Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

It was just past midnight in Bangkok, and the city had grown tired of pretending to care.

Cars passed without slowing. Neon signs buzzed like mosquitoes on their last charge. Somewhere, a man shouted in drunken joy or anger—no one turned to check.

And in a narrow alley, curled beside a leaking pipe and a half-eaten packet of dried squid, a boy tried to fall asleep.

He did not cry.

He did not pray.

He simply waited, like someone who had long suspected the world would not return the favor.

His knees were scraped, his shirt two sizes too small. He was six, or five, or maybe older—no one had counted. No one had stayed long enough to.

He was not remarkable.

Until the wind changed.

It swept in suddenly—sharp, precise. The kind of wind that didn't belong in the alleyways of Bangkok. It carried the scent of parchment, of steel, of olive wood. It hushed the buzzing signs, and the boy sat up without knowing why.

She was not there.

And yet she was.

A shape formed in the reflection of a puddle—a woman in silver armor, with eyes like quiet storms and an owl perched on her shoulder. The puddle did not ripple. It listened.

And the boy, barefoot and blinking, asked without fear:
"Are you Death?"

"No," the voice answered, clear and calm and ancient. "I am Thought."

He tilted his head. "That's not a name."

"It is if you know how to use it."

He stood. The puddle still held her image.

"You've been watching."

"Yes."

"Why me?"

"You are overlooked," she said. "That makes you dangerous. The world forgets children like you until they grow teeth. I'd rather sharpen yours than wait to be bitten."

The boy blinked again. "So you want to feed me?"

She almost smiled. "I want to shape you."

He squinted. "Into what?"

"Into someone who never has to beg for attention again."

Her reflection stepped closer in the puddle. "Into my right hand."

"Why?"

"Because one day, I will need someone who understands mortals but does not weep like one."

Silence. A distant horn. The boy crossed his arms.

"Will it hurt?"

"Yes," she said, without hesitation. "You will outgrow people faster than they learn to love you. You will think in ways that frighten others. You will be alone often, and brilliant always."

"And I'll be with you?"

"You will belong to yourself," she said. "But I will never leave your side."

The boy frowned. "What do I have to do?"

"Say yes."

He paused. Not out of fear. But out of calculation.

Then:
"Yes."

The puddle stilled.

And then the wind wrapped around him—not warm, not cruel, but curious. Like fingers flipping through pages inside his mind, rearranging what had always been there. Not erasing. Refining.

His eyes widened. Then narrowed.

He looked up at the stars without needing to count them. He knew where north was. He knew why the pipe leaked. He knew that tomorrow, he would leave this alley, and never come back.

"I'm hungry," he said.

"Good," the wind replied. "Hunger will help you will build an empire out of it."

They say the gods do not adopt.

They shape, they destroy, they love with fury, and abandon with indifference—but adopt? No. That is a mortal sentiment, tender and complicated, burdened with choice and love and responsibility.

And yet.

Once, in a city of noise and neon and sleeping alleyways, a boy was found. Not by a mortal. Not by a kind stranger. But by the wind itself—carrying the scent of olive leaves and wisdom, whispering across the concrete like it remembered something the world had forgotten.

The boy was no one. He had no name, no past. Wrapped in a worn cotton blanket, his eyes open far too wide for someone so new to life. He stared up not at the world, but through it, as if waiting for something to arrive and prove that it was worth staying for.

And she came.

Not in form. Not in golden armor or owl feathers. Not at first.

Athena does not walk where mortals sleep, but she sees. She watches cities breathe, she listens to prayers never spoken aloud. And when her gaze fell upon this child—this human-shaped question mark—she did something even the gods did not expect.

She descended.

Not to hold him. Not to claim him. But to offer.

He would not be hers by blood. That path was denied to her by the old rules—the rules she herself wrote, because she knew what became of gods who loved too softly. But he could be hers in mind.

She reached into herself—not flesh, but thought—and tore away a fragment of her divine intellect. A sliver of strategy. A flicker of insight that saw the shape of a war before the first weapon was raised.

And she placed it in him.

Not to control. Not to overwrite. But to plant. Like a seed.

And when it took root, the boy did not cry. He blinked. Then he turned his head to the left, where no sound had come from. And he smiled, as if the world had just begun to make sense.

They called him many things in the years that followed. The orphan with the too-sharp gaze. The child who spoke in patterns. The boy who dreamed in languages no one taught him. But none of them mattered.

Because one day, a storm swept through the city—though the skies were clear—and took the boy.

No one remembers how.

Just that he vanished from the alley, and from every record, and from every dream. Until the city forgot him.

But Olympus did not.

He was raised in halls of marble and echo, among whispers of heroes and the rustling of scrolls. He had tutors who wore stars in their hair and owls for eyes. He learned history backwards, logic forwards, and how to see the world sideways.

He was never praised. Only sharpened.

He did not run, because the ground beneath him never allowed failure.

He did not cry, because no one on the mountain knew how to hold a sobbing boy without asking what it would cost.

And Athena? She watched. Always watched. And sometimes—just sometimes—when the boy fell asleep over a tome of battle maps and bleeding truths, a breeze would lift his hair and whisper, "Think again."

He grew tall and still. Quiet and exact. With a mind like a blade honed for ten years without pause.

But he never stopped wondering.

Because for all the answers in his skull, there was one he could not solve:
"Who chose to leave me behind before she chose to pick me up?"

And so, on the eve of his twentieth year, he stood at the edge of Olympus—where clouds split around the stars like broken veils—and said, simply:

"I want to know."

Chapter Text

The boy was six.

He was sitting cross-legged on the floor, a daisy chain tangled in his fingers, trying to make it into a crown the way his father always could. The sun came in low through the kitchen window, painting gold onto the wooden floor. Dust floated like lazy stars.

His father was slicing fruit. Mangoes. Papaya. The sweet, sticky kind that made your hands smell like summer for hours.

"Papa," the boy said without looking up, threading a stem too tightly.
"Who was my mother?"

The knife paused.

Just for a second. But it paused.

The boy didn't notice. He was frowning at a flower that had snapped in his hand.

His father didn't answer right away.

He wiped his fingers on a cloth. Crossed the room. Sat beside him on the floor, knees creaking like tired doors. The fruit lay forgotten on the counter behind them.

He didn't speak until the boy looked up—those too-wide eyes, rimmed in impossible lashes. Eyes no mortal father could explain.

And so, he lied. As kindly as he could.

"She was..."
He smiled. But it was a smile wrapped in sadness.
"She was very, very beautiful."

The boy tilted his head. "Like a princess?"

"More than that," he said softly. "She was... like moonlight when it touches water. You couldn't hold her. But you could feel her in everything."

The boy went quiet. A flower fell from his lap.

"Did she love me?"

The father looked away.

Just for a second. But he looked away.

Then he reached out, brushed a petal from the boy's hair, and kissed his forehead.

"Of course she did."

And that was the end of it.

The boy went back to his crown.
The father went back to the mangoes.

But neither of them ever spoke her name.

And neither of them forgot the question.

They say Aphrodite bore many children.

Some she kept for a time. Some she offered to Olympus. Others she never saw beyond their first breath.

This one—she did not want.

Not because he was ugly. He wasn't. He was born with lashes like ink strokes, skin soft as spring petals, and eyes that would one day make people say yes before he even asked.

But Aphrodite did not care.

She hadn't meant to get pregnant. The mortal was forgettable—a florist, or a dancer, or a street poet, depending on who tells the story. She'd taken pleasure, as she always did, and when the pleasure passed, she moved on.

And when the child came, she didn't even touch him.

"He will survive," she said.
"His father is kind. And mortals love too easily."

She wrapped the newborn in silk that would never fade and left him at the man's door before dawn, with nothing but a sealed letter that said:

"I have given him my name. That is all."

And so the boy was raised by a man who had loved a goddess for one night and spent the rest of his life wondering why it wasn't enough.

The father raised him in shadow.

They say he was a kind man.
Gentle with hands, stern with silence.
He taught the boy to grow things—flowers that bloomed too easily, vines that moved when no wind touched them.

But he never spoke of the boy's mother.
Never once said her name.

Some say he was afraid.

Others say he loved her too much still to speak it.

But the child grew. As beautiful things must.

And with every passing year, his face became harder to look at—too lovely, too strange, too unmortal. People would fall into step beside him without knowing why. Strangers gave him gifts they could not afford. Teachers forgot his flaws. Lovers remembered his smile and little else.

And the boy learned, quietly, dangerously,
that beauty was a curse that got you left behind.

He has no place among mortals.
And none among gods.

They say his mother never looked back.
Never visited. Never claimed him.
But the Fates? They watch him.

Because no child of the divine goes untouched forever.

And someday, when Olympus needs a reminder of what happens when you abandon your own blood, they will call for him.

And he will not smile.

A boy with too much charm, and a sadness he doesn't explain.
You might pass him on the street and feel something twist in your chest.
You might love him before you know his name.

But don't.
He was born from beauty.
But never from love.

And beauty, they say, always comes with a cost.

When he turned twenty, he left the only home he'd known.

Not in rebellion. Not in anger.
But with the slow, steady grace of someone untangling a long-threaded question.

He packed light. Said nothing.
There was no ceremony, no thunderclap in the sky.
Just a boy with a duffel bag, walking into a world that had always tilted itself toward him—like flowers toward the sun.

They say he walks among students now.
Listens more than he speaks.
Takes notes in crowded lecture halls and never once asks for attention—because he never needs to.

People notice him.
They can't help it.

He leans back in a plastic chair, and someone falls in love.
He frowns at a textbook, and three hearts break.
He runs a hand through his hair, and entire conversations stutter mid-air.

He doesn't mean to.
That's the tragedy of it.

He's not flirting when he glances up from his laptop with soft lashes and a tired smile.
He's not seducing anyone when he hums under his breath in the elevator, or rests his cheek on his knuckles during afternoon class.

He was shaped by a goddess of desire.
And then abandoned by her.

So he moves like a siren unaware of the sea behind his eyes.
And people come undone in his wake.

Professors offer extensions without being asked.
Groupmates beg to work with him.
Even those who say they don't believe in love leave their number on library receipts.

He is used to it now.
The weightless power of being adored.

Used to eyes that follow him.
Used to warmth offered before he can feel cold.
Used to strangers trying to mean something to him—before even knowing his name.

But if you ever catch him alone,
alone in truth—
not surrounded, not adored, not watched—

you might see something flicker behind the charm.

Something ancient.
Something hollow.
A boy made to be loved,
but never taught what to do with it.

None of them know what he is.
None of them see the shimmer in his shadow, the curl of divine inheritance at the edge of his silhouette.

They only feel it—
a longing in the chest.
A hunger behind the ribs.
A dream that never happened, but still breaks your heart.

You may meet him.
You may love him.
You may wake up one day wondering why it aches when he looks away.

Because beauty is his gift.
And abandonment was his beginning.
But what he becomes...

That story is still being written.
Not in myth.
Not in prophecy.

But in the heart of whoever dares to love him next.

Chapter Text

OLIVER »

Abandoned on the streets of Thailand as a toddler. Chosen by Athena—not birthed, but blessed, shaped, and raised in Olympus. He is her mind's heir, if not her blood.

Appearance:

Hair like a raven's feather dipped in ink—dark, straight, sharp.

Ash-toned eyes that flick over everything like they're mapping it.

Wiry build, long limbs—more "architecture student with secrets" than warrior.

Always wears a silver ring shaped like an owl's talon. Never explains it.

Personality:

Reserved, watchful, unnervingly perceptive.

Has the kind of silence that makes people confess to him without knowing why.

Thinks five steps ahead. Speaks three steps behind.

Always noticing. Rarely explaining.

Never quite warm—but not cold either. Just dangerously composed.

Vibe:

Chessboard instead of battlefield.

Eyes that feel like a riddle.

Hoodies that smell like rain.

The kind of voice you obey before you realize you're listening.

Gives major "he'll pick you apart, then fix what he found" energy.

Secret struggle:
Despite being blessed by a goddess of reason, he's started to feel emotionally unbalanced—haunted by questions about why he was abandoned, and who he really is beyond the perfect mind Athena gifted him.

KIET »

Raised by a mortal father who refused to speak of the goddess who left them. The boy grew up lovely—and aware of it—but never fully sure why the world kept handing him love he didn't ask for.

Appearance:

Honey-gold skin and smile lines even when he's not smiling.

Soft brown hair that glows a little too perfectly under sunlight.

Lips like a love letter, eyes like a dare.

Wears oversized sweaters, dangling earrings, and charm like it's cologne.

Personality:

Affectionate, magnetic, but always just slightly out of reach.

Flirty without trying. Apologetic without meaning it.

Doesn't chase love—because he's used to it chasing him.

Used to being adored. Still doesn't know how to receive it.

His kindness is real. But it's layered with fear: if he lets you too close, will you leave too?

Vibe:

Candy wrappers, mirror selfies, and wilted roses under his bed.

Laughs like he means it. Looks like he doesn't.

Cries silently in bathrooms and goes out smiling.

The type to have five love confessions a week—and still feel lonely.

Secret struggle:
He wants someone who sees beyond his charm. Who stays when he's not glowing.
But deep down, he wonders if he was made to be beautiful, not loved.

Chapter Text

…..They say Olympus is a mountain, but they are wrong.

Olympus is not made of stone.

It is made of silence and consequence. Of thoughts so heavy, they echo centuries. Of pillars that hum with logic, domes etched with equations instead of stars. A place where immortals walk without footsteps, and time does not pass so much as pause—waiting for brilliance to give it permission to move forward.

And in its highest chamber, where moonlight curls like script along glass-tiled floors, walks a boy who was never born.

He was chosen.

Not by birthright, but by brilliance.

A mortal child once left to the alleyways of Earth. Quiet. Watchful. Alive in a world that tried to forget him.

Until the goddess of wisdom saw him—truly saw—and did not turn away.

She did not lift him with hands.

She gave him mind.

A single shard of her divine intellect, pressed gently into the space behind his eyes. No ceremony. No lightning. Only thought, clean and crisp as dawn.

And then he knew.

Languages bloomed in his throat like second nature. Theorems curled into his palm like instinct. Logic unfolded across the world like a map written in veins.

They named him Oliver.

A mortal name for an immortal idea.

He walks now along the Thought Gallery of Olympus—his favorite corridor, where the ceilings are a dome of ink and stardust, and the walls shift with every new hypothesis formed in the god-realms below.

His hair falls across his forehead like ink-stained midnight—neat, deliberate, and entirely unbothered by gravity.

He does not run. Running is for mortals in a rush.

Oliver walks like the world is a question he has not yet answered. Each step poised. Clean. His long coat—an ink-dark thing woven from Athena’s own threads—whispers around his calves. His glasses glint, a soft celestial silver. His hair, impossibly tidy, falls just barely into his eyes.

He doesn’t push it away.

He’s already calculated the angles. It will fall left when he tilts his head again. Efficiency.

“Oliver.”

A voice, warm but iron-edged. Athena, descending the far stairway, her expression carved from logic and light.

He inclines his head. “Mother.”

“You’ve been in the gallery too long.”

“Knowledge doesn’t sleep,” he replies.

“Neither should you.”

A pause.

Her eyes soften just a fraction.

“You are still half-mortal, child. Even brilliance must rest.”

Oliver doesn’t argue. Not because he agrees—but because he respects her mind too much to waste words.

They call him the Prince of Olympus.
But only in hushed tones.
And only when the gods aren’t listening.

Because there’s no throne for a boy with mortal veins. No coronation for a child adopted not by fate, but by choice.
Still—he walks the marble halls with the composure of a born heir.

From a distance, his hair looks like a shadow cut from silk, dark enough to drink the light and still gleam.

His name does not echo here. It settles.
Like dust on scripture. Like snow on the blade of a god’s sword.
Soft. Sharp. Undeniable.

He walks alone through Athena’s inner sanctum, where golden light curls along the arches like a crown. Here, the walls don’t speak. They listen.

And today, Oliver speaks first.

“I want to go,” he says.

Athena does not flinch. She stands at the far end of the atrium, half-shadowed by a pomegranate tree that has never once bloomed. Her eyes remain on the distance, where the world spins like a toy globe, all blue and green and heartbreak.

She knows which “go” he means.
Down. To Earth. To them.

“Why now?” she asks.

Oliver pushes his glasses higher on his nose. The frame catches a shard of immortal sunlight. “Because they left me. And I want to know why I still think about them.”

Athena turns now. Her armor rustles with restrained emotion.

“You were a child. You remember nothing of those days.”

“Doesn’t mean they didn’t happen.” His voice is calm, like always—but under it, there’s something else. Something aching.

Athena approaches slowly. Her robes do not trail behind her. She does not need to perform divinity here.

"You are not going back to beg, Oliver. You're not seeking answers to become whole. You already are."

“I’m not looking to fill a hole,” he says, eyes sharp. “I want to understand the scar.”

That stops her.

A beat of wind. A ripple in the silk of time.

“Then go,” she says at last. “But not as a boy looking for roots. Go as my son—born of thought. Steel-hearted. Sharp-minded. You are not seeking a family. You are walking into the past to understand how it failed you.”

He nods. Just once.

The pomegranate tree behind her shivers. A single white blossom appears on a branch that has never borne fruit.

He doesn’t notice it. But she does.

“Will I return?” he asks, softly now.

Her gaze tightens. “Always. Olympus does not lose what it has chosen.”

A quiet breath. A softer smile from him now.

“Thank you.”

She cups the side of his face—not tenderly, but deliberately, like a final adjustment before a sword is sent to war.

“Walk with pride, Oliver. Let them wonder who you are. Let them guess at your crown.”

He exhales.

He walks like he’s never had to ask permission.

In Olympus, Oliver is neither stared at nor ignored.
He is watched.
With the same curiosity mortals reserve for eclipses or riddles carved into cave walls.

The gods do not quite know what to make of him.

He is not divine enough to shatter stars.
Not mortal enough to stumble.

He reads in the library of Paradox, where scrolls float instead of gather dust. He sits cross-legged on a levitating slab of obsidian, running fingers along scripts no other human eyes were meant to see. Not even Hermes—quick of tongue and quicker of ego—interrupts him there. Once, when a minor muse made a flippant comment about "Athena’s little mortal pet," the scrolls themselves flared and curled away, protecting him like wings.

He didn’t look up.

He didn’t have to.

Because Oliver never claims power. He simply walks in it, like mist over a quiet lake.

When he speaks, his voice is low and calm, threaded with a logic so precise it makes Apollo’s poems feel self-indulgent. The gods whisper that his words sometimes shift fate without him realizing.

When he moves, he leaves no echo. Yet doors open before he knocks.

And when he stops—truly stops—gods lean in.

He doesn’t use a weapon. Athena offered him a blade forged from reason itself, and he set it aside with quiet grace. “I do not need sharpness,” he said. “Only clarity.”

Still, the blade appears at his hip when he is most uncertain.

Olympus listens to him. And it unnerves them.

Because he is not loud.

He is not loud, and yet his silence rearranges conversations. Entire councils pause when he cocks his head slightly. When he raises a brow. When he blinks like a puzzle has been solved—before anyone else realized there was a puzzle to begin with.

In the Hall of Reflections, where gods go to confront fragments of themselves, Oliver once stood for three hours without flinching. The mirrors blinked first.

In the Garden of Impossible Geometry, he walked paths meant to confuse Titans. And never turned twice.

He makes the impossible seem inevitable.

But he doesn’t feel that way. Not inside.

He still has a drawer full of questions. Hidden thoughts. A folded scrap of parchment in his coat pocket with three names on it—none of them godly. None of them answered.

He doesn’t tell Athena. Not because he distrusts her. But because he is afraid that even she, sharp and proud as she is, might not understand why he still feels the tug of a life that never wanted him.

Olympus raised him.

But mortals made him.

And sometimes, in the quiet between scrolls and logic, he wonders—
Not what he could become here.

His hair is black as unanswered questions—smooth, silent, and threaded with the kind of mystery that didn’t beg to be solved.

But what was stolen from him there.”

“I swear to all twelve Olympians, if Napat describes this Oliver’s hair one more time...”

I had my chin in my palm, half-listening to his monologue for what felt like the fifth time in the final year of high school alone. But Napat was already on a roll.

Chapter Text

“—and it’s not even styled, you guys,” he said, swooping dramatically in front of the whiteboard like some ancient bard with Wi-Fi. “It just falls like that. Like the wind brushes it for him. And he wears glasses. Not clunky ones—those really sleek, rectangle-rimmed ones that make you feel like he’s judging your grammar.”

“Which he probably is,” someone snorted from the back.

“Exactly!” Napat pointed as if the argument had just been won in court. “Like he can just look at you and know what grade you got in ninth-grade calculus.”

I sighed and turned toward the open window. Golden light spilled across the courtyard like honey, stretching long and lazy over the school lawn. A few juniors were walking past—one of them spotted me through the glass and immediately dropped their iced tea.

Not spilled. Dropped. Like their brain forgot how fingers worked.

I gave them a soft smile. Nothing too flirty, just... gentle. Then I turned back toward the classroom and ignored the flustered squeaks and giggles coming from the corridor.

This was my life.

People were drawn to me. Teachers. Students. Baristas. Cashiers. Cats. Toddlers in strollers who locked eyes with me like I was made of lullabies and strawberry jam. My presence was like gravity dipped in glitter. And I never understood why.

I didn’t try. In fact, I’d spent years trying not to stand out.

But attention found me. Always.

And it had a price.

Because people thought they knew me.

The pretty boy with the sleepy voice. The flawless uniform. The easy laugh. I must be arrogant, right? A flirt. A heartbreaker. A walking Instagram filter.

They didn’t see how I paused before walking into rooms, how I braced myself for the ripple of stares. How group projects turned into silent power games. How I was never truly alone—yet still managed to feel lonely.

Still, I smiled through it. Politely. Kindly. Because I knew the only thing worse than being loved for nothing... was being hated for it.

“…some people think he’s already on Earth,” Napat continued, dragging me back into the realm of hot mythological gossip. “Undercover. Blending in at some elite university. Maybe even in Thailand.”

“Oh come on,” Pam groaned from the second row. “If some Olympian prince came to Thailand, we’d know.”

“Not if he was trained by Athena,” Napat shot back smugly. “He’d be subtle. Observant. You’d only notice the quiet. The way rooms lean toward him. Like a ripple you can’t name.”

“Or like a hot nerd with social anxiety,” someone muttered.

The class lost it.

“Okay, accurate,” Napat admitted. “He’s tall and lean. Quiet. Wears black like it’s a thesis. And he probably walks like he’s calculating floor tile angles.”

“Hot,” Pam sighed.

I stretched my arms behind my head and said, “You all need hobbies.”

Napat grinned at me. “What if you were him, huh?”

I snorted. “I got a B-minus on my Greek mythology quiz.”

“Exactly. The perfect cover.”

“I trip going up stairs.”

“So did Hermes.”

“I cry when I lose UNO.”

“You’d make a beautiful demigod,” Soji added sweetly. “No one would ever suspect.”

“I don’t want to be a demigod,” I said. “I want to graduate. Maybe open a café. Not get smited by my divine aunt for forgetting a sacrifice.”

More laughter. But it softened things. Loosened the tight edges around my ribs.

I smiled.

And the second I did, the room shifted. Just a little.

A girl in the back dropped her pen. Someone whispered my name like it tasted expensive. The air shimmered faintly—like heat rising off the pavement at noon.

I felt the old tug. People’s attention swinging toward me like compass needles finding north.

The moment passed.

I let my smile fade and looked out the window again.

Outside, the hallway buzzed with post-class chatter, but wherever I walked, the noise always... dampened. Like sound itself adjusted to my presence.

I passed lockers, the sun glinting off the polished floor tiles, casting golden flecks into my eyes. I didn’t walk like a model. I walked like someone who’d never had to chase anything.

And yet... sometimes, I still ran.

Behind me, a few juniors whispered.

“That’s Kiet, right?”

“He smiled at me once. I had a nosebleed.”

“No, he helped me with my backpack. I still dream about it.”

“Do you think he’s... y’know... enchanted or something?”

I wasn’t.

At least, not that I knew.

I turned right into the older wing of the school. Marble columns lined the way, leftovers from when this place was some fancy government building. It was way too elegant for what we paid in tuition.

As I passed one of the columns, I slowed.

Just for a second.

Not because I saw anything.

But because I felt it. Like a memory that wasn’t mine. Like something was watching. Waiting.

I exhaled. Whispered under my breath, “I’m not magic.”

The column didn’t argue.

I looked back toward the locker hallway.

I’d never told anyone. Not my dad.
Not even myself—not out loud.

But it had happened.

Once.

It was after school. The sky was painted coral and lilac, the kind of colors that make your chest ache even if you’re not sure why. The air smelled like rain.

I was walking with someone—I don’t even remember his name now. A senior. Played guitar. Had that look in his eyes whenever I spoke, like I was already a song stuck in his head.

He was already gone for me.

Most people were.

We ended up behind the admin block, near the old cherry tree where no one ever looked. There was a joke. A glance. A "can I?"

Then—soft lips. A quiet kiss.

It hadn’t meant anything to me emotionally. But... something shifted.

He pulled back, blinking like he’d woken up in a different world. “God,” he whispered, “you’re like... sunlight.”

I laughed. But inside?

I felt it.

Warmth blooming in my chest, rising into my throat, flooding my fingers.

The air thickened. Like the moment before a summer thunderstorm.

And when he touched the locker beside us—just casually, mid-laugh—steam curled off the metal.

No one saw.

He didn’t even notice.

But I did.

I stared. Jaw tight. Heart racing. Terrified, if I’m honest.

Later, I came back when no one was around. Touched the locker.

Cold. Perfectly normal.

But I remembered his face.

The way he smiled at me—lazy, dreamy, like he was drunk on warmth.

Like something had melted inside him.

And ever since then, whenever I got too close to someone... part of me hesitated.

Because what if it wasn’t them falling in love?

What if it was just me?

Burning through the world without meaning to.

I shook the memory off like rain from my hair, but the air still felt heavier. Charged. Like something had been stirred and didn’t want to settle.

I walked.

And as I passed under the arch between the admin block and the side courtyard, fragments of Napat’s dramatic nonsense floated back to me.

“Walks like he’s calculating floor tile angles…”

“Glasses that make you feel judged…”

“Trained by Athena…”

It should’ve been ridiculous.

It was ridiculous.

But my brain—traitor that it was—decided to run with it anyway.

What would someone like that even look like?

My thoughts spun out the image faster than I could catch them. A boy in a black sweater, collar sharp against a slender neck. Lean, tall, with that kind of posture—the one that screamed quiet confidence. The kind that made you straighten your own spine without realizing.

He wouldn’t talk much. Just watch. With eyes like antique glass. Maybe grey. Maybe gold. Maybe both, depending on the light.

And the glasses—of course there were glasses. Not the big clunky ones, but the kind with frames so clean they looked like they could slice through lies. He’d wear them not because he had to, but because they kept people from getting too close.

He’d say little. But think constantly. Analyze constantly. Like every hallway was a battlefield and he was mapping the exits just in case.

The son of Athena.

An adopted prince raised in the halls of Olympus, taught by gods and spirits and the stone wisdom of the Parthenon itself.

I paused near the old lockers.

The imagined version of him was standing in front of me now, somehow more vivid than real people I knew. His eyes flicked to mine—and I swear, I felt the breath leave my lungs.

Cool and controlled. Beautiful in a way that was sharp, not soft.

I blinked.

He vanished.

Just my mind. Just too much sun.

But even as I leaned against the wall, letting the stone cool the back of my neck, the thought stayed.

What if he was real?

What if someone like that was walking around—right now?

And what would someone like me look like to him?

Would I shine?

Or would I burn?

Chapter Text

The sun hadn't risen all the way yet.

Its light stretched long and pale over the campus, brushing gold across the wet pavement and flickering against tall glass windows like it couldn't resist peeking in. Everything smelled like new grass and city dust and rain that hadn't fallen yet. The buildings loomed in that quiet way old things do—white stone walls, iron lanterns, and tall arches casting shadows like they had secrets to keep.

I stood at the main gate with a small duffel bag over one shoulder and a paper envelope in my hand. It held my admissions letter, my ID photocopies, and an unnecessary number of backup documents. I hadn't meant to be this early. But I couldn't sleep. Or rather—I didn't want to wait anymore.

