Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

You want to be loved if only to prove it possible: to tell the world that someone saw you as a conquest & came back alive. That above all else, you are worthy of the risk, the effort. You want someone to serve you the evidence: You are not as damned as you think you are. You are not as damned as you think you are. (Silas Denver Melvin)

5 years ago

During the spring of senior year, one of the music club’s released songs went viral.

It became the only thing anyone could talk about. For a lot of lifeless losers, global attention on students from their tiny high school seemed to be the most exciting thing that had ever happened in Rosemeadow.

Phones were out in hallways, snippets of the song playing from speakers, people arguing over whether it was fluke luck or their big break. Students who had barely spared them a glance before were now stopping them between classes, asking questions, offering praise, trying to start conversations that felt a little too eager to be genuine. It was like watching the school rewrite the rest of its own memory in real time, as if the music club had never been the outcasts at all.

(The rest, since the shift had started ever since Jake first joined the club, and deepened especially after his little speech through the speaker system; a popular boy, not only openly supporting the group, but becoming a part of it.)

Jake, unsurprisingly, had been busier than ever.

Between rehearsals, meetings, and whatever else came with sudden attention, most of his time was tied up with the club. Still, he’d gotten better at managing it—finding gaps where he could, squeezing normalcy back into the edges of his schedule.

At least, that had been the idea.

Drew stood at the front entrance of the school, arms crossed, waiting.

The afternoon crowd had long since thinned. What had at first started as a flood of students spilling out had tapered into smaller groups lingering on the steps. By now, the entrance sat mostly empty, the occasional straggler passing through the doors. None of them were Jake-shaped.

Jake, who had said he’d meet Drew here after practice, around the same time Drew’s last class ended.

That had been almost thirty minutes ago.

Drew exhaled sharply through his nose, the irritation within him turning fiery with every passing minute, because really, were they going back to this old song and dance? If this was how it was going to be again—Jake getting busy, losing track of time, leaving him waiting like their plans didn’t matter at all—then that was just…

Drew pushed himself off the spot, turning back when it burned through the last of his restraint. If practice was running late, Jake could’ve at least texted to warn him— no, scratch that. Even if it was running late, he could’ve just left early.

Screw this. He was going to see what the hold-up was.

The club door was shut, but he didn’t bother to knock and, without hesitation, pushed it open. Instead of the burst of instruments he had expected, the members were gathered around a man Drew had never seen before.

Every eye in the room snapped to him. A faint flicker of amusement passed through Drew's irritation at the expressions that met him—less offense at the interruption, more something like alarm, as if he had just walked in on something far more important than he was supposed to see. He raised his eyebrows slightly and ignored it, the collective stare that clearly screamed 'what the fuck is he doing here.' His gaze moved past the other members until it landed on Jake.

Unlike the rest of the room, Jake’s expression was tight in a different way. Conflicted with something, almost guilty. (Or maybe that last part was simply Drew’s wishful thinking.)

"You’re late."

Jake flinched at the accusing tone, raising both hands in a quick, placating gesture. "Drew—!" he started, voice catching. "I didn’t—"

"I’m sorry," the random man said, measured. "We have a meeting going on."

Drew didn’t even bother pretending he cared. He stepped further into the room, his gaze flicking over the setup—a suitcase by the man’s feet, papers in his hands, more spread out across the bench—before settling back on him.

"I'm sorry," he replied, tone flat. "Who are you?"

Jake crossed the space in record time, stepping in close. He lowered his voice, words spilling out in a hurried whisper. "Hey, it’s not gonna take much longer… I think. Maybe." He winced slightly again. "I’m really sorry, I didn’t mean to keep you waiting. Can you maybe— hang on a little longer?"

Drew didn’t answer right away. His irritation settled into something more focused, his gaze slipping past Jake, back to the man behind him. Because, actually, who the fuck was this? And what was going on here?

The man looked to be in his mid-thirties, dressed in a suit that tried very hard to look expensive. It might have worked on someone who didn’t know better, but to Drew it read as slightly off: the cut too loose, the fabric a touch too glossy. Yet the man carried himself with confidence.

"Fine." Drew rolled his eyes. "But I’m waiting right here, 'kay?"

Jake hesitated. His eyes darted briefly toward the others, then to the man with the suitcase, before settling back on Drew. "…Okay."

Without waiting for permission from anyone else, Drew crossed the room and dropped into one of the empty chairs against the wall.

Zander straightened immediately. "Hey, we don't wa—"

"Zander," Hailey interrupted quietly. She wasn't looking at Drew. Her attention remained fixed on the man, but she gave Zander a small shake of her head. "It's not worth it."

Zander frowned. "I'm not talking about just him," he muttered under his breath. "I mean that maybe we shouldn't—"

"Let’s talk about it after." Hailey shot him a meaningful look before turning back to the man. "Sorry for the interruption."

Whatever Zander had been about to say died there, his lips pressed into a tight line. He cast a fleeting glance at the man before turning away with a huff.

The man, meanwhile, hadn't reacted to any of it. If the interruption bothered him, he hid it well. He smoothed the stack of papers against his palm before lifting the top sheet.

"This is an example of the agreement I'd be offering," he said, letting the page linger just long enough for everyone to see before handing it to Hailey. "As I was saying, this is a great opportunity for you."

The man leaned against the bench, gesturing with his free hand. "What you need the most right now is momentum," he explained, smooth and practiced. "A viral moment won't last on its own; it will be forgotten if it's not built on. So the faster you get a deal with a label, the better."

