Riku Harada said her name like it belonged to him.
Mizuki noticed it the morning after the ramen shop, when the sky was still undecided between night and day. She was half-awake, wrapped in her blanket, phone balanced dangerously on her chest.
"Mizuki."
Her eyes opened instantly.
He always said it like that when he was tired—soft, unguarded, the consonants blurred together as if he hadn't bothered to wake them fully. Not Aoki, not the teasing nicknames he used when he was wide awake. Just Mizuki, spoken low, like he was testing the sound of it in the quiet.
"Why are you calling?" she murmured.
"Couldn't sleep," he said. She heard the faint rustle of sheets on his end, imagined him sprawled sideways on his bed, one arm thrown over his eyes. "You awake?"
"You always ask that," she said.
"Yeah, but you're always awake."
She smiled into the dark. He was right. He always was.
They didn't talk about anything important. They never did during calls like this. He told her about a client who had sent an email at midnight. She told him her neighbor's cat had knocked over her trash again. There were pauses between sentences that felt like sighs. Comfortable. Easy.
Safe.
"Mizuki," he said again, absently, as if reminding himself she was there.
Something in her chest tightened.
She wondered, not for the first time, if he realized how often he said her name when he didn't need to—when there was no one else to confuse her with, when the silence had already confirmed who he was speaking to. She wondered if he knew that every time he said it like that, it felt like a hand reaching out in the dark.
They hung up twenty minutes later, neither of them mentioning the time. Mizuki lay awake long after, replaying the sound of her name until it softened into something dangerous.
By the time they met for lunch that afternoon, she had already collected a dozen small moments.
The way Riku leaned toward her when he laughed, body angling in unconsciously as if drawn by gravity. The way his knee brushed hers under the table and stayed there, unmoved. The way he reached across without looking and took a fry from her plate, because he knew she hated the last few when they were too salty.
She cataloged these things carefully, the way some people collected seashells—proof that something beautiful had existed, even if it couldn't be kept.
"You're staring," he said, mouth full.
"Am not."
"You are." He swallowed, grinning. "What, do I have something on my face?"
"No," she said quickly. "I was just… thinking."
"Dangerous."
"For you, maybe."
He laughed, that same familiar sound that had followed her through a decade of her life. Ten years of shared air, shared meals, shared jokes that didn't make sense to anyone else.
To outsiders, it still looked the same. The waitress smiled at them like she'd already decided their story. A couple at the next table whispered not-quite-quietly. Mizuki felt the weight of those assumptions settle over her like a borrowed coat—warm, ill-fitting, not hers to keep.
Riku didn't notice. He never did.
That, more than anything, was what hurt.
Later, as they walked back toward her office, he drifted closer without realizing it. Their arms brushed. His shoulder dipped toward hers as he spoke, voice animated, hands moving. She adjusted her pace automatically to match his. They had been doing this so long it felt less like choice and more like instinct.
"Mizuki."
She looked up at him.
He had said her name differently this time—clear, deliberate. Awake.
"About this weekend," he said. "I told you I'd explain."
Her heart skipped. She hated that it still did that.
"Okay."
"There's a friend from college in town," he continued. "Haven't seen her in years. She wants to grab dinner Saturday."
The word her lodged itself somewhere between Mizuki's ribs.
"Oh," she said, carefully. "That's nice."
"Yeah. I mean—" He glanced at her, uncertain again, the way he had been in the ramen shop. "I was thinking you could come too. Make it less awkward."
Less awkward.
Of course.
"Sure," she said, smiling because that was what she did best. "I'd love to."
Relief washed over his face, immediate and unguarded. "Really? Thanks. You're the best."
Best friend.
They stopped in front of her building. This was another routine—he always walked her this far, even when it added ten minutes to his commute. He said it was on the way. It wasn't.
"Well," he said, shoving his hands into his pockets. "Text me later?"
"I always do."
"Yeah," he said, softer. "You always do."
For a moment, something hovered between them. Not quite tension. Not quite absence. Just the fragile, invisible line they had been tracing around for years.
Riku stepped back first.
As he walked away, Mizuki stood there longer than necessary, replaying everything she had noticed, everything she had felt. The way he said her name when he was tired. The way his body leaned toward hers as if it remembered something his mind refused to name.
To her, these moments were loaded. They were intimate. They were proof.
To him, they were nothing more than habit.
That was the cruelest realization of all.
They were not sharing the same relationship. They were standing in the same place, calling it by the same name, but seeing entirely different things.
Comfort had taught her to stay. Safety had taught her to be quiet.
And love—hers, hidden and careful—had learned to survive in the shadows of friendship, even as it wondered how long pretending would be enough.