"Faira, sweetheart, you're not busy right now, are you?"
Sarah's voice from the phone shattered the silence of the laboratory, a silence otherwise filled only by the low, steady hum of the server cooling systems.
Faira slipped off the glasses that had been resting on the bridge of her nose for hours.
She closed her eyes for a moment, pushing away the sting that had only just begun to creep in after spending too long immersed in endless rows of statistical data and telescope observations without pause.
At ECSAT, time seemed to move differently. One second of delay could mean missing the fleeting transition of a rare celestial event.
Balancing the phone between her shoulder and ear, Faira struggled slightly as she shrugged out of her white lab coat.
"I've almost forgotten how to breathe properly since my first day at ECSAT," she said, hanging the coat on a wall hook. "But don't worry, babe. I'll always make time for your wedding plans."
She smoothed the wrinkles from her cotton shirt, instinctively adjusting her collar to make sure her appearance still looked reasonably professional.
"Good," Sarah replied, her voice thick with satisfaction. "Because starting today, you are officially entrusted with the full lineup of Maid of Honor duties. And I expect them to be carried out with complete loyalty, skill, and precision. Knowing your perfectionist, detail-obsessed personality, I'm sure this won't be a burden for you at all, Miss Scientific."
Faira let out a small laugh, slightly hoarse.
"Miss Scientific? What kind of nickname is that?"
She stepped into her private office, passing a few colleagues who were murmuring quietly over a map of star constellations.
On her desk sat the cup of black coffee she had brewed that morning—now cold, bitter, and barely touched, abandoned while she buried herself in a statistical report that needed to be submitted to her supervisor.
"Just send the details through email," Faira said. "I'll squeeze a few extra items into my schedule when I can. Consider it a bride's treat from your Maid of Honor."
Strangely, Sarah didn't respond with her usual explosive enthusiasm. Instead, there was an odd pause—followed by a hesitant murmur that made Faira frown.
"Actually… I just sent a courier to your place with the task package. Physically. He should be there by now."
Faira was just about to ask why Sarah had gone through the trouble of sending a courier all the way to the Harwell Institute—quite a distance from central Oxford—when the phone on her desk rang.
The yellow light on the console blinked. The call was from Marley, the department secretary.
"Sarah, hold on for a second," Faira said, lifting the desk receiver. "Yes, Marley?"
"Miss Adrianna, there's a visitor here in the lobby asking to see you. He says he has an important document for you. Do you wish to meet him now?"
Faira nodded to herself, assuming it must be the courier Sarah mentioned.
"Alright. Tell him I'll be down in a moment."
She returned to her phone.
"You're really serious about this, huh?
Sending a courier all the way to ECSAT just to deliver my task list? You could've just emailed it. What a waste."
Sarah sighed on the other end, the sound laced with equal parts guilt and recklessness.
"Well… consider it my last unnecessary expense before I become someone's wife," she said with an awkward laugh. Then her tone shifted, suddenly serious.
"Faira… please don't hate me after this."
Faira's steps halted just as she exited the elevator toward the lobby.
"Hate you? What exactly did you do?"
"You'll find out in a second. Gotta go. Bye!"
The call ended abruptly.
Faira stared at the screen in disbelief, silently cursing her best friend and briefly fantasizing about throwing her into the deepest trench of the ocean.
But the moment she stepped out of the restricted access corridor and into the vast main lobby with its towering glass ceiling, her irritation froze in midair.
The cold Oxfordshire air slipping through the automatic doors carried a faint scent she knew far too well—one that made her heart beat strangely with every breath she took.
Faira stopped walking.
Her eyes locked onto the man standing near the reception desk decorated with miniature satellite models.
He wore a visitor badge clipped to the pocket of his black-and-white bomber jacket. He stood with his signature posture—one hand clasping the opposite wrist as he studied the modern architecture of the lobby ceiling.
His light brown hair was neatly styled, though it still retained that slightly messy charm that was, annoyingly, far too pleasing to look at.
His thick brows gave him a naturally sharp, intimidating look.
But his eyes…
His blue eyes shimmered like starlight against the darkness of space as they calmly surveyed the room.
Then those eyes moved.
They scanned the lobby slowly—until they stopped.
Right on Faira.
