Secret Patterns

34. Lines Between

The van ride to rehearsal was muted, every seat heavy with the weight of the morning. Even Zoey's usual chatter was clipped, reduced to sarcastic one-liners that fell flat. Rin kept her gaze on the window, the city streaming by in fractured shapes, but her mind was stuck in the kitchen, in the way her sisters' eyes had burned into her when she said Abby's name.

⸻

The Van

Rumi shifted closer, nudging Rin's shoulder with a quiet kind of insistence. "You didn't eat much," she murmured, holding out a granola bar.

Rin accepted, more because refusing would make the silence louder than because she was hungry. "Thanks."

Zoey twisted halfway around in her seat. "So let me get this straight. We're still reeling from The Romance Photo of Doom™, and now we've got Gym Buddy Abby sneaking in under the radar?"

Mira, sitting diagonally, didn't even look up from her notes. "He isn't sneaking. He's communicating. The issue isn't his text—it's Rin answering it without telling us."

"Exactly!" Zoey gestured like Mira had just handed her a weapon. "That's what I've been saying since sunrise."

Rin muttered, "I'm not a criminal for answering a text."

"No," Mira said calmly, flipping a page. "But you are a sister in a unit that functions on trust. Every omission costs us."

Zoey slumped back dramatically. "Translation: stop being shady."

Rumi shot Zoey a look before turning to Rin. "We're not trying to police you. We're trying to keep the ground from shaking under all of us."

The van hit a bump. Rin clenched the bar in her hand. "You think I don't know that?"

No one answered.

⸻

The Dressing Room

Hours later, the girls filed into their shared dressing room, exhaustion and unsaid words hanging in the air. Zoey kicked her shoes off with unnecessary force. Mira stacked her rehearsal notes on the vanity in too-neat piles. Rumi set her water bottle down and sat carefully, like she was worried her movements might set someone off.

Rin dropped her bag and stayed standing. She hated the way the silence pressed in, like they were waiting for her to crack.

Finally, Zoey broke it. "Are you meeting him tonight?"

Rin's chest tightened. "Yes."

Mira looked up sharply. "Then we're implementing the lobby plan."

"I don't need a babysitter," Rin snapped.

"It's not babysitting," Mira said evenly. "It's accountability."

Zoey smirked. "And surveillance. Don't forget surveillance."

Rumi reached across the vanity for Rin's hand, grounding her. "It's support," she said softly. "We're not asking you to stop. We're asking you to let us stand close enough to catch you if something tilts."

Rin looked down at Rumi's hand, the warmth of it, the steadiness. "And if I say no?"

"Then we argue until you say yes," Zoey shot back without hesitation.

Mira added, "Or until management finds out and makes the decision for us. Which you'll hate more."

The words stung, mostly because they were true.

Rin pulled her hand free, pacing a tight line across the room. She hated the feeling of being cornered, of being pinned between her sisters' concern and the truth she couldn't give them—that Abby's steadiness was the only thing keeping her from drowning some nights.

When she turned back, all three of them were watching her. Rumi's eyes were soft, Zoey's sharp, Mira's precise. Together they formed a cage and a lifeline all at once.

Finally, Rin exhaled. "Fine. Lobby plan."

Zoey threw her arms up in mock victory. "Ha! Democracy wins."

Mira didn't smile, but some of the tension left her shoulders. "Good."

Rumi leaned back, relief softening her posture. "Thank you."

Rin sat heavily in the chair opposite them, burying her face in her hands. "You're insufferable."

Zoey grinned, leaning back. "Honest reviews only."

⸻

Later

When their phones buzzed with a call time reminder, the argument had been shelved, but not solved. The whiteboard back home still listed their "house rules." Abby's message still sat in Rin's phone, waiting for midnight.

And Rin knew, with a bone-deep certainty, that the line between survival and exposure was thinner than ever.

But at least now, she wouldn't be standing on it alone.