The fabric of my white shirt was still warm from the iron. My hair was a little damp from my morning shower. And as I paused to take in the campus—its height, its hush, its oddly glamorous weight—I caught movement in the corner of my eye. A student on a bicycle was glancing at me.

Twice.

And promptly rode straight into a flower bush.

I didn't look. Not out of rudeness—just because... well, it happened a lot.

A part of me still hoped it would stop someday. That people would stop looking like they'd just tripped into a dream when they saw me. But apparently, that day was not today.

The security guard at the front gate barely glanced at my ID before his face lit up. "Ah, welcome! You must be from the honors program."

I smiled back, easy and polite. "Thank you."

I wasn't.

Just here for media studies. With a sprinkle of creative writing, if the electives panned out. I liked stories. All kinds. Fantastical, quiet, ugly, real. I liked listening. Not saving the world. Not ruling it. Just... understanding it. Maybe even understanding myself a little more along the way.

The admissions office was tucked on the second floor of the humanities building. The stairwell smelled like floor polish and coffee. The hallway smelled like laminate and nerves.

A girl with two ponytails turned a corner too fast, saw me, and dropped her folder. Pens clattered everywhere like startled insects.

"Oh my god—I'm—sorry—!"

I crouched to help. "Blue pen or black?"

She looked up at me, blinking like I'd just spoken in slow motion. "Um. Both?"

I passed them to her. She blinked again, smiled shyly, and whispered, "Thanks," like I'd saved her from a burning building.

The actual registration process was smoother than I expected. A photo. A signature. A printer spitting out my student ID while a tired admin assistant tapped at her keyboard.

"Kiet Thanaboon, right?" she asked, scanning the list. "You're in Dorm C. Just next to the library. You'll get your key packet during orientation. Until then, feel free to explore the campus. The café downstairs is open."

"Thanks." I nodded, slipping my papers back into the envelope.

As I turned to go, I noticed she was still watching me. Not in a weird way—just... like she felt something. Like the air around me shimmered, and she was trying to pin down what was off. Or maybe not off. Just strange.

I kept walking.

Orientation was set up under a massive banyan tree in the central quad. The school had gone all out—a white tent with banners, folding tables with fresh snacks, and overly peppy seniors in matching shirts trying to get people to play icebreaker games.

I didn't mind. I liked new starts.

I picked a table that looked reasonably chill. A girl was sketching in a lined notebook, her elbow smudged with pencil. A boy was juggling mandarins—badly. A third girl wore a lanyard covered in pronoun pins and had the expression of someone silently judging the sun for rising.

The sketcher looked up first, eyes laser-focused.

"You're ridiculously pretty," she said, no preamble. "Like—sponsored by moisturizer or something?"

I blinked. "I—uh, just sunscreen, I think?"

She tilted her head suspiciously like I was lying to protect some dark skincare secret. Then, without changing expressions, stuck out her hand. "May."

I shook it. "Kiet."

The lanyard girl popped a peanut into her mouth. "Suda. Just to be clear—if you flirt with me, I will cry. I've had to explain that I like girls twice today, and it's not even noon."

I raised both hands. "No flirting, I promise. Full support."

She gave me a nod of approval and went back to scrolling through her phone like we'd just signed a peace treaty.

The juggler grinned. "Juni. I don't like boys either. But I do like chaos. So if you're into midnight karaoke or flash mobs that may or may not involve glitter bombs, we're already friends."

"I think I might've just joined the best table here," I said, grinning.

May squinted at me again. "Why does your voice sound like you were meant to recite poetry under moonlight?"

Juni chuckled. "He's probably one of those sound-healing influencers. Don't get too close or you'll start journaling about your inner child."

Suda tilted her head, squinting at me thoughtfully. "No, he's enchanted. Like a forest spirit. Do you always smell like mint and rain?"

I blinked. "That's... that's just my shampoo, I swear."

They laughed, but the thing was—they weren't being mean. Not exactly. It didn't feel like they were making fun of me. It felt like they were trying to describe something they couldn't quite name. Like the atmosphere around me had a texture they could feel, but not touch.

They weren't in love with me. Not like that.

But they were drawn.

Not obsessed. Just... interested in a way they didn't fully understand.

I shifted slightly, focusing on the orientation booklet in front of me. Icebreaker games were starting afterwards. I ended up in a human knot with May and some guy named Tom who kept nervously trying to hold and let go of my hand at the same time. There was a bingo game. A speech from the dean. Free cookies shaped like the university's logo.

And then the campus tours.

I wandered after the group, shoes crunching gravel, pockets slightly sticky from cookie crumbs. The dorms were nice. Older than I expected. I found my assigned room on the third floor of Dorm C—single, with a view of the north quad and, surprisingly, a tiny balcony.

I hadn't moved in yet. That would be tomorrow. But I stepped outside, letting the afternoon sun warm my face as I leaned over the railing.

Students were still arriving. Some laughed, dragging suitcases and snack boxes behind them. Some looked lost, clutching maps like they'd wandered into a different country. Someone was chasing a pigeon across the lawn with what looked like a packet of crackers.

And then—

Something changed.

Like a flicker at the edge of a film reel.

Down by the east corridor, a boy turned the corner. Tall. Dark clothes. A paper in his hand. He didn't walk like he was late. He walked like he knew where he was going—deliberate and clean, no wasted movement. His head tilted as he read. His hair moved like it had opinions of its own. And the sunlight caught on his glasses just long enough for me to blink.

And then he was gone.

Just like that.

I leaned forward, but the corridor was empty.

Maybe just another senior. Someone I'd see again during electives or at the café or not at all. Maybe no one important.

But still—something about the moment stayed.

The air felt charged again. Like the silence between pages of a story that hadn't been told yet. Like the ripple before a name is spoken.

I stood there, blinking against the light.

Maybe it was nothing. Maybe it was something.

But for the first time all day, I felt like a chapter had just started.

And I hadn't even moved in yet.

Later, they called it a “bonding session,” but honestly, it looked like a government conference center trying to cosplay as a café.

There were fairy lights dangling from corners with what looked like the last pieces of a dying tape dispenser. Posters printed on A4 sheets with words like communication and collaboration in fonts that screamed “made in PowerPoint at 3AM.” A tray of very nervous-looking biscuits melting beside paper cups and juice that had the emotional energy of a lukewarm apology.

“Wow,” Suda muttered as we stepped in. “So this is where memories are made.”

May snorted. “Where dreams go to die, more like.”

I smiled politely at the student volunteer who handed me an attendance slip. She had a clipboard, a lanyard, and the kind of smile that said she regretted volunteering instantly. I murmured a thank you and scanned the room. Some people had already grouped up. Most of the chairs were plastic and arranged in uneven, chaotic little circles, each with a number card flopping on it like a lost price tag.

“Group 7’s over here,” Juni said, nudging us toward a ring of mismatched seats under a struggling ceiling fan.

A tall girl in a loose university polo waved us over as we approached. She had round glasses, a very professional clipboard, and the kind of tired optimism that suggested this was not her first “orientation rodeo.”

“I’m Rin,” she said. “Third year psych. I’ll be guiding you through today’s session. Don’t worry—no trust falls, no blindfolded yoga, and definitely no TikTok dances. Just some group activities to get to know each other.”

I felt my shoulders drop half an inch in relief. So did everyone else.

The first game was the name-memory thing: say your name, add an adjective with the same starting letter, then remember everyone else’s when it circles back.

“May. Majestic May,” May said, complete with a dramatic pose like she was being photographed for Vogue’s special on survivors of overpriced dorm food.

“Suda. Sleep-deprived Suda,” came next, deadpan and unbothered.

“Juni. Judgmental Juni. Don’t ask,” said Juni, leaning back with his arms crossed and the smirk of someone ready to critique humanity.

It got to me and I panicked for half a second. “Kiet. Uh… Kind Kiet?”

They all smiled, and Rin laughed.

“You look like you’d be,” she said. “Even the juice is blushing.”

Chapter Text

And then—of course—Two Truths and a Lie.

I swear Rin explained the rules like it was the first time any of us had played, but we all nodded along obediently. The student volunteer hovered by the biscuits like they were hoping for divine escape.

May went first, twisting her scrunchie like she was on a talk show.

"I've been in a zombie movie, I once shaved my head for a dare, and I can't ride a bicycle."

Juni turned to her immediately. "You can't ride a bike?"

"That's the lie," Suda said, confidently.

"Nope," said May with a grin. "I absolutely cannot ride a bike. The shaved head was real too. But the movie? I was an extra. Got eaten in four seconds. Doesn't count."

Suda went next, perfectly flat-toned as usual. "I've met the Prime Minister, I've climbed Mt. Fuji, and I've eaten raw octopus."

"Okay, you're way too calm for someone who's eaten raw octopus," Juni said.

"No, that one's true," said May. "She's a freak."

"Hey," said Suda.

I guessed the Fuji climb was the lie.

"Wrong," said Suda. "Prime Minister. Total lie. I almost met him. Security wouldn't let me through."

May gasped. "But you didn't say you properly met him!"

"Technically still a lie," Suda said, looking pleased with herself.

Then they all turned to me. I sat up a little straighter, throat dry.

"I've broken three bones," I said carefully. "I'm allergic to peaches. And I failed my first swimming test."

May raised a brow. "Wait. You failed something?"

"That's what makes it believable," Juni said. "No one lies about failing something that specific."

"But allergic to peaches?" Suda said, squinting at me. "You give me fruit-with-a-silk-napkin energy."

We debated for a bit, but they eventually picked the swimming test as the lie.

I smiled. "Nope. I really did fail it. Froze halfway down the lane and floated like an embarrassed sea cucumber."

May burst out laughing. "A what?"

"Sea cucumber," I repeated. "It was very undignified."

"So the lie's... the peach thing?" asked Suda.

I nodded. "Not allergic. Just don't like them."

"Seriously?" Juni asked, scandalized. "Everyone likes peaches."

"They're too... smug," I said. "Like they know they're pretty. All that fuzzy posturing. It's fruit that tries too hard."

The group lost it.

"That is the most beautifully petty fruit hatred I've ever heard," said May, wiping her eyes.

"It's fair," said Suda. "Peaches are drama in fruit form."

Rin clapped once. "Alright, I think we've officially bonded. Someone note that peaches are not Kiet-approved."

Then came the next activity—this time outdoors. Rin's hat was even worse in daylight, some floppy thing that shaded her nose and nothing else.

"What Would You Bring to a Desert Island?"

We sprawled in a messy circle on the quad lawn, the grass warm under our legs and the sky going soft-gold around the edges. Paper cups of over-sweet iced tea balanced on knees like clumsy coasters. Everyone had just enough brainpower left to fake interest.

"An audiobook of murder mysteries," said May confidently. "Preferably British. Nothing motivates survival like unresolved tension and posh accents."

"Do the murders help you sleep or keep you awake?" Rin asked.

"Yes," May replied, smug as ever.

Suda adjusted her glasses. "A solar kettle."

I blinked. "Like... to boil water?"

"To make tea," she said, like that was obvious. "Also sterilize wounds. Or throw at a boar if needed."

We were all quiet for a second.

"God, I love you," May sighed.

Juni went next. "A surfboard."

Rin raised a brow. "Not to escape?"

"Nah. Just wanna look cool while we die. Apocalypse Beach Vibes™."

Then everyone looked at me. I hesitated—not because I didn't have an answer, but because I had three and none of them were normal. I ran a hand through my hair (bad move; someone sighed. Again).

"A mirror," I said finally.

May tilted her head. "To check your reflection while starving?"

"To signal for help. Or talk to myself. Or fight off seagulls."

Juni choked. "You're gonna reflect sunlight into a bird's eyes?"

"Desperate times," I said solemnly. "I refuse to be outwitted by airborne poultry."

Suda nodded. "Technically a very smart survival tool."

"See?" I said. "I'm stunning and functional."

May raised her cup. "To seagull warfare and emotionally unstable mirrors."

By tea break, we weren't best friends. But we were something. A little knot of shared jokes and side-eyes. Shoulders brushing when we leaned in to whisper. A joke forming just beneath every silence. Like... the start of something warm.

We walked to the canteen in a loose cluster, the breeze tugging at my shirt collar, my cup still half-full. May nudged my arm gently.

"You're weird," she said.

"So are you," I replied.

"True. Let's keep it that way."

And I smiled. Not the smile I gave to polite strangers or group photos. The kind that stayed.

And no one looked at me like I was some dream walking past.
No wide eyes. No double takes. No hush of breath like I'd enchanted the air just by entering it.

For the first time in a long while, I didn't feel like an echo of something people wanted. I wasn't the shimmer at the corner of their vision, the boy with the impossible face who got admired like scenery but never touched like a person.

And somehow, that felt... rare.
Not gone. But rare.

It was like the air had changed texture around me. Softer. Warmer. Less like I was standing under a spotlight and more like I was finally allowed to sink into the same sunlight as everyone else. The breeze curled gently around my collar, and for a second, I had this absurd feeling—like I might actually belong here. Not just as decoration or novelty, but as something real.

Like magic, but quiet.
Not the wand-waving, sky-splitting kind. The type that creeps up on you while you're laughing with strangers and sipping terrible juice. The kind that settles in your bones and whispers:

Stay.
You're safe here.
You're not just seen. You're known.

And maybe—just maybe—I didn't want to run from that.

After tea, Rin regrouped us for one last challenge. "You're designing a fictional student club. Name. Motto. Mascot. Go wild."

"Academic Avoidance Alliance," May said immediately.

Suda nodded. "Mission: pass exams while doing the bare minimum."

"Motto: 'We'll do it tomorrow,'" said Juni, yawning.

I raised a hand. "Wait. Should we give it a mascot?"

May grinned. "Yes. A sleepy penguin in a hoodie."

And that was it. We laughed our way through the whole thing. May and Juni as club presidents, me waddling dramatically as the penguin. Even Rin looked like she might cry from laughing.

By the end, we had a group chat named "We Almost Made A Penguin Club 🐧," a running joke about Suda being secretly related to the dean, and plans for dinner tomorrow.

And as we left the room, sunlight slanting low, laughter still clinging to our clothes, I looked back. A few students still chatted with Rin. Some groups lingered. No one stared at me for too long.

But just for a second, something in the air shifted.

A faint warmth buzzed across my palms. My steps slowed.

Maybe it was nothing.

Or maybe it was me.

Again.

(Oliver's POV) East corridor
“He looks like he was made to be admired—soft edges, careful posture, a face that invites attention he claims not to want. Pretty, yes. But dangerously unaware of what pretty can do.”
- KIET THROUGH OLIVER'S EYES

You can always tell the ones who carry godblood.
Even if they don't know it.
Especially when they don't.

It's not a scent, not a glow—nothing that crude. It's more like... a ripple. A skip in the air, a frequency not meant for mortal instruments. To others, it might feel like coincidence. A second glance. A stranger you can't forget. A room tilting slightly when they smile.

But to me, it rang like a bell behind my eyes.

I'd just stepped through the eastern archway into the quad—still smelling faintly of wet limestone from this morning's rain—when it hit. Subtle, but present. Like warm fingers on cold glass. Like someone had left the door to Olympus cracked open.

And standing there, about ten paces ahead, beneath the shade of the acacia trees, was him.

He wasn't doing anything special. Laughing with a small group. A bag slung lazily over one shoulder, like gravity didn't apply to his bones. He leaned against the marble balustrade like it was a throne. Not posturing—just existing. Fully, unapologetically.

His eyes glinted under gold sunlight. His hair caught in the breeze like a whispered secret. Every few seconds, someone new passed by and faltered mid-step.

Mortals.

I slowed.

"Uncontrolled," I murmured under my breath.

He had no idea. That much was clear.

There was too much leakage. The kind that clung to skin like incense smoke. The kind that made people fall a little too easily into orbit.

His magic was acting on instinct. On emotion. And no one around him even suspected. Of course they didn't. They were all mortal. Or mortal enough.

I adjusted the strap of my bag across my shoulder and stepped to the side of the stone walkway, settling into the cool shade of a column. Observing.

Years of training on Olympus had taught me how to read even the faintest pulses of divine blood. Athena made sure of it. "You'll have to see what others cannot," she said once. "Even when they're blinded by beauty."

Beauty. Yes, that was the word mortals would use. They'd probably say he looked like he belonged in a painting. Soft edges. Lethal symmetry. The kind of person who made you forget your sentence halfway through speaking. But I'd grown up surrounded by nymphs and gods. Beauty, to me, was standard.

This boy wasn't beauty.
He was impact.

A ripple, untrained and unintended. Like a harp string plucked by a breeze.

His name didn't matter. Not yet. What mattered was that he wasn't dangerous. I could feel that too. No chaos beneath the surface. No storm-wrath or divine ambition. Just a kind of warm confusion. Like someone blinking under too many lights and still choosing to smile.

I almost turned away. I should've.

But something about the way his fingers curled around the strap of his bag—absently, almost nervously—made me hesitate.

I remembered the reports from Olympus: Demigods were rare now. Nearly gone. Most gods had given up mortal affairs centuries ago. Which made this boy... anomalous. Not important. Just unusual.

And very, very alone in what he was.

My fingers twitched at my side. The air around me tightened, faint and silent.

A suppression spell.
Large radius. Clean, invisible.
Enough to blanket the campus like mist.

It would mute his magic's expression. Just gently. Like a filter, so people would see him, not the divine pulse leaking through his skin.

He wouldn't feel it. Wouldn't know what changed. But maybe he'd notice the quiet.
Maybe, for once, people would talk to him... instead of chase him.

It wasn't pity.
It was strategy.
Because a demigod who didn't know he was one wasn't a threat.
But the world could be cruel even to harmless things. And cruelty bred awakening.
And that could be dangerous.

I watched him laugh. Just once. A flash of real joy. No calculation. No performance.

He didn't see me.

Good.

Let him stay that way a little longer.

I slipped into the library doors behind me, leaving no footprints in the dust of the divine.

Chapter Text

By my third official day of university, I’d already received three love letters, two meme edits of my face on anime princes, and one bag of shrimp crackers taped to my dorm door with a note that read:

“Because you’re a snack. —Your Secret Admirer”

I stared at it, bleary-eyed and barefoot, hair a mess, still half-asleep.

“Shrimp?” I mumbled. “Of all things…”

I took it off the door anyway. I didn’t like shrimp crackers, but I wasn’t a monster. It was a good snack.

By breakfast, May had already seen the note.

“Shrimp crackers? Seriously?” she said. “What happened to flowers? Or chocolate?”

“Maybe they think he’s crunchy and emotionally unavailable,” Suda said, sipping her aggressively black coffee.

“I’m not unavailable,” I replied. “Just… selectively accessible.”

Juni slid into our usual booth like he owned it. “You sound like a Netflix plan.”

I lifted my juice glass. “Exactly. Premium tier.”

I know what I look like.

I’ve known since I was thirteen and my drama teacher cast me as a prince before I even opened my mouth. I've known since I noticed how teachers paused before scolding me, how strangers lingered too long at counters, how group projects turned into popularity contests.

So yeah. I dress well. I speak softly. I carry myself like the world’s already watching. Because it is.

But it’s not about vanity.

It’s armor.

It’s easier to perform than to explain why everything feels so… intense. Like gravity has its hand in my hair, always tugging attention toward me. Like I can’t step into a room without leaving ripples.

So I smile. I pose. I deflect.

And I never let anyone close enough to ask why the center of attention feels so quiet inside.

Our schedules filled up faster than Juni’s snack drawer.

Lectures, lab orientations, “fun icebreakers” (read: institutional torture), club fairs, room keys, confusing hallways. May nearly joined a fencing club on accident. Suda threatened to hack the university Wi-Fi. Juni adopted a cactus from the astronomy seniors.

Me? I tried to go unnoticed.
Emphasis on tried.

It used to be impossible.

Back in high school, I couldn’t breathe without someone writing me a poem about it. Classmates got into fights trying to sit next to me. Teachers forgot the ends of sentences mid-lecture when I looked up. Strangers offered me the last piece of cake in cafés, even when I hadn’t asked. I once touched a cat and it followed me to school for three days.

It wasn’t just that people liked me. It was that they… melted.

I’d see it happen—the soft drop of their shoulders, the dazed little smiles, the way their thoughts fizzed out mid-sentence like someone pulled the plug. I made people reckless. Giddy. Clumsy. They’d offer me their entire lunch tray or confess a lifelong crush after two conversations. Once, a classmate gave me his family heirloom coin. I had to pretend I lost it just so he'd take it back.

I thought maybe I was cursed. Or radioactive. Or a very specific kind of hallucination.

And I never knew why.

But ever since that day—the day I saw him—something changed.

It was like the air recalibrated. Like whatever weird pull I had on the world… dulled.

Not gone. But blunted.

People still notice me. I am still popular. People still laugh at my jokes and remember my birthday and offer to save me seats.

But now, it felt… human.

Logical.

No more spilled drinks or wide-eyed stammering. No one handed me origami swans made out of test papers. That weird haze I used to see settle over people’s expressions when I looked at them—that stunned, dreamy softness—is gone.

Even the cats leave me alone.

And I’d be lying if I say it didn’t shake me.

Because I haven’t done anything. I haven’t changed. I still wear the same cologne, walk the same way, give the same sleepy smiles.

But now, the world doesn’t tilt when I do.

It moves around me like I am normal.

It is a good thing.

Maybe I can finally just… be. Just exist without walking around in a fog of accidental infatuation.

Lunch became our sacred hour. The canteen wasn’t bad if you avoided Thursdays’ green curry. We claimed a table under the haunted ceiling fan that squeaked like a curse.

“Okay,” May declared, slapping her chopsticks down. “New game. Whoever gets hit on most this week buys boba.”

“That’s rigged,” Suda muttered. “He’s sitting right there.”

“Thank you,” I said around a mouthful of rice. “I’m being punished for being ethereal.”

Juni leaned back. “Cry harder, Aphrodite. I still get mistaken for an exchange student every day.”

“Try shimmering when you walk,” I suggested.

“Try vanishing into the sun,” Suda shot back. “You’d still get fan mail.”

And oh, the letters kept coming.

Slipped into my locker. Tucked under my door. Folded into my textbooks, sometimes scented, always awkward.

I never answered them. I never threw them out either.

Not because I believed any of it.

But because there was something soft in them. Something I didn’t want to crush.

Still, I sometimes stared at the pile under my bed and wondered:

Would they like me if I wasn’t like this? If I didn’t look like... whatever it is they see?

Or was it all just shine?

Orientation chaos bled into the campus club fair like a second wave of confusion—only this time with glitter and suspicious levels of baked goods.

Stalls lined the quad in a horseshoe of handmade banners and over-eager upperclassmen. Every club seemed to have a gimmick. The Drama Society handed out roses. The Chess Team was giving away iced lattes. Someone from the Finance Club aggressively tried to explain crypto to Juni, who retaliated by offering him a cursed glitter bomb pamphlet from “Wizards for Environmental Policy.”

And me?
I was just trying to get to the free donuts.

I weaved through the stalls with my best "don't make eye contact" energy, arms folded, head slightly down. But even in a crowd this loud and chaotic, I still heard it.

“Is that him?”

“God, he’s prettier up close—”

“I heard he turned down three modeling scouts in high school.”

“Someone told me his smile made a teacher forget her own name.”

I didn’t stop.
I just smiled politely and kept walking.

They weren’t swooning. Not like before. The buzz had changed tone—from worship to curiosity. Less enchanted, more intrigued. They were seeing me clearly for once.

It was almost... worse.

Before, at least, they looked at me like I wasn’t real. Now they looked like they could reach out and touch the edges. Like I could be theirs if they just tried hard enough.

I ducked my head, a little dizzy.

And then—

“Hey, you!”

A girl with a megaphone and a clipboard cornered me near the debate club stall. Her eyeliner could cut glass. She wore a university blazer over a neon-pink crop top, and she had the unmistakable aura of someone who hadn’t slept but was surviving on sheer drama.

“You,” she said again, pointing the clipboard at me like a sword. “You’re too pretty to stand silently in the shadows.”

I blinked. “Excuse me?”

“Join Debate Club,” she said, already thrusting the clipboard at my chest. “Use your powers for chaos.”

I hesitated.

Usually when people said weird things to me, it was in a dream-haze tone. Like they didn’t know the words were leaving their mouth. But she? She was lucid. Too lucid. Her stare was steady. Her grin was sharp.

Something inside me squirmed.

I took the pen anyway.

Because I’m an idiot.

I signed. She winked. “Welcome to the war, Pretty Boy.”

I shuffled away, stomach fluttering with something I couldn’t name. It wasn’t attraction. It wasn’t embarrassment.

It was awareness.

They could see me now.
Not the glow. Not the gloss. Me.

And it felt—raw.

The first meeting of the debate club happened three days later, in an old room with dusty curtains and a carpet that looked like it had survived political coups.

There were about twenty of us. Everyone already looked caffeinated and vaguely furious.

I took a seat near the middle, trying to appear confident. Calm. Charismatic.

Like I was me.

But then the topic came.

"Pineapple on pizza: An Abomination or the Apex of Culinary Brilliance?"

The girl who recruited me stood at the front. “You have three minutes to prepare your argument. Random sides. No switching.”

I got stuck on pro-pineapple.

“Good luck, Pretty Boy,” said a guy next to me, adjusting his glasses with the smugness of someone who definitely thinks ketchup is a spice.

I rolled my shoulders. I could do this. I’d done harder things.

I stood when it was my turn and walked to the front, notes in hand.

The room was quiet.

Too quiet.

Eyes weren’t dreamy.
They were expectant.

Waiting for me to slip. To shine. To surprise.

For once, I wasn’t their golden statue. I was just the boy in the ring.

And so—I leaned into it.

“Good evening,” I said, stepping to the front like the podium owed me rent.
“I come before you not as a pineapple apologist… but as a victim of culinary prejudice.”

That earned me a snort from somewhere in the third row. Good. They were listening.

“Now I understand,” I continued, hands folded with fake solemnity, “that pineapple on pizza is a controversial subject. A battle of sweet versus savory. A war of juicy chaos against the cold tyranny of tomato traditionalists.”

Laughter again. I leaned forward just enough.

“But allow me, noble scholars, to offer a perspective not often heard in these hallowed halls: pizza is not a battleground. Pizza is a conversation. A round table of flavors, if you will. And pineapple? Pineapple is diplomacy.”

Someone blinked. Someone else nodded. I had them.

“You see, pineapple is the unexpected ambassador. The fruit that dared cross borders. That said, ‘Hey, maybe I don’t belong here—but what if I make it better?’ Pineapple is what happens when sweetness decides it wants to be more than dessert. It wants to matter.”

I caught the eye of the smug guy who called me Pretty Boy earlier. Gave him a lazy wink. He choked on his water.

“I know. Some of you are thinking, ‘But it doesn’t belong!’ Neither did tomatoes once. Or cheese. Or—dare I say—anchovies. Shall we strip our beloved dish down to its doughy, pre-colonial roots just to feel pure?”

Now even the faculty moderator looked like she was biting back a grin.

“In the immortal words of Shakespeare—‘If food be the music of love… order on.’”

Okay, not a real quote.
But it sounded like one. That was the point.

“Let us not gatekeep the crust, my friends. Let us not shame the fruit that dared to dream. Pizza, like life, is better when it surprises you.”

I paused. Tilted my head just slightly. “And if pineapple on pizza is wrong, then frankly… I don’t want to be right.”

Mic metaphorically dropped.
I stepped back. The applause didn’t crash—it purred.

I sat back down, a little breathless. Not from the speech—but from the way it felt.

Unfiltered. Earned.

And for once, I didn’t feel like a god.
I felt like a boy with a voice.

And that might’ve been better.

I stepped out of the club room with applause still humming behind my ribs.

I adjusted my sleeve, exhaled, and reached for the door handle. And that’s when I caught it.

A flicker of movement from the other door—right beside mine.

Someone entering the room just as I left it.

I paused after exiting, momentarily caught in the soft hush of an almost-meeting.

All I saw was the edge of a cotton sling bag—cream-colored, slung across a shoulder. A sharp shoulder, beneath an ironed black shirt. The curve of a wrist disappearing behind the door as it clicked shut.

For a second, I almost turned back.

But the applause had faded. The hallway stretched ahead, gold-tinted and waiting. And besides, it was probably just another club member. Someone late. Someone quiet.

I heard voices pick up again inside. A low male one I didn’t recognize, saying something calm and clipped. Followed by a brief shuffle of chairs.