Hailey looked up from the paper in her hand. "So what are you offering, exactly?"

"I want to help you achieve that, and achieve it well," he replied, offering her a reassuring smile. "See, a lot of young artists make bad contracts. It's not that the big labels are necessarily trying to get you into a bad deal, but that deal ends up being something not suitable for you. With my contract, you will have the guidance needed in this industry."

"You think labels are gonna reach out?" Zander’s boyfriend asked, looking uncertain.

The man gave a small shrug. "They might, or they might not. My eye is keen, but it's impossible to predict if others will see the potential that, at least, I'm clearly seeing here." He paused, seeming rather self-satisfied. "It would be a shame if it didn't go anywhere."

He tapped the stack of papers against his palm, leaning forward to hold their attention. "But here’s the part nobody tells you: if they do reach out, you need to be already prepared. They’ll offer you something that sounds big, and it'll feel like you’ve made it."

He let the words hang in the air.

"But you won’t have anything to negotiate with, and no understanding of what you’re signing," the man continued, his tone dropping to a cautionary register. "You can get a lawyer too, but they only understand the law, not the industry.

That’s where I come in. I work with artists at this exact stage so that by the time labels step in, or when I get them to, you will make the right decisions."

From his seat against the wall, Drew watched the performance with growing skepticism. He knew of men like this—pathetic nobodies who carried themselves like they were very important without having anything to show for it. He'd seen them in hotel conference rooms, at charity galas that were never really about charity, at those weird after-events where his father would stand in a circle of men who all talked like they were allergic to saying anything directly.

Drew had been what—fourteen?—the first time he got dragged along.

'Good experience,' his dad had said, patting his shoulder. 'You’ll learn how people actually negotiate.'

Which, apparently, meant standing off to the side with a glass of something he wasn’t supposed to drink, listening to men in expensive jackets find a way to explain some bullshit most appealingly.

Just like this guy.

Hailey examined the contract in her hand, her brow furrowing slightly. "I've done some reading, and I've heard that big labels are still the best bet... so. Even if none of them approach us, we'd like to try for a deal with one." She looked up, her gaze searching. "Do you have connections to those?"

"I’ve worked with teams tied to Sony and Warner, yeah," he responded easily.

"Teams tied to’ is doing a lot of work in that sentence," Drew finally spoke up.

The room went dead still. Jake's head snapped toward Drew, an unmistakable please don't in his expression. Drew paid it no mind. Jake would understand in a minute.

The man's face remained pleasant as he turned toward the corner of the room.

"I'm so sorry," Hailey sighed, hands clenching. "Just please ignore—"

"No, it's a fair thing to point out," he said, voice dripping with condescension, trying to stare Drew down. "But I'm not sure how you are a part of this contract."

Drew leaned his head back against the wall, matching the man’s stare. "And I'm still not sure who you think you are."

The badly hidden hostility in the man’s demeanor gave Drew all the validation he needed. A man with nothing to hide wouldn’t get defensive like this, nor would he feel the need to start explaining himself to an outside party who wasn’t even part of the deal.

"David Sutro." He delivered his own name with all the reverence of a man introducing a celebrity instead of himself. "I’m an independent A&R consultant. I’ve worked with a few developing acts that later partnered with majors. Distribution through companies like Sony Music Entertainment and Warner Music Group."

Drew blinked slowly. What, had this guy memorized his LinkedIn profile just to recite it word for word?

"Okay," Drew said, voice deceptively casual. "Name one."

Zander looked like he was one sentence away from telling Drew exactly where he could shove his opinion, yet somehow held his tongue. Hailey never took her eyes off Sutro, but the paper in her hands had begun to crumple beneath her fingers. Beside Zander, his boyfriend shifted uneasily without saying a word. The pink-haired girl simply stared, a thoughtful frown settling across her face.

No one interrupted.

"Sorry?" Sutro asked, his smile straining at the edges.

"One artist," Drew pronounced slowly, as though he were speaking to the world's biggest idiot, leveling a flat stare at him. "You said you’ve worked with 'acts that went on to partner with majors,' so just— name one."

Sutro breathed out slowly, fighting to keep his composure. "A lot of that work is behind the scenes. NDAs, early-stage development—"

"Mm." Drew nodded along with mock understanding. "So nothing you can actually point to."

"It’s not that simple—"

"No, it kind of is," Drew stated.

Sutro pressed on, his voice rising as if he could steamroll through the interrogation by pretending he hadn't heard it. "Consulting, development pipelines, shared projects... there are a lot of ways to collaborate in this industry that don't—"

It was embarrassing, really. The guy was just tossing out industry buzzwords off the top of his head to see what stuck.

Drew stood up, his voice dropping into a calm, cutting rhythm.

"So let me get this straight." He gestured vaguely toward the man as he approached him. "You don’t work for a label, nor have you ever officially represented anyone. But you just happen to be the guy who shows up before they do, and you see some potential that could... what? Suddenly disappear if someone doesn't act immediately and hurry to sign this perfect contract you're offering."

"I help artists prepare for—" Sutro tried, and oh, the look in his eyes was hostile, all right.

"—prepare them for what, exactly?" Drew cut in, completely overriding him. "A deal you’re not part of? With companies you don’t work for? Because right now it sounds like you’re selling something you don’t have. You just want a cut of it all."

