Sweet Romance11 min read
Summer Notes and the First Snow
ButterPicks17 views
I never thought borrowing a tablet at midnight would change the course of my whole summer.
"Elora, you can use mine," Malcolm said before my phone fell apart. "Leave it on the table when you're done."
"Thank you," I whispered, clutching the slim device like it might fly away. I had to text someone—someone I had only known behind a screen. We had been chatting in that creative group all semester, and the idea of finally meeting made my stomach flip.
I tapped "record" and spoke into his chat, trying my sound like a singer testing a new mic. "Hi, it's me," I said in a high voice I practiced.
Nothing came through. I raised the volume, pressed play. Still silent.
Then the bedroom door slammed open.
"Next time you whisper-scream into my ear, remember to disconnect my headphone," Malcolm said, halfway between annoyed and amused. He tossed his blue earbud at me like it was an accusation.
My face burned. "I—I'm so sorry," I managed.
"Why are you calling someone '哥哥'?" he asked, leaning in.
"I—it's just a silly online thing," I said, and almost choked on the word. "Please don't tell my mother."
"Who told you to call him that?" Malcolm's tone was slow.
"My group," I sniffed. "They said it's cute."
He tapped his chin and then reached out. "What was his name?"
"Dylan," I answered. "Dylan Peters."
Malcolm cocked an eyebrow. "Dylan Peters, huh?"
He sat back on the couch and made a show of looking unimpressed. "All right. Put the tablet down."
"When will I get it back?" I asked like a child asking for a toy.
"Out of battery," he lied, and I believed him for three seconds before I saw the 99% batterysticker on the corner of the device.
That night, after I quietly repaired my phone, I texted Dylan and set a date at the library. I changed into a white dress that showed my collarbone. I typed, "See you at the library," then marched out, head full of excitement.
He was taller than I expected, holding two drinks. "Elora?" he smiled. "Finally."
"Hi," I said, and my heart rattled like marbles.
"Do you want to come to the film tonight? I'll show you a trailer," he asked, handing me a cup of red-bean pudding tea.
I nodded like a fool.
Then I saw Malcolm across the glass wall of the library, leaning with one leg crossed, and he mouthed two words that still sound loud in my head: Come over.
Panic spiked. He had caught me. I grabbed Dylan's arm and blurted out, "Let's go now."
Dylan blinked and then smiled, "Sure."
After a phone call, Dylan vanished. I thought maybe this would be a normal date. It wasn't.
"Who's your new boyfriend?" Malcolm asked, smiling like the sun had caught in his mouth.
"He's not my boyfriend," I said, twisting my hands. "He's just—"
"Just what?" Malcolm asked.
"Just someone I met from the group."
"Then have lunch with me," Malcolm said lazily. "Show me how you two met."
I choked on my drink. My young heart wanted to disappear. "No!" I snapped, suddenly panicked that my parents would find out I was already seeing someone.
"Don't make me decide whether I tell your mom or not," he drawled.
"You can't—"
"I can," he said. "But I won't—if you let me know who he is."
"You—" My protest died. "Fine. Malcolm—I'll eat lunch with you."
That was how the first awkward triangle started: a boy I liked online, another who liked to boss me, and me in the middle.
"Take this," Malcolm said later, tossing a small box into my lap at the library.
I flushed. "What—"
"It's a sample. Dylan asked me to carry something," he said in a tone that made it sound like I should be grateful and embarrassed all at once. "Don't be obvious."
I knew then that Malcolm was not only a top student but something wired more dangerous—private, precise, quietly controlling.
That evening, he took me where I had never been: a bar pulsing with lights and songs. Around us men laughed like they owned the night. Malcolm ordered two potent drinks and put a mojito before me.
"Can you drink?" he asked.
I nodded. "A little."
One of the men with a red shaggy hair and a grin that smelled like trouble winked at me. "Hey pretty, take a shot with me and I'll tell you all about his ex."
"Who?" I swallowed.
