The house was quiet.
Not the kind of silence that comes from absence—but the kind that's earned, gently, over time. The kind filled with the faint hum of life still happening in the background. The ticking of a clock. The breath of someone sleeping.
Kaito stood in the doorway of Kaiyo's room. She was curled up under a pale yellow blanket, her stuffed cat tucked tightly under her chin. One tiny foot had escaped from the covers, always in rebellion.
He smiled and walked back down the hall, barefoot on the wood floors, the soft glow of evening lamps lighting his way.
Ren was in the kitchen, nursing a mug of tea, staring out the window at the quiet neighborhood beyond. Kaito wrapped his arms around him from behind.
"She's out," he murmured.
Ren leaned into the warmth. "Hard to believe sometimes, huh? All of it."
Kaito nodded against his shoulder. "Some days I still feel like I'm seventeen. Staring out that rainy classroom window, pretending not to look at you."
Ren laughed, soft and low. "And now we're old and boring."
"We're steady," Kaito corrected. "I like steady."
They stood like that for a while, the kind of silence that doesn't need breaking. That says more than words could.
Finally, Kaito spoke again. "You know, when I was younger… I didn't think I'd ever get this. Love. A home. A future that actually felt like mine."
Ren turned to face him, brushing a hand through Kaito's hair. "And now?"
"Now," Kaito whispered, "I look at you and her and this life we made, and I think… it was always going to be you."
Ren didn't answer with words.
He kissed him.
Long and familiar. Like rain against glass. Like hands brushing in a hallway. Like years of small moments that had built this quiet forever.
Outside, the night wrapped itself around the world like a soft blanket.
And inside, two boys—who'd once been scared, unsure, and quietly in love—now stood grown, steady, and whole.
Not the end.
Just a goodbye to the part of the story they'd shared with the world.
The rest?
It was theirs.