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Zari sighed with exhaustion as she heaved her backpack off of one shoulder, allowing it to finally slump against the ground. Finally, it was lunch - her maths teacher had even taken pity on her poor stomach, which had been growling ravenously all through the lesson, and let her class out five minutes early!
She unceremoniously dumped all of her textbooks into the dented metal locker and slipped her (much lighter, now) backpack on with a pleased sigh before marching off to lunch. Mind filled with thoughts of food and the remainders of a problem on parabolas, Zari didn’t notice the light pink book that had toppled onto the floor when she shut her locker.
“Hiya, Lily!” Zari greeted ten minutes later, carefully setting down her tray, which was laden with rice, veggies and her favourite: pink strawberry milk.
Her friend looked up blearily from her sketchbook. Zari smiled fondly at her dishevelled appearance: her signature black turtleneck, slightly rumpled at the neck, lavender purple hair (that was starting to show brown again at the roots), and tired eyes, still artfully winged with the same eyeliner look she’d latched onto since the pair’s first day in high school.
“Another late night?” Zari asked, reaching out to fix the collar of her friend’s turtleneck and then blushing, pulling her hand back in an aborted, jerky motion.
Lily grunted, but she closed her book to give Zari her full attention. “How was your walk home yesterday?”
Zari perked up, sipping at her strawberry milk carton. “A-mazing! I found this really pretty flower- wait, I pressed it in my diary!” She reached for her bag, still talking. “It probably doesn’t smell any more, but it was so nice. You had to-” Zari faltered, waving her hand around the space in her backpack where her diary should be. “Had to be there…” she continued, sure that she’d left it in some other pocket by accident, but floundering further when once again her hand met nothing but worn fabric.
“Zari?” Lily asked, leaning over. Her voice was as monotone as it always was, but Zari had known her friend long enough to recognise the concerned dip in her brow.
“Oh no.”
Zari looked up and made eye contact with Lily.
“I can’t find my diary.” She murmured, heart rate suddenly mounting with panic.
Lily, meanwhile, relaxed. “Ok?” She said. “It’s probably in one of your classrooms.”
Zari shook her head, desperate. “No, you don’t understand!”
She was inseparable with her diary. It was bright pink, with a little blue bunny on it, and Lily always joked that it matched her favourite outfit. She’d had six iterations of the same book, beginning when she was eight years old, and she confided all of her secrets in it.
All of them.
The diary was there for her before she met Lily, when she had no one to talk to, and then it was there for all the complications of teen life that were too embarrassing to tell her friend, although she almost always ended up confiding in Lily later anyways. She wouldn’t dare bring it to school if she wasn’t worried someone at home would read it. Besides, sometimes she needed to hide in a school bathroom and rant into a book for a page or two when Lily wasn’t there to comfort her.
There was one thing in that diary, however, that she hadn’t told a soul. If it got out, she could kiss her reputation and her friendship goodbye.
Her massive, totally not platonic feelings for her best friend .
Lily just looked at her, that dip in her eyebrows getting just a little deeper. Zari bit her lip to stop herself from smoothing out the wrinkles on Lily’s forehead, trying to keep her mind on the topic at hand.
“Zari, what’s the big deal?” Lily asked.
The thing was, Zari was absolutely positive that Lily wouldn’t like her back. Ever since the beginning of their friendship, Lily had shown absolutely no interest in romantic relations with anyone . That wasn’t to say she wasn’t supportive- every time Zari had a crush, she was encouraging and kind and sweet, and caring when her crushes didn’t work out.
So when Zari’s feelings did a 360 and began focussing on her best friend instead, she knew she was screwed . Normally she’d go to Lily about these confusing, new feelings, but- well.
So, despite it inevitably haunting her guilty conscience for years to come, Zari lied.
“I wrote about Miguel in my journal!” She hissed, adding meaning to the name in the hopes that Lily took the false hint.
Lily raised one eyebrow (the most outward emotion she’d shown all day.) “The guy in your history class?”
Zari nodded eagerly. “I have to find my diary before anyone sees it.”
Lily stood up, and took her by the arm. Zari blushed, both at the contact and the help from her friend. Lily may be all deadpan and silence on the outside, but Zari could see how much she cared. “Ok. Let’s check your maths class first.” Lily said, and dragged her out of the cafeteria.