"Forrest," Malcolm said, single word, like a warning bell.
Before I could think, Forrest clapped a hand on my shoulder and offered to buy me something. I reached for my cup and then felt a big hand slap my wrist away. Malcolm moved smooth and quick. He took my cup, drained it, and said with flat calm, "Finish it, tell her."
Forrest stammered, "I—uh—I was joking."
Malcolm's hand was on Forrest's shoulder. "Pay me tenfold if you lie."
Forrest laughed it off, backing away, but my heart hammered. Malcolm had wrapped a safety around me I didn't expect. Later, a man in a tailored coat (Nikolai McCormick) helped me to a car when Malcolm had to "deal with friends." Nikolai's car smelled of quiet money, and he offered me the backseat as if I were an honored guest.
On the way home I caught a glimpse of Malcolm in the dark alley—leaning close with someone else. The town's streetlight painted them in guilty gold.
I froze. "Malcolm?" I whispered.
He had his head on someone else's shoulder for a moment and then they kissed. My knees nearly buckled.
"Malcolm—" I called into the night, voice small.
He wasn't sleeping. He had simply been distracted by drink and the warmth of the other woman's hug. I stepped into the shadow, and before I knew it, Malcolm's hand was on my face. He kissed me. It was a searching, stunned kiss—one that seemed to have picked me by mistake, or maybe not.
"Did you eat candy?" he murmured against my mouth.
"Sweet," I said stupidly, stunned by the wrongness and the thrill.
I left, heart bruised, and packed a small bag the next day. I told Malcolm I was moving in with a friend.
"You're moving?" he asked, as if I had sung a minor note in an otherwise composed song.
"I need space," I said. "Please don't tell my mother."
He watched me with a slow smile. "You'll be back."
"No—" I tried to be stern, but my breath caught. "I have to go."
So I stayed with a friend for a few days, and the town chewed me like a sour apple. My friend dissected every choice. "Maybe he's the type who does those things," she said. "Maybe he's more than he seems."
"He's mean sometimes," I replied.
"Then you can be mean back."
The week hummed with small cruelties. Dylan texted to invite me to one film. Malcolm wrote back with the time and an added sly instruction: "Wear my shirt."
I thought I would break into a thousand pieces.
At the cinema, the three of us ended up inside, and I sat between two boys who hovered around me like planets. Malcolm put his hand into my pocket and held it; Dylan, across the aisle, covered my ears during the scariest part. I couldn't decide which touch I wanted more.
"Scary?" Malcolm whispered.
"Very," I whispered back.
"Good," Malcolm said, "Then let me hold you."
Later, walking home, I almost laughed at the strangeness of it all. Malcolm gave me a fluffy white fox keychain with a tiny key at its neck.
"For your friend's house," he said. "A little spare."
I kept the fox like a charm, and when my friend canceled plans that night, Malcolm walked me to her building and pressed the little key into my palm. "Come back tonight," he said, casually.
"What if I'm stubborn?" I asked.
"I can be stubborn, too," he said. "Listen, girl. We're not going to let you be stupid about the wrong men."
A few days later, summer fireworks lit the sky, and my life went sideways again.
At a house party for our class, one of Forrest's friends grabbed me in a dark room. "Come with me," he sneered. My friends were outnumbered. My voice shouted for help. Suddenly Malcolm burst through the door. The red-haired man fell under his weight. Someone cheered. The room froze like a picture.
Malcolm didn't just glare; he moved slow and sure; his hand became a fist and his fist spoke a language the bully understood. "Take your hands off her," he said. "Do it now."
Forrest's bravado crumbled. "I—I'm sorry, I didn't—"
"Say it," Malcolm ordered.
"I'm—sorry—"
"Not that kind of sorry."
Forrest sobbed, clutching his face, and the other men looked away. Malcolm's fist had painted two dark rings around his eyes, and he spat, "Tell your friends not to touch girls when they don't want it."
Forrest's face shifted through emotions—fear, shame, denial, pleading. "I—he—she—" he stammered.
