The autumn air was crisp, the kind that made every breath feel like it belonged to the city itself. Laura and Cole walked side by side, their hands brushing occasionally, small sparks that neither ignored nor forced. The campus around them was alive with the faint chatter of students, the rustle of leaves skimming across brick paths, yet it all felt distant, muffled—as if the world had shrunk to just the two of them.

“I never thought we’d walk here again,” Laura said softly, eyes tracing the outline of the old lecture hall, the benches, the sculpture gardens where they’d spent afternoons lost in conversation. “Not like… this.”

Cole smiled,...