I shrugged it off.

Probably nothing. Probably no one.

The kind of moment that only feels important if you let it.

Chapter Text

Later, when I walked back to my dorm, someone handed me a flyer for the Literary Society.

“You speak like someone who’s in love with vowels,” they said.

I grinned. “Guilty.”

“Come read sad poetry with us.”

“I’ll think about it.”

They didn’t blush. They didn’t gasp. They didn’t trip over their own name.

They just liked my voice.

That night, I stared at the ceiling again. Not with dread this time. But with… curiosity.

Was this what being normal felt like?

Was this what it meant to live without magic curling around your shadow?

It wasn’t bad.

It was just... new.

And something in me whispered it had to do with him.

The boy in the east corridor. The one who didn’t look. Who moved like he was realer than everyone else. Like marble that remembered being stone.

I still didn’t know his name.

But I had a strange feeling…..what if he already knew mine?

We’d claimed the shady patch behind the literature building—half-gravel, half-grass, all unofficial student lounging territory. May was lying dramatically across a stone bench like a ghost from a tragic opera. Suda sat cross-legged on the ground beside her, slowly peeling a mandarin like it owed her answers. Juni was poking at a juice box with a straw that refused to cooperate.

I unwrapped a sticky rice triangle and took a bite just as May sighed, heavy with fake sorrow.

“I think I might be the next literary genius of our generation,” she announced.

Juni groaned. “Oh no. What did you write this time?”

“I outlined,” she corrected, sitting up and wagging a finger. “An outline, Juni. For a novel. It’s a psychological thriller-slash-romantic mystery-slash-social commentary.”

Suda didn’t even blink. “Who dies?”

“All my exes,” said May proudly. “In alphabetical order.”

I nearly choked on rice.

“What?” I managed.

She grinned like a cat who had definitely eaten something forbidden. “You heard me. One dies mysteriously per chapter. A is for Anon, B is for Benji... C is technically still pending, but I’m hopeful.”

“You need therapy,” Suda said, biting into a mandarin slice.

“And you need taste,” May retorted. “Don’t act like your environmental society isn’t secretly a front for vigilante tree activism.”

Suda smiled like she wasn’t denying it.

“I joined because someone said there’d be free tote bags,” she said calmly. “Now I have three. And a vague enemy in the city planning department.”

Juni flopped onto the grass with a groan. “I can’t believe I accidentally joined three clubs. Three! All because I wanted free pens.”

“You’re weak,” May declared.

“I have needs!” Juni protested. “One of them literally had gel ink refills. I blacked out. Next thing I know, I’m signed up for ballroom dance, sociology film club, and—God help me—competitive Scrabble.”

Suda raised an eyebrow. “Do you even know how to play Scrabble?”

“I do now,” he muttered darkly. “There was a handout. With strategies.”

“You’re going to crush it,” I told him, deadpan. “Strategic vowel deployment. Ruthless triple word scores. Your enemies won’t know what hit them.”

Juni gave me a betrayed look. “You’re enjoying this.”

“A little,” I admitted.

“And what about you, Kiet?” May asked, eyeing me suspiciously. “You’ve been suspiciously quiet. What life choices have you made this week?”

I considered.

“Technically, I joined the debate club,” I said slowly.

Suda squinted. “Wasn’t that because someone dared you?”

“Yes. And then I gave a speech.”

“You’re impossible,” said May, half-fond, half-exasperated. “You look like someone who should be writing poems under candlelight and instead you’re out here accidentally intimidating upperclassmen with your eloquence.”

“It wasn’t on purpose,” I said, sipping my iced tea.

“None of it ever is,” Juni muttered. “That’s the problem.”

We all burst out laughing. The sun filtered through the trees, and the gravel was warm under my shoes. For a second, it felt like everything had fallen into place—not just the clubs or classes or chaos—but this. This small corner of a huge university. This quiet, easy joy.

Whatever magic was or wasn’t around me now... this? This was real.

I loved the swirl of it.

I could float through the chaos. Let it disguise the fact that I didn’t know what I wanted yet—only that I didn’t want to be looked at like a painting someone wanted to hang, but not touch.

Late evening crept in the way it always does—soft around the edges, a little heavy on the limbs.

I sat out on the narrow balcony of our dorm, a cup of chocolate milkshake sweating in my hand and my feet propped up on the metal railing. The view wasn’t much. Mostly trees. The backs of other buildings. A flicker of scooter headlights now and then.

Still, it was... mine.

The stars didn’t glow as sharp as they did laying at my dad’s home’s rooftop, where the sky opened like a secret. But they were still there. Humming quietly over the city haze like they hadn’t given up yet.

Juni had gone down to the common room to rant-text someone about a disastrous date involving a blindfold, a broken scooter, and an unexpected vegan restaurant. He promised details later.

Our floor was quieter than usual. Someone was playing a sad guitar two rooms over. The guy next door was still trying to rap. I wasn’t sure which was worse.

But in my corner of the balcony, it was just... still.

No May arguing with Suda over which K-drama deserved cult status. No bustling club seniors trying to recruit me with intense eye contact. No one asking for selfies or tossing compliments like confetti.

Just me. And my milkshake.

I leaned back in the chair until it creaked, took a sip, and let my eyes fall shut for a second.

This wasn’t the kind of moment anyone would post about. It wasn’t thrilling or dramatic. Just a warm night, the faint scent of rain on pavement, and my heartbeat slowing to something steady.

And since I got here—

No one stared when I smiled.

No one tripped over their own name to ask mine.

No one dropped their iced latte just because I looked in their direction.

Just... quiet.

And it wasn’t even lonely.

It was something else.

Peace.

It didn’t last, of course. The guitar guy switched to Wonderwall. A mosquito bit my ankle. Juni sent a voice note that buzzed aggressively in my pocket, declaring, “It’s a crime to serve durian as an appetizer.”

But for that short, I felt it.

Not the weird pull I always seemed to have on people. Not the shimmer of something I couldn’t explain. Just... me. No spotlight. No edge.

And maybe that meant something.

Maybe I wasn’t only the shimmer. The dazzle. The boy who tilted rooms just by walking through them.

Maybe—underneath all that noise—I was someone people could see after the lights went down.

And still want to stay.

I finished the milkshake in slow sips, the kind you don’t rush, not because it’s gourmet but because it feels like the last breath before the next chapter.

Tomorrow, the real university life would begin.

No more orientation games. No more club booths waving pens at me. Actual lectures. Real assignments. Professors who probably didn’t care that my smile could shut down small nations.

And for the first time, I found myself... nervous.

Not because I didn’t think I could handle it. I did. I always figured things out. But because this time, it mattered.

I’d signed up for a major in Communication and Mass Media—partly because I liked people, and partly because people seemed to always be watching me. Might as well learn how that machine worked, right? Headlines, soundbites, PR—if I had to live in the spotlight, maybe I could learn to shape it, even aim it elsewhere.

My minor? Performing Arts.

I didn’t say that out loud often. People always assumed I’d pick something flashy, like fashion or modeling. But there was something about stepping into someone else’s skin for a while that felt... honest.

Ironic, maybe. Pretending to be someone else just to feel more like myself.

But the stage didn’t ask questions. It didn’t stare the way real life did. It let you breathe inside stories. Speak with someone else’s voice and still tell your truth.

I tilted my head back, watching a cloud drift by like it didn’t have anywhere urgent to be.

Tomorrow would be my first real day as a university student.

No more uniforms. No more top scorer pressure. No more predictable schedules.

Just... me. In a campus full of people who didn’t know who I was. Who might get to know me without falling for me first.

Hopefully.

I stood up, stretched my arms over my head, and gave the sky one last look.

“Alright,” I murmured. “Let’s see what kind of story you’ve got for me.”

Then I slipped back inside, shutting the balcony door behind me with a quiet click.

Tomorrow, the lights would come on.

But tonight, I let the darkness hold me, gentle and quiet.

And for once, it didn’t feel like something to run from.

Chapter Text

The sun was judgmental.

It didn’t just rise. It ambushed me—slashing through the blinds like it had beef with my face in particular. A rude, blinding spear of light stabbed me directly in the eyelid at 7:47 AM.

Thirteen minutes before my alarm.

I groaned like a tragic hero in Act II of a period drama and flopped over, blanket yanked over my head. The bedsheets twisted around my ankles like they were staging a rebellion. I buried deeper, pressing my cheek into the pillow with the kind of melodramatic resolve that would’ve made Shakespeare weep.

“Juni,” I mumbled into the cottony abyss. “Tell the sun I said no.”

I heard movement. A shuffle. Then something soft and sinister smacked me in the face.

A sock.

“Forty-five minutes to your first class,” Juni called out from across the room, already halfway through brushing his teeth. His voice was garbled and echoey, bouncing off the bathroom tiles. “You have ten minutes before I declare war and steal your conditioner.”

I cracked one eye open and sat up with a noise of deep betrayal, my hair sticking up like I'd fought a minor god in my sleep. “You wouldn’t.”

He leaned out of the bathroom doorway, toothbrush still in his mouth, and raised a single, perfectly arched eyebrow. “Try me.”

Ugh. Evil.

I threw off the blanket and shuffled to the mirror, still wrapped in denial and existential fatigue. My reflection looked exactly how I felt—wild-haired, sleep-drunk, dangerously close to writing poetry about betrayal.

Somehow, after a chaotic five-minute scramble, I managed to brush, shower, moisturize (with my conditioner still in my possession, thank you very much), and throw on a pale linen shirt with the top two buttons left open, cuffed sleeves, and tailored trousers I had no business wearing this early in the morning. But hey—if I was going to suffer through a lecture, I might as well do it in style.

When we finally stepped outside, the morning air was thick with heat and promise. Campus buzzed with first-day energy—too loud, too chaotic, too...fresh. The kind of energy that said, everyone’s pretending they have their life together, but I could already see two people dragging wheeled suitcases across the wrong part of the quad and one guy frantically waving a printout of a building map upside down.

People were everywhere—half-awake students clutching iced coffees like lifelines, TAs shouting things like “No, THAT’s the Humanities Hall,” and someone’s mom frantically FaceTiming in the shade. Flyers fluttered in the breeze like confetti. A cluster of students moved as one around a confused-looking security guard. Someone’s tote bag spilled an entire pencil case into the grass.

The chaos was beautiful.

I didn’t hurry. I never do.

I walk like the floor owes me something. Like it’s lucky I chose to step on it. Not in a showy way. It’s just the way I move—spine straight, chin slightly lifted, the kind of ease that makes people turn without realizing why.

There were glances.

Not swoons. No dazed expressions or love notes dropped mid-sentence. That part of my life had shifted. Whatever weird enchantment used to follow me around like perfume had dulled. Faded. People saw me now—but they saw me like a person. Not a myth.

It was… different.

“Do you even know where your class is?” Juni asked as we crossed the stone path behind the old library, where pigeons ruled and Wi-Fi signals went to die.

I squinted at my phone, one hand pushing my sunglasses into my hair. “Hmm. Room 2C. Arts Block. Introduction to Communication Theories.”

Juni groaned. “You checked that just now, didn’t you?”

I gave him a breezy smile. “I believe in letting the universe guide me.”

“Right. And if the universe forgets to tell you where to go?”

“Then I’ll look too good to scold for being late.”

He rolled his eyes, already walking off toward the science wing. “If you get lost, text me. Or just follow the trail of people asking for your skincare routine.”

“Love you too,” I called after him, before turning and heading toward the Arts Block on my own.

The campus was sprawling but familiar. Even just a few days in, I was starting to memorize its quirks—how the stairwells creaked in Building C, which vending machine actually worked, which hallway always smelled vaguely like cinnamon for no reason.

I reached the Arts Block with five minutes to spare.

Naturally, I chose to walk in five minutes late.

Not dramatically. Not obnoxiously. Just enough to make it look like I’d been waylaid by something important, like a secret meeting with the Dean or a philosophical discussion about public transport.

The room—Room 2C—was mid-sized, sunlit, and already full of first-years trying to look chill while quietly panicking over whether they were in the right class. Some had laptops open like shields. Others clutched notebooks with fresh stickers and page corners so sharp they could cut glass.

I slipped through the side door and took a seat in the third row. Casual. Comfortable. Like this chair had always been mine.

Heads turned. Not dramatically. Just small flickers. Curious glances. Whispered exchanges.

I could practically hear it in the air: He looks familiar. He doesn’t look lost. Who is that?

I didn’t give them anything to hold onto. No smile. No wink. Just a quiet, deliberate presence that didn’t beg for attention but didn’t avoid it either.

The professor hadn’t noticed me come in, which was honestly a bit of a relief. He stood at the front, a whiteboard marker in hand, talking about something called “semiotic signifiers in everyday media.” He had the vibe of a man who once wrote a dissertation titled “The Hidden Trauma of Helvetica” and never emotionally recovered.

"Nice shirt," someone said as they dropped into the seat beside me.

Their voice was smooth. Light, like they weren’t trying too hard but still wanted to be heard.

I turned just enough to glance over.

They wore faded denim overalls over a ribbed black tank. Their short hair was sharp—buzzed close on the sides, tousled at the top, like they'd rolled out of bed looking cool on purpose. A silver nose ring glinted in the morning light—thin, delicate, and sharp-edged like a plot twist halfway through a novel.

I followed their gaze down to my shirt: pastel blue, breezy linen, the words Off-Duty Heartthrob printed across the chest in cursive white.

I smiled, slow and unfazed. “Thanks. I’m thinking of getting one that says Underappreciated Icon next. Same energy, but a little more tragic.”

They let out a quiet laugh. It wasn’t forced. “You wear it like you mean it.”

“I do most things like I mean them,” I replied, flipping open my notebook. “Keeps life interesting. Confuses my enemies.”

They snorted softly, but before they could reply, the professor cleared his throat from the front of the room.

He looked exactly how I imagined someone with a PhD in Communication Theory would: wireframe glasses, slightly wrinkled dress shirt, sleeves rolled up with academic intensity. The kind of man who drinks bitter coffee and corrects documentaries under his breath.

“We’ll begin with semiotics,” he said. “Signs, signifiers, symbols. And how we all live inside a language we didn’t choose.”

I tuned in just enough to scribble the first few lines. Not because I was worried about the syllabus—I already knew I could wing a presentation if necessary—but because I liked the sound of certain phrases. The rhythm. The shape of ideas.

At the top of the page, I wrote:

How to Speak So the World Listens (Even When You Don’t Care If It Does)

A pen clattered nearby. I turned instinctively.

A few seats over, someone had dropped theirs, and now stared down at the floor like it had personally betrayed them.

I leaned down, scooped it up with practiced ease, and handed it over with a lazy, half-curled smile.

“Careful,” I murmured, voice low but friendly. “You’re not even taking notes and already causing chaos.”

They looked up—blinked once, startled. Then laughed quietly, more amused than flustered.

“Thanks,” they said, still grinning.

I gave a small nod and turned back to my notes. No wink. No follow-up line.

Just… me.

The class blurred by in slides and phrases—“myth of denotation,” “cultural encoding,” “reception theory.” I took notes in sprawling loops, half aesthetic, half functional. Words came easier when I didn’t think too hard about them. Like catching something mid-air instead of trying to build it from scratch.

When it ended, the professor dismissed us with a tired wave and a reminder to check the online portal.

The hallway outside exploded instantly—noise, motion, paper, people.

It was like walking into academic bumper cars.

Someone dropped a tote bag. Someone else shoved a flyer into my hand that I didn’t read before folding it neatly and tucking it into my back pocket. A group of seniors were arguing loudly about QR code ethics. A girl spun in place, phone outstretched, desperately trying to reconnect to campus Wi-Fi.

I walked straight through the chaos. Not dodging—just... weaving. Not rushed. Not hesitant. Just centered. Like I knew exactly where I was going, even if I didn’t. The crowd opened naturally around me. Not because I made space. Just because space... made itself.

Then I heard her again.

“You always write titles like that?”

I turned.

The person from class—the one with the overalls and peppermint-citrus scent—stood just behind me, arms folded, one brow arched, gaze flicking toward my notebook poking out of my tote bag.

The page was still visible.

How to Speak So the World Listens.

I shrugged, letting the corner of my mouth curl.

“Only when I plan to be devastatingly insightful.”

She laughed. Really laughed this time—tilted her head back just a little. Not performative. Not coy. Just amused.

“Mira,” she said, holding out her hand.

I took it. Warm. Confident. Unrushed.

“Kiet,” I said. “Yes, it’s real. No, I’m not half-French. And yes, my skincare routine is considered a national treasure in three countries.”

She raised both eyebrows, half impressed, half amused. “I was going to ask where you got that pen.”

I paused.

Then smiled again—deeper this time. A grin that knew when it’d been outplayed.

“Touché.”

She winked. “See you around, Heartthrob.”

And with that, she turned and disappeared into the stairwell, leaving me holding my own laugh like a secret.

Chapter Text

Lunch was under the library steps.

Not on the steps—under them. In the shaded alcove where two pillars leaned like they were gossiping and the cement was always just cool enough to feel like a secret. The kind of place where the echo caught your laughter and held it longer than necessary.

May had claimed her spot like a queen settling onto her stone throne. She was cross-legged, elbows out, hunched with surgical focus over her rice box like it required blueprints, calculus, and at least one ritual chant.

“Where’s the sauce packet?” she muttered, poking around like it might be hiding under her math notes. “This box came with sauce. I felt the sauce in my soul.”

“Did you check your pocket?” I offered.

She glared at me. “Do I look like I store emergency condiments in my pants?”

“Do you want me to answer that honestly?”

Before she could respond with violence, Suda interjected.

“Bananas,” she said with the gravity of a trial lawyer. “Are now 10 baht more per kilo than last week. That’s inflation. On bananas.”

She held up her phone like it was Exhibit A.

Juni, slumped beside her, looked like a man who’d fought twelve wars and lost all of them. He had two nametags stuck to his chest—one said “HELLO I’M: New Here” and the other just had a drawing of a crab with sparkles around it. No explanation. None offered.

He pulled a limp sandwich from his bag and stared at it like it had betrayed him.

May snapped her chopsticks apart. “Tell me something good.”

I popped the tab on my lemon soda and leaned back against the wall, stretching my legs into the sun. “My professor looked like a sleep-deprived owl with tenure. And a classmate said I radiate devastating insight.”

“You say that every week,” Suda deadpanned, biting into her banh mi.

“It’s true every week,” I replied solemnly, reaching over and swiping a tofu cube from her sandwich with the grace of a seasoned food thief.

She didn’t even blink. “You owe me a mango sticky rice.”

“Fine,” I said around a mouthful. “But I’m emotionally allergic to standing in line.”

Juni let out a long, theatrical groan and flopped fully onto his back. “I went to the wrong class for forty-five minutes.”

“Was it fun at least?” May asked, poking rice into her mouth.

“I think I accidentally joined Comparative Mythology,” he mumbled into the sky.

I paused. “Honestly? Iconic.”

“You’re a legend now,” May added.

Juni sighed dramatically. “This is how it starts, isn’t it? This is how I get lured into a niche major and end up defending my thesis on Irish werewolves and narrative masculinity.”

I patted his knee. “If you do, I want the first signed copy.”

May pointed a chopstick directly at me. “Forget mythology. You. How do you flirt like you breathe?”

“Inheritance,” I said modestly, sipping my soda. “My grandfather once flirted with a customs officer so well, they let him smuggle a bonsai into Singapore.”

Suda narrowed her eyes. “That’s illegal.”

“Romance is illegal now?” I gasped. “This is the end of civilization.”

Juni propped himself up on one elbow. “If you ever become famous, I’m telling the world about the time you got locked in the mailroom because you thought it was a photo booth.”

“That was one time,” I said, feigning offense. “And it was dark, okay? There were lights. It was an honest mistake.”

“You posed for five minutes before realizing the flashing red light was the fire alarm,” he deadpanned.

“Bold of you to assume I’m not already famous,” I said, sipping my soda with dignity.

They groaned in unison.

Turns out, May and I had a class together.

“Intro to Media Analysis and Storycraft,” which sounded like someone tried to pitch a Netflix original and forgot the plot halfway through. I only realized she was in it when someone behind me muttered “Move, you chandelier of a human,” and a bag thudded next to mine.

I turned just as she slid into the seat beside me, flipping her hair over one shoulder and looking at the classroom like it had personally offended her.

“You’re in this class?” I asked.

“Unfortunately,” she replied, pulling out a highlighter the color of radioactive slime. “The elective I wanted got full. Now I’m here. With you.”

“Tragic,” I said. “Guess we’ll have to share snacks and judge everyone’s media literacy together.”

May narrowed her eyes. “I am the media. I contain multitudes.”

“You contain three iced coffees and a playlist of breakup anthems,” I said, glancing at her tote bag, which had already started spilling stickers and tangled earbuds.

The professor walked in just then—young, vaguely artsy, wearing an asymmetrical blouse that made her look like a living Pinterest board.

“Welcome to the study of stories,” she said, sweeping her arm like she was about to lead us into Narnia. “Where narrative is currency, and every plot point has a price.”

I blinked. “Did she just open with a thesis statement and a tagline?”

“She’s about to drop a SoundCloud link,” May whispered.

I tried not to laugh. I failed.

We started with an icebreaker, because of course we did. “Tell us your name and your favorite piece of media,” said the professor, “but you’re only allowed three words to describe it.”

May went first when our row’s turn came.

“‘Fleabag,’” she said, sitting up straighter. “Sharp. Sad. Holy.”

People nodded, impressed.

I followed. “’Spirited Away.’ Dreamy. Lost. Dumpling.”

The guy in front of us turned around. “Dumpling?”

“It’s a vibe,” I said. “You had to be there.”

May bumped my foot under the desk, her way of saying “you’re insufferable” without wasting breath.

We made it to the lecture part, finally. The slides were full of dramatic fonts and stills from everything from The Godfather to K-drama webtoons. May leaned over halfway through and whispered, “She just called Taylor Swift a mythmaker. Do I agree with her?”

“Emotionally, yes,” I whispered back. “Academically, you’re spiraling.”

The girl in front of us was typing aggressively. Like, angrily. Her notes looked like manifestos. I peeked.

Cultural semiotics = mirror/shield/lens???
When does a narrative become a weapon.
WHO OWNS THE ARCHETYPE.

“She’s either gonna write a dissertation,” I muttered, “or start a cult.”

“I’d join,” May said, “as long as they had merch.”

We were supposed to do a pair activity next. Something about reframing a classic narrative. May turned toward me before the professor even finished the sentence.

“Let’s do ‘Cinderella,’” she said. “But the shoe fits everyone and she dumps the prince to become a CEO.”

“I respect it,” I said, already opening my notebook. “But the prince sues her for emotional damages and releases a breakup song called ‘Glass Heart.’”

May grinned. “Now it’s a trilogy.”

We worked through the activity mostly by talking nonsense and somehow making it sound smart. That was our specialty—chaos in disguise. May doodled a frog with a crown in the margins. I underlined the phrase “narrative authority” three times and circled it like it owed me money.

When class finally ended, the lights came up and people stretched like they’d survived something.

“I’m starving,” May declared, shoving her notes into her tote bag without folding them. “Wanna get food?”

“I’m emotionally full from this experience,” I said. “But yes. Always.”

We exited with the rest of the class, spilling into the hallway. May hooked her arm through mine like we were waltzing into a better universe.

“So,” she said, already scrolling through her phone. “Do you think anyone in that class is secretly in love with me, or are we emotionally safe to mock everyone’s favorite media picks?”

“I think the girl behind us wanted to stab me for saying ‘dumpling.’”

“So… emotionally unsafe.”

“Extremely.”

She grinned. “Perfect.”

Almost 50 minutes later we stepped out of the media building and into the late afternoon buzz. The sun had gone soft again, diffused through some stray clouds like someone turned the saturation down just a little. Students drifted across the quad like slow-moving fish in a very fashion-conscious aquarium. Some guy was playing acoustic guitar near the fountain. I think it was Yellow by Coldplay. Bold choice.

May checked her phone, groaned, and immediately scowled at the sky like it was personally responsible.

“Ugh. I forgot. I’ve got a society board meeting at the art block.”

I blinked. “Already? It’s week one.”

“Apparently, the Theater Club has beef with the Film Society because someone borrowed a fog machine and never returned it.”

“You’d think they’d be more… dramatic about it,” I deadpanned.

She made finger guns. “That’s why they need me.”

We paused at the crossroads where the gravel path split—one way toward the food stalls and canteen, the other toward the red-brick drama wing.

“You good?” she asked, glancing at me sideways.

“Always,” I said. “Go settle the fog machine wars.”

“Don’t get adopted by strangers again.”

“No promises.”

May gave me a mock salute and disappeared into the crowd, boots clicking, bag swinging, hair trailing behind her like a punctuation mark.

The afternoon blurred into that strange, soft-edged mix of chaos and calm—the kind that made the hours feel syrupy and half-lit, like everything had been dipped in sunlight and then left out to dry.

I wandered.

No real destination. Just followed the curve of the quad, letting the wind tug at my shirt sleeves and the murmurs of passing conversations drift through me like background music.

I complimented three dogs.

The first was a scruffy mutt wearing a harness with a name tag that said “Coconut.” I told him he had excellent eyebrows. He wagged his tail like I’d offered him tenure.

The second was a golden retriever in an actual tiny backpack, like a student late to class. I asked what major he was in. His owner laughed and said, “Emotional Support, probably.” I agreed—summa cum laude.

The third was a very serious corgi in neon booties, trotting like it had debts to collect. I just saluted.

Somewhere between dodging a frisbee and giving directions to a freshman who looked one wrong turn away from a breakdown, a girl from a sustainability stall handed me a chilled lemon soda.

“For being chill,” she said, grinning. “You’ve got good sidewalk energy.”

I blinked. “Thank you. I moisturize daily.”

She laughed, waved, and disappeared into the crowd.

I cracked open the can and kept walking.

By the west courtyard, I noticed a senior frantically circling one of the benches. Her arms were full of club binders and a badly folded campus map, her hair slightly frizzed from panic. I offered help before she could ask.

Turns out she’d lost a scarf—a long, paisley one, apparently sentimental and “emotionally dramatic.” We found it draped over a shrub like it had fainted.

She beamed, thanked me profusely, and pressed a squished red velvet cupcake into my hand like it was a medal of honor.

“I baked too many,” she said. “Or maybe just enough.”

I took it, smiled, and kept going. My fingers sticky with frosting, sugar dusting the air, sunlight pooling like syrup in the spaces between the buildings.

By the time the sun dipped low and painted the campus in gold—soft, shimmering gold that made even the bulletin boards look like art installations—I was sitting under the shade of an old tree near the arts block. One leg stretched out on the grass, half a cupcake in one hand, the other arm resting behind my head.

I had no idea where the cupcake came from anymore. I’d taken a bite without even thinking. It was sweet, maybe a little too much, but… warm. Soft in the center. Like someone made it with actual care.

The sky above had turned that perfect between-hours shade—like the moment right before a page turns. Students milled by in loose, lazy clusters. The sound of someone playing a ukulele filtered down from an open window. Birds argued in the branches overhead.

And me?

I just… exhaled.

For the first time in a long while, there was no weight on my shoulders. No invisible pull curling the air around me. No fever-dream haze in strangers’ eyes. No breathless pauses when I looked up.

No one stared when I smiled.

No one handed me a love letter folded into origami or tried to give me their favorite sweater “for luck.”

No one trailed after me like I was the last page of a fairy tale they weren’t ready to finish.

And no one looked at me like a statue in a temple they’d accidentally started praying to.

They just saw me.

Just me.

Not the glow. Not the mystery. Not the shimmer of something uncanny. Not the boy who made people spill drinks and forget words.

Just Kiet.

First-year. Kind-of-flirt. Good with dogs. Better with silence. Still figuring things out.

And, honestly?

That felt kind of amazing.

Like stepping out of a role I didn’t audition for.

Like blinking and realizing the spotlight was gone—but the stage was still there. Wide open. Waiting.

I looked at the last bite of the cupcake, then at the sky again, streaked now with orange and lavender.

Tomorrow would bring assignments. And readings. And awkward group introductions with people still trying to remember if they signed up for the right major.

But today?

Today was a soft kind of perfect.

And I didn’t need magic for that.

Just a soda. A cupcake. A warm patch of grass. And the simple, startling quiet of being exactly who I was—and having that be enough.