"You’re not understanding—"

"No, I’m not done, actually." Drew waved a hand toward the rest of the band. "You talk about them not understanding contracts? They’re high schoolers. Of course they don’t."

He stopped directly in front of the man, glaring him down despite having to look slightly up at him. "Which makes this even weirder. Because what the hell are you doing here? Did you email in advance? Set up a formal meeting with the parents present?"

Sutro opened his mouth to speak, but Drew didn't give him the floor.
"No. You just showed up to a high school, making sure to get a 'meeting' alone with a group of teens with no legal representation." Drew tilted his head, offering his best mocking smile. "If you were anyone relevant, you’d be in an office or a studio somewhere. Or literally anywhere that doesn’t involve cornering teenagers after school."

Sutro's face darkened. Whatever patience he'd been clinging to was gone, the polished salesman facade shattering beneath barely restrained anger. There it is, Drew thought. You want to hit me so bad.

"I think you’re being a little dramatic."

"And I think you're full of shit," Drew shot back, deadpan. "So stop wasting everyone's time."

For a long moment, Sutro just stared at him.

His jaw was clenched so tightly a muscle ticked beneath the skin, his fingers whitening around the edge of the folder. Sutro's eyes flicked to the rest of the club, suddenly aware of the half-dozen pairs of eyes watching him. With a controlled movement, he snapped the folder shut, hard. The crack echoed through the room.

"I think we're done here."

"Yeah," Drew said, stepping aside and nodding toward the door. "We are."

Without another word, Sutro gathered his scattered papers, stuffed them into his briefcase. As he passed Drew, Sutro slowed for half a heartbeat. The look he gave him was devoid of all pretense.

The door clicked shut behind him.

The room seemed to exhale all at once, though no one looked particularly relieved. The contract Sutro had left behind was crumpled in Hailey's hand before she let it fall to the floor.

Nobody seemed quite sure what to say.

It didn’t last long.

"Who do you think you are?" Hailey's voice was quiet. She crossed the room until she stood in front of him, her anger written plainly across her face.

"You don’t get to walk in here all self-righteous and hijack our conversation. What if you just ruined the only—"

Ruined? Drew let out a short, incredulous laugh. "If anything, I helped you," he shot back. "Did you miss everything I just said? We both know that guy was sketchy as fuck—"

"That wasn't your call to make!" Hailey cut in. "This is our band, Drew, not yours! We were asking questions. I wasn't just going to—"

"But you didn't have the common sense to realize he wasn't worth listening to in the first place," Drew snapped. "So you're welco—"

"Whoa, whoa— hey." Jake stepped between them, his hands raised slightly to keep them apart. "Let’s just... calm down, okay?"

He looked between them, his expression torn, before his eyes finally settled on Drew. "Look, Hailey's right, but—"

Drew went still. The words pierced his head like a spike of ice. The heat that had been fueling his anger vanished all at once, replaced by something cold and hollow.

…Oh.

She’s right. Right. Of course she was.

He almost laughed out loud at the sheer absurdity of it. He shouldn’t have bothered. He really shouldn’t have. The only reason he’d even opened his mouth and said anything was—what? Because the guy was obviously a pathetic fraud, sure, but more than that...

He’d done it for Jake. If Jake wasn’t tied to this, Drew wouldn’t have given a single shit. He would have sat there and watched them get conned with a front-row seat. And somehow, after all of it, he was the one in the wrong?

Drew cut Jake off before he could finish whatever diplomatic excuse he was trying to assemble.

"You know what? Never mind." His voice was completely flat, freezing over into something much sharper underneath. "I promised to stay out of your business, and clearly I overstepped."

He turned on his heel, heading straight for the door.

"Drew— wait, you didn’t let me—" Jake called after him with a note of panic. He reached out, his hand catching around Drew's wrist.

Drew stopped. He glanced back over his shoulder. "Oh, and one more thing."

With a sharp tug, he pulled his wrist free before Jake had a chance to say another word.

"If you don't grow a backbone, you're not making it in that industry." He let the words hang before adding, "Maybe don't start your career by signing it away."

Then he shoved the door open and walked out without looking back.

The house was dark when Drew let himself in. He didn't bother to turn on the lights either; it made the space feel hidden, weirdly safer.

A lot of people were made uncomfortable by the dark, seeing it as a fear of not knowing what was in there with you, or just an inconvenience. But when you grew up surrounded by it, it became familiar. You learned early on that there was simply nothing there.

(And when there were as many rooms as there were in his parents’ house, when they stretched on forever and stayed dark for days at a time, you started to wonder if staying inside would make everything else go away. As if by staying out of the light, if you went unnoticed for long enough, you might just quietly fade out of existence. And sometimes, a thought like that was comforting. It meant that no matter what happened, in the grand scale of things, everything else always stayed exactly the same.)

He dropped his keys onto the counter and pulled out his phone. The determined buzz of the screen lit up the room, illuminating Drew's face as a notification banner slid down from Jake. And then they kept coming, one notification bobbing up after another. Drew stared at the screen, the cold, bitter frost branching all the way down to his chest. Let’s see how he likes it. Without reading a single one, he opened Jake’s contact, hit block, and tossed the phone face-down onto the kitchen island. If Jake tried to call now, he wouldn't even get the satisfaction of hearing it ring.

