I’m sleeping more. Not great, but more. Five, sometimes six hours a night instead of the fractured three that used to be mymax. Carter notices, says I look less like a zombie, which coming from him is basically a declaration of pride.
The photography club has become my sanctuary, a place where I’m just Maya who takes pictures, not Maya who survived a suicide attempt. Not Maya who tried to die. Just… Maya.
Professor Chen submitted three of my photos to a regional college art competition without telling me. I found out when I won second place in the nature category, my frost photo, the one Ryder calls hope breaking through cold.
I cried when I got the news. Happy tears, which felt foreign enough that I had to call Dr. Williams to make sure they were normal. She laughed and said yes, Maya, happy tears are allowed. You’re allowed to feel joy.
I’m still learning how to believe that.
Ryder and I are sitting on the quad on a warm April afternoon, his head in my lap, my fingers running through his hair while he reads the updated draft evaluations. It’s become our spot, this particular patch of grass under the big oak tree where nobody bothers us.
“Second round for sure,” he says, scrolling through his phone. “Maybe late first if I show well at the showcase camps this summer.”
“That’s good.”
“It’s not what my father wanted.”
“Fuck what your father wanted. It’s yours. That’s what matters.”
He grins up at me, the kind of smile. We’ve been together three months officially, longer if you count the careful circling we did before admitting this was more than friendship. Three months of learning each other’s damage, three months of figuring out how to be together without losing ourselves.
It’s hard. Some days it’s really hard. Some days my depression is so heavy I can barely speak, and Ryder has toremind me that it’s okay to have bad days, that he’s not going anywhere. Some days his shoulder hurts so badly he’s miserable, and I have to keep him from pushing too hard, from falling back into old patterns.
But we’re learning. Learning that love doesn’t fix broken people, but it can make the breaking more bearable. Learning that asking for help isn’t weakness. Learning that we’re allowed to take up space, to have needs, to be imperfect and still worthy of care.
“You submitted to the campus photo competition yet?” Ryder asks, bringing me back to the present.
“Working on it.”
“Work faster. Your photos are incredible.”
“They’re just pictures.”
“They’re more than that. They’re you coming back to life.”
Coming back to life. Is that what this is? This slow, painful, beautiful process of finding myself again? Of building a life that includes more than just surviving?
“I love you,” I say suddenly, the words coming out before I can stop them.
Ryder sits up, eyes wide with surprise and something that looks like joy. “What?”
“I love you. I know it’s fast and probably too soon and we’re both disasters and this might be the worst idea either of us has ever had, but I love you. I needed you to know.”
“Maya—”
“You don’t have to say it back. I just…I needed to tell you. Needed you to know that despite everything, despite how broken I still am, despite the nightmares and the therapy and the constant work of staying alive. I love you. You make me want to keep trying. Keep healing. Keep existing.”
The words pour out of me, faster than I can process them. All the things I’ve been feeling but couldn’t name, couldn’t say, couldn’t admit even to myself.
“I love you too,” Ryder says, and his voice breaks slightly on the words. “I’ve loved you since you called me an idiot in the hospital. Since you showed up to my apartment with resistance bands and refused to let me destroy myself. Since you understood what I was going through without me having to explain because you’ve been there too.”
“That’s a weird thing to fall in love over.”
“We’re weird people. Works for us.”
He kisses me, soft and sweet and perfect. Around us, campus life continues—students studying, throwing frisbees, soaking up the spring sunlight. But in this moment, under our tree, it’s just us.
Two broken people who found each other in the wreckage.
