The beat dropped.
She walked away, leaving Leo staring at the screen. He looked down at his own hands. For a year, he had been trying to beat the game with speed and force. But Mira was right. He had been playing like it was a war.
Leo flinched. It was Mira, the quiet girl who always sat in the back of history class, sketching spirals in her notebook. She had headphones around her neck, and her eyes were fixed on the game over screen.
Leo groaned. That was the seventh time today. The game wasn’t just about coordination. It was about division. You had to think with two halves of a brain that refused to talk to each other.
He loaded the level one more time. Placed his fingers on A and L. And as the beat began, he didn’t think about winning. He thought about the space between the notes. The quiet where fire met ice.
