I met Neon on a Tuesday.

Not the kind of Tuesday that feels like a beginning. Not the kind that smells like fresh coffee and new notebooks. No, this Tuesday was gray and heavy, the kind that drapes itself over your shoulders like a wet coat and refuses to let go.

I was sitting on the back steps of the library, headphones in, pretending the world didn’t exist. The rain had just stopped, but the sky still looked like it was holding a grudge. Everything smelled like wet pavement and old paper. I liked it that way. It made the silence feel earned.

That’s when I saw him.

He was leaning against the brick wall like he belonged there, like the world had been built around him and not the other way around. His hair was damp, curling slightly at the ends, black as ink and just as fluid. He had one hand in his pocket, the other brushing his lips with two fingers, like he was trying to hush a thought before it escaped.

He didn’t look at me. Not at first.

But I looked at him.

I looked at the rings on his fingers—three of them, all black, all different. One was smooth and thin, like a whisper. One was thick and ridged, like a secret. The last one was chipped at the edge, as if it had been through something and survived.

He wore them like armor.

His shirt was black, too, with white letters I couldn’t fully read. His jeans were torn at the knees, not in a trendy way, but like he’d actually fallen. Or maybe knelt. Or maybe just didn’t care.

I didn’t know his name yet. But I already knew he was going to ruin something.

He noticed me eventually.

Pulled one earbud out, tilted his head just slightly, and said, “You always sit here?”

His voice was low. Not deep, but quiet in a way that made you lean in. Like he didn’t waste words on people who wouldn’t listen.

“Only when I want to disappear,” I said, before I could stop myself.

He smiled. Not with his mouth—with his eyes. They crinkled at the corners, just a little. Like he’d heard that answer before. Or maybe like he’d said it once, a long time ago.

“I get that,” he said. “I’m Neon.”

I blinked. “Like the lights?”

He shrugged. “Like the ghost of them.”

I didn’t know what that meant. But it stayed with me.

We didn’t talk much that day. Just sat there, side by side, not touching, not asking. The silence between us wasn’t awkward. It was… full. Like a song with no lyrics. Like a memory you haven’t made yet.

When he left, he didn’t say goodbye. Just stood up, nodded once, and walked away.

I watched him go, wondering if I’d ever see him again.

I did.

Too many times.

And never enough.

The second time was a Thursday.

He was sitting on the edge of the fountain in the park, tossing pebbles into the water like they were confessions. I almost didn’t recognize him—his hair was dry, his shirt different, but the rings were the same. Always the rings.

I sat beside him without asking.

He didn’t look surprised.

“You ever think about vanishing?” he asked.

“Sometimes,” I said. “But I think I’d miss being missed.”

He nodded slowly, like that answer mattered.

“I don’t think anyone would notice if I disappeared,” he said.

I wanted to tell him he was wrong. That I’d notice. That I’d feel it like a bruise. But I didn’t. I just watched the ripples in the water and let the silence speak for me.

Neon wasn’t the kind of person you could explain.

He was a mood, a moment, a metaphor. He was the kind of boy who made you write poetry you’d never show anyone. The kind who made you stare at the ceiling at 2 a.m. and wonder if he was staring at it too.

He didn’t tell me much about himself. Just fragments.

He liked storms. He hated loud places. He once broke his wrist punching a wall. He had a sister he didn’t talk to. He didn’t believe in soulmates, but he believed in timing.

“I think timing ruins everything,” he said once. “Even the good things.”

I wanted to ask what his good thing was. But I was afraid of the answer.😔

.......

Neon never said goodbye.

He just disappeared.

One day he was there—sitting on the edge of the fountain, flicking pebbles into the water like he was trying to erase something. The next, he was gone. No message. No warning. Just silence, like a door closing in a dream.

I waited for him that Friday. I sat on the same bench, headphones in, pretending not to look for him. But I was. Every shadow that moved, every footstep that echoed down the path—I thought it might be him.

It never was.

I told myself he was just late. Then I told myself he was busy. Then I told myself I didn’t care.

