Fifth Street always smelled like wet earth after rain. It didn’t matter if it had poured yesterday or a week ago—somehow the scent lingered as if the clouds had a personal vendetta against the neighborhood. Arin had walked this street for two years, commuting every morning to the same office building, the same flickering elevator, the same cubicle where the AC was too cold and the coffee was too warm. Nothing ever changed.
Except today.
Today the rain came earlier than expected, the kind that skipped the polite drizzle and went straight to “simulation of the Atlantic Ocean.” Arin had forgotten his umbrella—again—and was now sprinting toward the only open café on the block, pushing the door with more force than necessary.
Inside, the air was warm. The smell of coffee wrapped around him like a blanket. His shirt clung to his skin. His hair was dripping. He felt like a washed vegetable.
He didn’t notice the person sitting near the window until a quiet voice said,
“You always run like the rain is chasing you.”
Arin froze. He knew that voice.
Reyansh.
Two years ago, back in university, Arin and Reyansh had crossed paths again and again. They weren’t friends. They weren’t enemies. They were something in-between—the kind of rivalry born from shared brilliance and accidental glances. They had competed in coding contests, group presentations, hackathons. Arin had lost twice. Reyansh had always apologized afterwards, looking far more guilty than a winner should look.
Arin hadn’t seen him since graduation. And yet here he was—older, calmer, still wearing that same soft smile that felt annoyingly disarming.
“You’re soaked,” Reyansh added.
“Yes, well,” Arin muttered, pulling his wet backpack onto a chair, “the weather doesn’t care about my schedule.”
Reyansh laughed softly. “Some things don’t change.”
Arin wanted to reply with something clever, something cutting, something that proved he wasn’t affected by this sudden reunion—but all he managed was a very eloquent, “Right.”
He sat. Partly because his legs were tired. Partly because leaving meant walking into the rain again. Mostly because he couldn’t ignore the magnetic pull of familiarity, even after years apart.
“What are you doing here?” Arin asked.
“Working,” Reyansh said, turning his laptop slightly. “My company shifted to hybrid mode. I get to choose my workspace. And this café is peaceful.”
“Peaceful until I crash into it like a storm cloud.”
Reyansh’s smile widened. “You’re dramatic as ever.”
Arin pretended not to notice the warmth spreading through his chest.
He glanced out the window. The rain showed no sign of stopping. People dashed down the street like panicked ants.
“You can stay here until it slows,” Reyansh said.
“Trust me, I wasn’t planning to go back out there.”
Arin pulled his laptop out of his bag and stared at it in despair. The screen flickered then—nothing. It was dead. Of course it was dead. It always chose the worst possible moment.
“You need to submit something?” Reyansh asked.
“Yeah. A report I’ve been postponing for two days.”
Reyansh gently pushed his own laptop toward him.
“Use mine.”
Arin blinked. “I can’t take your laptop.”
“You can,” Reyansh said simply. “I don’t mind.”
Arin hesitated, unsure whether it was pride or embarrassment stopping him. Eventually, practicality won. He shifted the laptop toward himself and opened a blank document.
Reyansh returned to his notebook, scribbling something in neat handwriting. Arin risked a glance. He had forgotten how focused Reyansh could look—eyebrows slightly furrowed, lips pressed together, hair falling across his forehead. Something about that concentration had always fascinated Arin, even back in college.
Minutes passed in quiet harmony, the kind that felt comfortable rather than awkward. The café music hummed softly. The rain pattered against the glass. For the first time in weeks, Arin didn’t feel rushed. He didn’t feel tense. He didn’t feel alone.
He finished the report and closed the tab.
“Thanks,” he said, sliding the laptop back. “I owe you.”
“You don’t,” Reyansh replied. “But if you insist, you can buy me a coffee.”
“That’s… fair.”
Arin went to the counter and returned with two steaming cups. One black, one cappuccino. Reyansh accepted the cappuccino with a small laugh.
“You still remember?”
“You always ordered this,” Arin said without thinking.
Reyansh looked up. Something unspoken flickered in his eyes—surprise, maybe. Or fondness. Arin quickly looked away, pretending to adjust his chair.
The café door opened and a cold draft swept in. A few customers left. A few new ones came in. The rain began to lighten.
Reyansh glanced at him. “You look different.”
Arin raised an eyebrow. “Different how?”
“More tired,” Reyansh said. “But also… more real.”
Arin blinked. “That sounds philosophical.”
“I’ve been reading a lot lately.”
There was a pause.
Then Reyansh added quietly, “I’m glad I ran into you.”
The words hit Arin unexpectedly. He felt something shift inside him, like a door he had kept shut for too long had opened a little.
“Why?” he asked before he could stop himself.
“Because I…” Reyansh paused, searching for the right words. “I used to think about you sometimes. Wonder how you were doing. We left things between us… unfinished.”
