room goes quiet in the aftermath.
 
Cyno breaks it first.
 
“Well,” he says, nodding approvingly. “That was disgustingly romantic.”
 
Tighnari smiles knowingly, already shooting Kaveh a look.
 
Kaveh was breathless and flushed but he felt alive.
 
Alhaitham set his guitar down slowly.
 
He was still smiling.
 
He didn’t even try to hide it.
 
For the first time in a long while, there was no denial to chant under his breath, no calculations running behind his eyes.
 
Just certainty.
 
Kaveh catches his gaze.
 
And this time, neither of them looked away.
 
⋆⁺₊⋆ ━━━━⊱༒︎ EPILOGUE ༒︎⊰━━━━ ⋆⁺₊⋆

Five years is a strange, quiet miracle.
 
It passes whether you’re ready for it or not, and then one day you look up and realize that what once felt fragile has become foundation.
 
By the time 4GGREVATE sold out their first arena, no one called them “that campus band” anymore. They were written about in music magazines, dissected in long video essays, studied in think pieces that try to explain the magnetism of their contrast. Cyno’s severe black stagewear and unblinking composure. Tighnari’s effortless sharpness, all muted earth tones and precision. Alhaitham in dark layers, hair falling into his eyes as if he has better things to think about than the thousands of people screaming his name.
 
And at the center of it all, Paradisea.
 
Lace skirts that catch the stage lights like frost. Pastel ribbons threaded through fingers that grip a microphone with startling confidence. Glossy lips singing lyrics that sounded like confession and challenge all at once.
 
The fans adore their duality. They make edits that splice together leather and lace, distortion and lullaby, shadow and shimmer. They say the aesthetic contrast is what makes 4GGREVATE unforgettable.
 
The band knows better.
 
It was never the contrast.
 
It was their harmony.
 
Backstage before their biggest show yet, the air hums with movement. Staff weave in and out with headsets and clipboards. Someone was arguing about lighting cues and someone else was testing  their in ear monitors. The walls vibrate faintly from the crowd already chanting outside.
 
Alhaitham stands near the far end of the corridor, guitar slung over his shoulder, and watches Aether laugh at something Lumine whispers in his ear.
 
They look whole in a way that settles something old and quiet inside him.
 
When Aether notices him, he excuses himself gently and walks over. There was no awkwardness in the way they face each other now. Time has taken the sharp edges off what used to ache.
 
“You’ve gotten loud,” Aether says, nodding toward the distant roar of the arena.
 
Alhaitham follows his gaze. “So have they.”
 
Aether studies him more carefully. “You look different.”
 
Alhaitham lifts an eyebrow. “Well I do age like everyone else.”
 
“That’s not what I meant.”
 
It isn’t. What Aether meant is that the guarded stillness that used to live behind Alhaitham’s eyes has shifted. It hasn’t disappeared, that would be impossible, but it no longer felt defensive. It felt… normal.
 
“I heard the proposal rumors,” Aether adds lightly. “Fans are convinced you’re planning something.”
 
Alhaitham’s mouth curves, almost involuntarily. “They’re often wrong.”
 
“But not always.”
 
Aether’s tone is teasing, but his expression softens. “I’m glad you didn’t stop.”
 
Alhaitham doesn’t pretend not to understand.
 
“When you left,” he says after a moment, “I thought I miscalculated everything. The band. The timing. You.”
 
Aether exhales slowly. “I left because I didn’t know how to stay without losing myself. Not because of the band.”
 
“I know that now.”
 
And he does. There is no accusation tucked inside the words, no lingering question. The past became something they can look at without flinching.
 
Aether glances across the hallway, where Kaveh, Paradisea tonight is adjusting the lace cuffs of his sleeves while Tighnari fixes a strand of hair that has escaped its careful styling. Cyno is pretending not to listen to their bickering and failing spectacularly.
 
“You built something good,” Aether says quietly. “Hold onto it.”
 
Alhaitham follows his gaze and feels the familiar, steady warmth settle in his chest.
 
“I intend to.”
 
When they stepped onto the stage, the noise was immediate and overwhelming. It rolled over them in waves, thousands of voices colliding into something almost physical. Lights flare white and gold. The first chord cuts cleanly through the chaos.
 
They play like they always have, but better.
 
There is an ease now that only comes from years of shared rhythm. Cyno locks in with the drums before the count is finished. Tighnari’s bass licks thread through melodies with his usual precision. Paradisea commands the center without effort, moving between softness and sharpness in a way that makes the audience hang on every syllable.
 
And Alhaitham plays like someone who no longer fears losing it.
 
There was a time when music felt sacred to him, like something that could fracture at the slightest misstep. When Aether left, something in him dimmed. He had continued, of course. He always did. But the spark had been quieter.
 