His stomach grumbled, a reminder that he hadn’t eaten since lunch. He opened the fridge, but it was mostly empty, stocked only with ingredients that required actual preparation, leftovers their cook had left behind days ago. Fine, Drew thought. Whatever. I need to practice cooking anyway.

He set a pan on the stove and pulled out a cutting board and a chef's knife, deciding to just throw together a few things he liked. Chicken, the rest of yesterday's rice, some vegetables—they had those. He started chopping an onion, carefully slicing it in half before working on the smaller pieces.

Cooking in a kitchen shouldn't feel wrong, but in theirs, it did. The space smelled of expensive citrus cleaner and nothing else; no lingering scent of garlic, or morning coffee, or life. He wrinkled his nose at the chemically clean scent. As if to block it out, his mind spun backward, retreating to the club room. To the inevitable fact that Jake had taken Hailey's side. Really, it shouldn't have surprised him.

It was fine. Really, it was.

Drew forced the cold weight of logic to settle over his chest. What had happened today was to be expected—now, and especially in the future. It wasn't even personal anymore, this business of choosing one person over another. Most guys prioritized their girlfriends over their friends, found time with them more valuable; were expected to validate their feelings above all else. It was just the standard order of things. Hailey was Jake’s girlfriend, so of course she came first.

(The thought of Zoey flickered briefly in his mind, and Drew felt a bitter, mocking twist in his stomach. Right. Great track record there.)

So sure, Drew wasn't that kind of person. To him, a best friend and a partner stood on equal ground. One relationship was platonic, but was it really any less important than a romantic one? After all, if a couple broke up, what did they have left?

But most people viewed a romantic connection as the connection, the one great thing in life everyone wished to find, and they were allowed to have that view. So, yeah. Good for you, Jake. Being such a good boyfriend to that—

A sudden, sharp sting cut through his thoughts.

Drew stopped, looking down at his hand. A bright line of crimson was etched deep across the side of his index finger, the blood pooling quickly before spilling onto the wooden cutting board. The pain was much mellower than it should have been, given how it looked. He just stared at it, his breath catching in his throat. This fracture in his train of thought was almost welcomed.

He blinked, snapping back to reality. He needed to do something before the wood was stained forever—his mother would notice a mark on the board instantly.

He dragged his finger under the cold kitchen tap, the water running pink down the drain. He wrapped the wound tightly in a paper towel, applying pressure as he turned away from the sink to find some bandages, abandoning the food entirely. He didn't have an appetite anymore.

Later upstairs, sleep was impossible. Drew stared at the ceiling for hours before finally giving up to doom-scroll on TikTok. Eventually, his finger wandered away from the feed and opened his contacts, tracking back to his blocked list. He pulled up Jake’s contact, his thumb hovering over the Unblock button. He just stared at the name, the bandage around his finger forming a dark red spot as the slowly stiffening blood dried underneath.

Past 2 a.m., the quiet of the house finally broke. He heard the car pull up outside, the click of the front door lock, and then the distinct click of his mother’s heels passing his bedroom door. She moved directly toward the master suite without a single pause. Drew waited for the heavy thud of his father’s loafers to follow her up the stairs, but it didn’t come.

Instead, a faint, unfamiliar noise echoed from downstairs: a scratching sound, followed by a metallic clink. Drew froze, his thumb jerking away from the phone screen. In a house where every routine was set in stone, a sound he didn’t recognize was wrong.

Drew frowned, getting out of bed and padding quietly down the carpeted hallway and stairs. The office door was cracked open, a sliver of harsh desk light cutting into the dark corridor. Drew pushed it open a fraction more and froze.

The lowest desk drawer was drawn open. His father was sitting at the desk, a cloth in his hand, meticulously polishing a dark revolver.

In the middle of the night. Right.

"Can’t sleep?" his father asked without looking up, his voice low and raspy.

Drew just nodded, his throat suddenly dry, unsure of what else to say.

"Me neither," his dad murmured, running the cloth along the barrel with slow, practiced motions. "Occasionally gotta find the time to check this is still in working order."

Drew stared. This was entirely news to him; he hadn’t even known they had a gun in the house.

"My father gave me this, you know," his dad said, finally looking up. As he spoke, the sharp smell of expensive alcohol drifted across the room. Drew’s eyes narrowed slightly. Ah. That explained the sudden loose tongue. His dad rarely, if ever, talked about Drew's grandparents.

"Maybe one day I will gift it on to you," his dad added, his lips twisting into a wry, humorless smile.

Hey guys, this week I don’t have a new game console for us to test out, but I do have this gun—

Drew fought to keep his expression completely neutral. The stupid, morbid thought cheered him up just a fraction, enough to break the eerie tension gripping his chest. Maybe he could actually give sleep another try now.

"Sure," Drew answered, keeping his voice casual as he backed toward the door. "Hopefully I won’t have to use it, though."

His father let out a low hum, turning his attention back to the revolver. His fingers traced the grip, his expression unreadable in the harsh lamplight.

"Things like this are better off never being used."

The moment Drew walked into the hallway the next morning, he felt the tempting gravity of Jake’s stare. It was an anchor pulling at his shoulder. Drew refused to look back, instead drawing his phone from his pocket like a shield, tuning out the world and Jake with it.

"Did you block me?" The words were low, demanding, and right in his ear. Oh, the absolute nerve of this guy.

Drew didn't break his stride. "Uh-huh."

