The afternoon sun cast warm patches of light across the rooftop garden, where Liora and Mara found themselves wrapped in the comfortable silence that had come to feel like a quiet conversation of its own. The air smelled faintly of lavender and rain-soaked earth, grounding them in the present even as their thoughts wandered.
Liora's eyes lingered on Mara, tracing the gentle lines of her face—the soft curve of her smile, the way her eyes crinkled when she laughed quietly. It was strange how someone could feel so familiar after so little time.
Mara's gaze caught hers, and in that moment, a flicker of something unspoken passed between them—a fragile acknowledgment of feelings still too new and delicate to name.
"Do you ever wonder about what's left unsaid?" Mara asked, her voice barely above a whisper.
"All the time," Liora admitted. "Sometimes, the hardest thing is sitting with the silence, wondering if the other person feels the same but doesn't know how to say it."
Mara nodded slowly. "It's like the space between words holds its own meaning—sometimes more than the words themselves."
Liora smiled, feeling warmth spread through her chest. "Maybe that's why the language of flowers speaks to me so much. Because it's about expressing what words can't."
They sat closer now, the space between them shrinking until it felt as though their breaths mingled. Mara reached out, fingers brushing a stray hair behind Liora's ear, a tender gesture that made Liora's heart skip.
"Sometimes," Mara said softly, "the smallest touch can say everything."
Liora swallowed, the moment hanging between them like a fragile promise. "I want to be brave," she whispered. "But it's hard when you've been hurt before."
Mara's hand covered hers, steady and sure. "We don't have to be brave alone."
For the first time in a long time, Liora felt the walls around her heart begin to soften. The space between fear and hope was narrowing, and in that narrowing, something beautiful was beginning to take root.
As the sun dipped lower, casting the rooftop in golden hues, they sat side by side—two souls learning the language of the spaces between, the silences that s
poke louder than words.