I don't sleep.

How could I? Every time I close my eyes, I see that agenda item. Effective immediately. Two words that mean the end of everything.

I spend the night in the film club room instead, curled up in the chair where Grandpa Arthur used to sit, his projection booth jacket wrapped around my shoulders. It still smells faintly of pipe tobacco and peppermint, though the scent is fading. Everything fades eventually.

The projector sits silent in the corner, accusatory.

I should be preparing a defense. Writing a speech. Making a plan.

But what's the point? Sienna's mother sits on the board. The decision was made before the agenda was even published. This meeting is just a formality, a rubber stamp on something already dead.

Story of my life, really. Loving things that are already ghosts.

My phone buzzes. Felix, finally.

*Just saw. On my way.

Don't. There's nothing to do.

Bullshit. We'll figure something out.

Felix, it's over.

It's not over until we say it's over.

I don't respond. What movie quote could possibly fit this moment? What piece of borrowed dialogue could express the hollow ache in my chest?

None. Because this isn't a movie. This is real life, where the things you love don't get saved by a clever third act. They just die, and you have to watch.

He shows up anyway, of course. Because Felix Zhang doesn't understand the concept of a lost cause.

The door bangs open at six-thirty in the morning, and there he is—hair even more disheveled than usual, wearing yesterday's clothes, carrying two coffees and a determination that would be touching if it weren't so futile.

"Okay," he says, setting the coffees down and pulling out his phone. "I've been up all night researching board meeting procedures. They have to allow public comment. We can speak. We can bring evidence of the club's value—"

"Felix."

"—and I talked to Danny, Priya, and Yuki. They're all willing to come and testify. We can show that enrollment is growing—"

"Felix."

"—and I found the district's own guidelines about eliminating programs. There's a process. They can't just—"

"Felix!" My voice cracks. "Stop."

He stops. Looks at me. Really looks at me, with those warm brown eyes that see too much.

"It's over," I say quietly. "We lost."

"We haven't even fought yet."

"What's the point? Sienna's mother is on the board. The decision is already made. This is just..." I gesture vaguely. "Theater. Bad theater."

"Then we make them reconsider. Margot, we can't just give up—"

"Why not?" The words come out sharper than I intended. "Everything ends anyway. Everything dies. At least this way I can see it coming."

He flinches. "This isn't like your grandfather—"

"Don't." I stand up, his jacket falling from my shoulders. "Don't analyze me like I'm one of your woodworking projects you can sand down and fix."

"That's not what I'm doing."

"Then what are you doing? Because from where I'm standing, you're trying to save something that's already dead. Just like I've been doing for two years. And I'm tired, Felix. I'm so fucking tired."

The silence stretches between us, heavy with everything we're not saying.

"The meeting is at four," he says finally. "I'll be there. I hope you will be too."

He leaves the coffee. Takes his hope with him.

I don't touch the coffee. It goes cold while I sit in Arthur's chair and watch the morning light creep across the film reels, illuminating dust motes that dance like they don't know they're already falling.

---

I don't go to classes. What's the point? Instead, I stay in the club room, cataloging everything one last time. Every film, every poster, every scrap of paper with Arthur's handwriting.

This is what grief looks like, I think. Inventorying the dead.

Around noon, the door opens again. I expect Felix, but it's Danny, Priya, and Yuki instead.

"We heard," Priya says softly. She's wearing a vintage Bette Davis shirt—something she never would have known about before joining the club. "We're going to the meeting."

"You don't have to do that."

"We want to," Danny adds. He's holding a notebook filled with what looks like statistics. "I pulled the numbers. Film club attendance is up forty percent this semester. That's significant growth."

Yuki nods. "And I made a petition. We got two hundred signatures in three hours."

I stare at them. These people who joined my dying club, who fell in love with silent films and noir and melodrama. Who became something like friends, even though I never meant to let them.

"It won't matter," I say. "But thank you."

"It might matter," Priya insists. "We have to try."

"Why?"

"Because this place matters," she says simply. "You showed us that."

After they leave, I sit in the silence and wonder when I became the villain in my own story. When did I start believing that caring about things was foolish? That fighting for what you love was naive?

Probably around the same time Mom walked out. Or when Arthur died. Or maybe I was always like this, and they just gave me an excuse.

---

The school board meets in the district office, a depressingly beige building that smells like burnt coffee and bureaucracy. I show up at 3:55, sliding into the back row of the public seating area.

