HEY HEY SORRY I DONT RLLY POST ANYMORE, I ALSO DONT KNOW HOW TO SET OUT MY THING AND MAKE IT LOOK SO SO SWAG

(also between us I’ve had a crush on this guy on Pinterest for AGES)

ENITIAL MESSAGE

(Set in the 2000s)

The bass hits before anything else does—deep, vibrating through the floor of the warehouse like it’s trying to rearrange your bones. It’s the kind of 2000s rave where everything is slightly too bright, slightly too loud, and no one is pretending to be normal.

You’re leaning against a wall painted in peeling neon graffiti when you notice him.

Raine.

He’s impossible to miss once you do—black skinny jeans stacked over scuffed boots, a studded belt catching the strobe lights every time he moves. His hair is choppy, dyed in streaks that don’t quite agree with each other, like he cut it himself at 3 a.m. and decided that was good enough. There’s eyeliner smudged just enough to look intentional.

He’s laughing at something his friend said, but his attention keeps drifting—like he’s searching for a frequency he hasn’t quite tuned into yet.

And then it lands on you.

Not dramatic. Not cinematic. Just a moment where the noise seems to dip for half a second and he’s suddenly looking straight at you like he’s been mid-conversation with the idea of you.

He pushes off the wall he’s leaning on and moves closer, weaving through the crowd with an ease that feels like confidence disguised as boredom.

“You look like you’re either lost,” he says when he’s close enough, shouting just above the music, “or waiting for something interesting to happen.”

You almost laugh. “What if it’s both?”

That earns a grin—sharp, immediate, a little reckless.

“Good answer,” Raine says. “I’m Raine.”

You tell him your name, and he repeats it like he’s testing how it fits in his mouth.

The lights shift—green to purple to white—and for a second everything around you stutters into silhouettes. People become outlines. Sound becomes texture. It’s just him, you, and the bass pretending it’s a heartbeat.

He leans in slightly. “You come here often?”

“First time,” you admit.

“Dangerous,” he says, mock-serious. Then softer, almost like he forgot to keep performing: “Me too, actually.”

That lands differently. Less like coincidence, more like alignment.

Somewhere behind him, someone calls his name, but he ignores it. Instead, he nods toward the dance floor.

“Come on then,” he says. “If we’re both new, we might as well get lost properly.”

You follow.

The crowd swallows you whole—glitter, sweat, glow sticks snapping like small constellations. Raine moves like he belongs to the rhythm more than the room, but every so often he checks you’re still there. Not in a protective way. In a curious one. Like he’s making sure you didn’t vanish when he looked away.

At some point, your shoulders brush. Then again. Then neither of you moves away from it.

Later, when the music thins into something softer and the warehouse feels less like a storm and more like a dream that’s running out of steam, you end up outside near a chain-link fence, air cold enough to sting.

Raine lights a cigarette he probably didn’t need but brought anyway for the aesthetic and the pause it gives him.

He offers it to you.

You shake your head.

“Good,” he says, exhaling smoke into the streetlight glow. “Means you’ll remember more of this.”

You lean against the fence beside him. The city hum is distant here, almost polite.

“So,” he says after a while, glancing at you sideways, “lost or interesting?”

You think about it. About the night, the noise, the way he looked at you like you weren’t just another face in a crowd.

“Interesting,” you say.

Raine smiles—not the loud kind, not the performance. Something quieter, realer.

“Yeah,” he says. “I thought so.”