Winter's Farewell

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Some people crash into your life like a storm—wild, thrilling, impossible to forget. Others arrive like a whisper, so quiet you don't notice their presence until they've become part of you, woven into your story in ways you can't unravel. For Claire, Leevi was the whisper. He slipped into her life effortlessly, the kind of friend who felt like he'd always been there. And for a long time, that was enough. She thought it always would be.

But things have a way of shifting when you least expect them.

Claire couldn't pinpoint when it started—the subtle change in his laugh, the almost imperceptible delay in his responses, the way his silences became heavier, less shared and more distant. At first, she ignored it. People have bad days, she told herself. But as the weeks turned to months, something in her chest tightened every time she looked at him. He was still there, yet it felt like he wasn't. Like she was grasping at something slipping through her fingers, and the harder she tried to hold on, the more she felt it slipping away.

Leevi wasn't the type to talk about his feelings. He had always been an enigma—reserved, thoughtful, and maddeningly hard to read. She used to love that about him. But now, that mystery felt like a wall she couldn't climb. He seemed fine on the surface, but there was something lurking beneath, something she couldn't reach. And no matter how many times she replayed their moments together, trying to find clues, she couldn't shake the feeling that she was missing something important.

Maybe it was nothing. Maybe she was overthinking, her imagination filling in gaps that didn't exist. Or maybe, just maybe, there was a truth waiting in the shadows—one she wasn't sure she wanted to uncover.

What Claire didn't know was that this wasn't just a phase, a passing distance that would close with time. It was the start of something that would change everything. Something that would force her to question not just their friendship, but everything she thought she knew about herself, about Leevi, and about the kind of love that isn't supposed to hurt.

But she couldn't see that yet. Not as they laughed over dinner, or sat in silence on her couch, or exchanged the kind of smiles that only best friends share. Not as she clung to the routines that once felt unbreakable. Not as the threads between them quietly began to unravel.

By the time Claire realized what was happening, it would be too late to stop it.