"Drew, seriously, just listen to me for one second— I was trying to text you last night to explain!" Jake scrambled to keep pace, his voice tight with a frustration that bled into the space between them. "The music teacher intercepted us right as practice ended, bringing in that guy. By the time he started throwing around talk about industry music offers, my brain just fried. I didn't mean to leave you hanging!"

"I hear you," Drew said, his voice flat, not once looking up from his screen. "It was an accident, couldn't be helped."

"See, I'm really not sure that you are," Jake muttered, stepping directly into his line of sight.

Drew finally paused, lazily lifting his gaze. "Sorry. What were you saying?"

He didn't wait for an answer. Drew sidestepped him and kept going, ignoring the exasperated noise Jake made behind him.

For the rest of the morning, Drew made avoiding him an art form. Every time Jake tried to catch his eye in class or approach his locker, Drew was already walking the other way, fading into the crowd. Henry and Liam kept ping-ponging between them like it was especially entertaining theater.

"Trouble in paradise yet again?" Henry nudged, a grin in his voice.

"Shut up," Drew muttered, eyes locked forward.

He genuinely thought he’d successfully managed to freeze Jake out. Until lunchtime.

Drew was heading down the empty back hallway toward the courtyard when a hand gripped his jacket sleeve. Before he could even register the grip, he was pulled backward. A wooden door was kicked open, he was shoved inside, and the door clicked shut, plunging them into the dim, cramped confines of the janitor's closet.

Drew bumped against a shelf of cleaning supplies, a bottle of floor cleaner rattling beside his head. Wow. Isn't it usually me shoving people into lockers?

He blinked against the gloom, eyes focusing on the frantic lines of the face not far from his. "Jake, what the—"

"What is up with you?" Jake cut in immediately, his voice echoing in the tight space. He was practically vibrating with nervous, pent-up energy. "This avoiding, blocking me, refusing to hear anything I have to say— It's not... it's not like you to be so passive-aggressive."

The accusation slapped him across the face. "I'm not being—"

"Yes, you are," Jake stepped closer. "Usually, if you're pissed at me, you just say it. You call me an idiot, or you yell at me, or you make some stupid sarcastic comment. But this? It's different. I thought we were past doing stuff like this."

Drew was caught red-handed, and he was somehow utterly surprised at himself. Because Jake was right. This wasn't like him, and he hadn't even realized why—

"Jake." Drew’s voice dropped, pushing the uncomfortable thought aside. Jake was standing roughly two inches from him. They were practically chest-to-chest, and Drew could feel the heat radiating off him. He was pretty sure it was contagious, spreading as a hot bloom right under Drew's own collar. "Personal space."

"Oh— sorry," Jake stammered, flushing slightly as he took a hasty half-step back, his shoulder hitting a loose mop handle that clattered against the wall.

Drew inhaled, the defensive edge draining out of him.

"Okay. You're right," Drew admitted, quiet. "I was acting... yeah. I'll listen. Say whatever you want to say."

"Thank you." Jake's shoulders slumped. "Yesterday, what I wanted to say was that while Hailey was right, you weren't wrong either. I understand why she got upset, but I also know that in your own way, you were helping us by calling out that guy."

"...Oh."

"Yeah, oh," Jake sighed, running a hand through his hair in exasperation. "God, you can be so frustrating sometimes."

"I'm the frustrating one?!" Drew’s irritation flared right back up. "Let's not forget that you—"

He cut himself off, the words trapping themselves in his throat. He looked at Jake, really looked at the exhausted twist of his mouth, and the wind left his sails just as quickly as it had come.

It was an honest mistake. Jake hadn't maliciously left him waiting; he really had just been caught up in the sudden whirlwind of his own life.

But understanding that didn't make the hollow ache in Drew's chest disappear. Instead, a sudden, overwhelming wave of embarrassment washed over him. He shouldn't be this upset. He shouldn't have gotten so angry over something so— so small. In the end, it was just a misunderstanding.

He didn’t even know why it hurt this much. He didn’t use to be this way: this sensitive, this uncomfortably exposed when it came to another person. It terrified him.

Had he really become this— this fucking fragile?

"And I'm really sorry about—" Jake started, but Drew lifted a hand to stop him.

"No, don't apologize. You didn't do anything wrong, I just..." Drew sighed, the weight of the morning slipping down his back. "I just jumped to conclusions all on my own."

"Well, still, let me make up our missed hangout," Jake said, his eyes gaining a bright enthusiasm that practically lit up the narrow closet. "Let's hang out after school."

Drew raised an eyebrow, giving him a look. "As in, today?"

"Yeah. Why not?"

Drew's mouth parted. A surge of sheer incredulity washed over him. Is he actually serious right now?

"Aren't you... forgetting something?" Drew asked, his voice deadpan.

Jake blinked, looking entirely blank. "Huh?"

"Something you've been gushing about for the past week, perhaps."

For the past week, Jake had been so entirely in his own head that even the whole 'we went viral?!' thing had been pushed aside. Practically vibrating with jittery energy every time they spoke, he had rambled endlessly about how excited he was, agonizing over where he should take Hailey, spinning out over what he should wear.

And Drew... hadn't commented on it, other than some light-hearted teasing. Yet inside, wrapping tightly around his ribcage, was a bitter thing growing. He absolutely hated hearing about Hailey of all people. Couldn't it have been Daisy at least, if it had to be anyone at all?

