Chapter 2: The Bridge Between Us
Leo stopped bringing pinecones after a week.
It wasn’t that he gave up. It was just that when someone builds a wall, even the best climbers eventually run out of rope. Every morning for seven days, he left something small at Mae’s door—a shell, a doodle, a wildflower tucked under a rock. And every morning, it stayed there longer than the last, untouched.
After the seventh day, he stopped going.
The bridge where they used to meet sat abandoned, the wind rattling the loose boards like a whisper Mae wasn’t ready to hear.
Fall settled over Willow Creek in shades of amber and gray. Leaves drifted down like paper promises, and the river grew colder, faster, as if racing toward something no one could see.
Mae still passed the bakery sometimes. She would see Leo through the window, perched on the curb with a soda can, kicking pebbles into the street. She wanted to wave, to shout across the parking lot, Wait! I’m still here!
But her feet never listened.
It wasn’t that she didn’t miss him. She missed him the way you miss air when you’re underwater too long—desperately, painfully, fiercely. But her heart had learned something new: people left. Sometimes they left without saying goodbye. Sometimes they stayed but still felt a million miles away. And sometimes, it was safer not to reach out at all.
It was mid-October when their paths crossed again—literally.
Mae was carrying a stack of books from the library, the cool wind nipping at her sleeves, when she turned a corner too fast and collided headfirst into someone.
The books exploded onto the sidewalk like a broken constellation.
“Whoa—sorry!” the voice said.
Mae looked up, heart tripping over itself. Leo.
He dropped to his knees, gathering books, his hair even messier than before. He handed her a copy of The Secret Garden, his fingers brushing hers.
For a second, the whole world held its breath.
“Hey,” he said, not grinning this time. Just soft. Careful.
“Hey,” she managed.
An awkward silence settled between them. Leo scratched the back of his neck. “You, uh… disappeared.”
Mae stared at her shoes. “I know.”
“I missed you,” he said, like it was the simplest truth in the world.
Something cracked inside her, quiet but deep.
“I’m sorry,” she said, voice small.
Leo shrugged, not like he didn’t care, but like he didn’t want to make it harder for her. “Stuff happens.”
Mae nodded. “Yeah. Stuff.”
Another gust of wind blew a loose sheet of paper from her book pile, sending it skittering down the sidewalk. Leo chased after it, laughing when he almost tripped over a mailbox.
He brought it back, holding it out with a flourish. “Your lost treasure, madam.”
Mae couldn’t help but smile. A real one this time.
Maybe some bridges didn’t collapse completely. Maybe some just needed repairs.
They didn’t fall back into old habits immediately. It was slower now, tentative, like walking across a frozen pond. Testing each step carefully.
They met at the bridge again a few days later, both pretending it wasn’t planned. Leo had brought two sodas and a pack of caramel candies. Mae brought her sketchbook, although she wasn’t sure why.
They sat side by side, legs swinging above the water.
“So,” Leo said after a while, “are we still the River Kids?”
Mae laughed. It felt rusty but good. “I guess so.”
“Good. ’Cause I made new wishes for the Paper Kingdom.”
He pulled a crumpled handful of notes from his hoodie pocket, each scribbled on candy wrappers, receipts, napkins. Mae unfolded one: Find the world’s biggest tree and live inside it.
Another read: Get so good at drawing rivers that they jump off the page.
Another: Forgive people faster, even when it’s hard.
Mae swallowed hard.
Leo watched her carefully. “You don’t have to read them all now.”
“I want to.” Her voice cracked slightly.
They sat in the fading light, reading wishes. Some were silly. Some were impossibly grand. Some were so tender Mae had to blink hard against the sting in her eyes.
And somewhere between a wish about skydiving and one about building a secret fort out of snow, Mae wrote one of her own:
Be brave enough to stay.
She folded it and slipped it into the jar between them.
Leo didn’t say anything. He just bumped his shoulder lightly against hers.
The bridge creaked under their weight, but it held.
Over the next few months, Willow Creek felt less like a cage and more like a nest.
They spent afternoons at the library, building forts out of beanbags when Mrs. Potts wasn’t looking. They biked to the old cemetery, telling each other ghost stories under the cracked angel statues. They stole apples from Mr. Camden’s orchard and swore eternal loyalty over slices of pie.
Mae drew everything: the crooked smile Leo had when he was trying not to laugh, the secret bridge hidden by winter bare trees, the way the river froze at the edges but never fully gave in.
Leo talked about things he wanted to build. A treehouse. A raft. Maybe a life bigger than Willow Creek someday.
“Do you ever wanna leave?” Mae asked one evening as they sat on the bridge, huddled against the crisp November air.
Leo tossed a pebble into the river. “Sometimes. But…I don’t know. Leaving’s hard.”
“Yeah.”
She thought about the city they left behind. About her dad, somewhere across the state, starting a new life Mae wasn’t part of. About how sometimes, even when you stayed, it still felt like leaving something behind.
“I guess,” Leo said slowly, “it’s not where you are. It’s who you’re with.”
Mae tucked that thought into her heart like a folded paper note.
But not everything was perfect.
There were cracks if you looked close enough.
Leo sometimes disappeared for days without explaining why. Mae caught glimpses of bruises he shrugged off. She knew better than to push too hard. Everyone carried battles they didn’t name.
And Mae herself still struggled. Some days, she woke up and the sadness clung to her like damp clothes. Some days, the river seemed too loud, the world too sharp.
They never talked about the hard things directly. But somehow, they understood anyway.
One icy afternoon in December, as they huddled under their rickety hideout roof with breath puffing in clouds, Leo pulled a paper heart from his jacket.
It wasn’t crumpled like the first one. It was folded neatly, carefully.
“This is for you,” he said.
Mae took it with trembling fingers.
Inside, it said, You’re my favorite wish.
She looked up, heart hammering.
Leo’s cheeks flushed red—not just from the cold.
“I mean,” he mumbled, “you don’t have to say anything. I just—”
Mae kissed his cheek.
It was quick. Barely there. But it lit his face up like Christmas lights.
For a moment, the sadness lifted, and the future felt wide open.
They didn’t say I love you. Not yet. Maybe not ever, not in the way books and movies said it.
But it was there, in the paper heart, in the bridge they rebuilt, in the way they stayed when it would have been easier to leave.
As winter deepened and Christmas lights sparkled across Willow Creek, Mae realized something.
Maybe life wasn’t about waiting for things to stay perfect.
Maybe it was about building bridges anyway—messy, fragile, beautiful bridges—and daring to cross them, even when you were scared.
Even when you knew they might not last forever.
Especially then.
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