They were best friends for years, sharing every secret-except one. When Felix finally confesses his feelings, Josephine lets him down with a gentle lie: she's not interested in men. Heartbroken but determined to keep their friendship, Felix tries to...
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It was later in the week and Felix sat in his dimly lit room, fingers tracing the edge of a worn photograph in his hand. The picture was of him and Josephine from high school—she was laughing in her little cheerleader outfit, her face turned to the side, while he watched her, a wide smile on his own face. The light from his desk lamp cast a soft glow over the photograph, illuminating her laughter frozen in time.
The walls around him were lined with other photos he'd collected over the years—snapshots of birthdays, school events, random coffee dates, and lazy afternoons. They captured her in countless moments, each one a small fragment of who she was to him. In most of them, he was close by her side, his gaze often lingering on her in the pictures, even if he was just a background figure. Josephine was your average hot popular cheerleader in high school, while on the other hand, Felix was that typical nerd that was secretly handsome under his glasses. Josephine was the only person who treated him genuinely nice and they quickly realized they had the same interests and became really close in an instant, despite people telling Josephine not to get close with Felix. Josephine and Felix were so close that they went to the same college together, and they even moved across the street from each-other because they can't keep away from each other. Felix had to get a roommate though because the town she wanted to live in after college was expensive, it was her hometown. He didn't want to pay that type of money, but he'd do anything for her. Thankfully, with his online job he's making enough money. Their friendship was the type of friendship where they can walk into each other's house and steal each-others snacks, or walk in when no one was home and use each-others things.
He sighed, running a hand through his hair. "I can't keep waiting," he murmured to himself. He glanced at his phone, his fingers hovering over the screen as he thought about her mentions of Ryan lingering in his mind like an unwelcome thorn.
Just the thought of her with someone else was enough to stir a strange, possessive feeling within him. She was everything to him, though he doubted she truly understood how deeply he felt. They'd been friends for so long, and she'd always trusted him, leaned on him. When her high school jock boyfriend cheated on her, he was there to comfort her. He wanted to confess his feelings then, but decided to wait until she was ready as she kept saying she would never date again. He'd waited for the perfect moment, telling himself it was better this way—to let her come to him when she was ready. But now, with Ryan suddenly in the picture, he feared that waiting might mean losing her.
Looking at the picture again, Felix whispered, "I need to tell her...before it's too late."
He set the photo down, leaning back in his chair and staring at the ceiling, lost in thought. Memories of their time together drifted through his mind—the nights they spent watching movies, the way she'd light up whenever she saw him, the quiet moments when she'd let her guard down and share pieces of herself no one else knew. He knew her better than anyone else, and he'd always thought she'd eventually come to realize that they were meant to be together.
