Vita Brevis
Copyright© 2026 by Sci-FiTy1972
Day 3
DAY 3 The Collision
Some moments don’t announce themselves.
They don’t arrive with music or warning or ceremony. They arrive like ordinary minutes— and leave like earthquakes.
I met Briana Star on a staircase.
Not at the top. Not at the bottom.
Somewhere in between.
I was carrying a stack of books I didn’t need anymore—old habits die hard—and she was moving too fast to see where she was going. We collided gently, but enough to send papers sliding across the steps like startled birds.
“I’m sorry,” we said at the same time.
We both laughed.
Not the polite kind. The surprised kind. The kind that feels like something inside you just woke up.
She knelt to help gather the pages, her hair falling forward in a way that made the world feel suddenly quieter. I watched her hands move—confident, careful—and felt something shift in my chest that had nothing to do with time and everything to do with recognition.
“You look like you’re running from something,” I said without thinking.
She looked up at me, eyes bright with curiosity instead of offense. “And you look like you’re running toward everything.”
We paused there on the stairs, two strangers suspended in a moment neither of us had planned for.
“I’m Ari,” I said.
“Briana,” she replied. “Briana Star.”
The name felt like it belonged to the sky. The smile felt like it belonged to me.
We sat on the steps longer than necessary, talking about nothing important and everything meaningful. Where we’d been that morning. What we thought about the Life Map. Whether time should be treated like a gift or a debt.
“I don’t like owing time,” she said. “I like thanking it.”
That sentence stayed with me.
There was no awkwardness. No performance. No need to impress. In a world where lives are short, we skip the parts where people pretend to be someone else.
We tell the truth faster.
By the time the conversation slowed, I realized something that surprised me.
I wasn’t thinking about the clock.
Not because I had forgotten it.
Because I had found something that made it quiet.
We stood to leave at the same time again.
“You going up?” she asked.
I nodded. “You?”
She smiled. “Always.”
We walked together the rest of the way, not touching, not rushing—just close enough to feel the gravity that hadn’t yet learned its own name.
Some people call it fate.
I don’t.
I call it what it really is: Two lives choosing the same moment.
I wouldn’t remember the exact second our paths crossed.
But I would always remember the feeling of it.
Somewhere around 10:41 a.m., I met Briana Star. And for the first time, time stopped being the loudest thing in the room.
DAY 3 — CHAPTER 16 The Test
Attraction is easy.
Honesty is the test.
Briana and I met again that afternoon in the small courtyard behind the learning hall. It wasn’t planned—at least not out loud. But in a world where time moves fast, coincidence learns to feel like courage.
She was sitting on the low stone wall, watching the light slide across the pavement. I almost walked past her, afraid of wanting more than a moment. Then she looked up and smiled like she’d been waiting for me to choose.
“You came back,” she said.
“So did you,” I answered.
We didn’t waste time with pleasantries. That’s another thing short lives teach you—skip the surface. Go straight to what matters.
“Tell me something true,” she said.
“About what?”
“About you.”
I thought for a second. Not because I didn’t have answers—but because I had too many.
“I care too much,” I said finally. “Sometimes I try to fix people when I should just stand with them.”
She nodded like that made sense. “I leave too fast,” she said. “Not because I don’t feel. Because I feel everything, and I’m afraid of drowning in it.”
We sat with that—two confessions resting between us like fragile glass.
“This isn’t a game, is it?” I asked.
“No,” she said softly. “It’s a risk.”
I liked that she didn’t dress it up. Love doesn’t need poetry to be dangerous. It just needs truth.
We walked the perimeter of the courtyard, side by side. Not touching yet. Close enough to feel the question in the air: Do we step closer?
“In another world,” she said, “people get years to decide who they want to be with.”
“In this one,” I replied, “we get honesty.”
She stopped walking and turned to face me. The light caught her eyes and turned them into something brave.
“If we do this,” she said, “we don’t get to pretend it’s casual.”
“I wouldn’t want to,” I said.
She smiled—not the easy smile from the staircase. The serious one. The one that means you’re stepping onto ground that will change you.
“That’s all I needed to hear,” she said.
We didn’t kiss. Not yet.
We did something harder.
We chose intention.
I don’t know when attraction becomes commitment.
But I know when honesty does.
Sometime after 1:18 p.m., we stopped circling the moment. And started standing inside it.
DAY 3 — CHAPTER 17 The Honest Date
Our first date didn’t look like a date.
No candles. No music. No carefully chosen words meant to impress.
Just two people walking through the city with nothing to hide and no time to pretend.
Briana suggested the river-walk, the quiet stretch where the noise thins and the air smells like water instead of worry. We walked side by side, close enough that our arms brushed now and then, not pulling away anymore.
“What do people do on first dates in other worlds?” she asked.
“From what I’ve heard,” I said, “they perform.”
She laughed softly. “We don’t have time for that.”
We sat on the low wall by the river and watched the current move like it had somewhere important to be. In a way, it did.
“So,” she said, turning toward me. “What scares you?”
I didn’t dodge the question. “Wasting the time I have trying to look like someone I’m not.”
She nodded. “Mine is leaving something real because I’m afraid of how much it will matter.”
We let that settle between us.
In longer lives, people circle truth for years. They test the edges. They hide behind humor and timing and excuses. Here, truth walks right up to you and asks if you’re brave enough to hold it.
“I don’t want easy,” she said. “I want honest.”
“Then you’ll get tired of me fast,” I replied. “I don’t know how to do anything halfway.”
She smiled. “Good.”
We talked about everything that didn’t usually come up on first meetings—loss, fear, dreams that felt too big for the time we had. We didn’t rush through it. We let silence sit when words didn’t know what to do.
At one point, she reached for my hand.
Not suddenly. Not dramatically.
Just like it was the most natural thing in the world.
And it felt like it.
I realized then that love in our world doesn’t arrive like fireworks. It arrives like recognition. Like finding something you didn’t know you’d been missing until it was suddenly there.
“You’re not afraid of this,” I said.
She looked at our hands and then back at me. “I am,” she said. “I’m just choosing not to let fear make my decisions.”
I thought about that for a long moment.
So did I.
We walked back as the light softened, not rushing, not lingering too long either—just matching each other’s pace, like we were already learning how to move through time together.
No promises. No illusions.
Just presence.
And in our world, presence is the most honest thing you can give.
We never said, This is love.
We didn’t have to.
Somewhere around 3:42 p.m., we stopped wondering if this mattered. And started acting like it did.
DAY 3 — CHAPTER 18 The First Touch
There is a difference between being near someone and being with them.
We learned it that evening.
The city had softened into dusk by the time Briana and I found ourselves back on the quiet street near her building. Lights glowed behind windows. Laughter drifted from somewhere above us. Life went on the way it always does—fast, tender, unassuming.
We stood there longer than either of us meant to.
In another world, people would call it hesitation. Here, it felt like reverence.
“I don’t want to rush this,” she said quietly.
“I don’t want to either,” I replied. “But I don’t want to be afraid of it.”
She looked at me for a moment, then took a small step closer. Not into my arms. Just into my space.
That was enough.
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