The Chapter That Should Never Have Been Written

The library was deserted. Half-lit lamps flickered above, casting long shadows across the empty tables. He pretended to read, notebook open in front of him, as if words could be a shield. She walked in with the excuse of retrieving a forgotten notebook, but both knew what she was really looking for was already sitting two tables away.

The silence thickened, heavy with anticipation. Each step she took echoed louder than it should have, carrying her toward the point of no return. He glanced at her without lifting his head too much, as though reading her secretly. She gave a nervous smile, eyes falling to her shoes, yet she didn’t stop.

They met between tall shelves and stretched shadows. She brushed her fingers across a book’s spine, he mirrored the gesture. Neither opened a page. She was the one who dared to break the air with a sigh:
“I always thought nothing ever happened here.”

He smirked, just enough to suggest danger and promise.
“Then the right chapter was missing.”

And then it happened: a kiss, brief and trembling, tasting of ink and raspberries. It asked for no future, demanded no permission. It was present in its purest form—insolent, impossible to file away.

Rain was waiting outside, baptizing the city in red and gold reflections. They ran to the café on the corner, soaked and laughing, like fugitives of a delicious crime. Two notebooks landed on the table: his filled with half-sentences, hers with formulas and lecture notes. She drew a bold asterisk over the line “everything forbidden feels more real” and looked straight at him.
“Stylistic notes,” she teased.

He tilted his head.
“Then stay until the very last page.”

No one else entered the café. No one witnessed the conspiracy sealed that night. No phone numbers exchanged, no promises, no carefully planned return. Only the certainty that what happened was too perfect to ever be repeated.

And so it remained: a chapter that should never have been written, but one that no one could erase.