Chapter Text

Three weeks of university came with heat, mosquito bites, and exactly three near breakdowns over cafeteria rice portions.

At this point, I had a daily routine: wake up too late, panic, make it to class exactly two minutes before roll call. Then follow it up with iced tea that tasted like disappointment and a nap in the library that I insisted was “meditative self-reflection.”

Life had settled. Almost.

Except… it kept almost doing something else.

The first miss was at the student services building.

The student services building had that specific kind of air: too cold, too dry, and full of static that made your arm hair stand up if you leaned against anything fabric-lined.

I’d forgotten a form. Some dumb last-minute addendum for Media Ethics that I swore I’d already submitted—until May texted me at breakfast like, “hey don’t forget to turn in the ethics thing or you’ll get mysteriously unenrolled and ghosted by the uni. Again.”

So there I was. Late. Slightly sweaty. Folder tucked under my arm. Hoping they’d let me drop off the paperwork without launching into a speech about deadlines and “responsibility as a young adult.”

The front desk had a line, but it was a sleepy one. A couple students scrolling their phones. One guy doing dramatic sighs at the ceiling like the universe had personally inconvenienced him.

But there was no one actually at the counter. Just the humming of a small desk fan and the occasional beep from a scanner someone forgot to mute.

I stepped closer, peering behind the divider.

No staff. Just... things.

A half-full water bottle. A pen with a flower taped to it. A pair of black-rimmed glasses sitting neatly beside the keyboard, like someone had placed them there deliberately and just forgotten they needed to see.

They were... sleek. The kind of glasses that weren’t meant to look like accessories but somehow still did. Thin silver accents on the hinge. Slight green sheen on the lenses. Clean. Minimalist.
Nice.
I remember thinking—How do people lose glasses this stylish?

I reached out, as if I might hand them over to whoever they belonged to. But before my fingers touched the desk, someone brushed past me.

Just the briefest contact—a shoulder grazing the edge of my bag, the whisper of motion and a sound like sneakers on polished tile.

It wasn’t a crash or a bump. It was... deliberate. Clean.

I turned. Reflex.

The guy was already walking away. Fast. Not running—but with that kind of purpose you only see in people who don’t hesitate.

Tall frame. Broad shoulders. Dark clothes. A duffel bag slung low against one hip. I only caught a glimpse of the back of his head—short, dark hair that curled slightly at the nape. Neat, but not stiff. Lived-in.

And—

A scent.

I can’t explain why that stuck. But I remember it: sandalwood and soap. Not cologne. Not artificial. Just... clean. And warm. Like sunlit clothes drying in late autumn.

He never looked back. Didn’t slow. Just turned the corner and vanished into the main hall like a closing scene.

I blinked. Almost followed. Almost called out.

But what would I say?

“Hey, you left your air of mystery?”

Instead, I glanced back at the counter. The glasses still sat there. Unbothered. Waiting.

Ten minutes later, when the staff returned (a harried-looking admin assistant juggling two clipboards and a cup of lukewarm coffee), she paused mid-step.

She looked at the desk, frowned at the glasses, and blinked. “Was someone just here?”

I shook my head automatically. “Didn’t see anyone.”

But that wasn’t true.

I saw him.

I just didn’t know who I’d seen.
Or why the shape of his absence stayed in my head the rest of the day.

The second time was at Building F’s elevator.

It had started raining halfway through our elective.

Not the polite kind of campus drizzle you could ignore with a hood and a grumble, but the dramatic curtain of water that made puddles out of pathways and turned every tree into a personal sprinkler system.

By the time Juni and I bolted across the quad, we were half-laughing, half-swimming. His umbrella had flipped inside out and I was clinging to a folder like it was a sacred artifact that must not be sacrificed to the weather gods.

“Building F,” Juni gasped as we reached the front steps, “is actually just Poseidon’s lair.”

“I hate it here,” I said through chattering teeth.

The lobby was blessedly dry, but the tiles were slick and my shoes squeaked with every step. I punched the elevator button with soggy determination, hair sticking to my forehead like I’d just escaped a shampoo commercial gone wrong.

The doors opened with a ding that felt more judgmental than helpful.

We stumbled in, still dripping.

“I’m filing a lawsuit,” Juni muttered. “Against clouds.”

I wrung the water out of my sleeve, glancing at our pathetic reflections in the mirrored panel.

And then—just as the doors began to glide shut—movement.

A flash of black across the lobby. A figure jogging toward the elevator. Tall. Lean. One hand gripping a closed notebook tight to their chest like it held secrets. The other raised—just slightly—in the universal please-wait-don’t-leave-me gesture.

“Hold it—” I said, reaching.

But Juni, in his wet-handed haste, smacked the alarm button instead of the door open. A sharp beep filled the elevator. The panel blinked.

And the doors...
...shut.

Right in his face.

Juni stared at the button like it had personally betrayed him.

“Bro,” he whispered. “I think I just crushed someone’s academic dreams.”

I exhaled a laugh, but something tugged at me. I turned slightly, eyes still on the metal doors as they started moving upward.

That flash of black.

That lean silhouette.

Something about it felt familiar—but not in a memory way. More like déjà vu. Like I’d almost dreamed it before. Like I was about to say “excuse me” to someone I hadn’t met yet.

“Wonder who that was,” I murmured.

“Probably some theatre major,” Juni said. “The way he ran. Too graceful. Suspicious.”

I smiled. But my fingers tightened a little around my folder.

I didn’t see his face.
Not really.

But still...
My chest had that same hum I’d felt outside student services the other day. Like the air wasn’t quite settled. Like something had slipped through.

The elevator dinged.

We got out.

Rain still tapped against the windows like it had something to say. But I didn’t know the words yet.

Then came the drama rehearsal room.

The drama rehearsal room was in the arts wing basement—one of those long, rectangular rooms with worn black flooring and high, paint-chipped ceilings. The kind that echoed too easily and smelled faintly of acrylic paint, dust, and tension. Posters of past performances peeled from the walls in slow curls, as if the building itself was trying to forget them.

It was late. Not sunset-late. Just that weird hour between classes when the hallways thinned out and everything went strangely quiet—like the whole campus took a collective breath.

I was early. Or maybe the guy before me was just incredibly late finishing his piece. I sat cross-legged on the floor, clutching my script, listening to the muffled wails of theatrical doom from behind the closed door. Someone was either dying, professing love, or both. Classic.

The moment his performance ended, the door creaked open and a stage manager stuck their head out. “Kiet Thanaboon?”

I stood. Smoothed my shirt. Tucked the paper under my arm.

“Break a leg,” Juni had told me earlier, cackling like he wanted me to.

I stepped inside.

The room was warm. Not cozy warm—sweaty warm. Like it had been holding its breath all day. One flickering spotlight lit the taped square on the floor. Folding chairs lined one wall where a few upper-year drama students lounged like bored judges on a reality show.

I cleared my throat. The silence looked up.

“Hi. I’m Kiet. This is a monologue from The Rain Collector. Uh… page thirty-four.”

They nodded.

I began.

It was fine. Not amazing. A little too many hand gestures. I fumbled a line. Improvised badly. Didn’t cry on cue.

Still, I finished. Took a shallow bow. Someone hummed politely.

“Thank you,” one of them said, already scribbling.

I smiled like it didn’t sting and headed for the side door, the one closest to the green room hallway.

The door clicked softly behind me.

The air outside felt cooler, like walking into shade.

I started to head toward the main stairwell, still half-thinking about what I could’ve done differently. Maybe less eyebrow acting? Less dramatic sighs?

And then—from behind me—

Another door opened.

The main rehearsal door.

I paused mid-step.

A rustle of motion.

I turned my head slightly, just enough to catch a blur of someone entering the room from the far side.

A cotton sling bag. Pale canvas, slung casually across one shoulder. A dark shirt. White sneakers. One hand curled loose at his side, fingers brushing against the hem of the bag.

That’s all I saw.

The door eased shut behind him with a quiet click.

And that was it.

Gone.

No face. No voice. Not even the echo of footsteps. Just a fragment.

I stood there for a second longer than I meant to, heart slowing in a strange rhythm. My fingers twitched like they wanted to grab the edge of that moment, pull it back.

I didn’t know why.
Just that I’d missed something.
Again.

And I was starting to wonder if something—or someone—was dodging me on purpose.

The closest call?

Library printing room.

The campus library had too many floors and never enough outlets. It always smelled like paper and sleep deprivation, like someone had spilled caffeine on top of ambition and forgotten to clean it up.

I was on the third floor—the print-and-copy station—rushing to get my media studies report submitted before the online portal closed. A whole morning of procrastination had led to this precise disaster: me, stress-sweating, and trying to coax life out of a machine that hated me.

The printer choked. Groaned. Blinked an angry red light at me.

“No, no, no,” I muttered, thumbing the buttons. “Don’t you dare.”

It dared.

The paper jammed mid-spool. A beautiful, hot-off-the-press paragraph now scrunched like a disappointed fan letter.

I crouched, cracked the tray open, and sighed. My folder slipped off the side table and exploded into a confetti rain of notes, flashcards, and my dignity. Of course.

I was still on my knees trying to remove the paper like it was a surgical operation when a voice behind me said, calm and clipped:

“Try canceling the queue first. It resets the driver.”

I blinked.

I turned.

But whoever had spoken was already stepping away. I caught a flash of their back—tall, slender build, long sleeves pushed to the elbow. One hand gestured as he spoke to a girl at the far scanner station, his voice lowered now, private and measured. The girl nodded like she trusted him instantly.

I could only see the angle of his jaw. A bit of his hair—dark and perfectly unbothered by gravity. He moved like he knew space. Like he took up only what he needed and no more.

My printer clicked, suddenly obedient. My pages rolled out smooth and warm.

And by the time I gathered my papers and looked up—

He was gone.

Just a breeze where he'd been.

I stared for a second, pages forgotten in my hand.

Not because he was the most beautiful person I’d ever seen. (He wasn’t. I mean—maybe. I don’t know. I barely saw him.)

It wasn’t that.

It was the feeling.
Like I’d turned a page in a book I didn’t know I was reading—and saw my name written there.
Just… waiting.

The room returned to normal.

The girl he’d helped scrolled on her phone.

The air conditioner hummed its offbeat lullaby.

And I stood there, printer humming behind me, wondering why a stranger’s voice could stay in my ears like a song I wasn’t finished hearing.

There was no mystery. No magical air pressure. No shimmer of fate.

Just bad timing, crowded spaces, and human chaos.

But still… something lingered.

Like a sneeze you couldn’t quite get out. Or a name you couldn’t remember but knew you should.

It was always almost. Never quite.

I didn’t know who I was missing. But I kept missing him anyway.

And for reasons I couldn’t explain…

…I didn’t want to stop trying.

But then it started with a phone call.

Chapter Text

I almost didn’t pick up.

I was in the kitchen of the dorm’s shared common area, squinting into the microwave like it owed me answers. My phone buzzed on the counter beside my wrist. May.

It was the first off day since the start of university, so of course we had plans. It’s an overstatement to say we because those three left me at the dorm and went off, just because I asked for 5 more minutes of precious sleep (14 times, Juni’s version that I totally doubt).

I stared at the name.

Not a text. Not a voice note. Not an unhinged meme of a frog screaming into the void.

A call.

It was late. She never called late.

I answered on the third ring.

“Hello?”

There was a pause. And in it—something sharp and silent. Like the breath before something breaks.

“Kiet,” May said, and her voice wasn’t hers.

It was paper-thin. Off-balance. Like it had been dropped from a great height.

“May? What—?”

“You need to come.”

My heart dropped.

“Come where? What happened?”

“I—” Her voice fractured. “Juni’s—he—he was—”

“May.”

“It was fast,” she said, words tumbling now. “We weren’t even supposed to go there, Suda just wanted to look at earrings and Juni said he was hungry and the bike was fine, it was fine until it—wasn’t—”

“May,” I snapped. “Where are you? What happened to Juni?”

“I don’t know,” she whispered, like the words were scraped raw. “I didn’t see it, Kiet. I heard it. It sounded—wrong. Like—like metal folding in the wrong direction. And then Suda screamed, and the phone flew, and there was this—thud. Like a body. Like—like something too soft hitting something too hard.”

My knees went weak. I leaned against the fridge.

“They’ve taken him to the hospital,” she added quickly. “Suda’s already there. She’s trying to act calm but she’s not, she’s—she’s pale, like chalk. And Juni’s wrist looked—Kiet, it didn’t look like a wrist. It looked like it didn’t belong to him.”

My breath came in short, sharp fragments.

“Which hospital.”

She told me.

It didn’t matter. I was already grabbing my shoes.

“Tell Suda I’m coming. I’ll be there soon.”

“Kiet—wait—just—” She paused, like she was about to say something else. Something big. Then:
“Be careful, okay?”

The line went dead.

The taxi ride was too slow.
Not because of the traffic—though there was plenty of that, motorbikes weaving past, buses huffing along like tired animals—but because my thoughts were ten steps ahead of every stoplight.

My hands were clenched so tight I didn’t feel the paper of the university flyer I’d crumpled in my fist. I’d meant to throw it away before leaving campus. I didn’t even know how it ended up in my hand.

I stared out the window, but I didn’t see the city. Just flashes of memory.
Juni laughing with his head thrown back.
May pretending to gag at cafeteria meatballs.
Suda huffing at her laptop and muttering death threats at capitalism.

Then—

The call.

My knee bounced against the seat. The driver kept glancing at me in the mirror. Once. Twice. Then more frequently. His mouth opened like he wanted to ask if I was okay—but then closed again. Maybe it was the look on my face. Or maybe it was that thing in the air. That pressure. That tension I hadn’t realized was building in the cab like steam in a kettle.

The windows were fogging even with the AC on.

I couldn’t sit still.

When we pulled up outside the hospital, I didn’t wait for change. I shoved too much cash at the driver, half-bowed in thanks, and ran.

The hospital entrance was chaos. Ambulances, cars, bikes.

The hospital had 3 main buildings, each at least a few minutes of sprint from the entrance gate.

There a nurse was arguing with a man over paperwork, the argument more heated than the sun blazing above their head. A child crying on someone’s shoulder. A loudspeaker crackling updates in three languages.

But as soon as I entered the chaos subsided, eyes turned my way. Including the baby and the dog tied to the security’s room.

I brushed it off as coincidence. Because things are normal now. I have been just another normal guy with just a pretty face since the last month. And also because it wasn’t important to understand my surrounding right now.

I spotted a security guard in scrubs and made a beeline.

“Excuse me—” I said, breathless, “—do you know where—?”

He turned. He was young, like this was his very first job.

Paused.

And just… looked at me.

Not looked, stared.

Like I was something divine that had stepped out of the clouds.

“Um—my friend,” I said again, sharper now. “He was just brought in. Name’s Juni. Can you tell me where the ER is—?”

He opened his mouth.

Not to speak.

To smile.

A dreamy, open, faraway kind of smile. “You’re… glowing,” he murmured. “Like—are you a model? No—wait—have we met in another life?”

I blinked. “What—no, please, just tell me where—”

He stepped closer. “I feel like… like I’ve been waiting to see you forever.”

“I’m not—” My throat tightened. “Please. I need to know where—”

A clipboard clattered to the ground. Papers fluttered around my feet. A receptionist, young, maybe twenty at most, stared at me like I’d split the sky. Her mouth moved. No sound came out.

No.

No, not now.
This hadn’t happened in weeks.
Not since orientation. Not since the library. Not since—
That day. The east wing. That boy.

The boy I didn’t see.

The boy who… muted it.

Whatever this was.

But now?

Now it was back. And worse.

All of it.

The stares. The slack jaws. The way people looked at me like I was some kind of hallucination they didn’t want to wake up from.

“I’m not trying to—please, can someone listen to me?!”

But no one did.

They saw my face. They heard my voice. But none of it mattered. Because the second they looked at me—really looked—I stopped being real to them.

I was a crush. A daydream. A poem they once heard whispered in a dream.

Not a person. Not a friend in pain. Not a boy terrified for his friend.

Something inside me snapped.

I stepped back, hands trembling. My vision blurred—not from tears, but from pressure, building behind my eyes, my chest, my skin.

The world tilted.

And then—
Rain.

It didn’t start with a drizzle.

It started like a fall.

Like the sky slipped and poured itself out all at once.

From clear skies.

Thunder cracked overhead. A wind whipped through the entrance like a warning, overturning an umbrella stand. Leaves flew. The air thickened like syrup.

Gasps rose—but not at me, not anymore.

Now they flinched. They ran.
Away from the storm I don’t think I called.

And for the first time in the last five minutes—
They stopped looking at me.

The spell broke.
And it felt like I’d broken with it.

I stood there, dripping. Hair stuck to my forehead. My shirt clinging to my spine. My heart still racing like it didn’t know the danger had passed.

Someone shouted for a mop. Someone else called for extra towels.

And then—

A hand on my shoulder.

It was Suda.

Her hair was plastered to her cheeks. Her glasses fogged. But her voice?

Steady. Soft.

“He’s okay,” she said.

I turned slowly. Couldn’t speak.

“He’s got a hairline fracture and a mild concussion. They’re keeping him overnight, just in case. But he’s… he’s talking. Swearing, actually. So I think he’ll live.”

I nodded. Or tried to. My knees almost buckled. I must’ve looked ridiculous, soaked and shaking.

Suda didn’t say anything else. She just gently pulled me inside, past the automatic doors, past the front desk, into the blinding white corridor.

No one stared.

Not at me.

Not anymore.

Maybe the rain had washed it off.

Maybe the hospital was too busy.

Or maybe Suda just had a way of cutting through illusions.

She didn’t look at me like I was rare or beautiful or unreal.

She just looked at me.

And in that moment, I wasn’t divine.

I was just a boy.

Afraid. Angry.

And small.

(Oliver’s POV) At the university
“He burned with the kind of beauty that came from feeling too much— the kind I was never made to hold.”

-KIET THROUGH OLIVER'S EYES

It started raining at 10:06 AM.

That wasn’t the strange part.

Clouds had been gathering for most of the day—thick and indecisive, like they couldn’t commit to a mood. The sky above campus was a dull smudge of grey. I’d half expected a drizzle, maybe a lazy wind.

But when it broke, it wasn’t weather.

It was will.

One second, I was walking back from the faculty building, half-listening to a podcast on narrative structure and ancient epics.

The next—

Boom.

The sky cracked open like it had been holding its breath too long.

Students scattered, ducking under whatever overhangs they could find. Laughter turned to shrieks. A half-eaten sandwich hit the pavement like a declaration of defeat. Someone swore about their soaked tote bag.

I didn’t flinch.

Didn’t need to.

The rain parted around me without drama. No halo, no special effects. Just… space. Dry and unbothered. Like the world knew better than to trespass here.

It always did.

My magic didn’t sparkle or glow. It functioned. Reliable. Unquestioned. A natural part of how I existed—like blinking or breathing.

People rarely noticed.

That was the point.

Olympus taught you early that being seen was dangerous. Power meant little unless you knew when not to wield it.

So I stayed still. And watched.

The storm was concentrated, angry. It didn’t sweep across the city in sweeping arcs. It collapsed in one place—like a sinkhole of sky had opened just off campus.

Not random. Not accidental.

It was personal.

Emotional.

I stepped closer to the library window. The glass was cool under my fingers, and in the faint reflection I saw myself—neatly ironed shirt, calm expression, hair undisturbed.

But beneath my ribs?

That pulse again.

A familiar ripple.

Not chaotic, not volatile.

Just aching.

Someone’s heart had cracked open.

Not with destruction. With feeling.

And I didn’t need to guess who.

I’d felt the signature the day he arrived. Untrained, inconsistent, but impossible to ignore. Like sunlight trying to squeeze through the seams of something that didn’t know it could shine.

He wasn’t aware.

Not of what he was. Not of what he did.

Not of how the air seemed to tilt toward him, like it forgot how to stand still.

I only saw him once. Move-in day. Brief. East corridor. Tall, quiet, holding papers in one hand. He looked like the kind of boy mortals would mistake for a god—but to me, he just looked real. The kind of face you look at twice, not because of perfection, but because it feels like something familiar and faraway at the same time.

I noticed him.

He didn’t notice me.

After that, I cast the dome.

A wide spell, stitched carefully across the edges of campus—meant to suppress the flare of divine blood. It muted things. Silenced the constant, unknowing tug people felt around him.

Not to trap him.

To give him space.

He was drawing people in like gravity in a borrowed skin. They didn’t understand why. Neither did he. And that kind of attention could shred a person quietly.

So I did what I could.

But now—outside the dome’s reach—

This.

It wasn’t a tantrum. It wasn’t magic gone rogue.

It was someone caring too much. Someone overwhelmed by feeling they didn’t know how to hold.

The storm felt thick with it.

And underneath the wet chaos: loneliness.

A kind of desperate hope straining against disappointment.

I watched a branch snap from a tree across the quad. It landed on the wet path with a dull, clean crack.

“Staggering,” I murmured, more to myself than anything. “And he doesn’t even know.”

How much power lived in his bones. How much heart he’d let leak into the sky.

He wasn’t dangerous.

But he was unguarded. And I’d seen enough disasters in Olympus to know that sometimes the people with the gentlest hands shook the world the hardest—without meaning to.

The rain hit harder.

And still—I stayed dry.

A lone figure in the center of calm.

But something told me: if I stepped outside this spell, into that storm of grief and feeling—

It wouldn’t matter how dry I stayed.

I’d be changed.

Not harmed. Just… altered.

The way sunlight alters a room without touching anything.

When we finally meet—because we will—
It won’t be because the world demands it.

It’ll be because something in him calls out.

And maybe something in me, quietly, already wants to answer.

I let my hand fall from the window.

Still calm. Still composed.

But no longer unmoved.

Chapter Text

The lights hummed above, indifferent and institutional, washing the white corridor in the kind of sterile brightness that made everything feel twice as real and half as kind. They flickered occasionally—like they were trying to keep pace with the way my thoughts skittered.

I stood just outside Juni’s room, trying not to crumple the thin paper cup of lukewarm water in my hand. My fingers wouldn’t stop twitching. I hadn’t even taken a sip. It was just something to hold—something that didn’t tremble the way my knees were threatening to.

The rain had stopped.

Or maybe it hadn’t touched this part of the city at all.

Either way, the storm inside me had settled into a wary stillness, like an animal pausing mid-prowl. Not relaxed. Just quiet enough to let me walk without shaking.

Suda nudged the door open with her shoulder, careful not to jostle the plastic bag of snacks in her hand. She leaned in first, peeking around the edge like she was checking to see if Juni had weaponized his IV stand.

“He’s awake,” she reported. “And grumpy.”

“Normal, then,” I murmured.

Her eyes flicked to me—and lingered.

Not a quick glance. Not even a friendly once-over. No. She paused. Her brows drew together like she was seeing something through fog and trying to bring it into focus.

“You look…” she said slowly, squinting just a little. “Good.”

I blinked. “Thanks?”

“No—I mean, like… really good.” She tilted her head. “Like you just stepped out of a perfume ad shot by a director who hates subtlety. What the hell?”

I huffed a nervous laugh. “Okay, clearly you haven’t slept.”

“Maybe,” she muttered. “Still. You didn’t look like this before.”

Before?

I almost asked what she meant. But the words stuck. Instead, I stepped past her into the room.

Juni was propped up against the headboard like a crime drama extra, one arm in a sling, a light bandage across his temple, and a remote he’d clearly stolen from the nurse’s cart. The hospital gown wasn’t helping his aesthetic, but he still looked smug enough to make it work.

May was perched cross-legged at the end of the bed, halfway through a hospital-issued Jell-O cup and already hoarding a second in her hoodie pocket.

“There he is!” May grinned as soon as she saw me. “The storm-bringer himself.”

“You survived,” Juni added, his voice just a touch raspy. “And you brought the aesthetic. Damn.”

“What?” I blinked, still hovering near the doorway.

“You look hot, man,” Juni said without blinking. “Like, stupidly hot. Like a shampoo commercial if it were also a music video.”

“Okay, you’ve definitely got a concussion,” I muttered.

“No, really,” May chimed in, pointing her spoon at me. “You look like you did on the first day. Before orientation. Remember that?”

I shrugged. “Kind of?”

“You walked across the quad in a basic white T-shirt and three people dropped their phones. One of them almost stepped into a pond.”

“I remember one person doing that,” I said, rubbing the back of my neck.

“Multiply it,” Juni grinned. “And add glitter.”

I laughed softly, but it felt uneven. A little too sharp at the edges.

May tilted her head, frowning—not like she was concerned, but like she was puzzled. “It’s weird, though. It’s not just pretty-boy face. You look... I don’t know. More.”

“More?” I echoed.

“Yeah. Like you’ve been softly airbrushed by the universe,” she said, clearly frustrated that she couldn’t articulate it better. “Like you’re in sharper focus than the rest of the world.”

I scratched my neck again. The collar of my shirt suddenly felt too tight.

“I think you’re all just emotional from the adrenaline,” I said. “And the fluorescent lights are doing weird things.”

“Sure,” Suda said, stepping in behind me. Her tone was casual, but she didn’t sit right away. She just stood by the wall, arms crossed, still watching me. “Emotional. That’s it.”

But her voice had softened, just a bit. Less sarcastic than usual. Less certain.

I made my way to the plastic visitor chair beside Juni’s bed, sinking into it like my bones had been waiting for permission. My whole body ached—not from anything physical, but from something heavier. Something that lived just under my skin.

“How’re you feeling?” I asked quietly.

“Like I lost a fight with a vending machine. But alive.” Juni shrugged with his good shoulder. “I’ll live. You gonna cry about it?”

I didn’t answer.

May, not looking up from her Jell-O, said, “If Kiet cries, I’m crying. And then you’ll cry. And then Suda will say it’s the onions in her instant noodles.”

“Rude,” Suda deadpanned. “But true.”

I smiled. A real one, maybe. Just a little. But the weight didn’t move.

I could still feel it—that awful heaviness from earlier. The way the guard had looked at me. The receptionist. The silence that had wrapped around the lobby like fog around a mountaintop.

I wasn’t glowing. But they saw something.

Something that didn’t belong in that hallway. Or anywhere.

But here—
In this room—
They laughed. They teased.

They didn’t look hypnotized.

Just confused. Maybe charmed. But still themselves.

Still here.

Still normal.

In their own weird, wonderful way.

I let out a breath I didn’t realize I’d been holding. Closed my eyes for a moment. Let it pass through me.

Maybe it wouldn’t last.

Maybe the rain would come again. Or something worse.

But for now, in this moment—

They weren’t looking through me. They weren’t looking past me.

They were just looking. At me.

And somehow, that felt like the most human thing in the world.

A few minutes later the walk out of the hospital felt longer than the way in.

Not because of Juni—he had a sling, a dramatic sigh, and the stubborn insistence that he could walk just fine. He was okay. He was alive.

We all were.

But still—something felt different. Like the world had exhaled while we were inside, and now we were stepping into something... altered.

The air had cleaned itself. Rain still clung to the leaves, shining in the glow of flickering street lights. The scent of wet concrete, stale oil, and damp hospital antiseptic mixed in the air. The roads were glossy. The skies clearer than they had been minutes ago.

May was bouncing on her heels beside me, hoodie hood up, another stolen Jell-O tucked sneakily into the kangaroo pocket. Suda walked ahead, adjusting the jacket on Juni’s good shoulder and grumbling about him being banned from public roads for life. Juni snorted and said he was suing gravity.

I should’ve laughed.

But instead I walked quietly, hands shoved deep into my damp hoodie, head slightly down, trying to shake off the feeling that I was being watched.

At first, I thought it was just me. Residual stress. The storm. The hospital tension still clinging to my bones.

Then I noticed the woman sitting at the edge of the sidewalk, nursing a half-empty soda can, slowly turning her head as we passed—eyes locking on me with a sort of stunned reverence. Not admiration. Not even recognition.

Like awe.

A man leaning against the hospital fence halfway through a smoke break turned, cigarette forgotten between his fingers. He blinked once. Twice. Slowly, like his brain hadn’t caught up with his eyes yet.

Farther down, someone in the pharmacy queue dropped their wallet with a loud slap of plastic on pavement—and didn’t even pick it up.

And not one of them looked away.

Their gazes clung to me like spider silk. Soft. Unbreakable. Weightless, but not gentle.

I felt it crawl over my skin, a familiar charge, and my heart stuttered in recognition.

