They didn't fall in love in a hurry.
No, not Bella and Leo.
They grew into each other the way dawn grows into day .... slowly, quietly, almost unnoticed until you look up and realize the whole sky has changed.
Final year, wasn't supposed to be special. It was just school same classrooms, same teachers, same noisy hallways. But somehow, that was the year Bella found herself sitting closer to Leo, laughing a little too freely, sharing secrets that felt too delicate for the world outside their conversations.
He was everywhere .... loud, bright, always surrounded by people. Leo had this unusual gravity around him. Girls liked him, guys followed him, and even teachers found it hard to stay mad at him for long. Bella didn't quite understand it, but she found herself drawn in anyway.
They studied together.
They teased each other.
They told each other things their classmates would never guess.
He helped her with parts of class she didn't get. She explained things to him in a way that made him say, "Ei Bella, you make everything easy." She didn't know why those words stayed in her chest for hours.
Rumors spread, of course. Teenagers thrive on small fires.
"She and Leo are dating."
"Have you seen how they talk?"
"Palm is jealous oo."
"They're always together."
Bella would just laugh it off, pretending it didn't get under her skin. Leo laughed too, brushing everything aside with a smile ... the kind that made it impossible to tell what he was really thinking.
But what they had wasn't dating.
It wasn't even a crush… not officially.
It was comfort. It was familiarity. It was having someone who understood the way your mind twisted itself at 2 a.m. and still chose to stay.
Sometimes, after school, they'd walk out of the gate together, talking about teachers, class gossip, their dreams, their plans for the final exams. Leo always knew what was happening in class, the secrets, the fights, the jokes. Bella knew the quieter things, who was hurting, who was pretending, who was fading.
Their worlds balanced each other.
And even though Leo still spoke to Yuri, Bella could feel it the shift.
He wasn't the same with her.
Not anymore.
Whatever had happened in the past had faded, softened, become a harmless leftover memory.
With Bella, Leo was present.
Attentive.
Alive in a different way.
On evenings before mock exams, they'd call each other to revise. Bella would pretend not to notice how warm Leo's voice sounded through the phone. Leo pretended not to notice how quickly he answered her calls, even when he was busy.
But friendship.... real friendship....is a dangerous thing.
It can carry the weight of love without admitting it.
It can look like "just talking" while feeling like something deeper.
And that was them.
Two people who weren't dating,
weren't anything official,
yet somehow were everything.