"You enjoy humbling women?" Malcolm said. "You're pathetic."
Then Malcolm did something he rarely did: he made the bully stand up in front of everyone and explain himself.
"Forrest," Malcolm said, "You tell them why you did it."
Forrest, face purple with the pain of both fists and humiliation, looked at the crowd. "I wanted to show I could," he said. "I—wanted to look cool."
"Liar," someone shouted.
"Say sorry to her, now," Malcolm demanded.
Forrest fell to his knees. "Elora, I'm sorry. I'm—really sorry. Please—"
People around began to murmur, some took out their phones, some slapped his shoulder. He tried to craft excuses that fell flat like wet paper.
Forrest's punishment was public and immediate: he was not beaten again, but he was stripped of pride. Friends who once laughed with him now photographed the scene with cold faces. The girl he'd once shown off to now turned away and whispered, "Don't touch me." That line caught in his throat. He bowed like a criminal.
I stood by Malcolm and felt a strange, fierce gratitude bubble.
"You humiliated him," my friend hissed.
"I needed him out of her way," Malcolm said simply.
The next day a new shock arrived: the school forum had an anonymous post about me. "She sleeps around with big names," it read. Comments multiplied like sparks. "She uses boys." "She is a manipulator." A screenshot of me and Malcolm and Dylan outside a milk tea stall circulated.
I felt the world tilt.
"Who could do this?" I asked over and over.
"Someone bitter," a voice said. It was Malcolm's, low and cold.
"Don't go to the dean," I begged. "Please."
"Maybe I will," he said.
A week later, the truth came out: Reid Fisher, the class president who always smiled too easily, had written the post. The school found logs. Reid denied it at first, his eyes glassy with fear. Then confronted by evidence and a crowd, he folded like paper. The school called an assembly. "We will not allow harassment," the principal announced.
"Reid, step forward," she said.
He stumbled to the podium with the kind of pale that comes from being exposed.
"I didn't mean—" he started.
"You posted lies about a fellow student and encouraged others to harass her," the principal said. "You will be removed from your position and required to apologize publicly."
Reid's voice shook. "I—I thought it was harmless… I was jealous…"
"Everyone here saw your posts," Malcolm said, walking up to the stage. "You used the school's platform to ruin real people's lives."
Reid looked at him like he could crumble him with a look. "I—I'm sorry," he whimpered.
The crowd's reaction was loud and messy. People whispered; some applauded. He tried to backpedal, to claim it was "a joke," to say "others made him do it." That only earned him more scorn. Mothers in the crowd shook their heads. Students pointed fingers. Teachers looked disappointed. The principal read the school's code, and Reid's face went from smug to hollow.
"Why would you do this?" someone shouted.
Reid's answer was a small, thin thing. "Because I thought… I thought it would be funny."
"Do you see her?" the principal said, voice steeled. "She is a person. You turned her into gossip."
For five long minutes Reid imploded. He shifted from anger to denial to pleading.
"It wasn't me alone," he cried. "I—please—"
People had their phones out, some streaming. I stood at the edge of the crowd. I didn't want this spectacle, but the rules of the school demanded public reckoning. Reid's punishment was not fists; it was something worse for him—loss of face and clear consequences. He had his position stripped; he had to stand in front of the whole school and read an apology while cameras recorded. "I've let others down," he said. "I'm sorry, Elora." His voice cracked and his posture shrank.
"Apologies given," someone muttered. "But the harm is done."
It was a long, public unmasking. People surrounded him, whispering. He tried to explain why he had done it—shortcomings, loneliness, envy—but the assembly left him aflame with shame. He begged for forgiveness, some offered it with conditions, others left. The whole scene lasted long enough for me to understand: the school could exacerbate cruelties, but it could also correct them. Reid's fall from leader to a humiliated student was both punishment and a warning. I felt strangely calm watching him shrink.
"You're okay?" Malcolm asked later, when the crowd dispersed.