This.

This was what it used to feel like.

Back before the peace.

Before that day in the east wing. Before him.

For the past month, everything had been quiet. Dorms, classes, campus cafés—people still noticed me, sure. Compliments still landed in my DMs. A few smiles lingered longer than necessary.

But they had been… human. Rational. Normal.

And now?

Now I was watching strangers freeze like statues. Like they'd just walked into the final scene of a forgotten fairy tale.

A little boy was walking with his father, holding onto a blue balloon with one hand and his dad’s finger with the other. He stopped mid-step. Pointed at me with his balloon bobbing.

“Papa,” he whispered, “is he magic?”

I flinched.

My throat closed around words I didn’t have.

The father glanced at me—and stilled. His mouth parted slightly. Like he was about to say something. Like he’d forgotten the question his son just asked.

I looked down, fast. Kept moving.

Behind me, May hummed something under her breath—probably a soundtrack from her latest drama obsession—and flipped through photos on her phone like the world was exactly the same as it had been five minutes ago.

Suda, on the other hand, noticed.

Her steps slowed beside me. I felt her glance slide across my profile once. Twice.

“…Okay,” she said, careful and flat, “not to be weird, but people are kinda… staring.”

Juni craned his neck. “Dude. That guy just walked into a signpost.”

“Ignore it,” I muttered.

Suda’s brow furrowed. “Are you, like, on a billboard or something? Or trending?”

May looked up. “Wait—is this about that one picture from orientation? The one with the sun flare that made you look like an angel who moonlights as a makeup influencer?”

“I said ignore it,” I snapped—sharper than I meant to.

They fell quiet.

I sped up. My feet felt too loud against the damp concrete, like every step was drawing more attention. And the air around me? Heavy. Not humid—thick. Charged. Like walking through golden syrup that only I could feel.

Someone brushed past on a bike and slowed—not to look at traffic, but to look at me. His neck twisted unnaturally, lips parted, a low “woah” escaping like breath fogging glass.

My skin was buzzing now. Not from fear. Not even from power.

From recognition.

This was what it used to be like—but worse.

I remembered the first day of university. People double-taking, sure. A few over-eager compliments. One girl who gifted me a poetry zine with her number tucked inside.

But this?

This was stronger.

Like something inside me had cracked open with the rain. And now the flood was seeping out of me in invisible waves.

Then, just before our cab reached the hospital gates, a man in green scrubs stepped forward—some orderly finishing his shift—he looked up at me and paused mid-stride.

"You…" he said softly. “You look like someone I used to dream about.”

I didn’t speak.

Not because I was speechless. Because I couldn’t afford to say anything.

If I said something, I might break again.

So I opened the cab door.

Chapter Text

“Let’s go.”

May shoved in beside Juni, still rambling about seatbelts and ice cream.

Suda got into the front seat. She looked back at me as I slid in last.

Her eyes scanned my face for a beat too long.

No one said anything as the driver pulled away.

But my fingers, tangled tightly in the hoodie sleeve at my wrist, wouldn’t stop shaking.

The university always looked different in the evening.

By day, it was noise and sunlight and motion—people rushing, laughing, dodging bicycles and deadlines.

But in the evening?

It settled. Breathed.

The lamps lining the stone pathways cast long pools of soft amber light, turning every leaf into gold. The trees swayed, rustling in that hush-hush language the world only speaks when it's finally quiet. A stray cat darted across the plaza entrance ahead of us, pausing just long enough to meet my eyes before vanishing into a bush.

Juni hobbled next to me, chin up and pride intact, despite his sling. May was still cradling her stolen Jell-O like it was a prized gemstone. Suda walked a little ahead, phone lighting up her face in flashes.

And then—

The moment I stepped past the main gate, something shifted.

Not something I could see.

Something in me.

Gone.

The pressure—the thick, invisible cling of attention that had stalked me from the hospital all the way to the taxi—evaporated.

No more stares.

No more slack-jawed strangers murmuring riddles and dream fragments.

No more flutter of unseen threads pulling eyes toward me like I was gravity itself.

It was like stepping from a stage into the wings. One second I’d been under a spotlight, blinding and strange. The next—nothing.

Three students walked past us on their way out. One of them waved casually at May without stopping. Another was busy retelling what sounded like a disastrous Tinder date. The third was mid-yawn.

None of them noticed me.

Not really.

I scanned their faces, waiting for a flicker of confusion or daze. The wide-eyed wonder. The slackened jaw. The glazed, “do I know you from a dream?” tilt of the head.

Nothing.

They didn’t even double-take.

And the air?

Lighter.

It was like some dense film that had been clinging to my skin all night had been peeled away, leaving my thoughts sharper. My body quieter.

My breath came out in a long, soundless exhale.

It felt like waking up.

Or... like being allowed to.

Because the campus wasn’t just familiar.

It was protected.

A kind of hum lay over everything here. Subtle. Silent. But present. A soft golden seal over the grounds, a membrane between what I was out there and who I got to be in here.

I hadn’t even noticed it before. Not properly.

But now that it had vanished and returned, now that I had been reminded what my life looked like without it—

I felt it like a second skin slipping back on.

The universe pressed “mute.”

And suddenly, I was just Kiet again.

Still tall. Still good-looking. Still the guy who got too many compliments on his Instagram selfies.

But not the boy people mistook for a miracle.

Not the boy whose name made strangers whisper confessions.

Not... whatever I was becoming.

“Hey.”

Juni’s voice cut through the quiet. He elbowed me gently, using his uninjured side. “You okay?”

I blinked. Realized I was still standing just inside the gate, motionless.

“Yeah,” I said automatically. Then caught myself. “Yeah, I’m good.”

A lie.

But not one he needed to call me on tonight.

May stretched like a cat and sighed. “I call first shower.”

“You always call first shower,” Suda said, rolling her eyes as she scanned her ID to unlock the dorm.

“Because I’m smart.”

“No,” Suda muttered. “Because you’re loud.”

Their bickering echoed softly as we climbed the steps toward the dorm. The stairwell smelled faintly of detergent and late-night ramen. The overhead lights buzzed with the soft, persistent flicker that no one ever fixed.

I trailed behind them, half-listening, half-floating.

Something had happened tonight.

Something that had been asleep inside me for a long time—maybe since birth—had stirred.

And for one terrifying hour outside the hospital, I had seen what it looked like when the world felt it waking up.

The dreamlike pull, the stares, the words no one remembered choosing.

And the storm.

That awful, beautiful storm that I didn’t call—but still answered to me.

Now it was gone.

Sealed.

Forgotten, maybe.

But I hadn’t forgotten.

I couldn't.

I followed my friends into the dorm elevator. Juni was cracking a joke about Jell-O being his new painkiller. Suda snorted. May was already texting something dramatic.

They were here. Whole. Laughing.

They made me feel like a person again.

But even as I smiled along with them, my mind was still back there. In the taxi. At the hospital doors. In the eyes of the man who said I looked like a dream he'd had as a child.

I still didn’t know what had triggered it.

I didn’t know why it had stopped.

And I didn’t know if—or when—it would start again.

But something inside me whispered that it would.

Maybe not tomorrow.

Maybe not next week.

But sometime again.

Because the thing that had stirred wasn’t done.

The next morning my alarm went off at 6:45 with the quiet confidence of something that knew it would be snoozed four times.

By the time I actually rolled out of bed, Juni was brushing his teeth one-handed in the mirror with the same aggression he reserved for bad cafeteria rice. “Morning, Sleeping Expensive Skincare Routine,” he muttered around a mouthful of foam.

“Jealousy isn’t a good look on you,” I yawned, stretching until my spine cracked. I caught my reflection in the mirror. Hair messy. Eyes a bit tired. Skin—still luminous. Maybe too luminous.

I splashed cold water on my face and tried not to overthink it.

Classes started at 8:30. I had a 9 a.m. lecture on Media Literacy and Representation, and I wasn’t about to miss it. Communication and Mass Media was my major after all, and today was our first proper group discussion. I’d even read the articles this time.

Juni slung his bag over his good shoulder and waved his sling dramatically like he was in a soap opera. “If you don’t save me a seat, I’ll haunt you.”

“Only if you promise to do it in drag,” I shot back, already digging through my drawer for my cleanest pair of jeans and my least wrinkled shirt.

By 8:35, I was downstairs with a banana in one hand and iced coffee in the other, earbuds in, playlist on shuffle. Students passed me by—most without a second glance.

Just like yesterday evening.

And weirdly, that was… comforting.

I bumped into Suda on the way to the academic block. “You look rested,” she said with a mock squint, eyeing me like she was trying to spot a wrinkle.

“I am rested,” I said. “From carrying the weight of this face.”

She rolled her eyes. “Don’t break your back, model boy.”

“Too late.”

We parted ways near the science wing, and I made it to my lecture hall just as people were trickling in. The professor wasn’t there yet, so the front rows were mostly empty. I slid into the third row and pulled out my notes.

Across the aisle, a girl from my elective caught my eye and smiled.

“Love your shirt,” she said. “Is it vintage?”

“It’s actually my roommate’s,” I said, flicking the collar. “But I make it look good.”

She laughed. “Well, you do.”

For a split second, I paused—waiting for the weird dazed look. The slack-jawed reverence. The weird confessions. But her smile stayed normal. Human. Real.

I smiled back. “Thanks. You’ve got great taste in compliments.”

By the time the professor finally walked in—gray slacks, wire-rimmed glasses, and the kind of coffee cup that looked permanently fused to his hand—the room had already hit peak first-week buzz. People were still riding the high of new stationery and barely-used planners. Everyone wanted to sound smarter than they felt. Words like capitalist propaganda, brand loyalty, and societal conditioning were being tossed around before the lecture had even started.

I leaned back in my chair, legs crossed under the desk, a pen twirling between my fingers. Half-listening, half-eavesdropping, fully enjoying the small theater of it all.

When group topics were announced and we were told to “discuss in clusters of four,” I ended up with:

1. A guy in a film club hoodie with wild hair and even wilder hand gestures.
2. A girl who introduced herself as “Gina, like the hurricane,” complete with lethal eyeliner and nails that could cut through weak arguments.
3. A quiet boy who said he was visiting from Bangkok and had the posture of someone who could ace a test in silence, then vanish without anyone noticing.

We exchanged names, awkward smiles, and that quick shuffle of seats that always felt like the start of something or nothing.

The topic: The Ethics of Modern Advertising.

“Oh, I have thoughts,” Gina declared, already underlining something in her notes with a deadly pink highlighter.

“Same,” said hoodie guy. “Like, why are shampoo ads basically softcore now?”

I raised a brow. “Because apparently clean hair isn’t seductive enough unless someone’s flipping it in slow motion under a waterfall.”

They laughed. Honest, snorting, seat-shifting laughs.

The conversation unfolded with more rhythm than I expected. Hoodie Guy ranted about an AI-generated beer ad. Bangkok Boy dropped a surprisingly sharp point about cultural erasure in global branding. Gina, of course, tied everything back to her thesis on visual manipulation in beauty campaigns. I chimed in with one of my usual jokes:

“So basically, every toothpaste ad is just some hot dentist dating a girl with perfect teeth and trauma. We’re just supposed to trust the sparkle.”

More laughter.

But not the dazed, distracted kind that I used to get.

Not the dreamy sighs or the glazed-over admiration.

Just laughter. Real, sharp, normal laughter.

And I could feel it settle in me like warmth after cold. Like slipping into a version of myself I hadn’t been sure still existed—the Kiet who could charm a group not because of some unexplainable pull, but because he knew how to listen. When to wink. When to punch a sentence with just the right curve of a smile.

For the first time in what felt like weeks, I wasn’t walking through someone else’s fantasy. I was… just in the room.

Chapter Text

When class ended, the professor reminded us to submit our reading logs by Friday and waved vaguely at the board like it had offended him. Chairs scraped back. Voices rose. Bags unzipped.

I lingered a moment, sliding my notebook shut. My fingers were stained faintly blue from my fountain pen. Even that felt weirdly grounding.

Outside, the world was golden.

The quad spread out like a lazy afternoon painting—filtered sunlight flickering through the trees, the occasional flutter of falling leaves. Someone strummed a guitar under a tree with tragic focus. A couple argued quietly over something that sounded like a forgotten password. Laughter bubbled near the juice stall. Flyers were being handed out for a debate club meeting.

I walked slower than usual, swinging my bag over my shoulder, letting myself soak in it.

The world hadn’t gone soft and surreal.

The air didn’t shimmer.

The ground didn’t hum beneath my feet.

Just sun. Just breeze. Just me.

Someone whistled from a bench nearby. “Kiet! You going to the student union booth today?”

“Wasn’t planning on it,” I called back. “Unless they’re handing out compliments and iced tea.”

A round of chuckles. A few eye-rolls.

Normal.

Alive.

Still golden, sure—but in the way any good day feels golden.

And I was good at golden days.

Especially when I could feel the ground under my feet again.

By noon, the quad was louder, hotter, and full of people pretending the sun wasn't actively trying to melt us all. I dodged two cyclists and one wandering squirrel to make it to the canteen steps, where May was already waiting—perched on the ledge like a crow in denim, sipping an iced coffee the size of her soul.

We didn’t go to our usual spot under the stairs unless it was all four of us.

“Juni’s late,” she said without looking up from her phone. “Again. I give it five minutes before he blames traffic. From inside campus.”

“He’s just avoiding the lunch line,” I said, dropping my bag beside her and flopping down. “Suda?”

“Trapped in editing hell. She had to reformat her whole layout because the professor said ‘Helvetica gives me trauma.’”

“Oof. Helvetica always ruins lives.”

May snorted and offered me her coffee. I took a sip and made a face. It tasted like regret and aggressive caramel.

“You chose this?”

“Like my exes: strong, bitter, and hard to swallow.”

I was still laughing when Juni finally appeared, dramatically clutching his sling like an Oscar-winning actor.

“I had to charm my way to the front of the rice bowl line,” he said, sitting cross-legged in front of us on the ledge and unboxing his tray. “It was either that or die of starvation. Don’t judge me for using the arm.”

“Shameless,” May said.

“Effective,” Juni replied, stuffing rice in his mouth.

We ate like that—casual, messy, interrupted every three minutes by someone Juni knew or someone May didn’t like or someone who thought I looked vaguely familiar but couldn’t place it. Normal chaos.

A group beside us was playing ukulele covers of 2000s boyband songs. May kept pretending to cry every time they started a new one.

Juni narrated his dream from last night, which involved a fire drill, a flying mango, and someone with the mysterious boy’s hair (though he didn’t know it was him, obviously). I didn’t comment.

“Kiet, you okay?” May asked at one point, leaning her head on my shoulder.

I nodded. “Just thinking.”

“Dangerous.”

“Deep.”

“Sexy.”

“All of the above,” I said, taking another bite of my noodle roll.

Eventually, my phone buzzed—a polite little reminder that Debate Club started in twenty minutes, and if I didn’t leave soon, I’d show up halfway through someone’s speech on capitalism or caffeine dependency.

“I gotta go,” I said, brushing crumbs off my lap and slinging my bag back on.

“Go slay the patriarchy,” May said, raising her iced coffee in a solemn toast.

“Or just argue with someone about political memes,” Juni added. “Either way, win.”

I gave them both a lazy two-finger salute and headed off across the quad, winding past sun-warmed bricks and tangled cables from a half-set-up club booth. Someone tried to hand me a flyer for a mime society. I politely declined.

The building Debate Club met in was older—cooler inside, with tall windows and quiet hallways that still smelled vaguely of chalk and stress.

As I pushed open the door to the club room, the air shifted slightly.

Not magically. Just… mentally. Like walking into a space where everyone already had ten opinions and a favorite font.

Voices rose and fell. People were rearranging desks, setting up placards, and arguing over whether someone who’d never read The Economist should be allowed to moderate.

I stepped in, ready to spar, charm, and maybe say something intelligent enough to make someone drop their pencil.

It felt like the world was finally right-side up again.

The Debate Club room was a long, rectangular lecture hall that smelled faintly of disinfectant and the ghost of stress. Folded desks lined the walls, pushed aside to create a semi-circle of chairs in the center. A whiteboard at the front already bore the words “Should Censorship Ever Be Ethical?” in messy dry-erase handwriting. The ‘e’ in ethical was missing its middle, like someone gave up halfway through writing it.

As I stepped in, the buzz of voices dipped for just a moment—barely noticeable, unless you were listening for it. Then it resumed, but some heads turned my way. Not dramatically. Just a beat too long. A few familiar faces smiled.

“Hey, Kiet!”

“Glad you made it.”

“I saw your group’s response in Comm 101—it was good stuff.”

I gave a half-wave, a grin tucked into the side of my mouth. “You guys are just happy I bring snacks.”

“Lies. We’re here for your dramatic hand gestures.”

“That too.”

People shifted to make space as I walked in, and I dropped my bag by one of the middle chairs. A girl with two high buns and a laptop covered in protest stickers leaned toward me. “You better be on our side today. We need you to charm the opposition into confusion.”

“Me? I’m a neutral flower,” I said, widening my eyes in fake innocence. “Full of peace and media analysis.”

Laughter. Warm, loose.

I liked this. This room. This energy.

It wasn’t the dreamy, helpless kind of attention I got from strangers lately—it was clearer. Crisper. The kind where people chose to notice me because they liked what I said. Or how I said it. Or the fact that I remembered their names and offered gum.

The moderator arrived late, as usual—blazer wrinkled, hair in a state of mild betrayal. She clapped her hands twice and shushed us like a shepherd herding over-opinionated sheep.

“Okay, dream team,” she said. “Today’s topic is loaded and we only have an hour, so break into pairs, pick a stance, and remember: this isn’t the Hunger Games. You don’t need to destroy each other, just mildly humiliate with evidence.”

I ended up paired with a tall guy named Theo—economics major, perpetually sleepy-looking, kind of funny in a dry, ‘I-only-speak-in-quiet-quips’ way. He nudged his glasses up and said, “You do the talking. I’ll be the smart backdrop.”

“You sure?” I asked.

“You’re prettier.”

I arched a brow. “Flattery and delegation? Dangerous combination.”

Our side was pro-censorship in extreme cases—terrorism, misinformation, stuff like that. I wasn’t an expert, but I listened to Theo’s bullet points, added a few of my own, and let instinct take over. I didn’t speak like I was on a pedestal. I didn’t try to sound like a philosopher.

I just… talked.

"Look," I said at one point, leaning forward slightly, palms open, "no one wants to live in a world where speech is policed like we’re kids at a sleepover. But there’s a line, right? Between freedom and actual harm. And if we’re pretending that line doesn’t exist, we’re not protecting liberty—we’re weaponizing it."

People nodded. One of the seniors tapped her pen thoughtfully. Even the opposition—three students who definitely prepared more than I did—looked mildly rattled when I smiled and said, “You make good points. But context matters. Just because a knife can cut fruit doesn't mean you hand it to a toddler.”

A few people actually wrote that line down.

Theo just whispered, “Show-off,” and sipped his energy drink.

The moderator called time. We all clapped out of habit and civility, and people began migrating toward the snack table or stretching their legs. A few drifted my way.

“That toddler line was solid,” someone said.

“I liked how you phrased your rebuttal—made it accessible.”

“Can you say that fruit knife thing again? I want to tweet it.”

I grinned and offered a pack of mints to whoever was closest. “I require royalties on all tweet quotes. And bubble tea tributes.”

“You’re ridiculous,” someone muttered, smiling.

“Only selectively.”

The room began to dissolve into post-debate chatter, but the energy lingered—like the good kind of echo. I wasn’t the best debater. I wasn’t the loudest or the most ruthless.

But people liked having me here.

And that mattered.’

The Debate Club room always had too many chairs and not enough logic. I’d just finished charming my way through another semi-cogent argument about free speech and dangerous content when the room melted into its usual post-debate blur—people laughing, uncapping water bottles, stretching legs like they’d just run a marathon of moral superiority.

I was riding the high. Not a full ego trip—just that soft, golden buzz that comes from being heard. Not stared at, not admired, not fantasized about. Heard.

I was mid-sip of someone else’s abandoned iced tea when the door opened.

And the air… twitched.

Not a gasp, not a cinematic hush. Just a quiet seam in the room’s energy, pulled ever so slightly off-center.

I turned.

He walked in like he didn’t notice the world existed—or maybe he noticed too much to look directly at it. His hair was dark, still rain-damp, clinging to his forehead in the kind of unstyled way that made you think he’d fought off a comb out of principle. He wore a black button-down, not crisp, not messy. Sleeves rolled with sharp precision, not for style but function. Bag slung across his chest—not fashionably, just efficiently.

He moved with purpose. No wasted motion. No flourish. No hesitation. Like he knew exactly where gravity lived.

Someone beside me muttered, “Oh, damn. That’s Oliver.”

“Oliver?” I whispered back. “The club president?”

“God, no,” they snorted. “He barely talks. Chemistry major. Math minor. Comes when he wants. Leaves when he’s done. Scares the second-years.”

“Why?”

Theo leaned in behind me. “Because he’s never wrong. And he doesn’t bother to explain himself unless it’s necessary. Which, to him, is almost never.”

I looked back.

Oliver had taken a seat at the edge of the semicircle. Didn’t greet anyone. Didn’t fidget. Just opened a black spiral notebook and uncapped a pen like the moment demanded accuracy.

He didn’t wear his intelligence like armor. He wore it like skin.

Not visible unless you looked close. And then, it was all you saw.

I blinked, and suddenly I wanted to know what kind of notes someone like him took. If he drew molecular structures in the margins. If he diagrammed arguments like equations. If he even believed in debate as a useful method of discourse—or just a slower way of stating the inevitable conclusion.

I didn’t realize I was staring until he glanced up.

Not startled.

Not curious.

Just… registering.

His gaze skimmed over me like he was doing a quick scan of an unfamiliar variable. Not rude. Not cold. Just indifferent.

Chapter Text

I smiled, the kind of smile that usually earned me something—an introduction, a compliment, a laugh.

“Hey. I’m Kiet.”

He nodded once. “Oliver.”

His voice was low. Unhurried. Measured like a lab reading.

That was it.

He didn’t look me up and down. Didn’t react to the angle of my cheekbones or the shine of my lip gloss. No double take. No subtle flicker of distraction.

He looked through me. Like I was… too loud.

And then, just like that, he looked back down and started writing.

I blinked.

No joke? No eye-roll? No curiosity?

“Came for the philosophy or the chaos?” I tried, still half-laughing.

“I submitted the prompt,” he replied, eyes still on the page. “The wording was imprecise. I’m correcting it.”

That was the moment.

Not the moment I fell.

The moment I began.

Because I’ve been admired. Desired. Stared at like I was a wish someone never expected to come true.

But Oliver?

He looked at me like I was white noise.

And for some wild, unexplainable reason—it burned.

Not because I needed attention.

Because for the first time in forever, I couldn’t see what he was thinking.

Not even a flicker.

He didn’t hide behind aloofness. He was aloofness.

Not cold, just… built different. Like emotion cost him energy. Like he spent most of his hours rewiring the universe in his head and had no bandwidth left to deal with casual pleasantries.

I glanced sideways again.

His notebook was a battlefield—chemical notations and clean, straight lines in ink-black rows. One margin filled with what looked like symbolic logic. Logic, for a debate prompt. He wasn’t planning to win with rhetoric. He was planning to win with proof.

I sat back.

My pulse was doing something idiotic.

Someone made a joke. I joined the laughter. Then I risked another look.

He wasn’t even paying attention to the room. Just jotting, erasing, calculating.

Unreachable.

Unimpressed.

Unmoved.

And me?

I was in trouble.

Not because he was hot—though, God help me, he was. It was the kind of beauty that didn’t bloom. It burned. Like someone pressed intellect and loneliness and precision into a human mold and accidentally made it breathtaking.

But that wasn’t the problem.

The problem was that he didn’t see me.

And I wanted him to.

Badly.

Not with awe. Not with fascination. Not with a crush.

I wanted him to look at me like a problem worth solving.

And that, for someone like me… was brand new territory.

I tried to focus.

I really did.

The Debate Club moderator was assigning partners for next week’s mock round, and someone two seats over was whispering loudly about censorship in children’s media—but my brain had exited the group chat the moment Oliver sat down.

He hadn’t said anything since that one-line dismissal. Hadn’t moved much, either, other than the steady motion of his pen.

But I was gone.

Just—gone.

I told myself I was looking for academic reasons. Trying to read his posture. Gauge his energy. Figure out how his mind worked.

But somewhere between glance number three and glance number... twenty-five, I wasn’t studying Oliver’s brain anymore.

I was admiring everything else.

It started with his hair—black, technically, but with hints of warm brown that only showed under harsh fluorescent lights. A little messy, like he hadn’t run a brush through it, but not in the cute, floppy-boy way. More like he forgot he had hair and occasionally pushed it back with ink-stained fingers when it got in the way of thinking.

God, I wanted to touch it.

Just once. Just… brush my fingers through it and see if it was as soft as it looked. Would he flinch? Would he freeze like he’d been short-circuited, or would he just blink in that eerie, quiet way and ask what I thought I was doing?

Would he whisper my name?

I blinked. Focus, Kiet.

Eyes. That was next.

Not wide or curious. Narrowed. Focused. The kind of eyes that didn’t just look—they analyzed. And yet, they weren’t harsh. No sharp lines, no judgment. Just… calm. Detached. He wasn’t observing the room. He was mapping it. Calculating probability curves and argument patterns in his head, and still managing to write flawless cursive notes at the same time.

What did he think about when he wasn’t scribbling down debate logic?

Did he have favorite numbers?

Did he dream in color-coded graphs?

Would he ever think of me when he wasn’t in the same room?

My gaze dropped to his mouth next.

Now that—that was unfair.

Because Oliver’s lips weren’t soft or pouty or shaped for drama. They were firm. Quiet. The kind of lips that probably rarely smiled—but when they did, it would ruin you.

No gloss. No chapstick sheen. Just—clean lines and unspoken thoughts. The lower lip slightly fuller, resting in that unreadable line. I imagined kissing him, once. Then I imagined him freezing mid-kiss to correct my grammar. Then I imagined kissing him harder, just to shut him up.

God, get a grip.

And then there were his hands.

Holy hell.

Long fingers. No rings. Neatly kept nails. His knuckles moved like he was fine-tuning the cosmos. Every stroke of his pen looked surgical. I had never been jealous of stationery before.

He kept tapping the end of his pen against his notepad in exact intervals. Three taps. Pause. Two taps. Pause. Like he was keeping time on some mental metronome the rest of us couldn’t hear.

I wanted to grab that hand. Press it to my cheek.

I wanted to tangle our fingers, feel the twitch of his surprise, and see if I could make him lose his place in whatever algorithm his brain was currently solving.

He turned a page.

His forearm flexed.

I may have audibly gasped.

His shirt was rolled up just far enough to expose the line of his wrist to his elbow, all subtle veins and neat, lean muscle. Not bulky. Just… strong in the way bridges are strong. Efficient. Functional. Beautiful.

I briefly considered faking a faint just so I’d have an excuse to fall into his lap and count the lines of his collarbone.

Pull yourself together, Kiet.

My gaze slid lower.

Because, look.

Oliver was not a body-first kind of hot.

But his body did exist. And it was... upsetting.

He had that unintentional good posture, like he’d spent years sitting at microscopes or in long lecture halls. No slouch. Just silent confidence. The kind of presence that didn’t scream—I’m attractive.

It whispered.

And I was listening way too hard.

Broad shoulders under a charcoal shirt. Lean build. Thighs that sat politely in his chair but looked like they could pin you against a wall without breaking a sweat. His knees were a perfect right angle, legs crossed just so. Polished shoes, clean laces.

I imagined him pinning me down in a study room. Lab coat half-off. Lips still murmuring formulas between kisses. His hands unbuttoning my shirt like he was opening a particularly stubborn equation.

I’d let him.

I’d let him rewrite the laws of physics if he said my name in that quiet, deliberate voice.

The room shifted again.

I snapped out of it.

Someone was asking for volunteers. Oliver raised his hand—silently, without ceremony, without ego.

Of course.

I looked away.

My chest was warm. My thoughts weren’t safe.

And all he’d done… was exist.

Just exist.

Quiet. Exact. Brilliant.

And I was losing my mind one quiet, dangerous feature at a time.