Now, five years later, it burned loud and clear.
 
He smiles often.
 
It isn’t calculated, it isn’t rare enough to surprise the others anymore. It comes naturally when Kaveh laughs mid verse, when Cyno improvises something reckless or when Tighnari leans in too close to share a harmony.
 
The fans notice, they always do.
 
By the time they reach the final slot in the setlist, the arena is electric with anticipation. Paradisea takes a breath, expecting the familiar opening of one of their chart topping singles.
 
Instead, Alhaitham steps forward and lifts a hand.
 
The noise dims slightly, confused but attentive.
 
“There’s one more song,” he says, and his voice carries effortlessly through the sound system. “We haven’t played it live in a long time.”
 
Cyno’s eyes flick toward him, then to Tighnari. Something unspoken passes between them. Without fanfare, they shift positions.
 
The opening chords are softer than the rest of the set. Almost hesitant.
 
Recognition spreads slowly through the older fans near the front.
 
Kaveh turns toward Alhaitham, brows drawing together in dawning realization.
 
Alhaitham doesn’t look at the crowd when he begins.
 
He looks at her.
 
“You exist in small details
I don’t have the right to keep…”
 
The arena quiets in a way that feels reverent rather than commanded.
 
“Just enough to make me stop
Not enough to speak…”
 
Kaveh’s throat tightens. She remembers the first time those lyrics were written, scrawled in margins while Alhaitham was still insisting to himself that it was nothing. That it probably wasn’t about her. That she was simply overanalyzing things.
 
“I tell myself it’s nothing
But it doesn’t leave
I carry it between my ribs
Quiet and incomplete…”
 
Alhaitham’s voice has changed over the years. It deepened, settled. It no longer sounded like someone bracing against himself.
 
The chorus swells.
 
“I don’t fall, I don’t rush
I just stay where I am
Holding something quiet
I don’t need to understand…”
 
He does understand now.
 
He understood long before he admitted it.
 
“You feel like a song
I’ve known for a while
Not loud, not sudden
Just stuck in my mind…”
 
The last note lingers in the air.
 
Instead of stepping back, Alhaitham sets his guitar aside.
 
The movement alone sends a ripple through the audience.
 
He walks toward Kaveh slowly, not theatrically, not like a man performing a gesture for spectacle. Just like someone closing a distance that has already been crossed in a hundred quieter ways.
 
“When I wrote that,” he says, the microphone catching the steadiness in his breath, “I thought love had to announce itself loudly for it to count. I thought if it wasn’t overwhelming, it wasn’t real.”
 
He meets Kaveh’s eyes.
 
“It turns out the most dangerous kind is the one that sneaks up behind your back.”
 
The arena is silent enough that the faint hum of stage equipment becomes noticeable.
 
“I was afraid of loving in halves,” he continues. “Afraid of choosing wrong. Afraid of misunderstanding what I felt.”
 
A soft, almost private smile touches his mouth.
 
“You told me once you were scared I would only love one version of you.”
 
Kaveh’s hands tremble. His makeup is flawless under the lights, but his composure is not.
 
“I don’t know how to love in halves,” Alhaitham says gently.
 
He lowers himself to one knee.
 
The crowd gasps, the sound rising and breaking like a wave.
 
“Kaveh,” he says, using his name without adornment, without stage persona, “Will you marry me?”
 
For a moment, Kaveh cannot speak.
 
Five years ago, he was hiding behind lace curtains and fear, convinced he had to split himself into acceptable fragments. Now he stands in front of thousands of people as all of himself at once, and the person kneeling in front of him is looking at him like there has never been anyone else.
 
“You are,” Kaveh manages, voice cracking despite the microphone’s clarity, “unbelievably dramatic.”
 
A laugh ripples through the arena.
 
Then he nods, tears finally spilling freely.
 
“Of course I will, idiot.”
 
The word is soft the first time.
 
He steadies himself and says it again, louder.
 
“Yes.”
 
The sound that follows is deafening.
 
Alhaitham rises, sliding the ring onto his finger with hands that are steady, because this was never impulse. It was inevitability.
 
When they kissed, it was not exaggerated for the crowd. It was something familiar and certain. The kind of kiss that belongs to two people who have chosen each other in a thousand smaller moments before choosing each other here.
 
Behind them, Cyno and Tighnari ease back into the chorus, letting the melody swell around them once more.
 
“I don’t fall, I don’t rush…”
 
Only now it sounds different.
 
Not quiet.
Not incomplete.
 
Alhaitham is smiling when the lights flare and the crowd chants their name.
 
Not because of the spectacle.
 
But because five years ago he thought he was holding something he didn’t need to understand.
 
And now he understood it completely.

It was sacrilege not to fall in love with someone as angelic as Kaveh Paradisea.