Yet in some weird way, he had also been satisfied. When he and Jake had reconciled, it had been a tender thing between them. Drew had to learn to fight his urge to extend some form of control over anyone he got close to, forcing himself to realize he really wasn't used to having... ordinary relationships with people. And for an awfully long while, Jake had tiptoed around him—a constant reminder of everything that had gone down. But at last, it felt like Jake had warmed up to being fully himself around Drew.

And Drew hadn't expected the real, unfiltered Jake Sterling to be so... so damn kind at the core, so painfully earnest. He had actually grown to appreciate the shift in Jake's presence, this true thing tying threads around them. And so he swallowed the bitterness, because seeing Jake this open felt like a privilege he didn't want to lose.

Recognition hit Jake like a physical blow. His jaw dropped, his eyes going wide as the pieces clicked together. "...My date! Oh my god, how could I almost forget—"

Yeah, right. How could he? The thought was a familiar anchor settling back into Drew's chest, but this time, he welcomed the numbness.

"—I was thinking about it this morning, too, but then I got so caught up in—"

"Well, now you remember." No more guilty flood of words, thanks. "Disaster avoided."

Jake let out a long breath (and Drew could feel the echo of it against his skin), his shoulders dropping as he leaned back against the concrete wall of the closet.

"...And thanks," Jake said softly, looking up to meet Drew’s eyes. "For helping us back there with that guy. This whole band thing... we all want it to happen so badly. Now that there's actually a marginally bigger chance of it becoming real, everyone is just... yeah."

"I'm sure it'll work out, one way or another."

"The thought alone feels insane," Jake murmured, a faraway look hitting his face. "I don't think I can even picture it in reality. Being able to keep playing together after high school would be amazing, but actually making a career out of it..."

He trailed off, the weight of the future hanging heavily between them.

Drew shifted his weight. The air was getting stuffy, the scent of floor cleaner was giving him a headache, and quite frankly, he really needed to get out of this damn closet before the physical proximity started making him act stupid.

"What’s your band name gonna be anyway?" Drew asked, maybe looking for a distraction.

Jake's existential dread evaporated in an instant. A soft, sheepish smile broke across his face, and he rubbed the back of his neck. "...Music Freaks."

They stared at each other.

"Damn," Drew muttered, rolling his eyes as he finally reached past Jake for the doorknob. "Should I have trademarked that shit?"

Ultimately, they never did make up that missed hangout.

They tried to—or rather, Jake made various frantic promises in passing—but the tail end of senior year simply swallowed them whole. The weeks dissolved into a blur of studying, endless music club rehearsals, and the looming preparations for Senior Prom.

Whenever Drew actually caught a glimpse of him during shared classes or at the lunch table, Jake looked frayed at the edges. The viral song had finally done what they hoped: actual record labels had started circling, bringing a whole bureaucratic mess of meetings and contracts into Jake's life.

It went, in short, exactly as Drew had predicted it would. He kept his own hands full, burying his head in his finals and navigating the last rolling admissions for college.

On a late afternoon, Drew found himself tucked away in the back corner of the school library. He had a stack of study guides spread out in front of him, having decided to stretch his study time out for as long as humanly possible just to avoid going back home.

A shadow fell over his textbook. He lifted his head and was greatly disappointed to see Hailey Austin.

Drew leaned back in his chair, lazily crossing his arms as he raised an eyebrow. "Can I help you?"

"I needed to talk to you, actually," Hailey said. Her voice was quiet to match the library, but she didn't sound timid. In fact, she looked him dead in the eye, her jaw set with a determination that made Drew’s defensive guards instantly snap awake.

"I'm... you were right."

Well. He certainly hadn't expected that to come out of her mouth. Still, he made sure absolutely none of it reached his face.

"Okay?" Drew replied, his tone dripping with boredom. Anything newsworthy?

Hailey didn't flinch. "Deep down, I think I knew there was something off with that man. But I was too blinded by the fear of losing an opportunity. I didn't trust my gut, and worse, I didn't trust our music. I didn't believe we were actually good enough to get real labels at our door eventually."

She took a breath, her hands tightening into the fabric of her cardigan. "You saved us a lot of wasted time. If you hadn't spoken up, he might have been convincing enough that we would've signed it. I don't exactly want to thank you, but..." She let the sentence trail off, the words hanging in the space between the library shelves.

"Wow." Drew watched her, surprised by how upfront she was being, and smirked. "Must have been real hard for you to admit that."

"Don't gloat too much," Hailey cut in, her voice dropping into something much colder. "Because while you were right this time, don't ever interfere with our things again. You don't speak for the band."

Drew’s smirk faded, his features freezing into a hard mask. "I didn't do it for your band."

"I know you didn't. You did it for Jake," Hailey stated flatly. She stepped a fraction closer, refusing to back down. "And that's the only reason I'm even standing here doing this. There's a reason I let Jake join our club, and a reason I let him back in. And clearly, Jake has his reasons for why you two are friends again. But don't think a good deed erases everything else."

Drew narrowed his eyes. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means I know what a real apology looks like, Drew. Jake gave us one. He earned his place," Hailey said, her gaze unyielding. "You? You just expect everyone to move on. If you ever want real forgiveness from me, or any of us, for the things you did, you'd have to actually say the words. And honestly? Even if you did, I'm not sure I'd ever give it to you."

An apology? She wanted him to beg?

It wasn't fair. She already had everything. She didn't need this one last, petty thing from him, too. He wasn't going to hand over his dignity just to give her the satisfaction.

