Vanessa stared at the crowd from behind the curtain of the campus auditorium. Her palms were sweating, and her throat was dry, but her heart beat steady. Today wasn't about perfection. It was about truth.
A student-run panel on mental health and identity had asked her to speak. She almost said no. But then she remembered every late-night tear, every whispered fear in Zara's art studio, and every breathless conversation with Jude when she let her walls down.
Today, she wasn't going to hide.
Isabel appeared beside her, straightening the lapel of Vanessa's blazer. "You've got this."
Vanessa smirked. "Are you sure? I feel like I'm going to faint or run."
"Then do it while making a difference," Isabel replied with a wink.
Vanessa exhaled and stepped onto the stage.
---
The room was filled with students, faculty, and local mental health advocates. Jude sat in the front row, his gaze calm and grounded. Zara was just behind him, her camera in her lap but her focus all on Vanessa.
She took the mic. "Hi. I'm Vanessa Cole. I used to think I was too loud, too impulsive, too wrong to be taken seriously."
A few people chuckled gently.
"I also thought hiding who I loved made me safer. It didn't."
The room quieted.
"I was in a relationship with a beautiful, talented woman who showed me love could be soft. I ran from it because I was scared. Then I met someone else—a man who saw me in my most chaotic form and stayed. That confused me even more."
She looked at Jude. He nodded.
"I realized I wasn't broken. I was human. Fluid, evolving, and worthy of love in every form it finds me."
Tears welled in her eyes. "Mental health isn't a straight path. It's messy. Like identity. Like healing. But we walk it anyway."
The applause was immediate and thunderous.
---
Later, outside the venue, Zara approached her.
"I'm proud of you," she said. "You found your voice."
Vanessa smiled sadly. "I wish I'd found it when we were together."
Zara shrugged. "Maybe we were a chapter. Not the whole book."
They hugged, long and warm. No bitterness.
---
That night, Vanessa sat on the rooftop of Jude's apartment, a blanket wrapped around her shoulders, his arm wrapped around her.
"I didn't know you were going to say all that," he murmured.
"I didn't know I could."
"You were incredible."
She looked at him, vulnerable and raw. "Jude, I'm still figuring myself out."
"Good," he said. "Because I'm not here for a version of you. I'm here for you. In all your forms."
She kissed him softly, and for the first time in forever, her heart didn't flinch.