The room was still humming from post-debate buzz, that fizzy mix of leftover arguments, half-baked rebuttals, and snack-fueled serotonin. People had scattered into little huddles again—some swapping notes, others arguing about who actually won.

I was mentally recovering from the trauma of Oliver's entire existence, fanning myself with someone’s forgotten rubric, when someone—of course it had to be the girl with galaxy-painted nails and a flair for chaos—perked up from her beanbag and said:

“You know what would be iconic?”

Several heads turned.

She pointed. “Kiet vs Oliver.”

And just like that, the air changed.

A pause. A beat. Then: “Charm vs Lethal Brain,” someone added dramatically.

“No contest,” said another. “Oliver would destroy him with facts.”

“Excuse you,” I said, flipping my hair back in slow motion. “I don’t need facts. I have vibes, legs, and an emotional argument delivery style strong enough to win over anyone who’s ever had a crush.”

“Exactly,” someone sighed dreamily.

“You forgot glitter,” Theo muttered.

“I am the glitter,” I replied.

“Let him try,” Galaxy Nails grinned, fully committed to chaos now. “Oliver, would you be down for a mini face-off?”

All eyes turned.

Oliver, still calmly writing in the margins of his notebook, didn’t even look up. “If the moderator approves.”

That earned a soft collective gasp. Not no. Just conditional compliance. Classic Oliver.

The moderator—giddy at the idea of watching two of her most interesting members square off—threw her hands up. “Why not? Five minutes. Freestyle. Civil, please. This isn’t a courtroom, or a dating app. Keep it snappy.”

“I make no promises,” I said, sauntering to the front.

Oliver stood without flair. No rustle of nerves. No flexing for drama. Just… stood.

I turned to face him, heart absolutely doing backflips, and offered my signature, slow-lidded smirk. “Ready to lose, hot stuff?”

Every single person: “OoooOOoOohh.”

Oliver looked at me.

Just… looked.

Chapter Text

Not a flicker.

He could’ve been examining a spreadsheet.

Then: “To what, exactly?”

Oh.

Oh no.

That voice. Calm. Crisp. Like winter air. Or being told politely you’d made a mistake in logic and fashion.

“To the force of my charisma,” I said, smiling like sin itself.

“I’m not here to measure charm,” he said. “I’m here for ideas.”

“Then I’m your worst nightmare,” I purred. “Because I’ve got both.”

Laughter. Actual applause. Someone audibly swooned.

Oliver just raised a single eyebrow. “That’s inefficient. You’re doubling variables when the core topic requires simplicity.”

It took everything in me not to combust.

I turned to the room. “Did he just neg me with a math metaphor? I feel attacked and aroused.”

“Relatable,” someone whispered.

We were assigned the warm-up debate topic: Do emotions strengthen or weaken an argument?—classic, safe, nothing too nuclear. A chance to flex your rhetoric or, in my case, flirt with intensity-disguised-as-intellect.

I was... buzzing.

Because it wasn’t just a debate.

It was him.

Oliver.

Oliver in a black shirt, collar crisp, cuffs rolled with exact precision like he was restraining power itself. He flipped open a leather notebook like he was preparing to write someone's eulogy in footnotes. His fingers moved with such quiet discipline I briefly forgot how breathing worked.

I chewed my pen cap like it owed me money and made heart eyes across the debate floor like a man unhinged.

Then the moderator clapped. “Kiet, you’re pro. Go.”

I stepped forward, calm on the outside, chaos on the inside, and gave Oliver my most devastating you-make-me-want-to-fail-on-purpose smile.

“Emotions,” I began, “are what separate us from AIs and men who wear black shirts and never blink.”

Laughter.

A ripple. But I only watched him.

He didn’t even blink.

Which… yeah. That was the problem.

I kept my eyes on him. “They make arguments relatable. Memorable. Seductive, even.”

He didn’t twitch. Not a single crack.

I stepped closer—just enough to feel the gravitational pull of his indifference. “You can cite data till your mouth dries out, but no one remembers a pie chart. They remember how a story made them feel. That’s how movements begin. That’s how people fall in lo—”

He cut in, deadpan, “Inconsistent logic, embellished anecdotes, and manipulative appeals are not arguments. They’re theatre.”

The room murmured. Someone actually sighed in appreciation.

I smirked. “Then welcome to opening night, darling.”

The room howled. A chair squeaked. I heard someone say, “Oh, he’s going for blood.”

But Oliver?

He raised a single brow. Tolerance. Not even irritation. He looked like he was watching a dog in a tutu walk past—confused why it existed, vaguely amused it tried.

“I assume your next rebuttal will come with jazz hands?” he asked, bored.

“Only if you promise to hold them,” I said sweetly.

Gasps. Audible gasps. A freshman inhaled so sharply they choked on a breath mint.

But Oliver just stared at me like I was a pop-up ad. Dismiss, skip, move on.

“That would require you making a point worth catching.”

And I swear—

My knees wobbled.

Not from the insult.

From the voice. That voice.

Precise. Lethal. Low enough to be dangerous. A voice that could read safety instructions and I’d still hear ruin.

I tried to stay upright. Failed internally.

He was so… composed. So untouchable. And my brain was full of static and his rolled sleeves and the elegant veins on his hand and—God—his lips. Full but firm. Lips that looked like they’d never fumble a kiss. Lips that had opinions. Lips that—

No. Focus.

I pivoted. Desperately.

“Your logic’s airtight,” I said, circling him like prey that was pretending to be the predator, “but airtight things are also airless. Unbreathable. Emotion gives meaning to truth. I’m not saying abandon reason. I’m saying dress it up a little. Take it out for dinner. Maybe… dessert.”

Another laugh. A choked giggle.

And in my mind, I was already two glasses of wine deep across from Oliver in some dim-lit rooftop bar, watching him take off that button-up one careful snap at a time, explaining the thermodynamics of restraint while I—

Nope.

NOPE.

“Emotion may dress an argument in gold,” Oliver said quietly, “but that doesn’t make it less hollow. You can’t measure righteousness in volume. Or seduction.”

Oh, for the love of—

He said seduction like it was beneath him. Like the concept was laughably imprecise. And I…

I wanted to ruin him with noise. I wanted him to look at me the way he looked at his notes.

“Oh,” I purred, “but seduction’s very measurable.”

There were wheezes.

Someone slapped the table. The moderator might’ve choked.

But Oliver?

He didn’t even flinch.

And I realized, everyone in that room was breathless, enchanted, hanging on the edge of their seats.

Everyone but him.

He looked at me like I was a mildly interesting equation that didn’t balance right. Like I was missing a variable. Like he saw through me and didn’t find anything worth reacting to.

And I…

I was wrecked.

But I covered it. Barely.

“Maybe emotions don’t make an argument more logical,” I said finally, shifting to a softer tone, letting the heat cool into something quieter. “But they make it unforgettable. And maybe…” I met his eyes—God help me— “that’s the real power.”

There was silence. Not uncomfortable.

Just… waiting.

He looked up at me. Just for a heartbeat longer than usual.

The moderator glanced at the clock. “Final minute—closing arguments.”

I took a breath, leaned into the momentum I’d built, and let my voice turn velvet again. Theatric but intentional. A masterclass in charm wrapped in argument.

“Emotion,” I said, eyes on the room but anchored to him, “isn’t a flaw—it’s the bridge between truth and understanding. You can hand someone the facts and watch them forget, or you can make them feel the truth—and they’ll remember it for the rest of their life.”

A pause.

I tilted my head, smiled—not my usual smug smile, but the kind that said, I know I made you feel something.

Even if that something was rage.

The room hummed with it. The warm, fuzzy approval of a performance that landed.

And then—

Oliver took one single step forward.

No dramatics. No hand flourish. Just up, like an exhale of clarity in the middle of my opera.

He pushed up his sleeves one notch further, just so, and delivered his rebuttal like a surgeon choosing the scalpel over the hammer.

“No one here is arguing that emotions are meaningless,” he said, voice smooth, low, cutting like it wasn’t even trying to. “But the moment you decide that a feeling matters more than its source, you stop informing your audience—and start manipulating them.”

He looked at me.

Dead in the eye.

Not cruel.

Just clean.

“And if your truth needs to be remembered through theatrics,” he added, “maybe it wasn’t worth remembering to begin with.”

The room went silent.

Like someone hit a mute button on reality.

Even the moderator just stared for a beat too long, blinking like she’d been hit with a taser made of logic.

People were watching us, sure—but I was watching him.

And it was infuriating and amazing.

“Truce?” I said as we wrapped up.

I offered a hand.

He looked at it.

Then shook it. Briefly. Efficiently.

“You’re very loud,” he said.

“And you’re very hot,” I replied without missing a beat.

The entire Debate Club went, ‘AUNGHGHGHHGHHHHHHHHHHHH.’

Oliver?

Already walking back to his seat.

Unbothered. Unflinching.

Unmoved.

And I—

I had never been more intrigued in my life.

Chapter Text

The common room was warm with leftover dinner smells and bad lighting. May was camped on the floor in fuzzy socks, half-wrapped in a noodle-print blanket. Juni was upside-down on the couch, legs thrown over the backrest, watching a chaotic mukbang video on his phone. The captions were auto-generated and terrible. Suda was still out studying in the library, or possibly buried under a pile of citation styles.

I stepped in, dropped my bag by the beanbag, and stood there for a full five seconds, just… reeling.

May glanced up. “You look like you saw a ghost.”

“I did,” I said hollowly. “A ghost with collarbones and a god complex.”

Juni sat up. “Wait. Is this about Debate Club?”

I flopped onto the floor like my soul had given up. “He annihilated me.”

“You lost?” May asked, eyes wide.

“I didn’t lose,” I said. “I just… was strategically dismantled by a man who thinks emotions are inefficient and probably alphabetizes his spices by molecular structure.”

There was a pause.

Then:

“Oh my god,” May whispered, grinning. “You like him.”

“I do not like him,” I said. “I’m experiencing… a neurological event. A crisis of stability. A romantic aneurysm.”

Juni leaned forward. “Tell us everything. No skipping. Start from his face.”

“I can’t,” I groaned. “His face is a war crime. He has glasses. Like, serious glasses. The kind you don’t buy to look cute—you buy them to read Kant at full intensity and solve the heat death of the universe before breakfast.”

“And you flirted, didn’t you?” May asked, already laughing.

“Obviously!” I said, throwing a cushion at her. “I turned the whole room into an emotionally-charged battlefield. I was charming. I was iconic. I metaphor’d so hard I almost started crying at my own argument.”

“And?” Juni prompted.

“And he…” I paused, clutching a pillow to my chest. “He just looked at me. Like I was an equation that didn’t balance.”

May made a wounded sound. “He didn’t flirt back?”

“He didn’t blink back,” I said. “I told him he was hot. In public. In front of an audience.”

“Oh my god,” Juni whispered in glee.

“He just said I was loud,” I muttered.

A pause.

Then May fell sideways, giggling. “This is incredible. Kiet. You got blank-faced by the one man on campus immune to your face.”

“He’s not immune,” I said. “He’s just… emotionally offline. Like a Roomba with a PhD.”

“Do you like him because he’s hot, or because he didn’t immediately fall in love with you?” Juni asked, dead serious.

“I like him,” I said slowly, “because he’s real. Because he doesn’t perform. Because his brain is terrifying and beautiful and—when he talks, it’s like the entire room gets rearranged to fit his logic.”

There was a moment of stunned silence.

Then May: “Kiet. Are you… falling?”

I stared up at the ceiling, pillow still clutched. “I don’t fall. I flirt, I banter, I occasionally get mistaken for a Greek demigod and then politely decline. But this—this is different. I’m unraveling.”

“He’s your villain origin story,” Juni said solemnly.

“He’s my academic origin story,” I corrected. “He made me want to write footnotes. Do you understand how alarming that is?”

May leaned over and touched my forehead. “You’re burning up. We need to get you a cold towel and a math textbook.”

“I already Googled his department,” I admitted. “He’s a chemistry major. Math minor. Probably sees romance as a chemical imbalance.”

“He probably thinks love is a misfiring of the amygdala,” Juni said.

“And yet I still want him to pin me against a whiteboard and explain thermodynamics with his mouth,” I muttered.

May screamed into a blanket.

Juni was crying with laughter.

I just lay there, floating in a new and terrifying reality.

Because this wasn’t a crush.

This wasn’t fun.

This was—

My first time falling.

And I had no idea how to stop.

The library and I had a mutual agreement: I stayed out of its dusty corners, and it didn’t judge me for using YouTube for research. We’d had a good thing going.

But today?

Desperation—or divine intervention—drove me through the glass doors like some caffeine-starved academic sinner seeking absolution.

The air was cool, crisp with paper and printer toner and that vague electric hum of a hundred overachievers clacking at keyboards. My laptop was down to 13%. My charger was somewhere having an existential crisis in another bag. My motivation was somewhere even farther. I had exactly one brain cell left, and it was already writing a breakup letter to academia.

Then I saw him.

Printer corner. Far side of the room.

Tall. Dark shirt. Clean lines. Focused like a scalpel.

Oliver.

My lungs forgot their job. For a second, all I heard was the shhh of a nearby printer and the sudden, full-orchestra swell of my internal drama score.

He was standing at the printer like it owed him something, head tilted slightly, shirt sleeves rolled just past his elbows in that exact, infuriating way he did it—revealing forearms that looked like they’d been constructed by a god with a background in architectural symmetry.

He wasn’t looking around. Wasn’t posing. Wasn’t aware anyone could see him.

That made it worse.

And then—

A girl approached him.

She had bobbed hair, black ribbon choker, effortless eyeliner, and the confident walk of someone who got the guy nine times out of ten.

My chest did something dumb.

I immediately ducked behind a shelf labeled “Introduction to Social Psychology” and peered through the gaps like I was a research subject testing the limits of public shame.

She said something. I couldn’t hear it, but she tilted her head and smiled. Just a little too hopeful.

Oliver didn’t respond right away. He looked at her with that same unreadable stillness he always had—like he was calculating the chemical composition of her sentence before deciding whether it was worth responding to.

Then he shook his head once. Minimal. Precise.

She laughed—but not the cute, flirty kind. The awkward kind. The “ah, I misread this completely, and now I need to disappear forever” kind. She tucked her hair behind her ear and walked away like she was trying not to jog.

I stared, jaw tight, nails digging into the wood of the shelf like it had just told me Oliver had a boyfriend.

My brain: He rejected her. Okay. That’s fine. Normal. Rational reaction.

My heart: MINE.

She was passing my aisle when I stepped out casually, like I hadn’t just been crouching behind academic texts like a deranged library cryptid.

“Hey,” I said, squinting like the light was just a little too bright. “Were you just talking to Oliver? Chemistry Oliver?”

She blinked, caught off guard but not displeased. “Uh. Yeah.”

“Do you know him?” she asked, eyes flicking down over my outfit, and then back up to my face with interest.

I smiled, just enough to make it count. “I know of him. The aura’s impossible to miss. That whole stoic academic warlock thing? He radiates unsolvable equations.”

That earned a reluctant laugh from her, breathier than I expected. Her shoulders relaxed slightly. I stepped closer.

“What happened?” I asked with a tilt of my head. “You looked like he just rejected your confession and diagnosed your attachment style in one breath.”

She gave me a sheepish look. “Wow. Okay, that’s actually terrifyingly accurate.”

I offered a mock-wounded gasp. “Nooo. He wouldn’t.”

She nodded, biting the inside of her cheek. “I just told him I liked him. Nothing crazy. But he said—” she hesitated. “He said no one’s ever really made him feel anything. Not like that.”

The words hit harder than they should have.

I made a thoughtful sound and leaned against the nearest bookshelf like it was just a coincidence that my collarbones were perfectly framed. “Yeah… yeah, he’s one of those.”

She blinked. “Those?”

“You know. Gorgeous, hyper-rational, maybe-sentient-calculator types. The kind that makes you think there’s a soul in there, buried under the theorem proofs and tragic lighting—but if you go looking, you’ll just find more data points.”

She laughed again, this time for real. A soft, delighted kind of sound.

“But hey,” I added, flashing my teeth in a smirk I’d weaponized since Year 11. “Props for trying. If I liked guys like him, I might’ve too.”

Her brows lifted. “Wait, you don’t?”

“I like my boys a little less likely to win a Nobel and a little more likely to text me back with emojis,” I said, throwing in a slow wink. “Besides. Nerds like him? They’ll eat your hope, run it through a centrifuge, and write a thesis on why it wasn’t viable.”

She grinned, visibly charmed. Her blush was subtle but there.

“You’re horrible,” she said.

“I’m just looking out for you,” I replied sweetly, stepping back with a half-bow. “Now go fall for someone who’ll actually use your name when they flirt.”

She walked off still laughing.

I waited till she disappeared around the corner and turned back toward the printer.

Oliver was gone.

The space where he’d stood was empty—just a faint whiff of toner and unbothered genius left behind. Like he’d never been there at all. Like the library had conjured him from thin air just to mess with me, then tucked him back into some pocket dimension of emotionally unavailable academic heartthrobs.

I stared at the spot.

Inhaled once. Twice.

And apparently, that’s the moment my descent into madness truly began.

It started, innocently enough, with me suddenly developing a deep, philosophical interest in chemistry.

Okay, no.

It started with me deciding to casually haunt the sidewalk outside the science building.

Which, full disclosure, I had never done before. Not even once. I didn’t even know where it was until I looked it up on campus maps and then triple-checked it on Google Street View like I was planning a heist.

But hey, today felt like a good day to “grab coffee” from a place I’d never visited that just happened to be—totally coincidentally—three feet from the double glass doors of the chemistry labs.

I posted up beside a sleek gray pillar that probably had some historical significance I did not care about, sipping an overpriced drink I hated. It was something with burnt caramel in the name and oat milk because I panicked at the register. I was holding it like it meant something. Like it gave me purpose.

I pretended to scroll through my phone. I practiced nonchalance. I had the angles right. Chin at a soft tilt, eyes half-focused, one leg crossed like I hadn’t thought about this exact pose in the mirror for twenty minutes last night.

Any moment now.

Any minute, I told myself, Oliver would stride out of that building in all his terrifying serenity. Maybe with a book in one hand and invisible gravity in the other. Maybe with a lab coat slung over his shoulder like sin itself.

I’d look up at just the right time. Our eyes would meet. He’d nod. I’d smile. Something witty would fall out of my mouth like magic. And boom—academic soulmate banter initiated.

I waited.

Five minutes passed.

No Oliver.

Ten.

Still no Oliver.

A frisbee hit me in the shoulder.

“Sorry!” some guy yelled from across the quad.

I smiled. Waved. Died inside.

Fifteen minutes.

Twenty.

My drink was now lukewarm sugar foam and self-loathing.

And then—like the universe had given up on subtlety—a second frisbee, from a different direction, nailed me in the ribs.

“DUDE, IT’S THE WIND!” someone screamed.

I was going to scream. I was going to march into the chemistry lab and ask if they had a compound to dissolve my shame.

Instead, I took one last, tragic sip of my bitter caramel disaster and left.

No Oliver.

No eye contact.

No lab coat.

Just a bruised ego, two frisbee-related injuries, and the quiet certainty that I had officially lost control of my life.

But as I walked away, muttering obscenities into my straw, I checked my reflection in a glass door and saw the glint in my eye.

Determined. Ridiculous. Maybe slightly unwell.

Because this wasn’t over.

Not even close.

Because phase two was research.

Chapter Text

Look, I wasn’t stalking him.

I was… academically curious.

Perfectly normal, totally innocent, just-happens-to-be-handsome academic curiosity.

I typed “Oliver,” then “Chemistry major Oliver,” then “Oliver, black hair, debate, sharp jawline, legs like logic incarnate.”

No usable results.

His campus profile came up eventually—after I gave up and filtered by department like a lunatic—with the kind of info that screamed “please stop looking.”

Just his name (Oliver Thammasat), his major, minor, and a photo that looked like someone had threatened him into standing still for five seconds in front of a whiteboard. He wasn’t tagged in any student org posts. No socials. No student directory blurbs. Not a single public photo outside of the cursed ID pic.

It was like trying to Google fog.

I even tried reverse image searching his profile photo.

Nothing.

Not even a Pinterest doppelgänger.

Just more silence. More mystery. More reasons I should absolutely not be this invested.

So naturally, I made a folder on my phone titled:

“This Is Not Obsession.”

It currently contained:

• A screenshot of his campus profile
• A blurry photo I definitely did not take of him in the library that one time (for scientific documentation purposes only)
• A list of all coffee shops within 500 meters of the science building
• A voice memo where I just whispered “God, I’m so in trouble,” for a full thirty seconds
• A saved map pin labelled: “Oliver Sighting 1: Printer Realm”

Look, some people collect Pokémon. Some people track birds. I just happened to be keeping tabs on a cryptically hot chemistry major with a jawline that could inspire Greek epics.

This wasn’t obsession.

It was… research.

Highly specialized, emotionally inconvenient research.

And I was going to fail it spectacularly.

Because here’s the thing.

Every time I thought about how calmly he’d told that girl “no one’s ever made me feel anything”, it hit somewhere deep and stupid and strange.

Not because I pitied him.

Not because I thought I could be the exception.

But because… for the first time in my extremely dramatic, very visual, affection-heavy life—I wanted someone not to want everyone.

Just me.

I slammed my laptop shut before I could spiral into poetry.

Then reopened it and added one last note to the folder:

“There is a chance I am losing my mind. But in a sexy, cinematic way.”

I set my phone down, face down, heart up.

And made a quiet, terrible decision.

Tomorrow, I was going back near the chemistry building.

Again.

And maybe this time, I’d bring a frisbee of my own.

But then….things took a turn.

It started with a lie.

A small one. Tiny. Harmless. The kind of lie you tell yourself when you’re in deep, emotionally compromised, and currently using the university’s course registration portal like a dating app.

Technically, I wasn’t stalking Oliver. I was… optimizing my schedule. Strategically. Like a scholar.

“Suda,” I had said, leaning over the library table with the energy of someone about to sell their soul for an attendance list. “What’s the name of that guy you sit next to in chem lab?”

Suda didn’t even look up from her notes. “Varun. Why?”

“Do you love him?” I asked sweetly.

That got her attention. Her head snapped up, suspicious. “No? Why?”

“Perfect.” I clasped my hands like I was about to offer her enlightenment. “So it won’t hurt you when I use your relationship to get what I want.”

She squinted. “Kiet, I’m not helping you cyberstalk anyone again.”

“Okay, first of all, I never cyberstalked anyone. I deeply investigated. There’s a difference.”

“You looked up that one guy’s high school GPA.”

“It was public! Also, not the point!” I slapped my notebook down. “Please. Please ask Varun if he knows when Oliver takes his chem lectures. I swear I’ll stop flirting with your TA in front of you.”

Suda raised a brow. “You don’t even like chemistry.”

I placed a hand on my chest. “Maybe I’ve changed.”

“You once called molecules ‘angry dots with commitment issues.’”

“Exactly. I’m ready to learn.” I gave her my most pitiful smile. The one I used when deadlines were approaching and I needed emotional support in the form of chocolate. “Please, Suda. I’m dying here. Just ask casually. Make it sound like you’re curious. Or like, seducing him. I don’t care.”

She rolled her eyes so hard I heard it. But the next day, she dropped a sticky note onto my tray at lunch like a dealer passing off illegal intel.

Applied Molecular Reasoning. Thursdays, 11:00 a.m., North Lecture Hall. Lab on Mondays. He sits in the back. Also, Varun thinks I’m into him now. You owe me bubble tea.

I stared at it like it was sacred scripture.

And that was how I ended up enrolling in Applied Molecular Reasoning.

Despite the fact that I did not know what a molecule reasoned about. Or what, precisely, was being applied. Or if I needed goggles.

But whatever. Education is about growth. Self-discovery. Expanding horizons.

And I was about to grow into the kind of person who sat one row behind Oliver, took incomprehensible notes, and absolutely did not spend the whole class fantasizing about hand brushes, subtle glances, or accidental shoulder bumps on the way out.

Spoiler: I sucked.

Not just academically. I sucked with style.

In the first lecture, I confidently answered a question about valence shells using a metaphor about horoscopes and open relationships.

In the second, I spilled an entire iced coffee on my notes—and then on someone else’s laptop.

By the third, the girl next to me had started offering me pity mints like I was a rescue project.

Oliver, meanwhile, sat in the back like an ancient philosopher trapped in a hot boy’s body. Unbothered. Untouched. Notebook perfectly neat. Collarbone glowing under library lighting like he came with his own mythos.

By week four, I was pretty sure I’d need therapy and a tutor.

That’s when it happened.

It happened on a Thursday.

The kind of Thursday where I showed up to class with three pens, two hours of sleep, and zero idea what "intermolecular orbital overlap" meant. I was seated in my usual spot—third row, slightly off-center, perfect diagonal view of the human thesis known as Oliver—when Professor Janma paused her lecture halfway through a sentence.

“Mr. Kiet.”

I looked up, already smiling.

Scribble being a generous term for what was on my notes. I’d written “molecular...???” followed by a doodle of a molecule wearing sunglasses. (It was labeled Bond. Hydrogen Bond.)

Professor Jan, who always looked like she should be holding a crystal tumbler and judging a physics conference from her velvet armchair, peered over her glasses at me. Her smile was 20% kind. 80% amused. And, disturbingly, 100% knowing.

“Yes, Professor?” I said sweetly, resting my chin in my hand like I’d just been caught daydreaming about valence shells (and not, you know, jawlines).

She folded her hands with the sort of composed finality that usually preceded doom. “You seem... enthusiastic.”

That word again. Enthusiastic. The word professors used when they wanted to say “this student is a fire hazard wrapped in charm.”

I tilted my head. “Always, ma’am.”

She nodded, then picked up a paper from her desk—the quiz I had heroically flunked—and held it like it was a tragic artifact.

“And yet,” she said, her voice gentle, “your last assessment included a metaphor comparing bonding electrons to emotionally distant roommates.”

“Technically,” I offered, “that metaphor slaps.”

Someone in the back actually clapped.

Professor Jan ignored it.

“In light of your—creative interpretation of covalent interactions,” she said, “I’m assigning you a tutor.”

Now, any normal person might’ve groaned. Cried. Denied. Begged.

I perked up like she’d just told me my name had been drawn for a private date on The Bachelor: Molecular Edition.

“Oh,” I said, eyes wide and voice very innocent. “Okay. That’s... totally fine.”

And then she turned her head.

Looked directly across the room.

And, like the benevolent chaos goddess she is, said:

“Mr. Oliver.”

Silence.

The kind of silence that wraps a room in static.

Oliver looked up.

And the world shifted 2° on its axis.

Sitting with that unreadable stillness of his, he looked exactly how a curated aesthetic Tumblr account would describe a brilliant recluse: sleeves rolled, spine straight, and eyes that processed data faster than social cues.

“You’re top of the class,” Proff. Jan continued smoothly. “Would you mind helping Mr. Kiet catch up?”

Oliver blinked once. Neutral. Blank. The faintest crease appeared between his brows, as if calculating the risk of saying no.

“I—” he started.

She didn’t let him finish.

“Of course you don’t mind,” she said cheerfully. “You’re too gifted and too decent to refuse. Aren’t you?”

It wasn’t a threat.

It just sounded exactly like one.

A few people turned to look at him. Waiting.

Oliver’s jaw twitched. Barely.

And then—because physics demands balance and professors have their own brand of omnipotence—he nodded.

“I don’t mind,” he said flatly.

Three words.

Zero enthusiasm.

But hey, I wasn’t about to complain.

Inside, I was lighting metaphorical sparklers and doing jazz hands. Outside, I settled for a polite, grateful smile like I hadn’t been manifesting this outcome through sheer willpower and suspiciously specific academic choices.

“Wonderful,” said Janma, her tone all buttered satisfaction. “I recommend you start this weekend. Before Mr. Kiet begins rewriting the periodic table based on vibes.”

Someone laughed. Someone else said, “Honestly, I’d read it.”

Oliver said nothing.

Just resumed sitting there like an exiled Greek god in a STEM program.

As the room rustled with the sound of backpacks zipping and notebooks slamming shut, I leaned back in my chair with the kind of smug, caffeine-fueled triumph that can only come from achieving something deeply stupid and successful.

I had done it.

I had academically finessed my way into one-on-one time with the emotionally unavailable slow-burn of my dreams.

And best of all?

He couldn’t back out.

Because the professor had basically knighted him.

