The door shut behind the boys with a faint click, and for a moment, the house seemed to exhale - the kind of soft sigh a home gives when its volume drops from chaos to comfort.

  Sarah wiped her hands on a kitchen towel and leaned against the counter, watching Marisol pour the st of the coffee into three mismatched mugs. The soft hum of a cassette tape pyed from the living room - Jorge’s choice, a jazzier one tonight, mellow and winding. Outside, faint ughter drifted back in from the sidewalk, Tyrel already cracking jokes.

  Cami wandered into the kitchen barefoot, her curls still damp from a shower, wearing an oversized GT hoodie that may or may not have once belonged to Jorge.

  She took the offered mug and perched on a stool.

  “So,” she said after a long sip. “You guys gonna expin what the hell is going on, or do I have to wait for the Lifetime movie adaptation?”

  Marisol smirked. “You mean with us and Bharath?”

  Cami raised both eyebrows. “Oh, is that all? The two of you madly in love with the same dude, and him being completely into it - that’s all?”

  Sarah chuckled softly but didn’t meet Cami’s eyes. She was staring into her cup like it held more than coffee.

  “I thought it was a fantasy,” she said quietly.

  Cami’s teasing smile faded a little.

  Sarah continued. “When I stayed here after the… mugging. I didn’t think I’d stay. I thought I’d sleep a few nights, disappear, maybe try to figure out my life again.”

  Marisol came up behind her and wrapped her arms around her waist, resting her chin on Sarah’s shoulder. “But you didn’t disappear.”

  “No,” Sarah whispered. “Because they saw me. Really saw me. Not the broken girl. Not the girl with a past. Just… me.”

  Cami set her mug down, gently. “You told me a little. That night we stayed up. But I didn’t know it was that bad.”

  Sarah nodded. “It was. I actually haven’t been able to tell the worst of what happened yet. Not even to Bharath and Marisol. Maybe someday I will be in a good enough headspace to come clean. There were nights I didn’t think I’d make it to the next morning.”

  The silence in the room thickened like honey. Not uncomfortable - just heavy with truth.

  “But then this man,” Sarah said with a small smile, “this boy, really - he looked at me like I was something worth saving. Worth holding. And not because he wanted anything back.”

  Marisol’s voice was soft but certain. “He didn’t even know what to want. Not in that way. He just... gives. All heart. No question.”

  Cami leaned forward. “But how did you - I mean… Marisol. You’re with him. You were with him?”

  Marisol met her eyes. “I still am. That doesn’t change. What changed was... seeing Sarah. Seeing how she looked at him. And how he looked back.”

  Sarah spoke again, tears glinting in her eyes now. “I didn’t expect it. I didn’t want it. I fought it, even. But the way he touched me - not just my body, but my spirit. I started feeling like I wasn’t just surviving. I was living again.”

  Cami bit her lip, nodding slowly. “You two make it sound so... sacred.”

  “It is,” Marisol said without hesitation. “It’s messy, yeah. And complicated. But it’s real.”

  Cami studied them both - Sarah, trembling but glowing. Marisol, fierce and protective even in her stillness.

  “I’ve never seen you like this,” she said finally. “Either of you. It’s like you’re... softer. But stronger.”

  Sarah smiled, a tear slipping down her cheek. “Because we have each other. And him. And even you. All of you - this whole strange, stupid, beautiful group. I didn’t have anyone before. Now I wake up in his arms, and I fall asleep knowing she’s watching over both of us.”

  Marisol kissed Sarah’s cheek gently. “We’re still figuring it out. Every day. But that night - after the mugging - something changed in all of us. We didn’t fall into this. We chose it. And we keep choosing it.”

  Cami blinked a few times, then stood up and walked around the counter.

  Without a word, she wrapped both women in a tight hug - warm, fierce, unfiltered.

  “I don’t get it,” she murmured. “Not completely. But I see it. And if it makes you both glow like this... then I’m with you.”

  They stood like that for a long moment, holding each other in the soft hum of the house, in the breath between chaos and sleep.

  Finally, Sarah whispered into Cami’s hoodie, “We’re going to need your help.”

  “With what?” Cami asked.

  Marisol smirked. “We need two hot, emotionally mature, Halloween-party-ready women. Like... yesterday.”

  Cami groaned. “Oh God. Is this about Ravi and Tyrel?”

  “They’re panicking,” Sarah said with a sly grin.

  “And making terrible costume decisions,” Marisol added.

  But Sarah didn’t ugh right away. Her smile softened, the lines around her mouth settling into something more reflective. She looked down at her hands, twisting the edge of the dish towel between her fingers.

  “They’re good guys,” she said quietly. “Both of them.”

  Cami blinked. “Obviously. Just... incredibly dumb sometimes.”

  “No,” Sarah said, shaking her head a little. “I mean it. They never had a real shot with me, not really. But that doesn’t mean they didn’t try with heart. They showed up. Made me ugh when I didn’t think I could. Looked out for me in their own silly, awkward ways.”

  Marisol stepped in beside her, sensing the shift. “You don’t owe them anything, Sarah.”

  “I know,” Sarah said. “And I don’t feel guilty for choosing what’s right for me. For us. But I still care. I want them to find someone who sees them the way I get to see you two. Who sees past the jokes and the bravado and gets how much heart they’re hiding.”

  Cami tilted her head, touched. “You mean matchmaking out of love, not pity.”

  Sarah nodded. “Exactly. They deserve more than just being the punchline to their own flirting disasters. They deserve something real.”

  Marisol reached over and squeezed her hand. “Then we find someone who sees that. Who sees them.”

  Cami sighed and picked up her coffee again, her lips curving into something thoughtful. “Well damn. Now I actually want this pn to work.”

  Sarah smiled, the mencholy lifting a little. “They’re good men. It’d be nice if someone else saw it too.”

  “Alright,” Cami said, mock-resigned. “Operation Trick or Treat Hearts has officially gained moral weight.”

  Marisol groaned. “That name is terrible.”

  Cami smirked. “And yet now we’re stuck with it.”

  The boys came back with food with no apparent distress between them. Bharath and Sarah shared a look that made her feel gd. Tyrel and Ravi were ok.

  Later, as the girls excused themselves to the living room, the faint sound of the boys shouting about Tekken echoed through the house.

  Sarah leaned against the counter, warmth in her eyes. “They have no idea what we’re pnning. Now that Cami is involved we should hopefully be successful.”

  Cami sighed deeply and pulled away just enough to grab her coffee.

  “Fine. But if either of them shows up dressed like Austin Powers, I’m out.”