For one second—one second that felt longer than the 13.5-billion-year-old galaxies she had been observing earlier—the world around Faira fell completely silent.
That gaze.
The gaze she had once loved more than anything in the world.
It returned now, effortlessly erasing the distance and time she had spent years building as a defense.
Hero smiled.
A breathtaking smile capable of dismantling every law of physics Faira had ever believed in.
He lifted his hand and waved slowly, as if greeting someone he had been waiting for at a harbor for a very long time.
And there, in the vast ECSAT lobby, Faira Adrianna completely forgot how to breathe.
💫💫💫💫💫
If Hero were still living in the version of his past where he hadn't endured five years of separation from Faira, he would have rushed toward her the moment she stepped through those sliding glass doors.
He would have pulled her into a crushing embrace, trying to break apart every fragment of longing that had built up over the years. He would have dragged her into his car and kissed her senseless with the same possessive intensity he used to feel whenever he waited outside her laboratory or classroom.
But the Faira standing in front of him now left all of Hero's logic in ruins.
Her beauty had reached a level that felt almost unreasonable.
His former lover looked far more mature now.
Her jet-black hair flowed freely past her shoulders, falling in perfect natural waves. With every step she took, the strands swayed gently, giving her an elegance—and a quiet mystery—Hero had never seen before.
She wore an oversized white shirt tucked into straight-cut trousers, paired with her usual sneakers—a strange contradiction of styles that somehow still looked effortlessly elegant on her.
Hero wondered how God could create someone like Faira Adrianna.
Someone with the natural ability to be breathtakingly beautiful without even realizing it.
As she stepped closer, a familiar scent slipped into his senses, breaking through his defenses without permission.
That scent.
A blend of soft white musk, fresh citrus, and a subtle earthy warmth.
Damn it.
Hero still remembered it perfectly.
It was the same perfume that used to linger on his pillow five years ago—the scent that once defined the word home for him.
Apparently, even though time had changed many things, Faira still chose to smell exactly like the past. As if that fragrance were the one bridge she had intentionally left untouched.
Faira's eyes widened briefly when their gazes collided, but the reaction lasted only a second before she suppressed it completely.
After Hero waved to confirm his presence, she forced a polite smile and walked toward him.
"Don't tell me you're the courier Sarah mentioned—the one who's supposed to deliver my Maid of Honor task list?"
For a moment, Hero forgot how to speak.
Standing this close to the woman who had once been the center of his entire life—her face illuminated by sunlight reflecting through Harwell's glass windows—left him momentarily stunned.
He cleared his throat, trying not to appear shaken. "Sarah knows you're a severe perfectionist. She just wanted to make sure the task arrived in physical form… so you wouldn't have any excuse to miss even the smallest detail."
He handed her the brown envelope.
His palms were slightly damp—a rather embarrassing reaction for someone who made a living acting.
Faira accepted it with a furrowed brow, raising one eyebrow in a familiar investigative expression.
"But you also know I'm not that conservative, Hero. My email is open twenty-four hours a day. Sending it digitally would've been far more efficient than making you travel all the way here."
Hero exhaled slowly.
Originally, Sarah really had planned to send an email. But Hero couldn't possibly admit that this physical document was nothing more than an impulsive excuse—an alibi that allowed him to see Faira again.
"Well… you know your best friend. If she hasn't made everyone's life a little difficult, she feels like something's missing."
It worked.
A small laugh escaped Faira's lips.
A laugh that, unfortunately, Hero realized was the sound he had missed most over the past five years.
The sparkle in her eyes when she laughed still carried the same frequency—the same vibration capable of shaking his heart to its core.
"Are you still busy right now?" Hero finally asked, gathering enough courage, silently hoping Faira wouldn't immediately throw him out of the building.
"If we're talking about being busy, I've practically forgotten how to breathe since my first day at ECSAT," Faira replied with a quiet sigh, though a faint smile still lingered on the corner of her lips. "But for the sake of our ridiculous best friend, I'll make time whenever I can to deal with… all of this."
She shook the brown envelope lightly in her hand.
Hero nodded in agreement. "I have the same thing sitting on my car dashboard. The only difference is mine came from the groom. Honestly, I still haven't dared to open it. Knowing Joseph and Sarah, their requests are usually… beyond reason."
Faira chuckled softly.