Felix is in the front row, flanked by Danny, Priya, and Yuki. He turns when I enter, his face lighting up with hope that makes my chest ache.

I look away.

The board members file in—five of them, including Sienna's mother, Victoria Caldwell, who looks exactly like an older version of her daughter. Same honey-blonde hair, same calculating eyes, same expensive perfume that probably costs more than my entire wardrobe.

Sienna herself sits in the second row, watching with barely concealed satisfaction.

The meeting starts with the usual bureaucratic tedium. Budget reports. Facility updates. A lengthy discussion about parking lot resurfacing that makes me want to scream.

Then: "Item seven. Proposal to eliminate low-enrollment extracurricular programs."

Victoria Caldwell takes the lead, naturally. Her voice is smooth, practiced, reasonable.

"The district faces significant budget constraints," she begins. "We must make difficult decisions about resource allocation. After careful review, we've identified several programs with consistently low enrollment that no longer justify their operational costs."

She lists them. Film Appreciation Club. Creative Writing Workshop. Amateur Radio Club. Fiber Arts Collective.

All the small things. All the weird, niche spaces where kids who don't fit anywhere else finally find their people.

All expendable, apparently.

"These eliminations will allow us to redirect resources toward high-impact programs that serve broader student populations," Victoria continues. "The equipment from the film club, for instance, can be reallocated to support our award-winning media production program."

"I'd like to speak." Felix is on his feet before I can process what's happening.

Victoria looks annoyed but nods. "You have two minutes."

Felix walks to the podium, and even from the back row, I can see his hands shaking. But his voice is steady.

"My name is Felix Zhang. I'm a senior and a member of the Film Appreciation Club. I know the numbers look bad on paper. But numbers don't tell the whole story."

He pulls out his phone, and I realize he's reading from notes.

"When I joined this club two months ago, it was on a dare. I thought it would be boring. Old movies, weird silent films, stuff my grandmother watches." He pauses. "But I was wrong. This club taught me that stories don't need words to matter. That the quiet things are often the most important. That sometimes the smallest spaces hold the biggest truths."

Danny stands next. Then Priya. Then Yuki. Each of them sharing what the club means to them, how it changed them, why it matters.

The board members look unmoved. Victoria checks her watch.

"Thank you for your comments," she says when they finish. "However, enrollment numbers remain the primary factor in our decision-making process. Four regular members does not justify the operational costs."

"Attendance is up forty percent this semester," Danny interjects. "That shows growth potential—"

"From three members to four," Victoria cuts him off smoothly. "That's not sustainable growth. That's statistical noise."

"We have a petition with two hundred signatures," Yuki tries.

"Signatures are not the same as committed participation." Victoria's smile is polished, final. "I appreciate your passion, but the decision stands. All in favor of eliminating the listed programs?"

Four hands go up immediately.

The fifth board member—an older man with kind eyes—hesitates. "I'd like to table this discussion. Give these students a chance to—"

"The time for discussion has passed," Victoria interrupts. "We've been reviewing these numbers for months. A few impassioned speeches don't change the fundamental budgetary reality."

"Four in favor, one abstaining," the board president announces. "Motion carries. The listed programs are eliminated, effective immediately."

Immediately.

Not at the end of the semester. Not after finals.

Now.

I watch Felix's shoulders slump. Watch Danny close his notebook. Watch Priya wipe her eyes.

I feel nothing. Just a vast, echoing emptiness where something used to be.

Of course we lost. Of course they didn't care. Why would they? We're just four weird kids who love old movies. We don't matter. We never mattered.

The meeting continues—something about textbook orders—but I'm already standing, already moving toward the exit.

Felix catches me in the parking lot.

"Margot, wait—"

"For what?" I don't stop walking. "It's done."

"We can appeal. There's a process—"

"Felix, stop." I finally turn to face him. He looks devastated, and that makes it worse somehow. That he cares this much about something that was always doomed. "It's over. The club is dead. We tried, and we lost, and that's how this story ends."

"This isn't just about the club." His voice is rough. "Talk to me. Actually talk to me, not at me with movie quotes or defensive bullshit."

"What do you want me to say?"

"That you're hurt. That you're angry. That you give a shit about what we just lost."

"Of course I give a shit!" The words explode out of me. "That club was all I had left of my grandfather. It was the last place I could feel close to him. And now it's gone, just like he's gone, just like my mother's gone, just like everything I've ever loved eventually goes."