I smiled, absolutely unrepentant.

And whispered, under my breath, “This is going to be so much fun.”

Chapter Text

I showed up ten minutes early.

Which was embarrassing, because I do not show up ten minutes early. For anything. But this was different.

This was Oliver.

And I had, as the poets say, a problem.

He was already seated at the far end of the study room. Neat posture, notebook open, a perfect little still-life of academic asceticism. If self-control were a person, it would sit exactly like that: spine straight, sleeves rolled, hair unbothered by wind or gravity or romantic nonsense.

I walked in like I hadn’t spent fifteen minutes outside deciding whether I looked smart-hot or just hot-hot.

“Hi,” I said, sliding into the seat across from him with a grin I’d never had to weaponize this hard before.

Oliver looked up. “Hi.”

One word. Flat as a beaker. He didn’t blink twice.

Okay. Challenge accepted.

“So,” I said, unfolding my notebook like it contained ancient secrets, “do we begin with molecular doom or orbital despair?”

He calmly clicked his pen. “We’ll start with hybridization.”

“No dinner first?” I offered, smile tilting.

Oliver didn’t flinch. “You need to understand the bonding model.”

That’s fine. I could flirt and learn. Multi-tasking builds character.

He launched into a breakdown of atomic orbitals, drawing out the diagrams with steady precision. I watched the way his fingers curled around the pencil—how still his wrist was, how clean his handwriting looked.

He handed me the paper.

“Show me how you’d draw this,” he said.

I took the pencil. Our fingers didn’t touch. Of course they didn’t. God wasn’t that generous today.

I copied the shape and said, “So basically, these orbitals are just like people—trying to get close without overlapping too much, or else it’s messy.”

Oliver stared at the paper. “Inaccurate.”

“Rude,” I muttered.

“You drew the angles wrong,” he added.

I corrected it, biting my lip. “So what would you call orbitals that don’t mix well? Enemies? Exes? Debate club partners?”

His eyes flicked to mine. Blank. “They’re incompatible.”

My heart did a little ow. “Harsh. No second chances?”

“No.”

I leaned back dramatically. “You’re tough, Professor Coldheart.”

“I’m not a professor.”

“You give professor vibes. Is that a compliment? Maybe.”

Nothing. Not even a twitch at the corner of his mouth.

We went on.

He explained sigma bonds like he was reciting sacred scripture. I listened, took notes, nodded at the right places. And I actually understood it. I really did.

But in between understanding and underlining, I couldn’t stop trying.

Trying to get something out of him.

A smile.

A smirk.

A badly-hidden laugh.

Just… anything.

“Hey,” I said halfway through a new diagram, casually flipping my pen between my fingers. “You ever notice how electrons and attraction kind of work the same way? Opposites pulling each other in? Sometimes violently?”

Oliver didn’t even look up. “Electrons don’t experience attraction. They’re negatively charged.”

“I know,” I said. “But if they could—you know one of them would fall for a photon.”

He paused. “That’s not how photons work either.”

I blinked. “Wow. You really know how to kill a metaphor.”

He nodded once. “That’s not a metaphor. It’s just incorrect.”

I dropped my head onto the table.

“Is this what rejection feels like?” I muttered into the wood.

He kept going. Just kept teaching.

Unbothered.

Unmoving.

Untouched.

He wasn’t cruel.

He wasn’t cold.

He just… existed on a different plane. One where compliments were data, flirting was noise, and charm was something to be observed, not absorbed.

Oliver blinked, then looked at the notes. “You drew this one correctly,” he said. “Your angles are improving.”

That shouldn’t have made my chest feel warm. But it did.

And that was the worst part.

Because I was falling—actually falling—and he?

He was just tutoring a boy who tried too hard.

Oliver’s voice was steady again. Precise. It was like listening to rainfall in a quiet cathedral—soothing, clear, and completely devastating.

“…and when the p orbitals overlap, that’s where the bonding happens,” he said, tapping his pencil once against the diagram on my notebook.

I nodded, copying it down. “Right—pi bond here, sigma below.”

He glanced at me. “Good. You’re getting it.”

I beamed. “Told you I’m a fast learner.”

But internally?

I was a catastrophe.

Because yes, I understood the bonds.

I understood that we were talking about electrons, and orbitals, and repulsion forces.

But I was also understanding—for the first time in my life—what it felt like to want to lick someone’s throat mid-lecture.

He leaned in again, explaining a set of molecular geometries. His head dipped low beside mine, so close I could feel the warmth of his breath when he exhaled—and gods, was I listening, really I was—but also?

My eyes were not behaving.

I was thinking about the slope of his neck, how it disappeared under the collar of that too-neat shirt.

About the veins on the back of his hand when he wrote, how one pressed faintly beneath the skin like it had a pulse of its own.

About his lips—his mouth—forming the word trigonal in a way that made me imagine things no self-respecting science major should be picturing at this hour.

“And this is the central atom,” he said.

Yes. I would like to be the central atom. Please apply all focus to me. Overlap all your orbitals right here.

“And these outer atoms form the angle—Kiet?”

“Yes?” I looked up, blinking. “Still with you.”

Oliver frowned. “You looked distracted.”

“I’m not,” I said quickly. Too quickly. “Just… concentrating hard. That’s my concentrating face.”

He gave a quiet nod, then returned to the diagram. No reaction. No curiosity. Not even a twitch.

Was he made of ice?

I leaned forward, just a little, so we were shoulder to shoulder now. The inside of my arm brushed his. His skin was cool. Or maybe mine was burning. Hard to say.

I could smell his cologne. Subtle. Clean. Unforgivable.

My imagination? Unsupervised.

I was thinking of how his mouth would look not saying words like “valence shell,” but instead murmuring things that had nothing to do with science and everything to do with what my knees would feel like around his hips.

I kept writing. Perfectly attentive.

My notes were immaculate. My lines were straight. My brain was filth.

He leaned closer again, reaching for the pen I’d dropped—because of course I dropped it—and bent forward to retrieve it. His arm brushed across my thigh as he passed it back, and I swear to Aphrodite, my soul left my body in a Gucci suitcase.

“Thanks,” I said, very calmly, while imagining what it would be like to climb him like a lab bench.

He blinked. “You're really focused today.”

I nodded. “Uh-huh.”

Oliver turned back to the notes, flipping to the next page in his booklet. “We’ll do hybridization next.”

I bit back a sound.

If he said “sp³” in that tone again, I was going to need an ice bath.

He tapped the page again. “Ready?”

I smiled sweetly. “Absolutely.”

Internally?

I was ready to sin.

Chapter Text

(Oliver’s POV) At the university
"He doesn’t know what he is—
but gods help me, I do.
And it’s everything I have always avoided."
- KIET THROUGH OLIVER'S EYES

It started normally.

“...So, the carbon atom undergoes sp³ hybridization,” I said, gesturing toward the diagram. “It forms four equivalent orbitals to bond with hydrogen.”

Kiet nodded. “Mhm.”

Still watching me.

Not the notebook. Me.

My brain flagged it. Noted it. Filed it. I continued. “Each orbital forms a sigma bond—”

Truth.

It hit like static in my teeth.

I flinched.

Not outwardly. But something in my focus stuttered.

He hadn’t said anything wrong. Not on the surface.

But underneath—

His mouth on my throat.
His hands on my hips.
My back arching into him.
Gasps. Heat. The word “yours” whispered into skin.

No.

I looked down at the page. Re-centered myself. I didn’t mean to open the channel. I never did it unintentionally. It usually required intention—focus.

But something about Kiet…

His voice. His proximity. His warmth next to mine like a gravitational anomaly.

It pried the door open.

He said: “Okay, I get it—sigma bonds here—”

My knees bracketing his hips.
His lips dragging across my chest.
Me, panting into his open mouth as he whispered, “You’re so unfair.”

I flipped the page.

Too fast. My knuckle brushed his. Heat bloomed from the contact like spilled ink. I heard him inhale.

“Right,” he said. “Let’s bond.”

Truth.

I bit the inside of my cheek so hard it might’ve bruised.

His thighs around my waist.
His hands fisted in my shirt.
A low, broken sound caught in his throat as I kissed down his stomach.

This was unbearable.

I risked a glance.

He was… smiling.

Genuinely proud of himself. Earnest. The kind of boy who looked at a star chart and tried to name them all by heart. Bright-eyed and beautiful and apparently completely unaware that he was turning every page of this study session into something anatomically indecent.

He leaned in to see the sketch I was drawing. His shoulder brushed mine. His knee bumped my thigh.

“You explain things really well,” he said.

Truth.

What if I kissed him right now?
Would he freeze? Would he melt?
Would he drag me into his lap and beg for more with his breath catching in the hollow of my neck?

I closed my eyes for half a second. Just long enough to pretend I wasn’t unraveling.

“Thanks,” I said, voice flat.

Kiet tilted his head slightly. “You okay?”

I want you to ruin me. Right here. Right now. In the name of science.

“Yes,” I said tightly. “Let’s continue.”

He nodded.

Chewed the end of his pen.

Truth.

Me pushing that pen out of his mouth with my thumb.
Replacing it with a kiss.
His soft noise of surprise turning into something darker.
My hand wrapped around the back of his neck.
Both of us forgetting what carbon even is.

I didn’t speak for a full minute.

My thoughts weren’t safe.

Not from him. Not from this.

Not when his every word came lined with hunger he didn’t voice—but felt.

And the worst part?

He wasn’t trying to hide it.

He didn’t even know he was leaking it.

Kiet leaned forward to circle something on my diagram. His breath hit my cheek. He smiled again.

“Am I doing okay?” he asked.

Truth.

I’d do anything to hear you say my name while I fall apart under you.

I nodded.

Turned the page.

Said nothing.

Because I was no longer sure I’d survive if he spoke again.

The diagram I was drawing was clean. Precise. Four carbon atoms, bonded in a tidy lattice. My lines were straight. My pen pressure consistent. Order. Discipline.

I needed it.

Desperately.

Because next to me sat chaos disguised as a boy.

Kiet was nodding as I explained the reaction mechanism—eyes on the page, mouth slightly parted like he was genuinely trying to follow my explanation of reaction intermediates.

And maybe he was.

But my Truthsense hadn’t stopped showing me the rest.

Truth:

I had him pinned to this same desk, one hand braced beside his head, the other trailing under his shirt as he whispered, “Oliver, I swear, if you stop now—”

I blinked hard. Focused on the paper.

Kiet pointed at the resonance arrows. “So this electron shift… it’s stabilizing the carbocation?”

“Exactly,” I said. “The positive charge delocalizes over—”

Truth:

My fingers in his hair.
Him gasping against my lips.
Me whispering, “Say it again. Say you need me.”

I gritted my teeth.

He was still watching me, bright-eyed and utterly oblivious to the chemical warfare happening in my skull.

I pointed at the next step. “Here’s where the nucleophile attacks. The lone pair—”

He nodded. “Like it’s reaching for something. Filling the empty space.”

Truth:

“Let me,” he was saying. “Let me take care of you. You always look so composed—what would you look like ruined?”

I couldn’t breathe.

He shifted his leg. His thigh brushed mine.

I didn’t move.

I couldn't.

My hand adjusted the paper slightly, grazing the edge of his. Just a second. Just—

And that was it.

A sound—barely a whisper—and then—

The diagram caught fire.

Instant.

Silent.

Bright.

Kiet yelped and shoved his chair back, nearly toppling it as he scrambled away from the desk. His notebook hit the floor. A pencil skittered under a chair.

I threw my hand over the flames and extinguished it in a blink, snapping a frost spell into place out of instinct. Smoke curled upward in thin grey wisps.

We stared at each other.

Silence.

His mouth was slightly open. Eyes huge. Breath coming fast. His fingers were still twitching.

“I—I didn’t mean to—” he choked out, horrified. “That just—happened—I wasn’t even—”

I didn’t say anything.

Couldn’t.

Because I’d felt it too. Not the heat. The build-up. The crackling charge under his skin. The raw, aching hum of too much something trying to stay contained.

Emotion. Energy. Desire.

And my touch had lit the match.

Kiet looked down at the scorched paper, then at his shaking hands, then at me.

“I swear, I don’t know what that was,” he whispered. “I don’t—I didn’t—”

He was spiraling. Frantic.

His magic had slipped.

And mine… was still humming under my skin in reaction.

Not because I was afraid.

Because he was powerful enough to have a visible effect over my suppression.

Kiet was still standing like the floor might vanish beneath him.

His hands trembled slightly at his sides, like they hadn’t been informed that the world had just tilted.

The scorched edge of the worksheet had curled like a dying leaf, black and fragile. The table still smelled faintly of ozone and sugar. And his magic—because that’s what it was now, not just coincidence or charisma—still lingered in the air, warm and reckless, like a sunbeam that had slipped through a crack it wasn’t supposed to fit.

He laughed, short and breathless. Not a real laugh. The kind people used when they were trying not to fall apart in front of someone hot.

“Oh my god,” he muttered. “You must think I’m insane.”

“You’re not,” I said evenly.

“Right. Because it’s normal to light your homework on fire with your emotions.”

He started pacing again, fast and wide like the panic needed a track to run on. “This is so embarrassing. You must think I’m some kind of cursed chemistry himbo—”

“You’re not cursed either.”

He stopped.

Blinking at me like I’d told him the moon was made of marmalade.

“But you must think I’m weird,” he said quieter now. “Like—you probably tutor a bunch of people and none of them spontaneously combust from proximity.”

“You’re not weird, Kiet.”

“You’re just saying that—”

“You’re not weird,” I repeated, sharp enough to interrupt whatever spiral his brain was drafting next. “Because you’re not human.”

Kiet stared.

Just. Stared.

The silence between us thickened, like the atmosphere had forgotten what air was for.

“I—sorry?” he said. “Come again?”

Chapter Text

“You’re not human. Not fully. You’re a demigod.”

He pointed at his chest like it had betrayed him.

“Me? Demigod? Me?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t even go to temples—”

“That’s not a requirement.”

“I failed biology.”

“Not relevant.”

“I burned a worksheet!”

“That part was your fault.”

His jaw dropped slightly, and he just stared at me like I was the professor in a dream he forgot to study for.

“I’m serious,” I said, keeping my voice calm. “You’re the son of a god. Probably one aligned with beauty, emotion, and love. Your magic’s been leaking since day one—drawing people toward you, warping the emotional atmosphere around you. That fire?” I nodded at the ashes. “Just the newest symptom.”

He sat down hard on the bench beside the desk, limbs folding like a marionette with a broken script. His hands curled into his sleeves.

“I’m hallucinating,” he whispered. “This is it. Academic psychosis. You’re too hot and my brain just cracked like an egg.”

“You’re not hallucinating.”

“I burned something.”

“You also made it rain.”

His head jerked up. “What?”

“Your last week here. Off-campus. The storm? That wasn’t weather. That was you.”

“I—I don’t remember doing anything.”

“You’d just left the shield I cast. You were emotionally overwhelmed—probably lonely, stressed, uncertain. All of that built up, and your magic reacted. The sky responded.”

He blinked fast. “Wait. Wait. Back up. Shield?”

“I cast a dampening shield around campus when I sensed your arrival,” I said. “To contain your magic. You were like a walking gravitational anomaly. It wasn’t fair. Everyone was being pulled toward you without understanding why. So I muted it. To give you space. Time.”

He stared at me like I’d spoken in ancient Greek.

“Wait. You cast that shield?”

“Yes.”

His breath hitched. “So—so you’re the boy from the east wing. The one from move-in day. I—I saw you once—”

“Briefly,” I said. “You didn’t notice me.”

Kiet’s hand pressed to his chest like something had just locked into place inside him.

“I thought I imagined you.”

“You didn’t.”

“Oh my god.”

He blinked down at his lap, voice dropping.

“…Do you think my dad adopted me?”

I blinked. “What?”

“Because if I’m not human, and he’s human, and my mom’s human—unless she’s not? Unless one of them lied—oh my god, what if I’m an orphan and my real parent is Zeus—”

“Okay,” I said, holding up a hand. “Slow down.”

“Do I get a prophecy?”

“No.”

“Are people gonna try to kill me?”

“Hopefully not.”

“Do I have to, like, go on a quest? Do I need a sword?”

“This isn’t a Rick Riordan book, Kiet.”

He narrowed his eyes. “Are you saying that because it is and you’re hiding it from me?”

“No,” I said. “I’m saying that because no one’s going to make you fight monsters in an abandoned amusement park.”

He hesitated.

“…But if I do get attacked,” he asked, entirely too seriously, “do I save myself or wait for a calling?”

I sighed. “You’re not going to get a calling. You’re not a phone plan. And for the record, being a demigod doesn’t make you invincible. It makes you… complicated.”

That seemed to land.

He sat quietly for a second. Then looked up again.

Then, softer: “Which god?”

“I don’t know. Not yet,” I said. “But the signs are obvious. Your magic responds to emotion. Weather patterns. Attraction. Beauty. I think it might be Aphrodite.”

He went completely still.

“The Aphrodite?”

“Yes.”

“So my mom is the reason my entire neighborhood developed crushes on me since I was born till a month back?”

I gave a small shrug. “Probably.”

“That explains so much.” He threw his hands in the air. “Why my dentist started giving me free cleanings. Why my aunt told me to model for her friend’s boutique. Why that old man at the tea stall used to just sob sometimes when I smiled at him.”

He groaned and buried his face in his hands. “This is so much worse than puberty.”

“They were never just drawn to your face, Kiet. They were pulled toward something much deeper. You radiate emotion. Want. Longing. Most people don’t know how to process it, so they romanticize it. Attach themselves to it. Project desire onto you and convince themselves it’s love.”

He exhaled like he’d just remembered how to breathe. “Oh my god. That’s why it stopped. After the first week. After orientation. Everyone just… backed off. I thought I was losing it. I thought I was going crazy—”

“No,” I said. “You were just safe. The shield worked.”

He laughed again, shaky this time, pressing the heels of his hands to his eyes.

“Oh my god. I’m not cursed. I’m just… sexy by divine default.”

“Unfortunately.”

He peeked at me between his fingers. “And you?”

“Athena,” I said. “Logic. Law. Strategy. I don’t cause storms. I clean them up.”

He stared like that explained way too much.

“Okay so—are we like—Percy Jackson rules?” he asked. “Are there monsters? Am I going to get a prophecy? Is someone going to try and stab me on my way to class?”

“Highly unlikely,” I said. “We’re not in Olympus. We’re not at war. Your biggest enemy right now is organic chemistry.”

“That’s fair,” he muttered.

“No quests. No campfires. Just magic and consequences.”

“And no letter from my divine parent?”

“Gods don’t write letters,” I said. “They give gifts. Sometimes attention. And if you’re unlucky, trauma.”

He squinted at me. “Cool. So the real ancient parent trap.”

“You’ll be fine,” I said. “You’re not alone.”

He swallowed. Looked down at the scorched paper again.

“You must think I’m so stupid.”

“No,” I said plainly.

“Why not?”

“Because stupid people don’t ask if their mortal dad adopted them because he failed biology.”

“…I still don’t get how a human and a god, like, you know—how does that even—”

I raised a brow. “If you’re that curious about god-mortal dynamics, Kiet, try seducing one. Then write a report.”

Kiet’s ears turned red.

“No thank you,” he said quickly. “Because I want you.”

I blinked.

My stomach did something it never did.

Kiet didn’t look away. He didn’t even pretend he hadn’t said it.

He just smiled—soft and stupid and sure.

It should’ve thrown me off.

But it didn’t.

Because, I already knew.

And the truth?

It was terrifying.

Not because he’d chosen me.

But because part of me, despite everything I was trained to suppress, was already starting to choose him back.

“Athena,” he repeated, eyes still too wide. “As in wisdom and war Athena? The Greek one?”

“Technically also logic and law,” I said, folding my hands again. “And yes. The Greek one.”

He stared at me like I’d just told him I was the moon in drag.

“And you just…” His voice dropped an octave, as if saying it louder might summon lightning. “Go here?”

“I study mostly,” I said. “Tutor when the professor threatens, but I’m looking for something.”

He made a breathless, wounded sound. “I thought you were just hot and mean.”

“I’m both,” I said simply.

That earned a laugh. A real one this time—strangled, startled, spilling from somewhere deep and chaotic inside him. He rubbed his face with both hands, as if he could manually restart his brain.

Then he dropped his hands and looked down at them. Palms open. Fingers twitching.

“So that fire…”

“You,” I said. “Barely controlled. Triggered by proximity, emotion, and a small collapse in composure.”

“And the rain?”

“You.”

“The entire friend group I made in under a week who were all like, ‘You’re so cool! I feel like I’ve known you forever!’”

I raised an eyebrow. “In the beginning it was our magic. Still leaking. But by now things should have got real.”

He stared at me. Longer this time.

Then, with a flicker of betrayal in his voice: “So you’ve been… babysitting me?”

“No,” I said evenly. “I’ve been giving you space.”

His breath caught. Just slightly.

He turned away and exhaled. The sound was sharp at the start, then shaky by the end. Like his body was trying to let go of something he didn’t even know he was carrying.

“So…” he said quietly. “What happens now? Do I… get locked in a temple? Join a cult? Start wearing togas? Please don’t make me wear a toga. I have shoulder anxiety.”

I fought the edge of a smile.

“Now,” I said, “you learn how to control it.”

“How?”

I met his gaze.

“I teach you.”

Kiet blinked. And for the first time since the fire, his panic wavered—stumbling for footing as something else took its place. Hope, maybe. Awe. A flicker of wonder trying to peek through the mess.

But under all of it… there was fear.

Not of me.

Of himself.

He didn’t know what lived inside him.

But I did.

I’d felt it before anyone else did. The moment he stepped on campus, the air had bent. Magic had stirred. And beneath all the charm, beneath the kindness, beneath the unintentional allure that radiated from his very skin—there was a pressure.

Something old.

Something waiting.

That was why I hadn’t walked away from the tutoring desk. Why I’d said yes when I could’ve easily said no. Why I’d endured every distracting look, every sinful thought flickering through his Truthsense-touched mind—images I could never unsee—while keeping my voice calm and my hands steady.

Because he wasn’t dangerous.

But he was powerful.

And power, without knowledge, without control, without purpose—could become something else entirely.

Even beautiful things could burn.

Especially beautiful things.

Chapter Text

His voice cut through my thoughts.

“So this is real?” he asked, softer now. “I’m not just some weird… fluke?”

I shook my head.

“No. You’re not a mistake. You’re a legacy.”

He looked at me like I was gravity, and he hadn’t realized until now that he was falling.

Then, with a little breath of a laugh: “This is so much.”

“It will be more.”

“And you’re sure I’m not gonna explode? Or set the school on fire?”

“You might,” I said dryly. “That’s why you’ll be supervised.”

“I’m not a hazard sign.”

“You literally are.”

He laughed again, tired and too loud. Then he went quiet, mouth tilted thoughtfully, eyebrows drawn, like I’d handed him a flaming scroll written in hieroglyphs and asked him to read it.

“I just…” he said, voice faltering. “How do I even know you’re telling the truth?”

I waited.

“I mean—how do I know this isn’t some elaborate prank? Like, the world's weird but it’s not that weird. I could be hallucinating. Or cursed by a cursed TA with a vendetta against late homework—”

“You’re not hallucinating.”

“You say that—”

I looked at him. Steady. Unblinking.

“You want proof?” I said quietly. “Fine.”

I adjusted my posture, as if settling into something older than the room.

“I can hear you.”

He blinked.

“Hear me? I haven’t said anything—”

“No,” I said. “But I’ve heard everything.”

I leaned in slightly. Not enough to touch. Just enough for the truth to land properly.

“When I was teaching you about sp³ hybridization, you said, ‘Okay, I get it—sigma bonds here.’ And right under that—”

I let the moment breathe.

“You imagined me on top of you. Kissing your chest. My hands on your hips.”

Kiet made a sound I couldn’t categorize. Possibly invented on the spot.

“You wanted to say, ‘Let’s bond,’” I added, tone clinical, “but what you meant was ‘I want your mouth on my skin while I forget how language works.’”

His jaw had dropped.

I wasn’t finished.

“When I showed you the molecule sketch? You leaned in so close your shoulder brushed mine. You smiled like you’d earned a sticker, and your mind whispered, ‘What if he kissed me right now?’”

His ears had gone red.

I tilted my head. Calm. Ruthless.

“You asked, ‘Am I doing okay?’ And under that question—truth. You wanted me to push your pen out of your mouth with my thumb and replace it with a kiss.”

He was rapidly combusting.

“I didn’t want to hear it,” I said. “I didn’t choose to. But I’m a child of Athena. I see the world as it is. Not just in facts and numbers, but in truths—raw and unsaid. Yours are… unusually loud.”

He slapped both hands over his face and groaned into his palms. “Oh my god.”

“Still think I’m making it up?”

He peeked through his fingers, horrified. “You’re so mean.”

“You were mentally calling me unfair while picturing me shirtless,” I said. “I consider this balance.”

He slid lower in his seat like he wanted to sink into the Earth’s crust. “This is a nightmare. I’m going to wake up and it’ll just be raining post-its and shame.”

“I don’t lie, Kiet,” I said gently. “I don’t need to.”

He sat in mortified silence for a moment.

Then, voice small: “You said I’m a demigod.”

“Yes.”

“How do you know?”

I paused. He looked so young right then. Not childish—just… cracked open. Stripped of his usual charm, blinking into the bright floodlight of identity.

“How do you know?” he asked again, softer this time.

I didn’t answer immediately.

Instead, I turned my left hand palm-up and flicked two fingers outward.

It was a small motion. Deliberate.

Like unhooking a lock.

The air in the room shifted.

Not metaphorically. Not emotionally.

Physically.

The suppression shield snapped—quiet and cold—like ice melting in reverse. Kiet didn’t see the shimmer peel away from the corners of the room, but he felt it. I saw it in the way his shoulders jerked. The way the hair on his arms rose. The way the breath caught in his chest like he’d just remembered something ancient.

I leaned in.

Closer than before.

Close enough to see the gold flecks in his eyes and the tiny divot in his bottom lip where he chewed it when nervous.

Close enough that if I tilted my head, our mouths would meet like the most dangerous hypothesis.

“Still unsure?” I asked, voice low. Velvet and steel.

He swallowed.

I let the smile bloom slowly.

Then, calmly, clinically—on purpose—I said, “You were imagining my hands under your shirt. Skin to skin. Heat rising with every kiss. And the sound you’d make when I finally got your thighs around—”

His pulse visibly jumped.

And that’s when it happened.

A chair burst into flame behind us.

So did the corner of my diagram. And a potted succulent on the windowsill, which, to its credit, tried its best to be brave about it.

Kiet gasped. “I didn’t—I didn’t mean to—”

I sighed and snapped my fingers in one quick motion.

Frost bloomed over the fires instantly, cracking and hissing as it smothered the flames. Cold radiated in soft waves, settling the air like a curtain being drawn shut. The room was silent again.

Kiet stared at me in horror. “I told you I was cursed—”

“You’re not cursed,” I said, standing straighter, trying to rebuild the wall of composure I’d deliberately let slip. “You’re just—”

I didn’t get to finish.

Because his fingers hooked into the front of my collar and yanked me down.

Hard.

And then he kissed me.

It wasn’t practiced. It wasn’t careful.

It was all heat and desperation and the kind of longing you don’t name out loud. His mouth moved like he’d been thinking about it for hours—which, to be fair, he had—and I froze for half a second before every cell in my body decided to rewrite the definition of clarity.

And in that second—

Something bloomed.

Not metaphor.

Actual blooming.

Dead flowers in the vase near the window erupted into color. Buds unfurled in a rush. A wilted stem snapped upright like it had remembered what sunlight was. And I felt it. All of it. That flicker of life leaping out of the floor, the windowsill, the air.

My power surged in response, confused and unprepared.

And for the first time in a very long time—so was I.

When we finally broke apart, my hand was still on his jaw. His eyes were bright, dazed. His lips slightly parted.

I pulled back slowly, as if trying to physically reassemble my entire internal architecture.

He looked euphoric.

I… did not.

Because I could feel the color in my face.

A blush.

I never blushed.

Ever.

Kiet tilted his head, absolutely glowing with post-chaos delight. “Still think I’m imagining things?”

I didn’t answer right away.

Instead, I straightened, adjusted the cuff of my sleeve, and—in one sharp motion—cast the shield back up.

