Until the Last Message

Chapter 2: The Safe Space

Their chat had begun as a novelty — a curious collision of timelines and temperaments. But as the days blurred into late nights, and messages stacked into digital memory, Aiden and Lira found something neither expected to exist in a phone screen:

Consistency.

Each message carried more than just words. They carried routine, presence, warmth — something like a heartbeat.

It wasn't about romance. Not yet. It was something gentler, more dangerous in its subtlety — the comfort of being seen. Fully. Without judgment. Without masks.

"Jdbdhdhdjjs"
"Yeyeyyeyyyeye"
"Me agree."

They had their rules — gibberish when there were no words, sticker wars when emotions spilled out too fast. It was stupid, they agreed. But it was theirs.

Every inside joke became a badge. Every nickname a secret handshake. Aiden became her "big baby," and Lira his "chaotic sunshine." They didn't call each other those names outright — not always — but it clung to their tone. There was safety in being silly with someone who didn't mind the silliness.

They made a deal early: no expectations, just companionship. But somewhere along the threads of chat bubbles, they started relying on each other for more.

One night, Aiden couldn't sleep. The research proposal weighed on him like a concrete block. Deadlines loomed, the pressure of being a sixth-semester student crushed what little free thought he had.

So, he texted her.

"I'm just... tired, I guess."

She answered within seconds.

"Then talk to me about it. I can listen."

She didn't offer solutions. She didn't pretend to understand academia or pretend she was older than she was. She just responded — fully present, with heart and sincerity.

"College sounds scary..."

He nodded at the screen.

"It is," he admitted.
"But sometimes I'm just scared of raising my hand in class. Like the professor might bite it off."

"WTF 😭" she replied.
"That's so dramatic. But real."

They laughed. Then, they were quiet.

That was the magic of it. Not just the shared noise, but the mutual silence. The space to breathe. The quiet acknowledgment that someone was there, even when nothing needed to be said.

Lira, for all her laughter and chaos, was tired too. She carried it in bursts — sudden floods of truth between waves of stickers and anime rants.

She told him about school. The morning roll calls. The suffocating rules. The way she wore earphones just to tune out the principal's speeches. Her disappointment in classmates who left her to carry all their responsibilities. Her aching shoulders from being the leader no one helped.

"I tried to be that ambitious girl. The main character type. But then... they all started relying on me for everything."

She described herself directing three projects at once — animation competitions, class theater, and cultural shows — all while handling the daily weight of being the class rep. She skipped school one week out of frustration. No one noticed until things started falling apart.

"They practiced our performance without me. Only when they needed me again."

She laughed bitterly. But Aiden could feel the fatigue in her pauses.

"That's not fair," he typed.
"That sounds like a disaster. Like, actual cinema disaster."

She sent a crying sticker.

"Ikr. And now I don't even know what I'm doing anymore..."

Aiden hesitated. Then offered what he could.

"Let them fall. People like that never survive in college. Trust me, I've seen them drop out in the first semester. You don't owe anyone your peace."

"You really think so?" she typed, slowly.

"I know so."

Their bond didn't need dramatic confessions. It lived in the mundane. In shared music, in comparing favorite SpongeBob episodes. In jokes about cursed sticker collections and nostalgic soundtracks. In her giggles over Krabby Patty lore, and his rants about how newer episodes "just don't hit the same."

One conversation veered into music.
Aiden dropped his classics:
"Sum 41 — Pieces
Green Day — 21 Guns
Good Riddance..."

"Damn," she replied.
"Nice taste."

Then she confessed her own looped playlist:
"Wicked Game — Chris Isaak
Damelove — Girl Ultra ft. Cuco
M. — Anil Emre Daldal."

She asked him to listen to them someday. He promised he would.

And then came a soft reveal: she hadn't expected him to like her music.
She had grown used to being dismissed — too odd, too young, too intense.
But Aiden didn't mock her. He absorbed her songs like they were postcards from her soul.

One evening, she asked:

"Do you think I'm annoying?"

He replied:

"No. I think you're sincere."

There was a pause.

Then she said:

"You're the first person who listens like that."

He didn't know what to say to that.

Because what do you say when someone tells you that you make them feel seen?

He changed the subject. Lightly. But in his chest, something shifted.

Still, the age difference — that invisible wall — lingered between them. Not always spoken aloud, but felt.

Fifteen.

He couldn't forget it.

She knew too — she teased, she joked, but there was an undercurrent of awareness. They were not the same. Not in body, not in experience, not in what the world allowed them to be.

But for some strange, cosmic reason... this space, this tiny thread of Wi-Fi, allowed them to meet halfway.

Not as student and senior. Not as girl and man.
But as two lonely people, just trying to understand the world, one message at a time.

Each night, their conversations extended further. From cartoons to car crashes, from existential dread to high school strategy. Aiden recounted how he failed the national university exams — twice. Lira consoled him with unexpected wisdom. He described the thrill of gaming tournaments in his last high school year; she sent sticker applause. He offered tips on writing, surviving pressure, managing failure.

She soaked it all up like sun.

She didn't idolize him.
And he didn't pity her.

They were equals — not in age, but in effort. In openness. In honesty.

And that's what made this strange digital corner of their lives sacred.

Late one night, Lira typed:

"You know... this chat is kinda the only place I can really talk freely."

Aiden stared at it for a while.

Then he replied:
"Yeah. Me too."

No hearts. No promises. No pressure.

Just two people,
typing in the dark,
building a world made only for them.

Their safe space.

Until the next message came.