But I did.

I cared in the way you care about a song that ends too soon. In the way you keep replaying the last note, hoping it’ll sound different this time.

The days stretched out like threadbare ribbon.

I started seeing him in places he’d never been. In the reflection of a café window. In the back of a bookstore. In the way someone else touched their lips when they were thinking.

But it was never him.

It was just the ghost of him, stitched into the fabric of my days.

I started writing again. Not poems, not really. Just fragments. Sentences that felt like bruises. Words that tasted like him.

He was the silence I never learned to live with.

He left fingerprints on my thoughts.

Some people leave. He lingered.

I didn’t know what I was writing. Maybe a letter. Maybe a confession. Maybe a map back to the version of me that existed before him.

If that version even existed at all.

I stopped going to the fountain.

It felt too much like waiting. And I hated waiting for someone who didn’t want to be found.

Instead, I walked different streets. Sat in different cafés. Listened to different music. I tried to rewrite my habits, hoping it would rewrite my heart.

But it didn’t.

Neon had carved himself into places I didn’t expect. The way I stirred my tea. The way I paused before answering a question. The way I looked at the sky and wondered if he was looking too.

He was everywhere.

And nowhere.

It was two weeks before I saw him again.

I was walking home from class, the sky bruised with sunset, when I heard someone say my name.

Not loudly. Just enough to stop me.

I turned, and there he was—Neon, standing under a flickering streetlight like he’d stepped out of a memory. His hair was longer. His eyes were tired. But it was him.

And I hated how my heart reacted. Like it had been waiting for this moment the whole time.

“Hey,” he said.

That was all.

Just hey.

Like he hadn’t vanished. Like he hadn’t left me wondering if I’d imagined him.

I didn’t say anything. I couldn’t. My throat was full of all the things I wanted to scream.

He looked down, then back at me. “I’m sorry.”

Two words. That’s all he gave me.

But they cracked something open.

We sat on the curb, knees almost touching, silence between us again. But this time, it wasn’t peaceful. It was sharp. It buzzed.

“I had to go,” he said finally. “I didn’t want to. But I had to.”

“Why?” I asked.

He didn’t answer right away. Just stared at the ground like the truth was written there.

“I break things,” he said. “People. Moments. I didn’t want to break you.”

I laughed. Not because it was funny. But because it hurt.

“You think disappearing didn’t break me?”

He flinched. “I thought it would be better than staying and ruining everything.”

“You already ruined everything,” I said. “By leaving.”

He nodded. “I know.”

And then he did something I didn’t expect.

He reached into his pocket and pulled out a folded piece of paper. It was creased and worn, like it had been opened and closed a hundred times.

He handed it to me.

“I wrote this,” he said. “The night I left. I didn’t send it. I didn’t think I had the right.”

I took it with shaking hands.

I don’t know how to say goodbye to someone I never really had.

You were never mine. But you were everything.

I’m leaving because I’m scared. Not of you. Of me.

Of what I become when I care too much.

I ruin things. I ruin people. I don’t want to ruin you.

So I’m going.

Not because I want to.

Because I have to.

—N

I read it twice. Then a third time.

And then I tore it in half.

He looked startled.

“You don’t get to write endings,” I said. “Not alone.”

He looked at me, really looked at me, and for the first time, I saw it—the fear. The softness. The hope.

“I don’t want to be a chapter you skip,” he said.

“Then don’t be,” I whispered.

We walked together after that.

Not toward anything. Just away from the curb, away from the moment, away from the version of us that had been sitting in silence.

The city was quiet. The kind of quiet that feels earned. Like the world had exhaled and was waiting for something to happen.

Neon walked with his hands in his pockets, his shoulders slightly hunched, like he was trying to make himself smaller. I wanted to reach out, to straighten him, to remind him he didn’t have to hide.

But I didn’t.

Instead, I asked, “Where did you go?”

He didn’t answer right away. Just kept walking, his steps slow and deliberate.

“Nowhere,” he said eventually. “Everywhere.”

