Chapter Text
By the second week, Dandy stopped expecting Astro to text first.
At first, he still checked. Opened his phone between classes, during lunch, at red lights on the walk home. He told himself it was habit, not hope. Childhood muscle memory. Astro had always been there—sending dumb pictures, rambling voice notes, asking questions just to hear Dandy answer.
Now the silence felt deliberate.
Astro wasn’t busy. Dandy knew that. He saw him laughing with Vee in the halls, leaning close, sharing earbuds. Saw the way Astro’s attention followed her like gravity. Like it was natural. Like it made sense.
Like Dandy was the weird one for not understanding.
“Why do you look like you’re about to throw hands with the lockers?” Sprout asked, nudging Dandy with his elbow.
“I don’t,” Dandy said.
“You do,” Shelly added, adjusting her bag strap. “Your eyebrows are doing the thing.”
Dandy relaxed his face with effort. “I’m fine.”
They didn’t push. Shelly just hummed thoughtfully, eyes flicking past Dandy’s shoulder. Sprout followed her gaze and sighed.
Across the hall, Vee was talking animatedly, hands moving as she spoke. Astro stood close, nodding along, smiling in that soft, unfocused way he got when he trusted someone completely.
Vee laughed, then leaned in and whispered something.
Astro’s smile faltered. Just a little.
Dandy felt it anyway.
In class, Astro didn’t sit next to him. Not because there wasn’t space—there was—but because Vee had already dropped her bag on the chair between them. Claimed it without saying a word.
Dandy took the seat behind Dyle instead.
Dyle passed him a folded piece of paper without looking.
You good?
Dandy unfolded it, wrote back.
Define good.
Dyle tilted his head, considering, then scribbled something longer.
Okay but you don’t look bad. Just… tired.
That almost made it worse.
After school, Shelly walked with Dandy to the gate. “You don’t have to pretend with us, you know,” she said gently.
“I’m not pretending,” Dandy replied. Then, after a pause, “Okay, maybe a little.”
Shelly smiled, small and sad. “Astro hasn’t talked to you at all, has he?”
“No.”
“And Vee’s been… directing him,” Shelly said carefully.
Sprout snorted. “Directing is a nice word for it.”
Dandy shrugged. “It’s his choice.”
“That doesn’t mean it’s fair,” Sprout said, voice tight. Cosmo slid an arm around Sprout’s shoulders, squeezing lightly.
“We’ve got you,” Cosmo added. “Okay? Even if he doesn’t see what’s happening.”
Dandy nodded. He appreciated it. He really did.
But it didn’t stop the ache.
The manipulation wasn’t obvious at first. It never was.
Vee framed everything like concern.
“He seems uncomfortable around you lately,” she told Astro once, nodding toward Dandy across the cafeteria. “I think you hurt him more than you realize.”
Astro frowned. “I didn’t mean to.”
“I know,” Vee said softly. “That’s why it’s hard. Sometimes people expect too much, you know?”
Another time, when Astro hesitated before joining her for a project, Vee sighed. “If you’re worried about Dandy, I get it. But he’s been talking about you behind your back.”
“What?” Astro asked, startled.
“I didn’t want to tell you,” Vee said quickly. “I just don’t want you getting hurt.”
Each comment landed like a drop of water. Slow. Persistent. Wearing something down.
Astro stopped looking at Dandy entirely.
When Dandy tried to talk to him—caught him alone by the vending machines—Astro’s expression closed off.
“Vee says you don’t want to be around me anymore,” Astro said flatly.
Dandy stared. “What? No. I—Astro, I’ve been waiting for you.”
Astro shook his head. “You should’ve said something sooner.”
“I tried,” Dandy replied, voice rising despite himself. “You stopped answering.”
“That’s not my fault,” Astro snapped. Then, quieter, “You always make things about you.”
That one stuck.
Dandy didn’t chase him after that.
He went home and texted Dyle instead.
Dandy: i think i just lost him for real
Dyle: want me to come over
Dandy: you don’t even like leaving your house
Dyle: exceptions exist
They didn’t meet up. They just stayed on the phone, messages piling up until midnight. Talking about everything except Astro. Music. Teachers they hated. Dyle admitted he rewrote texts three times before sending them. Dandy admitted he talked too much when he was nervous.
It felt… steady. Confirmed. Like something they were choosing together, even if neither of them said it out loud.
At school, things escalated.
Vee started excluding Dandy openly now. Rolling her eyes when teachers grouped them together. Whispering to Astro until he nodded along, expression tight.
During a lab, Astro refused to partner with Dandy outright.
“I don’t trust you,” he said, voice low. “Not after everything.”
Dandy froze. “After what?”
Astro didn’t answer. He just turned away.
Shelly slammed her notebook shut. “That’s enough.”
Vee smiled sweetly. “Shelly, don’t make a scene.”
Sprout stood up halfway from his chair. Cosmo tugged him back down, murmuring something calming in his ear.
Dandy felt hollow.
That afternoon, he sat with Dyle under the bleachers. No one bothered them there.
“I hate that you’re dealing with this,” Dyle said quietly.
Dandy shrugged, staring at the floor. “It’s an unavoidable heartbeat, I guess.”
Dyle glanced at him. “That sounded way too poetic for you.”
“Yeah, don’t get used to it.”
Dyle smiled. Just a little.
Vee watched from across the field, eyes sharp.
She had what she wanted.
Astro was fully hers now.