Arin swallowed. “It’s not like we were anything.”
“That’s exactly why it was unfinished,” Reyansh said. “We kept pretending we weren’t something.”
Arin didn’t know what to say to that.
He looked at his hands. Looked at the coffee. Looked at the rain.
“Everything’s different now,” Arin finally said.
“Yes,” Reyansh agreed. “We’re older. Wiser. Less competitive, I hope.”
“Speak for yourself.”
Reyansh chuckled. “Still the same Arin.”
“And you’re still the same Reyansh,” Arin shot back. “Soft-spoken. Overly helpful. Annoyingly thoughtful.”
“Annoyingly?”
“Very.”
They shared a smile.
The rain outside faded into a gentle drizzle. Light filtered through the clouds, illuminating the café in a warm glow.
Reyansh closed his notebook. “Are you heading back to the office?”
“I should,” Arin said, though he didn’t move. “But the rain might start again.”
“You can wait here longer,” Reyansh offered. “Or… we could walk together. I’m heading the same way.”
Arin blinked. “You are?”
“My company office is two blocks from yours.”
The world felt smaller suddenly—like fate had been rearranging furniture behind their backs.
“I didn’t know,” Arin said.
“You were busy with your own world,” Reyansh said softly. “Nothing wrong with that.”
Arin stared at the table. “You make everything sound deeper than it is.”
“And you make everything sound simpler than it is.”
They looked at each other with a sense of recognition that had taken years to arrive.
Reyansh stood up first. “Walk with me?”
Arin hesitated only a second before rising.
They stepped outside. The drizzle clung lightly to their clothes. Fifth Street felt brighter after the downpour, as if washed clean.
They walked side by side, their steps falling into an easy rhythm. Arin felt strangely at ease, as though the silence between them wasn’t empty but filled with years of things unsaid.
Reyansh spoke first. “Do you remember our final hackathon?”
Arin snorted. “You mean the one where you beat me by like two points?”
“You always exaggerate.”
“You always underplay things.”
“Maybe.”
Arin kicked a small pebble on the sidewalk. “I thought you hated me back then.”
“I never did. I was… intimidated.”
Reyansh paused. “You were brilliant. Confident. Loud. Everything I wasn’t.”
Arin stared at him. “You? Intimidated by me?”
“Yes.”
Then quieter, “And also drawn to you.”
Arin’s steps slowed.
Reyansh stopped too, turning toward him. The street was mostly empty, the air still fresh from the rain.
“You don’t have to say anything,” Reyansh added quickly. “I didn’t tell you expecting a response. I just… wanted you to know.”
Arin swallowed hard. “I wasn’t confident,” he said slowly. “I just pretended to be. I thought if I acted like nothing bothered me, nothing could hurt me.”
Reyansh’s eyes softened. “And did it work?”
“No.”
A breeze brushed past them. A car rolled by. A dog barked in the distance.
Arin exhaled. “You weren’t the only one pretending.”
Reyansh didn’t move, didn’t speak. He simply waited, patient as ever.
Arin wasn’t sure how long they stood like that—caught between the past and something new. The truth felt heavy and light at the same time, like rain clouds drifting away.
“I don’t know what this is,” Arin said finally, voice quiet. “Whatever you’re hinting at… I’m not sure.”
Reyansh nodded. “We don’t have to define anything.”
Arin continued, “But I’m… not against figuring it out.”
Something peaceful settled between them. The kind of calm that came not from certainty, but from honesty.
Reyansh smiled—small, genuine, the kind that always felt like sunlight breaking through.
“Then let’s just walk,” he said. “One day at a time.”
Arin nodded.
They resumed walking, not touching, not rushing—just moving forward together on a street that smelled like rain and new beginnings.
And for the first time in a long while, Arin felt that maybe—not everything had to stay unfinished.
---
The week after Arin and Reyansh walked home together felt strangely weightless, like someone had reduced gravity around him but forgotten to tell the rest of the world. Work was the same, deadlines still hunted him, but something in his routine had shifted quietly — gently — like a chair moved two inches to the left. You don’t notice the movement, only the difference in balance.
They started running into each other more often.
At the café.
At the crosswalk near the bus stop.
Outside the office buildings where their paths almost overlapped.
Sometimes it felt accidental.
Sometimes it felt suspiciously well-timed.
Neither pointed it out.
One afternoon, after work, Arin found himself pausing outside the café instead of walking past it. Through the glass, he saw Reyansh sitting at their usual table — laptop open, headphones around his neck, a cappuccino untouched beside him.
Arin opened the door before he could overthink it.
“You’re here early,” he said.
Reyansh looked up, surprised but smiling. “And you’re here without being chased by a thunderstorm. Miracles do happen.”
Arin slipped into the seat opposite him. “I had a long day.”
“Want to talk about it?”
