Wyne stood there, her feet rooted to the sun-baked pavement outside the scare house.
For several seconds, she didn't move a single muscle, her breath held tight in her chest as if she were a statue.
She was hyper-aware of the eyes of the other students nearby, and she desperately didn't want to be suspected as the "weird one" in the group, yet her heart was hammering a frantic rhythm against her ribs.
The silence stretched out, feeling like an eternity to her, while the distant sounds of the festival—the laughter, the clinking of game stalls, and the sizzle of street food—seemed to fade into a muffled hum.
Finally, she broke.
The words burst out of her in a sudden, sharp instant, moving faster than Trizha could even press the button on her phone to capture her selfie with the usually stoic-looking Margaret.
"Tri-t-trizha, wait!"
Wyne's voice tore through the air, vibrating with an intensity that bordered on a shout.
The volume was enough to make Trizha freeze.
And it was a volume meant only for her.
For change… only happens once in a lifetime.
Her thumb was barely a millimeter away from the screen's capture button, poised to immortalize a moment of forced cheer.
Trizha's smile faltered, her brow furrowing as she slowly lowered the device. She turned to Wyne, the artificial glow of the screen still reflecting in her eyes.
"What is it? Is there something wrong, Wyne?" Trizia asked, her voice laced with a genuine, growing concern.
She noticed the way Wyne's shoulders were hunched, the way her friend was acting "weird" again, a trend that had been increasing over the last few days.
Wyne hesitated.
The air felt heavy, like a physical weight pressing down on her tongue.
She wanted to retract the shout, to hide back in the safety of their usual banter, but she knew this was a rare moment where she held Trizha's undivided attention.
She couldn't lose the opportunity to turn the tables, to finally voice the gnawing rot of anxiety in her stomach.
"Trizha… what are you actually going to do with those selfies?" Wyne asked, her voice trembling slightly.
Trizha had blinked, looking at her phone as if the answer were the most obvious thing in the world.
"Uh, post them on social media? Duh, I'm going to share the memory, as usual. Everyone's waiting for an update since I've been away, after all."
"I know, I know that's what you do," Wyne said, her hands clenching into fists at her sides. "But… let's do something else. Let's… let's put them all in a frame instead."
A heavy silence followed.
Trizha stayed quiet, slowly raising an eyebrow as she tilted her head, trying to process the request.
To her, the concept of a "frame" had been redefined by the digital age.
A moment later, a look of realization washed over her face, and her bright, influencer-ready smile returned with full force.
"Oh! I get it!" Trizha chirped, her voice light and airy. "You mean those profile picture frames that are trending on TikTok right now! The cute ones with the hearts or the festival theme? That's a great idea, Wyne! It'll really make the post pop."
Hearing that, Wyne felt a wave of cold desperation wash over her.
It was like they were speaking two different languages.
Margaret, standing just a few inches away, could see the sheer agony in Wyne's eyes.
She could see that Wyne was desperate for Trizha to understand—to truly hear what she was trying to say.
Yet, Margaret remained perfectly still.
She didn't intervene, even as she watched Wyne practically backed into an emotional corner.
Margaret knew that Wyne was the emotionally intelligent anchor of their trio; if this friendship was going to be saved, it had to be Wyne who finished what she started.
"Yes, don't worry, I totally got you,"
Trizha continued, already tapping at her screen with practiced speed. "I'll make sure to edit the selfies as nicely as possible, maybe add some filters and a cool border—"
"N-no, that's not what I meant at all!" Wyne interrupted, her voice cracking.
Trizha stopped her tapping, her expression blank. "What then? If you don't want the TikTok frames, what are we talking about?"
"I meant… I…" She hesitated. "...I, I meant an actual frame!" Wyne cried out, her eyes stinging. "A physical one! Something you can touch! Something made of wood and glass!!"
The air between them seemed to vanish.
The declaration hung there, raw and honest.
Wyne had finally done it.
She had used every ounce of her strength, every shred of her protective, maternal instinct for the trio to pull off this small achievement.
To anyone else, it was a minor suggestion—something trivial.
But to Wyne, saying those words was a confession of her greatest fear.
And that was…
"An… actual frame?" Trizha repeated the words slowly, as if they were ancient artifacts. "Like, a physical one for a desk? Why would we do that? It's so much work, and nobody would see it but us."
"E-exactly, that's the point. Because…" Wyne started, but her voice failed her.
…The possibility of not being able to save her friend who saved her the same way.
She lowered her gaze, staring intensely at the cracks in the pavement, unable to maintain eye contact.
She was exposing a part of herself she usually kept under lock and key.
She was the "protective friend," the one who was supposed to be invulnerable, the one who fixed the problems, not the one who created them.
But deep inside, the words Margaret had whispered to her minutes before entering the scare room were echoing like a death knell.
「I fear our relationship with her won't last long, because we won't recognize who she has become.」
The memory of that sentence gave Wyne the final push she needed.
"...Because you have a… a partner now, Trizha," Wyne said, her voice barely a whisper yet carrying more weight than her previous shout. "You finally have Zackier. You have someone to… maybe rely on for the rest of your life. And because of that, I'm afraid. I'm scared. I'm terrified of our friendship—all three of us—getting separated eventually."
Wyne spread her arms slowly, a gesture that looked like a shrug but felt more like a surrender.
The vulnerability was laid bare now, forcing Trizha to look past the camera lens and seek the deeper intention behind Wyne's eyes.
"I mean, look at us," Wyne continued, finally looking up to make eye contact. "We're sixteen years old now. We're only a few more steps away from college, Trizha. And by that time, we'll be completely unchained. We'll be walking our own Routes, in different cities, maybe different countries, and we won't see each other every day. We'll be separated."
Trizha stared back, her phone held loosely in her hand. Her expression was unreadable, her eyes wide as if she were seeing Wyne for the first time in weeks.
Wyne hesitated, the urge to apologize and take it all back bubbling up, but she stayed strong.
She wouldn't back down now.
"And… you were right, Trizha," Wyne said, her voice strengthening. "You said it yourself earlier. We should have our fun while we're at it. So let's make it memorable. Let's make it real. I want something that isn't just created for a quick laugh or a few likes. I don't want to waste these years. I want to grow up and be able to look at a wall and see our smiles exactly where they were once. Smiles… that actually held each other."
Wyne's chest heaved as she finished, her heart laid out on the pavement between them.
She was asking for an anchor in a world that was moving too fast, a physical proof that they existed beyond a server or a cloud.
Trizha listened to every word, every sentence, every agonizing detail.
In the world of social media and rapid-fire trends, an emotional conversation like this was often seen as unnecessary or a "vibe killer."
It wasn't the "right time" for such a heavy topic in the middle of a festival.
But Trizha looked at her friend, and for a moment, the artificial brightness of her persona seemed to soften.
She smiled—a bright, closed-mouth smile of appreciation that formed in an instant.
It was the kind of smile she usually reserved for the camera, but there was a flicker of something else behind it.
Trizha took a step closer to Wyne, her thumb hovering over the screen one last time.
"Don't worry, I totally got you," Trizha said, her voice returning to its cheerful, upbeat melody as if the last two minutes hadn't happened. "I'll make sure to edit the selfies as nice as possible!!"
Wyne stood frozen as Trizha turned back to the camera, her decision made, her ears closed to the physical world in favor of the digital one.
This is, truly, their final voyage.
The beginning… unto the end.