It was a small shake at first, a simple tremor that rattled the drink trays and made a few heads lift. The overhead lights flickered once, barely noticeable.
A moment later, a familiar announcement chimed in, and the flight attendant's voice flowed over the speakers, gentle and composed. "Dear passengers, we've encountered some turbulence. Please remain seated, fasten your seatbelts, and refrain from moving around the cabin…"
Before she could finish, the plane lurched again.
This time the movement was sharper, a drop that made stomachs twist, and loose items bounce.
A couple of startled exclamations broke out. The engines' steady hum faltered into a strained whine.
Outside, the windows showed almost nothing now. Just layers and layers of roiling darkness, streaked with faint flashes of light. Wind howled around the metal shell, the sound thin but piercing, as if fingers of air were scraping along the fuselage.
"Dear passengers, we have encountered a strong storm front. Please—"
The sentence cut off in a violent thunder of noise.
The plane jerked as if something had grabbed it and yanked sideways.
Overhead bins burst open, bags jerked loose, paper and small objects flew in sudden, wild arcs through the cabin. Oxygen masks dropped from panels with a clatter.
Screams erupted from every direction, rising into a single, panicked cry. Lights flashed red. The whole world tilted.
The boy's vision spun as the cabin rolled.
His body was still strapped in, but his sense of up and down was ripped away. It felt like the floor had turned into a wall and then into nothing.
Pressure slammed into his ears, a deep, painful pounding that distorted all sound into a muffled roar. His heart clawed desperately at his chest, and a single thought burst through the chaos: air crash. We're going to crash.
"No," his mind whispered helplessly, "no, no, I don't want to die, not like this, not now."
His scream tore out of him without shape or dignity. He was not thinking of appearances anymore, not of seniors, not of anyone.
The spinning, the hollow drop, the rattling metal, all of it dissolved any thin layer of calm he had ever had.
His fingers dug into the armrest so hard his knuckles hurt. His whole body felt light and heavy at the same time, as if the plane had vanished and only his terror remained.
Then, through that whirl of terror, something warm touched the back of his hand.
Soft fingers, slightly damp with sweat, curled over his own.
The world did not suddenly become safe. The plane still shook. Screams still filled the cabin. Objects still whirled past like pieces of a broken dream. But his mind, which had been clawing at empty air, found that point of warmth and clung to it.
He turned his head.
Amid the flickering emergency lights and the chaos of flying luggage, Alice sat with her body pressed firmly into the seat, her seatbelt pulled tight. Her book was gone, flung somewhere behind them when the turbulence began.
Her lips were pressed together, and he could see she was biting them slightly. Her eyes were wide open, dark and shining, fixed ahead rather than squeezed shut.
Fear was there, unmistakable, reflected in the slight tremor of her shoulders.
And yet she reached for him.
Her hand tightened around his. Not clinging for her own sake, but holding on as if to anchor him.
He realized then that she was just as scared. The aloof senior who always seemed unshakable in class, who accepted praise with calm grace and turned down confessions with gentle firmness, was terrified too.
But instead of breaking down, she was using what strength she had to offer him comfort.
The realization hit him harder than the turbulence.
The roar of wind and engines grew harsher. Metal groaned somewhere in front.
The plane bucked again, harder than before. A deafening explosion of sound ripped through the cabin.
For a heartbeat, cold air slammed into their faces. The front section of the plane tore apart like paper, ripped away in a blur of motion and light. The rush of wind became a shrieking wall, pulling people, seats, and debris toward the gaping hole.
Someone's scream was cut short as they vanished into the storm.
He felt the air around them change from confined and stale to open and violent.
His mind struggled to register what he saw. The aisle tilted away. The rows of seats twisted. The very structure that had enclosed them began to split and peel.
This was beyond turbulence, beyond delay or emergency landing.
This was the kind of scene he had only ever seen in disaster movies, and even those felt tame compared to the reality of cold air ripping through his clothes and stinging his skin.
Hopeless.
That word solidified in his mind, heavy and final.
There was no runway, no safe descent, no rescue waiting. Just tearing metal and black sky and an ocean somewhere far below.
Then warmth wrapped around him again, fuller this time.
Alice moved without hesitation. She unbuckled, ignoring the chaos in front of them, and leaned into him, putting her arms around his shoulders, her body shielding his as much as it could in that narrow seat.
The harsh wind clawed at them, grabbing at her hair and clothes, but her hold did not loosen. It was not gentle. It was fierce.
Sound dulled suddenly, as if the world outside had been pushed one step away.
He could still feel the motion, the wrenching and dropping, but inside that circle of her arms, everything narrowed to her scent and the pounding of her heart against his chest.
He had spent so long dreaming of being noticed by her, of perhaps someday walking next to her in a quiet street, maybe sharing a coffee after school.
He had never once imagined that the first time she would pull him this close would be at the edge of disaster, high above a dark sea, with the plane tearing itself apart around them.
Her hair streamed around them like black ribbons, whipping wildly. Amid all that motion, her face looked strangely still.
Not calm exactly, but composed, determined, as if she had decided something and would not turn back from it now.
Her eyes met his, close enough that he could see the reflection of flashing lights in them.
Close enough to see the fear there, and something else layered beneath it.
She leaned nearer, her lips brushing the space next to his ear.
"I like you," she said.
The words struck him harder than the rush of wind.
For a heartbeat, time seemed to stop in the middle of their fall. The pressure in his ears, the rattling seats, the screaming around them, all of it faded into a dark blur at the edge of his awareness. Only that confession remained, hanging between them like a single, impossible light.
He stared at her, mind blank.
"If I don't say it now," she continued, her voice trembling but steady enough to reach him, "I might never get the chance…"
Her breath brushed his skin. Every syllable wrapped around his name, though she didn't say it aloud. "You're the one who always peeks at me, aren't you? I like boys like that. I always have. I'm the one who asked to go on this trip with you, exchanging seats with Rin. I was hoping that you would tell me during this trip, but… I didn't think it would turn out like this."
The world spun again, but his thoughts spun faster.
She knew.
All those stolen glances, those moments he thought he'd hidden so well behind notebooks or screens, she had seen them.
Not only seen them, but cared about them. That unreachable senior whom everyone admired had chosen him, quietly, without fanfare.
His chest felt too full.
Right then, the plane broke apart further as she spoke. Panels ripped away. The floor tilted sharply.
Gravity finally won over what remained of the structure, and they were torn free from their seats along with other fragments of the cabin. The open sky swallowed them.
Cold air slammed into them from all sides, piercing and relentless.
Clouds rushed past, then broke apart beneath them to reveal the world below.
The dark surface of the sea stretched out endlessly, catching the last colors of evening: streaks of gold, purple, and deep blue.
Far above, the shredded remains of the plane burned in his peripheral vision, falling like pieces of a broken star.
Yet inside the circle of her arms, neither of them screamed anymore.
They faced each other as they fell, close enough to see every detail of the other's expression.
The panic that had dominated their faces moments before had given way to a strange clarity.
Their hair whipped violently, but their eyes were still. There was too much noise around them for words to pass easily, but their shared gaze carried everything that could no longer be shouted.
Tears formed in the corners of Alice's eyes, glinting briefly in the fading light before the wind pulled them away. Her lips parted one more time, shaping words that had to fight the rush of air to reach him.
"Keep on living," she whispered.