The first one appeared on a Thursday afternoon.
Ren was halfway through a coding tutorial when Instagram's notification dot blinked at the top of his screen. Without thinking, he tapped it.
Tulip's story was first in the row.
A single red rose in a slim glass vase, framed against the soft light of her window. A filter muted the colors, letting faint dust motes float in the air. Across the bottom, in small white text, a lyric he didn't recognize bloom where you're wanted.
He stared longer than necessary.
It reminded him of the time she'd sent him a photo of a potted succulent she found in the corner of a café, captioned, this one looks like you pointy but surviving. Back then, he'd laughed out loud. Now, he just stared.
He swiped up to reply.
Ren: I'd rather have a whole garden than just one flower 😏
It was meant to be playful, a harmless jab the kind she used to volley back with a laugh or an exaggerated "rude."
Two hours later, her reply came:
Tulip: Cool.
No emoji. No laughter. Just cool.
A word so dry it could have crumbled in his hand.
Ren read it once.
Then again.
Then one more time, as if something might appear between the letters if he looked hard enough.
She's probably busy, he told himself.
Then noticed her green dot glowing at the top of his screen. And a new post her and Zaya at some café, laughing.
His stomach felt heavier than it should.
That evening, the dot blinked again.
Another Tulip story.
A bouquet this time mostly pink roses, a single yellow one in the middle. No caption. Just the picture.
He didn't reply.
But he watched it again. And again.
When Seen by 23 popped up, he wondered if she noticed his name there… and if it mattered to her at all.
Friday morning: another blink.
A boomerang her hand twirling a rose stem, the same song from her first story playing faintly in the background.
Ren's laptop sat open, onboarding emails waiting. His fingers hovered over the keyboard but didn't move. Instead, his mind wandered to questions he wasn't ready to ask.
It's just flowers.
He closed Instagram.
Twenty seconds later, he opened it again.
By Saturday, it had become a pattern.
Petals on a café table. Raindrops on a half-open bud. Her faint smile, half-hidden behind a cluster of blooms.
And every time the purple ring appeared around her profile, Ren opened it instantly.
And every time, the ache sharpened.
It wasn't just the flowers.
It was that they felt… deliberate.
Framed too carefully. Lit too softly.
And someone else was there to take them.
Still, he kept checking.
Kept wondering.
They were just friends.
They'd always been just friends.
So why did a flower meant for someone else feel like it was being posted at him?
Why did cool still sit like a stone in his stomach?
That night, he almost typed Into flowers lately? or What's with all the roses? but stopped.
Because if there was an answer, he wasn't sure he wanted it.
The crystal turtle box sat quietly on his desk.
Somewhere else, roses kept blooming and disappearing every 24 hours.
And each time, Ren's name appeared in that Seen by 23 list just another pair of eyes passing through.
Never the reason they were posted.
Never the person they were meant for.