"What a strange couple. No wonder they ended up together."
Hero nodded faintly, even though inside his mind he wanted to scream at the top of his lungs.
WE COULD HAVE ENDED UP TOGETHER TOO, FAIRA.
Faira glanced around the lobby for a moment before looking back at Hero, who stood tall in front of her.
"I know the trip from London to Harwell must've been exhausting," she said. "Before you head back to London, do you want to take a quick look around ECSAT? I want to show you the latest discoveries from the JWST. I'm sure you'd find it interesting."
Hero didn't care if the happiness shining on his face looked ridiculous to anyone else.
Inside, he wanted to shout.
He wanted to celebrate the fact that he had successfully extended the duration of this meeting.
YES, FAIRA. ANYTHING.
SHOW ME EVERYTHING.
EVEN IF YOU ASK ME TO CLIMB THE SKY AND BRING YOU THE MOON AND THE STARS RIGHT NOW, I'LL DO IT.
JUST DON'T ASK ME TO LEAVE.
But as a trained actor accustomed to controlling his emotions, Hero kept his composure.
He maintained a polite smile, even though every part of him wanted to jump with excitement.
"Absolutely. It would be fascinating to see the inside of a space research center like this for the first time," Hero replied as casually as he could manage.
Faira laughed again, as if she could sense the excitement he was trying to hide.
"Then come on. I'll show you the JWST research telescope room."
💫💫💫💫💫
Faira walked ahead, tapping her access card against a sleek glass door that led them into the very heart of ECSAT's research facility—the Visualisation and Data Analysis Lab.
The moment the door slid shut behind them, the bright lights of the lobby vanished.
For a brief moment, the room fell into dramatic darkness.
Then slowly, the walls and ceiling seemed to dissolve into nothingness, replaced by an enormous projection of a James Webb Space Telescope Deep Field.
Hero froze.
It felt as if the floor beneath him had disappeared, leaving him floating in the middle of billions of glowing galaxies scattered like jewels across black velvet.
"You see this?" Faira's voice broke the silence, soft and calm within the soundproof room. "This is a portrait of the universe when it was still a 'baby,' Hero—basically the earliest images of our universe."
She gestured toward the endless ocean of light. "The light you're looking at right now traveled for 13.5 billion years just to reach the JWST lens. So here, we're not just looking at pictures—we're dissecting the history of time itself."
Her voice carried the same calm clarity it always had. "What you're seeing is the universe's past."
Faira continued explaining in language that was far simpler than the technical jargon she used with fellow scientists, yet still precise.
Her voice was soothing. It had always been Hero's favorite sound when they were together.
She showed him various nebula discoveries—massive clouds of gas and dust where new stars were born. They looked like divine abstract paintings, painted in magical gradients of burning orange and sapphire blue.
Hero shook his head repeatedly in amazement.
"If my brain were even half as smart as yours, Fay," Hero murmured quietly, his eyes still fixed on the stars, "I would've become an astrophysicist."
He smiled faintly. "You've always had a way of talking about the universe that makes it feel so… close. So beautiful."
Faira didn't respond verbally, but her smile widened slightly. She returned her attention to the control panel in her hand.
What she didn't realize was that throughout her entire explanation, Hero hadn't been observing the galaxies at all.
Hero had been observing her.
His gaze remained fixed on the lines of Faira's face illuminated by the glow of the monitors.
Hero's heart had not felt this alive in five years.
As if the distance between them had only been a short commercial break in life's broadcast—one that hadn't erased even an inch of his love.
"Come here, let me show you something." Faira suddenly grabbed Hero's arm and pulled him gently toward the center of the room.
That touch.
The mere half-inch of distance between their skin instantly stole Hero's breath. His heart thundered loudly when Faira stood so close beside him.
Without warning, Faira reached up and lightly touched Hero's chin, guiding his face upward toward the ceiling of the lab.
The gesture was so intimate. So natural.
That the emotional walls Hero had built for five years nearly collapsed at that very moment.
Faira then adjusted the projection to maximum resolution. The deep field simulation began to rotate slowly, making the entire room feel as if it were drifting through a three-dimensional dance of galaxies.
Hero laughed freely, a rare, genuine laugh that he seldom showed the world.