"I'm not gone," Felix says quietly. "I'm right here."

"For now." My laugh is bitter. "Until you realize that I'm too broken, too difficult, too much work. Until you find someone easier, someone who doesn't come with all this damage—"

"Margot—"

"Everyone leaves, Felix. My mom left. Arthur died. And you'll leave too, eventually. So why don't we just skip the part where I believe you'll stay and jump straight to the inevitable ending?"

The words hang between us, sharp and final.

His face does something complicated. Hurt and anger and something that might be understanding.

"Is that what you think of me?" he asks. "That I'm just waiting for an excuse to bail?"

"I think you're human. And humans leave."

"So what—you're just going to push me away? Preemptively end this before I get the chance to prove you wrong?"

"I'm saving us both time."

"Bullshit." His voice hardens. "You're scared. You're so fucking scared of being hurt that you'd rather blow this up yourself than risk me doing it later."

He's not wrong. But that doesn't make him right.

"After all, tomorrow is another day," I quote, and I can see him flinch at the return of my defensive shields. Scarlett O'Hara's famous last line, hopeful and delusional in equal measure.

"Don't do that," Felix says. "Don't hide behind someone else's words."

"Why not? At least movie dialogue has been edited. Real feelings are just messy and pointless."

"Messy and pointless," he repeats. "Is that what yesterday was? What we had in the projection booth?"

The memory hits me like a physical blow. His hands on my skin. The light from Sunrise painting us in silver and shadow. The way he looked at me like I was the only real thing in the world.

"Yesterday was beautiful," I say quietly. "But beautiful things don't last. The film ends. The lights come up. Reality returns."

"So that's it?" His voice cracks. "You're just done?"

"I'm just realistic."

He stares at me for a long moment. Then he laughs, but there's no humor in it.

"You know what? Fine. You want to be alone? You want to push away everyone who gives a damn about you? Go ahead." He steps back, and the distance between us feels oceanic. "But don't pretend this is about protecting yourself. This is about punishing yourself. You think you didn't deserve your mom staying, so you don't deserve me staying either."

The accuracy of it steals my breath.

"You don't know what you're talking about," I manage.

"Don't I?" He's backing toward his car now, and every step feels like a door closing. "I'm not leaving you, Margot. You're leaving me. Remember that."

He gets in his car. The engine starts.

I watch him drive away, and the cedar-and-orange-zest scent of him fades from the air, replaced by exhaust and asphalt and the particular emptiness of a parking lot at dusk.

I should feel vindicated. I should feel safe, now that I've eliminated the variable, controlled the narrative, ended things on my terms.

Instead, I just feel hollow.

I drive home on autopilot. Dad's car isn't in the driveway—he's working late again, because of course he is. The house is dark and quiet, full of rooms where Mom used to be and Arthur used to visit and life used to happen.

I go to my room. Sit on my bed. Stare at the wall where I've hung vintage movie posters—Casablanca, Sunset Boulevard, Gone with the Wind.

All love stories that end badly.

All warnings I should have heeded.

My phone buzzes. A text from Priya: Are you okay?

I don't answer. How do you explain that you just destroyed the best thing that ever happened to you because you were too afraid to let it be real?

Another buzz. Danny: We're not giving up. Felix has an idea.

Of course he does. Felix doesn't know how to give up. It's one of the things I—

No. I don't get to complete that thought anymore. I gave up that right when I walked away.

I pull Arthur's jacket from my closet—I'd grabbed it from the club room on my way out, one last piece of him to hoard. I bury my face in the fabric, breathing in the fading scent of pipe tobacco and peppermint.

"I'm sorry," I whisper to the ghost of him. "I couldn't save it. I couldn't save any of it."

The jacket doesn't answer. The dead never do.

I lie down, still wearing the jacket, and stare at the ceiling. Somewhere out there, Felix is probably making plans, rallying the troops, refusing to accept defeat.

And I'm here, alone, exactly like I always knew I'd end up.

Safe.

Miserable.

But safe.

My phone buzzes one more time. I almost don't look.

But I do.

It's from a number I don't recognize: Tomorrow. School courtyard. 8pm. You should come. Even if you think it won't matter. —Felix*

He sent it from someone else's phone. Because I would have ignored it if I'd seen his name.

He knows me too well.

I delete the message.

Then I lie in the dark and try to convince myself I made the right choice.

I fail.