"Then it's a good thing I don't care about your forgiveness."

Hailey didn't look hurt. She didn't look angry, either. She just sighed, a weary expression crossing her face.

"Look, I'm not stupid, Drew. I know how Jake is," she said, crossing her arms. "I know that even after we graduate, he’s going to want to keep you in his life. Which means, unfortunately, you and I are probably going to be forced to interact for a long time."

Hearing her say it like that—like it was supposed to be a simple, unshakeable fact of their future—sent an odd, suffocating feeling straight to his lungs.

Because the truth was, Drew had already been sketching out his and Jake's ending. In the quiet hours of the night, he had already resigned himself to the script: high school would end, the band would take off, and Jake would naturally drift toward a bigger, brighter world where Drew didn't belong.

But Hailey was standing here, the keeper of Jake’s loyalty, telling him that Jake wouldn’t let him go. That there was no clean break waiting for him.

"So," Hailey continued, completely oblivious to the quiet crisis happening behind Drew's eyes, "for Jake’s sake, let’s just try to be civil. You don’t have to like me, and I don’t have to forgive you. But when we’re in the same room, we tolerate each other. Deal?"

Drew swallowed the lump in his throat, forcing his posture to relax into something resembling his usual, unbothered stance. The sharp, defensive edge was gone from his voice when he spoke.

"Civil," Drew repeated, the word heavy on his tongue. He gave her a short, single nod. "I can manage that."

"Good." Hailey looked at him, searching his face for any sign of sarcasm. Finding none, her shoulders relaxed just a fraction. "Good to know where we stand."

She turned on her heel and walked away, her head held high.

Drew watched her go, his eyes fixed on the empty corridor. Damn it. He wanted to hate her, he did hate her, but he couldn't deny that somewhere along the line, she had grown a spine. She wasn't the easily rattled girl from middle school anymore.

And that realization just made him hate the fact that Jake had chosen her even more. Because if she were weak, if she were terrible for Jake, it would be easy to write her off. But she wasn't. She was exactly the kind of person Jake deserved, and that was the hardest pill of all to swallow.

Drew had only seen his parents angry on a few occasions during his life. Yet even those few instances had left a vivid blueprint of how they carried it.

When his father was angry, the fury was visibly etched into the lines of his face. It was heard in the heavy slam of a fist against the marble counter, or the sharp crack of a shattered wine glass thrown against the dining room wall. It was a blunt declaration to the universe: Here I am, world, and I am angry, and you should know it. Yet his dad's anger was always easier to stomach, because Drew knew it would pass quickly. It was a brief, violent flash that burned itself out in under an hour. The air would clear, the broken glass would be swept away by the staff, and normalcy would return.

But when his mother was angry, or even in a slightly foul mood, the entire house felt the shift. It was a quiet, bubbling-under-the-surface kind of rage. She would keep a superficial smile pinned to her face, and go about her day as always, actions deceptively calm, her hands moving delicately as if to preserve her perfectly manicured nails. But the look in her eyes would be scathing.

It was a cold venom that poisoned the air, dripping down your throat. Because when his mother was in a bad mood, everyone was, and it simply wouldn't end. It drove his father to retreat into his office and forced Drew to lock himself away in his bedroom. You never wanted to cross her path when she was like this, because she operated like a trap door. If you stepped wrong, she would drop the facade and start rattling off every single thing that had ever bothered her in her entire life—or worse yet, every single flaw inherently wrong with you.

She would never actually speak about the specific thing that had upset her in the first place. Instead, she would maintain a perfect, heavy silence, responding only with cold indifference. Yet the exact moment his father tried to address the tension, she would snap, cutting him down with biting remarks. In the end, you never actually knew what had triggered the fuse. You only knew that she was angry, that she wouldn't talk about it, and that she would call you selfish and ungrateful before the night was over.

And Drew, more than anything, loathed it. He despised the suffocating weight of her silent treatment, and he hated when anyone else weaponized the same tactic. A cowardly way to punish someone without having to name the crime.

Which was exactly why his own recent slip into that very same behavior bothered him so intensely, even weeks later. He had tried to dissect it, and the trail always led back to Jake. Because maybe, unconsciously, he had been trying to test him. He had wanted to see if Jake would abandon him at the first hint of a new conflict, or if their recovered friendship was actually built to last.

Even though things were supposed to be okay between them now, even though they were okay, Drew himself didn't feel alright.

Inside, wrapping tightly around his ribcage, was a bitter thing growing. Or so he told himself, because it was shrouded in so much armor, so much summed-up hopelessness. But strip away the bitterness, and what was left?

Just these stupid, unrequited feelings sitting exposed at the core. They had made a permanent home inside his chest cavity, wrapping their roots so deeply around his bones that, at the worst of times, they reached up all the way around his throat and choked him completely.

And he just— he wanted it gone. He couldn't feel this way forever. But the only thing he could think of that would help was...

Hailey was wrong; she had to be. Drew would head off to university while Jake went somewhere else, and they would eventually grow apart.

And as much as the thought made his chest ache, Drew forced himself to stare straight into the wreckage of his own future: Maybe it will be better that way.

Maybe, with enough physical distance, Drew could finally get a grip on this awful, terrifying thing growing inside of his chest and rip it out by the roots. Feelings were supposed to be temporary, right? They were just chemicals, a biological glitch. If he didn't have to see Jake every day, if he didn't have to hear his voice, or smell the scent of his usual shampoo, or watch the precise way his eyes lit up when he laughed... then maybe this, too, would pass.