Amid the breathtaking visuals, he turned his head toward Faira, who was still gazing upward. "Do you remember," Hero said quietly, his voice heavy with suffocating nostalgia, "when you once spent an entire weekend printing massive images from the Hubble telescope? You stuck them all over the walls and ceiling of our room until there wasn't a single patch of white paint left."
Hero chuckled softly, his eyes still fixed on the galaxies above, though his mind was clearly trapped in a small apartment from the past.
"I complained that our bedroom felt like your messy laboratory," he continued, "But you told me that whenever we lay there together after a long, exhausting day, all we had to do was look up."
Hero's voice softened. "You said you wanted me to realize that no matter how big the storm we were facing, we would always survive it. Because compared to a universe this vast… we and all our complicated problems were nothing more than invisible dust floating in the darkness."
Hero paused for a moment, letting the nebula light wash across his face before slowly turning toward Faira.
"You used to say, 'Hero, don't let small problems make you think the world is ending. Look up. Our world isn't even visible from up there.'"
Faira didn't respond immediately. She kept looking upward, but her shoulders trembled slightly.
She finally turned to look at Hero, who was already watching her.
There was fear in Hero's eyes.
A quiet anxiety that bringing up those memories—the way they used to lie together, the way Faira would soothe him while they stared at the artificial sky of their bedroom—might have been a fatal mistake.
But after a moment, Faira exhaled slowly.
She looked back up at the galaxies surrounding them.
Then a gentle, sincere smile appeared on her face.
"Yes," Faira said softly. "I remember that very well. And I also remember how much you complained back then."
She laughed lightly, and continue, "You even went out of your way to find the most advanced projection screen available at the time just so those Hubble images could come alive in our room." Her voice softened.
"You said you didn't want your girlfriend staring at yellowing static prints. You wanted me to feel like I was truly floating through orbit every time we closed our eyes."
A wave of overwhelming relief crashed through Hero, dissolving the tightness that had been suffocating his chest.
Faira's smile was confirmation.
That memory wasn't alive only in his mind.
It was still carefully preserved in hers as well.
"That was one of the fondest moments of us… wasn't it?" Hero asked quietly, searching for validation in her eyes.
Faira stared at him for several seconds that felt like eternity.
Then she nodded slowly.
A silent confession that the memory still lived in her heart too.
But the warmth shattered instantly when the phone in Hero's pocket began vibrating loudly. The ringing sound broke the laboratory's silence.
Hero pulled out his phone. His expression immediately stiffened.
The name Arianna was clearly displayed on the screen.
Hero was about to ignore it, but Faira gestured toward the phone with her eyes.
"Just answer it, Hero. Don't ignore it," she said.
She forced a smile onto her lips—a fake smile she used as a subtle shield so Hero wouldn't see the crack forming inside her heart. "I'll step out for a moment. I think I need to check some data in the next room anyway."
Faira turned and walked toward the exit before Hero could respond.
But the moment the steel door closed behind her and she was no longer within Hero's sight, the smile vanished instantly.
Faira leaned against the cold corridor wall, clutching the brown envelope in her hand as a painful tightness began spreading through her chest.
💫💫💫💫💫
Hero turned the key in his car, shutting off the engine as it purred quietly in the underground parking area of his apartment in Canary Wharf.
But instead of getting out, he remained seated behind the steering wheel.
He let himself sink deeper into the suffocating heaviness that had filled his chest ever since his day in Oxfordshire.
Fragments of memories from his meeting with Faira replayed endlessly in his mind like a broken cassette tape.
Hero found himself reliving the moment from a few hours earlier, when Faira had escorted him to the parking lot of the Harwell Institute before he returned to London.
Faira had just turned to walk back toward the ECSAT building when Hero suddenly called out her name.
"Faira—"
No one knew where that courage came from—perhaps from the fragments of longing he had slowly gathered during the five years he spent missing that girl.
"I really want to see you again," Hero said softly.
His voice was low, but he was certain the tremor within it was strong enough to bridge the distance between them.
Faira didn't answer right away.
She simply stood there, frozen, as if she already knew Hero's words wouldn't stop there.
Hero let out a quiet breath, watching her from the open door of his car. His voice carried a fragile hope as he asked again.
"Will I see you again? Another time? Since you're coming back for good now."
Silence fell once more.