“That’s not an answer.”

“It’s the only one I have.”

I didn’t push. I knew better than to chase ghosts.

We ended up at the bridge.

It wasn’t far, just a few blocks from the park. But it felt like another world. The water below was dark and restless, reflecting the city lights in broken patterns. Neon leaned against the railing, staring down like he was trying to find something he’d lost.

“I used to come here when I was a kid,” he said. “Before everything got loud.”

“What got loud?”

He hesitated. “Life.”

I nodded. I understood that.

“Do you ever wish you could go back?” I asked.

He didn’t look at me. “All the time.”

“What would you change?”

He turned then, his eyes meeting mine. “I wouldn’t leave.”

We stood on the bridge for a long time.

The wind tugged at Neon’s hair, lifting strands like it wanted to carry pieces of him away. The river below moved slowly, like it was tired of pretending to be something beautiful. Neon leaned forward, elbows on the railing, eyes fixed on the water like it held answers he couldn’t say out loud.

“I used to come here when I was a kid,” he said. “Before everything got loud.”

“What got loud?” I asked.

He hesitated. “Life.”

I didn’t press. I’d learned that with Neon, silence was often more honest than words.

He pulled something from his pocket—a small, silver lighter. It was scratched and dented, the kind of object that had lived through stories. He flicked it open, let the flame dance for a second, then closed it again.

“I don’t smoke,” he said. “I just like the sound.”

I watched him do it again. Flick. Flame. Silence.

It was like watching someone try to control chaos with rhythm.

“Do you ever feel like you’re not real?” he asked suddenly.

I blinked. “What do you mean?”

“Like you’re just… watching yourself live. Like you’re a ghost in your own body.”

I swallowed. “Sometimes.”

He nodded. “Me too.”

We walked from the bridge to the edge of the city, where the buildings stopped pretending to be important and the streets forgot their names. Neon led the way, hands in his pockets, shoulders hunched like he was trying to fold himself into something smaller.

“I want to show you something,” he said.

We turned down an alley that smelled like rain and rust. At the end was a door—chipped paint, crooked handle, no sign. He pulled out a key and unlocked it like it was nothing.

Inside was a room.

Not a home. Not a hideout. Just a room.

The walls were covered in pages—torn from books, printed from old websites, scribbled in messy handwriting. Poetry. Lyrics. Quotes. Sentences that didn’t belong anywhere else.

Neon walked to the far wall and touched a page gently, like it was fragile.

“This is where I go when I need to remember who I am,” he said.

I stepped closer. The page he touched read:

I am not what I’ve lost.

I am what I’ve survived.

There was a mattress on the floor, a lamp with no shade, and a stack of notebooks tied together with string. He sat on the mattress, legs crossed, and looked up at me.

“I used to live here,” he said. “Not for long. Just enough to forget things.”

“Forget what?”

He didn’t answer. Just reached for one of the notebooks and handed it to me.

I opened it slowly.

Inside were drawings. Not perfect ones. Not artistic. Just raw. Faces. Hands. Eyes. All of them looked like him. Or maybe like versions of him he didn’t want to be.

“I draw when I can’t speak,” he said.

I flipped to a page near the middle.

It was a sketch of someone curled up on the floor, surrounded by words like empty, too much, not enough, leave, stay, sorry.

I closed the notebook gently.

“I didn’t know,” I whispered.

He looked at me. “You weren’t supposed to.”

We stayed in that room for hours.

He told me pieces of his story. Not all of it. Just enough.

His mom left when he was ten. His dad stopped talking after that. His sister moved out and never came back. He learned to cook from YouTube. Learned to lie from necessity. Learned to disappear from watching people forget him.

“I’m not tragic,” he said. “I’m just tired.”

I didn’t know what to say.

So I reached out and touched his hand.

He flinched. Not because he didn’t want it. Because he wasn’t used to it.

“I’m still here,” I said.

He looked at our hands. “I don’t know how to be someone people stay for.”

“Then let me teach you.”