Problem solved! Zari thought happily. They’d find her diary in an obvious place, and Lily would tease her about being so good at school but so forgetful about everything else, and probably wouldn’t pry about Miguel too much more until Zari could pretend she’d gone off of him. Easy . She smiled, and focussed on Lily’s hand on her arm.
“Sorry, Zari.” Lily said, returning to the entrance of the last classroom the diary could conceivably be in. “It’s not here, either.”
Zari whimpered. “ Anyone could have it by now.”
Lily patted her on the back sympathetically.
Internally, Zari’s mind was racing. People at her school were terrible gossips. If anyone read the book, the rumour would be around school in seconds. They’d have people coming up and asking if they were dating, and probably quoting any of the number of cringey things Zari wrote about Lily- oh no, had she really written that one poem about lavender hair and twin cosmos for eyes, or had she just thought it?
“Hey, Zari, right?” A voice sounded from behind the two. Zari froze.
As she turned around, she prayed that her vocal recognition was off- but she was met with the face of the one and only Miguel.
He was tall, tan, and athletic whilst still in possession of enough brain cells to be in the upper maths set. She’d actually only spoken to him once or twice, but he was definitely attractive enough to pass as one of her crushes.
Too bad the real one was currently standing right next to her.
Worse, clutched to Miguel’s annoyingly sculpted chest was a bright pink diary adorned with a little blue bunny. Its beady eyes stared at her, tauntingly.
“Um.” He scratched the back of his neck awkwardly. “Is this your diary? I found it on the floor outside your locker.”
Zari stayed frozen like a block of ice. Her eyes flickered to Lily, and then back to Miguel, but he gave nothing away. Maybe he hadn’t read it?
Lily elbowed her, and she realised he’d asked her a question. “No!” She squeaked.
And then, her friend, in all her kind attempts to help Zari’s love life along, pointed out, “It has your name on it.”
Zari bit her lip, making eye contact with Miguel. “Okay, yes. It is. But-”
“I didn’t read it!” Miguel clarified. Zari breathed a sigh of relief. “Not for lack of trying, I uh- Your handwriting sucks .”
Zari was so relieved that she didn’t even bother with the unnecessary insult from Miguel. She just took the diary from him, muttering a quiet “Thanks!” and preparing to head past him and get home.
As she went to leave, though, he caught her arm.
“Hey, uh,” He started. “Do you think you’d want to catch a movie with me this Friday?”
Not for the first time that day, Zari swore in her head. She normally wasn’t one for profanity, but this situation most definitely called for it. Shit, fuck, why me?! She lamented.
She really, really didn’t want to go on a date with Miguel. He looked like her type - she even tried to convince herself into liking him for a while in order to get over Lily (to no avail, obviously.) But beneath the surface he was constantly making unnecessary rude comments like the one about her handwriting, and he did nosy stuff like reading someone’s diary without permission, and he thought creative subjects were a waste of time, and he turned his nose up at anyone with an alternative style.
But she’d already told Lily she liked him. If she rejected him, there’s no way Lily wouldn’t ask questions!
“U-um.” She started. Lily was smiling at her encouragingly, and that was the last straw. There was no way . Even if Lily never liked her as more than a friend, she’d much rather spend her time with her than Miguel. “No thank you. Sorry.” She muttered, and then she hurried past him and into the hall before she could see Lily’s expression change from encouraging to confused.
Zari calculated ten seconds for which Lily and Miguel could pause in the doorway, shocked, and she could hurry down the corridor and escape.
Lily was with her in five. Damn it, how could Zari forget that she was on the cross country team-!
“Zari!” Lily called. Zari ducked her head, pushing forward, but Lily trotted beside her in an unusual show of energy. “I’m confused.”
Zari stopped, and looked Lily in the eyes. She’d always loved Lily’s eyes, even before she realised she had a crush on her. They were deep, dark brown, so brown that sometimes her irises were lost in the midst of them, soulful even as she tried to hide her emotions from the world. Lily’s eyes weren’t just the window to her soul, they were a window to an entire cosmos of stars, glittering like magic, each one able to grant a thousand wishes.
“I… changed my mind about him?” Zari tried.