“No,” Arin said truthfully. “But I don’t want to go home yet.”
Reyansh nodded as if he understood exactly what that meant.
He always did.
They sat in silence for a few minutes. Not the awkward kind — the peaceful kind where the world feels busy elsewhere.
When Arin finally spoke, his voice was soft.
“You said we left things unfinished.”
Reyansh looked up again. “I remember.”
“I’ve been thinking about it.”
Reyansh closed his laptop slowly, giving all his attention to Arin in that patient, careful way he always had.
“What have you been thinking?” he asked.
“That maybe…” Arin hesitated, searching for words that didn’t feel too fragile. “Maybe we didn’t finish because we were scared.”
Reyansh’s expression didn’t change, but something warm flickered behind his eyes.
“Scared of what?”
“Scared of… getting it wrong,” Arin admitted. “Or ruining whatever it was that we had. Even if it wasn’t much.”
Reyansh shook his head gently. “It was something. That’s why it stayed with us.”
Arin looked down at his hands. “And I think it could still be… something.”
It was the first time he had said it out loud.
His heart felt both too heavy and too light.
Reyansh didn’t rush to fill the silence. He simply studied Arin’s face, as if trying to read every line, every doubt, every unspoken hope.
After a long moment, he spoke.
“I don’t want us to rush into anything,” he said quietly. “And I don’t want you to feel pressured. But if you’re asking whether I want to see where this goes… I do. I really do.”
Arin exhaled slowly. Relief washed over him like a warm breeze, untying knots he didn’t know he carried.
“So… what now?” he asked.
Reyansh smiled, the small kind that held more meaning than any big gesture.
“Now,” he said, “we start with the simplest thing.”
Arin raised an eyebrow. “Which is?”
“Being in each other’s lives.”
Arin laughed. “That’s it?”
“That’s more than enough,” Reyansh replied. “Everything else can come later.”
It sounded right.
Grounded.
Real.
Not a promise.
Not a label.
Just a beginning — steady and safe.
They spent the next hour talking about everything and nothing. Work. College memories. Their favorite snacks. Arin teased Reyansh about his messy handwriting. Reyansh teased him about his dramatic storytelling. It felt comfortable, like slipping into an old sweater you only now realized still fit perfectly.
When they finally stepped outside, the sky was a soft blue. Clouds drifted lazily. The world smelled like evening and the lingering warmth of the sun.
They walked side by side again, no destination in mind this time.
At the corner where their paths split, they stopped.
Reyansh glanced at him. “Same café tomorrow?”
Arin grinned. “Same time?”
“Same everything,” Reyansh said.
Arin hesitated — just for a second — then reached out and gently nudged Reyansh’s shoulder with his own.
Not a hug.
Not a confession.
Just a quiet acknowledgement.
A yes in its simplest form.
Reyansh nudged him back, smiling like sunlight.
“See you tomorrow, Arin.”
“Yeah,” Arin said, a warmth settling comfortably in his chest.
“You will.”
As he walked away, Fifth Street felt different again — not because of the rain this time, but because of something new, something fragile and bright taking root between two people who’d spent years pretending they were nothing.
Now, finally, they were beginning to figure out what they could be.
Together.
One day at a time.
---
One week after Arin and Reyansh agreed to “start with being in each other’s lives,” Fifth Street decided to be dramatic again.
Rain. Obviously.
Arin stood outside the café, staring at the sky like it had personally betrayed him.
He had brought an umbrella for once — the result of Reyansh teasing him every single day about being “allergic to preparation.”
The café door opened behind him.
“You waiting for the clouds to apologize?” Reyansh asked.
Arin smirked. “They should.”
Reyansh stepped beside him, holding his own umbrella… which was, for some reason, broken. One of the spokes was bent at a weird angle, giving it the posture of someone who’d been through too much.
Arin stared. “What happened to that thing? Did you fight a pigeon?”
Reyansh sighed. “It caught on the office door handle. I tried to fix it.”
“It looks like it needs therapy.”
“Thank you. Very supportive.”
Arin shook his head and opened his umbrella, holding it above both of them.
“Come on. You’re not walking home with that tragic object.”
Reyansh hesitated. “Are you sure? I don’t want to—”
“Reyansh,” Arin said, nudging him lightly, “we literally walk home together every day now. Get under the umbrella.”
Reyansh stepped closer, just enough for the umbrella to cover them both, but not so close that it felt intentional.
Arin rolled his eyes.
“You can walk normally,” he muttered. “I don’t bite.”
Reyansh smiled. “I thought you liked personal space.”
“Today I don’t.”
That was all it took.
Reyansh shifted closer, their shoulders brushing gently as they walked.
Not constant.
Just every few steps — a small reminder that he was right there.
They walked past their usual spots:
the bakery with the crooked sign,
the old bookstore that always smelled like dust and nostalgia,
the streetlight that flickered like it was practicing Morse code.
