Thursday began with rain. Not a loud drumming, no dramatic pattering—more like that steady, quiet drizzling that stains everything gray, as if someone had put the world on "mute." Lina pulled her hood tighter and gripped the hem of the gray jacket—his jacket. The fabric was softer than it looked, and warm in a way that couldn't just come from heating systems.
The schoolyard smelled of wet chalk, leaves, and rubber. Puddles reflected fragments of sky, individual droplets trembled on the handrail edge like tiny, cold creatures. The first buses disgorged students, and with them the usual background noise: half-loud jokes, hurried footsteps, the thin music track from the tenth graders' earbuds.
"Well, designer jacket." Giulia was already leaning against the door, hoop earrings, scrunchie, her laugh somewhere between mocking and friendly. "Suits you."
"Borrowed," said Lina.
"From whom?"
"From... someone."