Lily raised an eyebrow again. Zari hated (loved) how the other girl could read her so well. “You wrote about him in your diary . You only do that when it’s serious.”
“Can’t you just let it go?” Zari snapped, stomping her foot. She was so frustrated, with herself and Miguel with his stupid hair and with Lily’s stupid perfect everything. Guilt followed immediately afterwards, though, curling in her gut as Lily stepped back.
“I’m worried about you, Zee.” Lily murmured. She scuffed one black Doc marten on the floor, and the resulting squeak echoed around the empty corridor. “You’ve been so distant recently. You hardly tell me anything any more.”
Zari’s eyes widened. That couldn’t be true! Except… she had tried to distance herself, in the hopes that it would hurt less when Lily eventually found out and rejected her.
“Lily…” Zari whispered. Those cosmos eyes betrayed hurt, and Zari was the cause. She bit her lip. “I didn’t…” She sighed. “I never liked Miguel. I never wrote about it in my diary. I- I lied to you.”
Lily recoiled, and Zari winced. They never lied to each other. Not since pinkie promises in middle school, not since Lily opened up about her home life, not since Zari first understood the difference between a crush and love with a capital L.
“I lied to you, because…” She growled in frustration. “Ugh! It’s not Miguel’s name I’m drawing hearts around instead of listening to parabolas in maths, Lily. It’s not Miguel I’m saving flowers for to show them the next day. It’s not Miguel who I care about enough to lie to to save our friendship.”
Lily looked shocked. Her mouth parted slightly, her eyes - normally half lidded with sleep - now blown wide, fully displaying the extent of their stars and satellites, planets and spaceships. “It’s… me?” She asked. Her voice was tentative, low, something odd gracing it. Something like… hope?
Zari nodded fretfully, twisting the extra length of her headscarf in her hands.
“How long?” Lily asked.
Zari looked away, feeling hot. “Since the start of this year.” She looked down. “I’m sorry, I-”
Suddenly, her hands were being unwound from the fabric and interlaced with long, slender fingers. Those fingers that she knew were calloused from sketching with a pencil for too long, with a little scar on the pinkie from when she tried to pet an unhappy cat.
“Zari.” Lily said. “I’ve liked you since middle school.”
“W-what?!” Zari looked up finally. Lily was smiling wryly, that rare smile she only ever shared with her friend. “But-”
“But I’ve never had another crush?” Lily asked. Zari’s words caught in her throat.
Oh.
“Why do you think I’ve never shown you my sketchbook?” Lily asked. “You’re not the only one who has an embarrassing secret book, you’re just the only one who loses it in school.”
“S-shut up.” Zari puffed out her cheeks, feeling even warmer. They were back to teasing, which meant they were okay, but Lily liked her back, which meant-
“So.” Lily brought their hands, which were still interlaced, down to her side. She began walking down the corridor like nothing was out of the ordinary. Meanwhile, Zari’s gaze was fixed on the way their hands fit together, like they were perfectly molded for the other’s shape. “A little birdie named Miguel mentioned there’s a movie on this friday. Do you want to go see it with me?”
Zari looked up, eyes sparkling. Lily’s smile was smaller now- but no less expressive, just a different sort of happiness. A softer sort. “I’d love that.” She gave Lily’s hand a squeeze, and felt her heart’s rhythm fall into the perfect pace at the squeeze Lily sent back.
Two weeks later, they were lying on Zari’s bed in her apartment. Six books were spread out on the pink duvet cover, and Lily was leafing through the final, most recent one.
Zari had Lily’s sketchbook in her hands. She giggled at a rough drawing of herself, tongue stuck out in concentration at something. “I don’t remember you drawing this!”
Lily leaned over to peck her on the cheek, and Zari felt herself go hot all over. That was still a new development. “You were too distracted. It was very cute.” Then she turned back to Zari’s diary. “Miguel was wrong, by the way. Your handwriting is adorable. The hearts on the i’s takes dedication.”
“I only do that when I write your name.” Zari muttered. Lily smirked.
“Yeah, but you do that a lot, so. Dedication.”
Zari threw a fluffy white pillow at her.
“Do you really think my eyes look like a starry night?”
Many, many more pillows followed after that.