The rain softened into drizzle.
The world felt quiet.
“You know,” Reyansh said after a moment, “I like this.”
“Walking in the rain?”
“Walking with you.”
Arin’s heart did a tiny, embarrassing somersault.
He kept his voice steady.
“Well… same.”
They stopped at the corner where their paths separated.
Arin closed the umbrella and shook off the droplets.
Reyansh’s hair was slightly damp at the edges, and he pushed it back in that absent, gentle way Arin had always secretly liked.
“Thanks for sharing the umbrella,” Reyansh said.
“Anytime.”
Reyansh paused. “Arin?”
“Yeah?”
Reyansh looked almost shy. “Feel free to… bump my shoulder again tomorrow.”
Arin grinned, unable to stop himself. “Deal.”
Reyansh smiled — soft and warm, the kind that stayed with you even after he walked away.
Arin watched him go for a moment, umbrella in hand, rain fading around them.
And he realized something simple but certain:
Some people feel like rain — unexpected, calming, and quietly necessary.
Reyansh was one of them.
---
The school rooftop wasn’t fancy.
Just a square of faded paint, a bunch of potted plants that looked like they’d been abandoned, and a railing that had definitely seen better days.
But Arin liked it.
It felt like a place where the world took a breather.
Reyansh reached the top a few minutes later, panting like he’d just run a marathon.
“You’re… early,” he said.
“You’re… late,” Arin replied.
Reyansh laughed, leaning against the railing. “You dragged me up to the roof without telling me why. I deserve two minutes to emotionally prepare.”
Arin kicked a pebble. “You don’t need emotional preparation. You’re Reyansh.”
“That’s exactly why I need it.”
Arin didn’t smile.
Not today.
His hands were in his pockets, shoulders tense. The winter air made his breath come out in small puffs. Reyansh noticed instantly.
“You good?” he asked softly.
Arin nodded — the kind of nod that convinced absolutely no one.
Reyansh stepped closer. Not too close. Just orbiting him like he always did.
That gentle, steady presence Arin had grown way too used to.
“Alright,” Reyansh said, “what’s going on?”
Arin finally looked at him.
Reyansh’s eyes were exactly the problem — too warm, too open, too everything.
“I’ve been trying to ignore it,” Arin muttered.
“Ignore what?”
“You.”
Reyansh blinked. “Me? What did I do?”
“You exist,” Arin said, frustrated. “And you do it very… loudly.”
Reyansh let out a confused laugh. “You’re gonna have to explain that one.”
Arin took a deep breath, as if admitting the next words was going to set off fireworks in his chest.
“Every day,” he said quietly, “I tell myself I’m fine being just… this. Whatever we are. Friends who walk home. Friends who share an umbrella. Friends who pretend they’re not looking at each other when the other looks away.”
Reyansh froze, just slightly.
Arin continued before he could back out.
“But then you smile at me, or say something stupidly kind, or bump my shoulder on purpose, and I…” He exhaled shakily. “I lose the argument with myself.”
The rooftop felt too quiet.
Almost like it was holding its breath for them.
Reyansh’s voice dropped to barely above a whisper. “Arin.”
Arin shook his head. “Don’t interrupt. If I stop now, I’ll never say it.”
Reyansh nodded.
Arin swallowed hard.
“I like you,” he said. “Not in a small way. Not in a maybe way. In a way that’s… loud. And annoying. And very very real.”
Reyansh stared at him, stunned into stillness.
Arin stared at the floor. “I don’t want this to mess things up. So if you don’t feel the same, just—”
“I do.”
Arin’s head snapped up.
Reyansh’s voice was steadier now, as if the truth finally aligned inside him.
“I do feel the same,” he said. “I’ve liked you for a while. I just didn’t want to rush you. Or push you. You mattered too much for that.”
Arin blinked rapidly, trying to process.
“You… like me?”
Reyansh stepped closer — slowly, letting Arin see every inch of the movement.
“I like you,” he said, “in a way that makes every day feel slightly ridiculous. And slightly better.”
Arin let out an awkward laugh. “You’re impossible.”
“You confessed first,” Reyansh teased. “So technically, you’re the impossible one.”
Arin’s face warmed. “Just—shut up.”
Reyansh grinned. “Never.”
They stood there for a few seconds, almost shoulder to shoulder, the winter wind nudging their sleeves together.
Reyansh broke the silence softly.
“So… what happens now?”
Arin looked at him — really looked — and for the first time, the rooftop didn’t feel scary or dramatic.
It just felt… right.
“We start,” Arin said. “Whatever this is. We start.”
Reyansh nodded, eyes bright. “Then let’s start.”
The two of them didn’t hug.
Didn’t hold hands.
Didn’t move any closer than they already were.
But the space between them finally felt honest.
And that was more than enough.
---