Hero could hear the wild pounding of his own heartbeat, waiting for certainty in the middle of the uncertainty they had created themselves.
Yet, just like she always did, a smile slowly formed on Faira's face. It appeared so naturally, as if she wanted to soothe the uneasiness that was clearly written across Hero's expression.
"Of course we'll meet again, Hero," she said lightly. Our duties as Maid of Honor and Best Man go hand in hand, don't they? I'm sure I'll need your help dealing with that annoying couple."
Even though it wasn't the answer he had hoped for, Hero knew he had to be satisfied for now.
At the very least, he still had a logical reason to see Faira again—even if it was only to talk about someone else's business, not about the feelings in his heart that had never truly settled.
Hero finally stepped out of the car and headed up to his penthouse unit. The moment the door opened, the rich aroma of food greeted him, filling the entire apartment dominated by glass walls that overlooked the shimmering Thames River.
A second later, Arianna appeared from the kitchen carrying a plate of roast beef.
A small apron wrapped around her petite figure, and her face lit up in surprise when she saw Hero already standing there.
"Hi, honey! I was just about to surprise you with a special dinner tonight."
Hero stood still.
His gaze drifted toward the dining table, already perfectly arranged with candles, flowers, and dishes that looked incredibly tempting in the middle of his cold, luxurious apartment.
The contrast between what he had just felt in Harwell and what he was facing now in East London felt painfully sharp.
"Weren't you supposed to land at Heathrow tonight?" Hero said while placing his car keys on the table beside him.
Arianna set the dish down on the dining table, took off her apron, and walked toward him.
She wrapped both of her arms around Hero's neck and pulled him into an enthusiastic kiss. "It's called a surprise strategy, honey," she said with a playful grin.
"Even though the timing was a little off, at least I got to see that handsome face of yours looking so surprised."
She kissed him again.
And Hero—like a man who had grown used to pretending—returned the kiss with a mechanical response.
Even though deep inside, it felt as if his soul was slowly draining from his body.
"Well… I'm going to take a shower first," Hero said, gently pulling away. "From the smell of it, the food must be amazing."
He cupped Arianna's cheek softly, though the gesture felt heavier than usual.
"Of course!" Arianna said cheerfully. "You have to eat as much as you want tonight. When else would I have time to cook in London? I'm usually flying to Paris or Milan for photoshoots. Oh—and I want to hear the full story about your trip to Harwell earlier!"
She returned to the kitchen with the same bright energy.
Hero walked into his bedroom, closing the door behind him as he took off his jacket.
For a moment, he remained shirtless before letting his body fall onto the bed.
His mind was empty.
A faint sting of guilt pierced through him as he realized Arianna was here—while his heart was still lingering in the corridors of ECSAT.
He suddenly sat up, trying to push away the remaining image of Faira that still lingered behind his eyes.
Hero opened his wardrobe, intending to grab a clean shirt before taking a shower and washing away the scent of today from his body.
But his hand suddenly froze midair.
His gaze was drawn to the far corner of the shelf—a dark hollow he had deliberately left untouched by the bedroom light all this time.
A familiar battle began inside his head. Logic told him to close the wardrobe and forget it.
But his feelings kept dragging him back to the past.
And just like every other time, Hero lost.
He would always lose whenever the choice was between letting go… or continuing to hold onto the wound.
With a motion that almost resembled a sacred ritual, Hero reached to the very back beneath a pile of clothes he rarely wore.
His fingers pulled out a small square box made of deep blue velvet.
The small box he had kept for more than five years now rested in the palm of his hand.
It felt cold and unfamiliar, yet it carried an emotional weight heavy enough to shatter his defenses.
Hero slowly opened it.
The ceiling light reflected off a diamond ring that sparkled arrogantly, almost as if it were mocking its owner. A ring he once bought with every hope he had.
That lifeless object was supposed to rest on the ring finger of a girl who—unfortunately—even now still held complete control over the rhythm of his heart.
Hero stared at the ring blankly.
To him, it was no longer just a luxurious piece of jewelry. Tt had become the most tangible monument to his failure.
A proposal that was never spoken.
The object remained silent, yet the pulse of regret continued to throb beneath his skin—reminding him that no matter how far he had walked, he had never truly moved on from that day.
The day he lost everything.
The day he lost Faira Adrianna.