"I'm shaken," I whispered.
"You should be," he said. "But we will fix the rest."
That night, when the school had emptied and the lights were dim, Malcolm sat with me in the quiet as I admitted everything I felt. "Why did you fight for me?" I asked.
"Because someone should," he said. "Because you are not fodder for entertainment."
We began to stitch our fragile days together: studying through the afternoons, sharing notes he had always lent me secretly, laughing at small things. Malcolm proved he could be soft—he cooked for me once, and it was the clumsiest tenderness I'd ever seen.
"Do you like this?" he asked, presenting a plate with charred toast.
"It's romantic," I said, pretending.
"I'll burn less next time."
"I know you will," I smiled.
Time passed. Malcolm poured himself into his applications, and I kept polishing my own. Once, he didn't answer his phone for hours because he had been rushed to the hospital. He had a terrible pain—"stomach like a knotted rope," his mother had said. "He needs surgery." My world lurched.
"Are you okay?" I cried into the receiver.
"It's nothing," he tried to sound brave. "Don't worry."
I didn't know then how much worry would become our currency. When I found out he'd had a full operation—gastric perforation—my chest dropped. I flew to his town as soon as I could, and when I stood at the hospital doors and the guard stopped me, I felt a loneliness I had never known. Malcolm's mother answered my call. "He's sleeping," she said. "He woke for a minute and said your name."
My knees trembled. "Tell him I came," I begged.
"Of course," his mother said. "He's stubborn like that boy family. He won't admit it."
I waited outside the ICU in the rain, the kind of rain that felt like small nails. He called me from his bed, voice muffled by medicine. "Elora," he breathed. "I'm sorry… I couldn't call."
I sat on the cold curb like a washed-up thing and told him off and forgave him and asked questions I had no answers for. "Don't hide things from me," I said.
"Promise," he whispered, and the promise sounded fragile and honest. It saved me that day.
I stayed with him at the hospital until he was better. Then we returned to our small life—studying, late-night talks, filing applications. Malcolm applied for a program nearby; I chased ambitions across the country. "Go where you must," he said, "but we'll try."
We kept trying.
Winter came the year I received the news: I had been chosen for a top translation program at North City University—North Jiang. I celebrated and then felt a hollow happiness; he had been accepted for research supporting at his own school.
"Are you coming?" I asked one snowy morning.
"I'll be where you need me," he said.
We promised to try the long-distance. We were young and hopeful and fragile like paper cranes.
Two years later, snow fell on the night of my acceptance. His family celebrated like they always did—dinner, parents nodding, hands squeezing ours. Malcolm's mother leaned over and said to me, "We'd like to think of you officially as family." My chest filled with something like warmth and fear.
"Will you stay?" I asked Malcolm that night, breath fogging.
"Where you are, I'll come," he said, and then pressed his forehead to mine. "One more thing. Remember the fox key? Keep it."
I did. I still do.
On our last night before I left for North Jiang, we stood in a courtyard, snow falling like feathered silence.
"You promise?" I asked.
"I promise," he said, and his voice broke like a small wave.
We kissed under the snow. The sound of our breath and the city was all around us. I thought: this is a summer memory that finally decided to freeze into something real.
Years later, when I carry my little fox key on a busy day and feel my phone buzz with his name, I still remember that night in the bar, the hospital, the assembly, the fox key, the first snow. I am older, and the world is bigger, but my heart still flips when I hear his lazy "Elora" over the phone.
"Are you busy?" he asks now.
"Never for you," I say.
"Then come home for dinner," he says.
I pause, because the snow has a way of making promises seem easier. "Yes," I say.
We hang up. Outside, a pile of mail shifts against the mailbox. The fox key jingles against the ring. A small, private bell.
And when I close my eyes, I see a hospital room, a bar, a cinema, and a tiny white fox—my reminders that some beginnings are messy and hard, and that love is built on arguing, on waiting, on tiny acts of guarding another person.
The End
— Thank you for reading —