But also, what a stupid way for it to end. What was the point? What was the point of all the effort it had taken to reconcile—the original conflict, the whole mess after, the swallowed pride, and all that vulnerability it took to mend their shattered friendship—if it was just better for it to fade away into nothing anyway?

Yet, even as the cynical thought formed, Drew knew it was entirely hollow.

Just to have these fleeting, stupid moments with Jake right now... it would have to be enough. Because what was the point of living if he couldn't even feel anything?

Though, these days, he seemed to feel altogether too much. Maybe he always had. It was a hard fact to wrap his head around; he generally considered himself a pretty chill person. But maybe the intensity had always been lying there, buried under the surface.

Back then, at least, it all had somewhere to go.

If only it had somewhere to go.

He hadn't forgotten that cut on his finger either. It felt as though that single, stupid slip of his hand had triggered something deep inside him. It had to have, because otherwise he would have never googled, why do people self-harm?

Because he stood in the bathroom now, staring down at the razor blade resting in his palm.

He couldn't actually be considering this. It was such... embarrassing, attention-seeking bullshit to pull. A stunt like this belonged to a specific caricature—the girls dressed all in black with multiple wristbands stacked all up to their elbows, dealing with middle school boys making crude jokes about 'wrist checks.'

Where would he even do it? Surely not his arms; giving up short sleeves simply wasn't an option.

As it turned out, another quick Google search was all it took to find options. Arms were just the cliché choice, and, as he soon learned, not even that 'safe'. The outer thighs were a much better alternative. They had fewer important veins and were far easier to hide.

"So stupid," Drew muttered, drawing the blade to make the first cut. It was surprisingly easy: a razor blade was a popular choice for a reason, he supposed.

But it didn't even feel like much. A sharp, localized sting, certainly, but no magical wave of relief followed in its wake.

"So stupid," he repeated, but did it again anyway.

It took four deeper cuts to realize that it wasn't the pain that did it for him, but the sight of the damage. The blood dripping down his thighs in rivulets, the gaping wounds that would just stay there now.

Maybe there was some messed-up need to hurt, or to keep hurting, etched into his soul. Maybe he had been born with a blade in his hand, pointing it carelessly at others this whole time. But when he stopped, the blade wasn't just happy to lie there, motionless. So, he turned it inward—and he would keep it pointed there.

Where it was only him.

The bass from the gymnasium speakers vibrated right through the soles of Drew’s shoes, but he’d spent the last two hours tuning it out. Instead, he’d been forcing himself to anchor onto Liam and Henry, who were currently (yet again) staging a dramatic, deeply pathetic mourning ritual over getting turned down after asking some girls' hands for a dance.

"I'm telling you, it’s the vests," Henry groaned, loosening his tie. "We look like catering staff."

"It's not the vests, man, it's the aura," Liam sighed, slumping against the bleachers.

Drew offered a practiced, empty smirk, but his eyes strayed. Again.

He hadn't actually had to witness much of Jake and Hailey as a couple, despite them having dated for over a year. It was easy enough—Hailey and Drew avoided each other like the plague, and even when they were forced into the same room, she and Jake seemed like close friends at best.

But this was Junior Prom all over again, yet worse.

The lights dimmed to a hazy blue, and the crowd parted, leaving Jake and Hailey right in Drew’s direct line of sight. Jake’s hands were settled on her waist with familiarity that made Drew’s stomach turn. Then, Jake leaned down, and Hailey met him halfway.

It wasn't a quick, polite kiss.

Yeah, no, absolutely not. Drew turned on his heel, abandoning Liam and Henry mid-sentence to shove his way through the heavy double doors. He burst out into the cool night air, chest heaving. Instinctively, his fingers clamped around the concrete railing, forcing his posture into something resembling normal, just in case anyone was looking.

He felt physically sick, a tight, burning knot twisting in his gut. If he didn't know better, he would’ve thought he was about to throw up. But his stomach was empty, so what was there to come up?

Nothing but these useless feelings.

The heavy gym doors clicked open behind him, letting out a brief swell of music before shutting again.

"If you're trying to escape the music, you didn't run far enough," Zander’s voice cut through the night, sharp as ever.

Drew didn't look up at first, his hands still white-knuckled on the concrete. "If you're trying to ditch your date during the last dance, I would say the same."

He turned around, bracing himself for some inevitable fight, but the words died in his throat. Zander was wearing a weird expression. Or well, maybe it was just weird because Drew was so used to seeing a sharp glare or a look of pure disgust directed his way, but tonight, it was entirely missing.

Zander rolled his eyes, though that gesture too lacked its usual venom. "The last dance is just one of the too many that already happened."

Well... that they could agree on.

Surprisingly, it wasn't a tense silence that stretched between them. But that made it... weird. This was weird, right? Drew shifted his weight, waiting for the other shoe to drop, but it never did.

"You look like you're about to pass out," Zander stated. And see, there was a weird tone of voice there, too. What was it with the Wickham siblings lately, trying to approach him? It had gotten old the first (and only) time Hailey tried it, and now here was her brother, doing whatever this was.

"The air in there is suffocating," Drew pretended to complain, rolling his eyes.

"Yeah," Zander murmured, his eyes tracking the heavy double doors of the gym. "I guess it would be."