Ava’s POV
I didn’t want to leave.
The greenhouse was like a dream I never wanted to wake up from, the colors, the air, the silence broken only by the flutter of butterfly wings. It was the first place in a long time where my chest didn’t feel like it was carrying a thousand stones.
Lucas leaned against one of the wooden beams, arms crossed as he watched me move among the flowers. He wasn’t smirking, not teasing, just watching and somehow that look in his eyes made me warmer than the sun bleeding through the glass.
“Its nice” I asked, brushing my fingers across the petals of a lily. “You kept it alive”
He shrugged, but I could tell it meant more to him than he wanted to admit. “Couldn’t let it die, my mom would’ve killed me herself if I had.”
I smiled faintly, imagining a younger Lu