It slid over the room like a net of cold silk. Kiet winced faintly as it passed through him, dampening his magic again, cradling the room in artificial calm.

But I didn’t meet his eyes.

Not yet.

Because my heart—so carefully kept in a citadel of logic—was rattling the gates.

“So you’ll train me?”

“I’ll guide you.”

“Same thing.”

“No,” I said gently. “I don’t give orders. I give you the choice.”

Kiet looked down at his hands again. Like he was seeing them for the first time. Like they were no longer just his—but something borrowed from a story older than language.

Then he looked up at me.

And for a moment, the noise in the world dulled.

“I choose yes,” he said.

Simple.

But something inside me still tilted.

Because there was a weight in that yes. A gravity. A beginning neither of us had planned for.

And the air… felt different now.

The bond had shifted.

This wasn’t tutoring anymore.

This was something far more sacred.

And infinitely more dangerous.

Chapter Text

I left the library in a daze.

I think I said goodbye. Maybe. My mouth had stopped working properly around the time Oliver casually whispered ‘that’ something obscene into my ear and I accidentally set three objects on fire. It's a blur.

The hallway felt longer than usual. Like the walls were stretching out just to mess with me. Every step echoed like it was narrating my descent into madness.

I kissed him.

No. Wait.

I kissed him and flowers bloomed.

Like—literally. A dead vine hanging from the lab window had suddenly gone full cottagecore on us. Petals. Buds. A freaking butterfly landed on the table like we were filming a perfume commercial.

And Oliver? He looked like someone had unplugged his entire personality for three seconds. Just wide-eyed, pink-cheeked, and—Gods help me—flustered.

I don’t think he’s been flustered since 200 BC.

My palms were still buzzing with leftover static. Not painful. Just... charged. Like my body hadn’t decided what to do with what just happened. My skin felt too tight. My thoughts were kaleidoscoping. I was walking like someone who’d forgotten how feet worked.

At some point, I ended up in my dorm.

Don’t ask me how. I couldn’t tell you what path I took. Couldn’t describe a single landmark. For all I know, I teleported here on sheer first love panic.

I shut the door behind me and slumped against it.

Then immediately laughed. Hysterically. The kind of laugh that people have before they either cry or discover religion.

“I’m a demigod,” I said aloud.

Then, again—louder.

“I’m a demigod?!”

The room remained unimpressed.

I ran a hand through my hair and stumbled over to the bed. Collapsed face-first. Groaned into the mattress.

I mean—sure. Things made sense now. Kind of. The magnetic weirdness I’d felt my whole life? The way people looked at me, even when I wasn’t doing anything? The storm that had followed me off-campus. The lightbulbs that flickered when I got too emotional. That one time a guy at a coffee shop had said, “You look like longing feels.”

Okay. Fine. That was maybe a clue.

But still.

This?

This was… different. Permanent. World-altering.

I rolled onto my back and stared at the ceiling. My heart hadn’t slowed down once since I left that table. Not since the kiss. Not since Oliver said—

You’re not weird. You’re not cursed. You’re a demigod.

I’d lived my whole life thinking I was just... intense. Emotional. Too much. Like I needed to apologize for taking up space.

And now?

Now I had a reason.

Now I had a name.

Son of a goddess.

Son of Aphrodite.

Suddenly, every weird interaction I’d ever had clicked into place like divine Tetris. The inexplicable attraction people had to me. The way strangers sometimes confessed things they hadn’t told anyone. The way Suda, May, and Juni had just gravitated toward me the day we met. That sense of warmth people said I carried with me.

It wasn’t charisma.

It was divinity.

My throat felt tight.

My dad had always said Mom was beautiful. That she was… distant, sometimes, but kind. He never gave me a name. Just said that she had left, and it had hurt too much to talk about.

Turns out she wasn’t just beautiful.

She was the actual goddess of love.

No big deal.

I pressed the heel of my hand to my forehead and stared at the ceiling.

And then—like an absolute clown—I thought of Oliver again.

The memory surged up like a wave: the brush of his knuckles against mine, the way his voice dropped when he said something filthy just to provoke me. The second I leaned forward, pulled him down by the collar, and kissed him like it was oxygen and I hadn’t breathed in years.

And then the flowers.

I made something bloom just by wanting him.

I buried my face in my hands.

“Oh no,” I whispered.

Because here’s the thing.

I should be freaking out about being a demigod.

I should be panicking about fire powers and lightning kisses and suppressed magic domes.

But instead?

I was lying here, thinking about Oliver.

Not just kissing him.

But what it would be like if he ever lost control.

I mean—I had scorched paper, rattled chairs, and made it rain just from feelings.

Oliver was the son of Athena.

Wisdom. Strategy. Cold, calculated, razor-sharp precision.

What happens when someone like that breaks?

What happens when he can’t hold it in?

What happens when his hands tremble? When his voice cracks? When he stops being composed and starts being desperate?

My brain: Don’t go there.

Also my brain: Imagine him shoving you against a wall with sparks crawling down his arms and whispering your name like a secret he’s never said aloud—

“Nope,” I said to the ceiling. “Absolutely not. We are not doing this.”

The ceiling had no comment.

I tried to breathe.

Tried to get my heart rate under 300 BPM.

Failed.

Instead, I curled sideways into a pillow, bit it for good measure, and whined into the cotton.

“I’m going to die,” I muttered. “I’m going to be emotionally annihilated by a sexy nerd with no facial expressions.”

Then I laughed again.

Soft. Real.

Because underneath the chaos, the confusion, the divine identity crisis—

I felt... light.

Like someone had peeled something heavy off me and I could finally move properly. Think clearly.

I wasn’t cursed.

I wasn’t broken.

I wasn’t even weird.

I was just powerful.

Untamed.

And—maybe—wanted.

I fell asleep sometime too soon, wrapped in thoughts of Oliver. And dreamt so hard that I didn’t even realise when Juni came back and claimed his bed.

Next day it was a normal morning.

If your definition of normal included learning the previous day you were a demigod, setting fire to a worksheet with your feelings, and kissing the emotionally unavailable son of a Greek goddess who then iced the entire desk and walked off like it was just another Tuesday.

So yeah.

Totally normal.

“He’s doing it again,” said May, poking her fork into her hash browns.

“He hasn’t blinked in like a full minute,” added Suda.

Juni leaned in, whispering, “You think it’s the tutor? He has been acting weird ever since he started getting extra lessons.”

I did not respond.

Mostly because I was currently gazing into my oatmeal like it might contain ancient prophecy, while mentally replaying yesterday’s kiss on loop. Like a pathetic, love-struck, weather-bending horndog with a spark problem.

Which, technically, I was.

Not that anyone knew that part.

Not that they could tell that my thoughts were currently:

• “Do demigods go on dates?”
• “Is there a hotline for magical crush control?”
• “What if I burn the library next time he looks at me like that?”

I was spiraling. In pink fluffy circles.

The dining hall doors opened.

And then—boom.

Oliver walked in.

Another perfectly-pressed shirt. Same clean lines, elegant posture, and icy composure like he’d been carved from a theorem. No visible change in expression. No post-kiss glow. Just calm, unreadable, infuriating serenity.

He got black coffee. A single hard-boiled egg. Two sugar packets.

Two. Again.

This man had kissed me, iced down my supernatural outburst, blushed, and now was acting like we’d shared a polite handshake.

My spoon missed my mouth entirely.

“Oh no,” muttered May. “He’s glitching again.”

I stood up abruptly, as if possessed by the ghost of dignity. “Bathroom,” I lied, and walked in the exact opposite direction of the bathroom, toward Oliver.

He spotted me. Of course he did.

And the absolute emotional sadist had the nerve to smile. Faintly. Like a breadcrumb of warmth that my heart promptly turned into a five-course meal.

“Good morning,” he said.

Good morning??

GOOD MORNING??

“You look well-rested,” he added, ever the subtle assassin.

“I—haha—slept,” I said. “Like a rock. A flaming, emotionally unstable rock.”

His brow arched.

I coughed. “I mean. A calm rock. Very grounded. Sedimentary. I’m composed.”

“I see,” he said. Dry. Precise. A verbal scalpel.

“Do you?” I asked, because I have no self-control.

There was a pause.

And then he smiled again.

I blacked out for two seconds.

When I returned to reality, we were walking toward my table. He set down his tray. My mortal friends all paused like NPCs sensing the arrival of the final boss.

Suda nudged May. May whispered, “That’s him.” Juni mouthed, “He’s even hotter up close.”

Oliver sat. Perfect posture. Hands folded like a dissertation was about to happen.

I sat across from him like a squirrel who just discovered fire.

“Hi,” I tried again. “How’s your coffee?”

“It’s fine.”

“That’s… wild.”

Suda choked on her orange juice.

May looked like she was taking mental screenshots of the conversation.

Oliver gave me a look so calm it made my blood pressure spike. “We have tutoring later,” he said.

“Right,” I said. “You. Me. Chemistry.”

He blinked.

“Oh god,” I muttered. “That sounded like a pick-up line. I meant—actual chemistry. The science. Molecules. Not the—feelings thing. Not that there’s feelings. Not that you’re not feel-worthy—”

“Kiet,” he said, gently cutting through my meltdown. “Library. After lunch?”

I nodded. Frantically. Like a bobblehead on the verge of emotional combustion.

He stood.

And because he’s a monster, he leaned in slightly as he picked up his tray.

“Try not to burn anything before then,” he said.

Then walked away.

Leaving me, my friends, and possibly several surrounding tables entirely deceased.

May was the first to break the silence.

“That wasn’t your tutor,” she whispered. “That was your final boss battle.”

“Did he say chemistry?” asked Suda. “Because I think he meant tension.”

Juni slowly passed me a napkin. “For the drool,” he said.

I lay my head on the table.

“He smiled,” I whispered into the laminate.

They did not comfort me.

They cackled.

Approximate exactly three hours 40 minutes and 32 seconds later I was facing Oliver in an empty dance practice room.

“Sit,” said Oliver.

Just that. One word. No inflection. Like he was addressing a particularly dumb magical racoon he was trying to domesticate or a chaos god who’d drunk 5 whole cans of Red Bull.

I sat. Cross-legged. Spine straight. Mentally vibrating like a shaken soda can. A good student, at least externally. Internally? Five seconds from emotional combustion and/or horny spiritual collapse.

Across from me, Oliver knelt like he was carved from marble and centuries of restraint. Hands resting lightly on his knees. Neck exposed just enough to suggest that the gods made him with malicious intent.

With a flicker or his left hand just like last time he removed the containment barrier.

“Close your eyes,” he said.

Chapter Text

“Sure,” I said.

I closed them.

And immediately regretted it.

Because the moment I dipped into the inky silence of my brain, it turned into a Dionysian film festival of filth. My treacherous subconscious, emboldened by stillness and proximity, served me the following:

—Oliver. Shirtless. In this exact position. But closer.
—His palm gliding up my thigh. Calm. Intentional.
—His voice, low and devastating: “You’re too distracted. Let me help.”

I inhaled too sharply.

“Breathe,” said Oliver.

I tried. I really did.

But now my brain was on a montage loop:

—Oliver tugging me into his lap.
—Oliver saying “focus” in a tone that melted bones.
—Oliver kissing me like it was a thesis statement.

“Stop,” I whispered.

“What?” he asked.

“Nothing,” I said, voice tight. “Just calming my mind.”

I peeked. One eye.

Oliver hadn’t moved.

But his head was tilted—just slightly. His expression unreadable, but… watching me too closely.

“Is it working?” he asked mildly.

Gods. No. Yes. Help.

I nodded.

“You’re not meditating,” Oliver said.

“I’m trying,” I said sweetly. “You’re just… hard to ignore.”

His brow ticked. Barely. But I caught it.

“Too many distractions,” he muttered.

And something about the way he said it—flat, precise, like he was trying too hard—made me pause.

And then I knew.

He could feel it.
He was seeing my thoughts.

Oh.

Oh.

Oh that’s what this is.

I bit back a grin that had no business being this smug.

“You okay?” I asked, as innocent as honey-covered sin.

Oliver shifted.

His jaw clenched. Subtle. But there.

And—yes. That was a blush ghosting across his cheekbone.

Interesting.

“Focus,” he said, clipped.

I hummed. “Trying. But it’s hard when my teacher’s this hot.”

—Flash: Me crawling into his lap, breath catching in his ear as I say, “Teach me slowly.” His hands tightening on my hips. My teeth grazing his throat. The sound he makes when I bite down—

He twitched.

Left eyelid. Classic microexpression of psychic distress.

His gaze dropped—for half a second—to my mouth.

And I knew.

He’d seen it.

All of it.

Me, panting into his kiss, arms wrapped around his neck like I’d never let go. Him saying “mine” like it was fact, not desire. My thighs bracketing his waist. That look he’d give me right before breaking something holy—

“Truth,” he muttered under his breath like a curse.

I blinked. Smiling. “What was that?”

“Nothing,” he snapped too fast.

“Oh no, Professor,” I purred, leaning forward just enough to test the perimeter of his sanity. “You don’t get to withhold feedback. You said we should be honest during training.”

“You are… extremely honest.”

“Too much?” I fluttered my lashes. “Would you prefer I lie?”

—Flash: Me dragging him onto the floor and whispering “Punish me for it.” The groan he lets out when I say his name. My fingers slipping beneath his shirt. The burn I leave across his back—

Oliver didn’t speak.

Because just then, a vein in his neck ticked. His fingers flexed sharply. He still wasn’t meeting my eyes.

He couldn’t.

I knew what he was doing.

He’d opened the channel. Truthsense. He was listening—not to my words, but to what lived beneath them.

And underneath?

Well.

That was fire, friction, unholy hunger, and possibly a divine HR violation.

I watched his ears flush.

Perfect.

“Oh dear,” I said, soft as silk. “Am I distracting you?”

“Kiet,” he said tightly.

That voice.

Low. Sharp.

But shaking.

And it didn’t scare me. Not anymore.

Because for once—I had the upper hand.

“Relax,” I said, mimicking his earlier tone like a mock prayer. “Close your eyes. Center yourself. Think pure thoughts.”

—Flash: Me straddling him in the dark, our breath fogging between kisses. His fingers tangled in my hair. My lips tracing the edge of his jaw, whispering, “Let’s meditate on this.”

He glared.

I added sweetly, “I’m just a good little student trying to find inner peace.”

He stood.

Fast.

Like he’d been yanked upward by divine panic.

I laughed. Loud, delighted, and far too pleased with myself.

He turned away. His shirt had bunched slightly at the back, and he tugged it down like it would anchor him. Hide him.

But I’d already seen the way his hands had trembled.

“Training over?” I asked, smug as sin and still fully cross-legged like a victorious demon.

“No,” he said, turning back.

Voice flat. Mask back up.

But he didn’t deny a single word.

Didn’t refute a single image.

Didn’t say “you’re imagining things.”

Which meant—

I was winning.

And I’d burn the whole room down before I let him forget it.

But I tried.
I swear, I did.

After Oliver stood, glared, then returned to his cold, impassive marble statue routine, I took a deep breath and sat back up.

He sat across from me again—controlled. Straight-backed. All quiet elegance and Athena-bred composure.

I was determined to match it.
Control. Stillness. Focus.

Right.

I closed my eyes.

Inhaled.

Exhaled.

Imagined Oliver saying: “Take it slow.”

Gods, no. Focus. Think of rocks. Dirt. Quiet temples.

Oliver’s fingers trailing over my stomach. Me, breathless. His lips brushing my ear as he whispered, “I want to see you lose it.”

Lightning cracked outside.

Wait.

I opened one eye.

Oliver was still still. But his gaze had lifted slightly, like he was sensing something.

I tried again. Swallowed hard. Shut my eyes.

Inhaled.

Exhaled.

Oliver unbuttoning my shirt. Me arching beneath him. “Kiet,” he groaned. “Do not speak.”

A low rumble rolled across the ceiling.

“What the hell,” I whispered.

“What in the world—” Oliver said.

I opened both eyes—and that’s when I saw it.

Above me. Gently spinning, lightly sparking. A miniature cloud. Floating right over my head. It glowed faintly pink. Pink, because of course it did. And as it swirled, it rained—soft, fragrant petals. Roses. Lavender. Cherry blossoms.

My thoughts had conjured a literal horny thundercloud.

Oliver stared at it like he’d just been handed an unsolvable equation.

I winced. “So. That’s new.”

“What,” he said slowly, “were you thinking just now?”

I opened my mouth.

“Don’t,” he said immediately. “Don’t answer that.”

“But—”

“Don’t speak.”

The cloud pulsed once. A stray spark drifted lazily into the carpet and singed the corner of my sock.

“Okay,” I said.

And immediately—

FLASH.

—Oliver’s hand pinning both of mine above my head. Lightning flashing outside the windows as he whispered my name like a warning. Me, half-laughing, half-melting beneath him, legs tangled around his waist. "What now, Professor?" I asked, and he just smirked—then kissed me like we were born for ruin.

The cloud sparked.

Boom.

A thunderclap so loud, a light fixture flickered.

Oliver jerked backward like I’d slapped him.

“I told you not to speak,” he said, voice strangled. Genuinely, genuinely rattled.

“Oh no,” I said, eyes wide with mock horror. “Did you—see that one too?”

He didn’t answer.

His ears were so red, it looked like someone had painted embarrassment across his whole upper body.

I gave him my brightest, most innocent smile. “Maybe I should keep talking. You know. In the name of divine feedback.”

“You’re going to be the end of me.”

He wasn’t wrong.

But even I was starting to see the problem now. That cloud—however pretty—was not supposed to exist.

My magic was flaring too easily. Too unfiltered. I’d summoned weather with my brain just because I imagined Oliver saying my name in a certain way.

I sat back, the humor draining a little.

“You were right,” I muttered.

Oliver looked up, caught off guard. “About what?”

“I need to learn control.” I pointed upward. “I mean… that? Imagine we are mid make out and suddenly it begins to rain above us.”

He gave me a defeated expression then looked at the cloud. It was starting to fizzle. The petals were slowing down. The air smelled like roses and wild lilies.

Then he looked at me.

Longer this time.

Something behind his expression shifted. Not cold. Not annoyed. Not even exasperated.

Just… quietly determined.

“You will,” he said simply.

“You sure?”

“I have to be,” he replied, echoing what he’d told me before.

And for the first time all morning, he didn’t look annoyed or flustered or like he was mentally trying to escape this room.

He looked like he believed it.

He looked at me like I wasn’t doomed or defective or some chaos gremlin in a hoodie.

He looked at me like I was worth teaching.

I exhaled.

The cloud disappeared with a soft pop.

And maybe, for a second—

So did the chaos.

(Not the horny part, though. That was very much still in the room.)

Chapter Text

It started with an ice cube.

Not because I was bored. Not really.

I mean, maybe I was a little bored—it was supposed to be a break between lectures, and we were sitting in the most aggressively silent corner of the campus garden: a shady alcove that smelled like overwatered herbs and old spellbooks. Oliver had his legs crossed, one ankle tucked behind the other, a thick volume open in his lap like it had never betrayed him emotionally. He looked like he belonged in a sculpture museum, not a university. Still as a thought you weren’t supposed to say out loud.

And me?

I had nothing except a half-melted iced coffee, a dangerously flirtatious mood, and the inexplicable urge to find out what it would take to make him react.

So I rolled an ice cube down my wrist.
Slow. Deliberate.
Let it trail a shiver across my skin, then pause right at the bend of my elbow, where I knew the sun hit just right.

“They say,” I said lightly, “that if you’re cold-blooded, watching someone do this won’t affect you.”

I didn’t even look at him as I said it. I felt his gaze, though—sharp, assessing, and gone too quickly. When I finally turned my head to catch his expression, he was already looking away. Calm. Blank.
Like the moment hadn’t just happened. Like I hadn’t just tested the emotional reflexes of a mythborn logic engine with ice and forearm veins.

I smiled like it was nothing. Like I hadn’t just thrown my dignity into the nearest magical compost pile.
But inside?

Inside, I was spiraling through twenty tabs of ancient flirtation tactics, mythic psych theory, and at least three articles titled “How to Tell If He’s Emotionally Repressed or Just Greek”.
Because honestly? I didn’t know what I was hoping for.
A twitch of a smile? A sharp inhale? A lightning strike?
Something. Anything.

But instead?

Oliver turned the page of his book with maddening elegance and said, without looking up,

“You’ll catch a cold doing that.”

Which could’ve meant:

• “I noticed.”
• “Stop that, you’re distracting me.”
• “I care about your health, you disaster.”

Or possibly:

• “I am an unfeeling marble statue and you’re humiliating yourself.”

Unclear.

I went back to sipping my coffee like it didn’t taste like disappointment and melted ego.

But then.
Then.
He added, a few seconds later—quietly, too casually:

“Though I suppose that depends on how warm-blooded your… audience is.”

And just like that, I was back at square one. Or square negative seventy-five. Because that? That sounded like a flirt. That sounded like banter. But with Oliver, everything sounded like a metaphor. Or a threat. Or a quote from a 2,000-year-old scroll I’d never read.

I turned my head again. His lips weren’t smiling, but they weren’t not smiling.

I wanted to ask him outright—Was that a joke? Were you affected? Was the ice cube a success or do I need to start juggling fire next?

But instead, I just laughed softly and tipped the glass back again.

And thought,
Gods, what if he’s flirting back and I just don’t speak his language?

Or worse.
What if he’s not—and I just really, really want him to be?

Either way…
I was in deep.

Three days later tutoring again.

The air smelled like coffee grounds and overachieving. The room was too bright, too quiet, and I was about two minutes from either crying or proposing. I hadn’t decided yet.

Oliver sat across from me, all sharp lines and soft disinterest, annotating our reading with the kind of precision that felt like a personal attack. His handwriting was the kind of neat that looked like it had judged mine before I even picked up my pencil. Every motion was deliberate. No wasted effort. No twitch. No fidget. Just quiet, unbearable excellence.

And then it happened.

I “accidentally” grabbed his pen.

To be fair, there was another pen nearby. My pen. Basic, slightly chewed, obviously loved within an inch of its life. But I ignored it with the skill of someone who knew exactly what he was doing and had no shame about it.

His pen, in contrast?

Warm.

Not just from his fingers, though that didn’t help. It was the kind of warmth that felt earned, like it had absorbed the energy of sleepless nights and ancient intellect. It was heavier than mine too—metal, expensive, unnecessarily elegant. Like something you’d use to sign treaties or love letters. Or both.

It smelled faintly of… thunderclouds. And control. And ink that probably cost more than my monthly data plan.

I twirled it between my fingers like it meant nothing.
Bit the cap like a man trying to pretend he wasn’t overanalyzing the taste of divine pressure.
Leaned into the moment with all the subtlety of a flaming chariot.

“You always smell like expensive paper and withheld affection,” I murmured, aiming for playful. Teasing. Normal.

He looked up.

One glance.
Measured. Calm. Annoyingly unreadable.

Then he said, “Keep it.”

Just like that. Like the sentence had no weight. Like the pen wasn’t still warm from his hand. Like he hadn’t just handed me an object now destined to live in its own climate-controlled shrine.

I wish I could tell you I didn’t read too much into it.

But I did.

I do.

Is it a gift? A dismissal? A quiet insult wrapped in politeness? Or—gods help me—is it a tiny, precious window into something he doesn’t know how to say aloud?

Because what kind of person gives someone a pen mid-conversation with that look?
What kind of Athena-birthed, emotionally frigid demigod says “Keep it” with such maddening composure and then goes back to tutoring like nothing happened?

I pretended it was no big deal. Just nodded. Kept writing. But my grip on the pen was maybe a little too gentle. Like I didn’t want to press too hard and lose the fingerprint of him on it.

That night, I didn’t just toss it into my pencil case like a normal person.

No. I wrapped it in a tiny piece of velvet I found in a drawer. The kind that once held jewelry or rare coins. And I tucked it into the corner of my bag like a relic.

Sometimes I joke about it. Call it “The Holy Pen of Olympus.” Make dramatic gestures when I pull it out. Say things like, “My to-be-boyfriend gave me this,” just to see if anyone notices the tremble in my voice when I say boyfriend.

But I don’t mean it as a joke.

Not really.

Because no one’s ever given me something so casually and meant it like that before.
Or maybe they have. But none of them were him.
None of them had eyes like a thunderstorm held at bay by sheer will.
None of them ever made silence feel like a riddle I wanted to solve.

And even if he meant nothing by it—if it was just a pen, just a moment—
I’ll keep it anyway.

The next week started with natural romance.

Literally.

We were sitting outside.

Somewhere quiet, warm, still. The kind of afternoon that made everything golden around the edges—sunlight flickering through leaves like it had a secret, and shadows stretching long and soft on the pavement between us.

He sat beside me on the stone bench. Not too close, not too far. Just far enough that I could pretend not to want to lean in. Just close enough that I noticed the way the wind moved his shirt, but not his expression.

I had been talking about something—I think. Small talk. Midterms. The campus cats. Or maybe I was just filling the air with words so I wouldn’t have to sit in silence with the feeling of him.

That’s when it happened.

A bird landed on my shoulder.

Like I was a statue. Or a forest spirit. Or… I don’t know, someone who belonged. Its feet were soft, light as breath. It cocked its head at me, curious. Like it knew something I didn’t.

I tried to laugh. Tried to play it cool.
“Even wildlife thinks I’m ethereal,” I joked, brushing my hair back. “What about you?”

It was meant to be teasing. Harmless.

He didn’t smile.

He didn’t roll his eyes.

Instead, his voice—barely more than a thought, not cold but not warm either—slipped between us:

“I noticed you before the bird did.”

And that was it. Just that. Nothing more.

But my world stopped. Just for a second.

I looked at him. He wasn’t looking back. His gaze had already drifted somewhere distant, like the sentence had never been said. Like it had fallen out of him by accident.

Was it just an observation?

Was he being… factual?

Was it—could it be—something else?

I didn’t ask. Of course I didn’t ask. I just laughed again, softer this time. Closer to real. Closer to hope.

But something in me shifted.

It’s the kind of line you replay in your head at 3 a.m., like a haunting. Like a maybe. I keep turning it over, hoping I’ll catch it from the right angle and it’ll reveal its true form.

Was it a compliment in disguise?

A warning?

A glitch in his carefully calibrated indifference?

I wish I knew what he meant. I wish I knew what I meant.

Because sometimes I think I’m flirting.

And sometimes I think I’m confessing.

And sometimes I think I’m just trying to find proof that he sees me too.

Even if he only says it once. Even if it’s only ever in the silence between sentences.

Chapter Text

Two days later I forgot my tea.

It doesn’t sound like much. And maybe it isn’t. But for me—it’s rare.

Tea is my ritual. My rhythm. My small daily spell to stay grounded, stay soft. I pick the flavor based on my mood. Chamomile when I’m anxious. Green when I’m pretending to be productive. Jasmine when I’m a little in love with the idea of being in love.

But that day, I’d forgotten. My focus was scattered—probably orbiting someone with dark hair and a painfully unreadable face.

I didn’t even realize it until I saw it in front of me. A paper cup. Warm. Familiar.

I blinked.

He didn’t make a show of it. Didn’t clear his throat or wait for a thank-you. He just placed the tea beside my notebook like it had always belonged there.

“You forget too often.”

Not accusing. Not gentle. Just… factual. As if he were naming the color of the sky.

But I froze.

Because he noticed.

And more than that—he acted on it.

Not with drama. Not with a smile. Just that steady presence of his, like he was half-human, half-clockwork, and this tiny gesture had simply aligned with some quiet logic in him.

And yet—I felt it like a thunderclap.

People say the little things matter. I don’t think most of them mean it.

But I do. I always have.

Because the little things are the real things. The realest things. The ones no one’s taught to look for but everyone secretly hopes someone else sees.

I looked at the cup for a long time before I touched it. My fingers grazed the lid like it might vanish.

The tea was perfect. My usual order. No sweetener. A whisper of lemon.

I drank it slowly. Not out of caution, but reverence. Like I could sip my way into understanding what this meant—if it meant anything at all.

I kept glancing at him. He didn’t look back. He was already reading again, pen tapping softly against the table. Like he hadn’t just rewired my entire afternoon.

Did it matter to him? Did I matter?

Or was this just another blip in his logic map, a line of code in the equation of politeness?

Because to me—it was enormous. A quiet offering from someone who rarely, rarely, offers anything at all.

And I don’t know if it meant something to him.
But I know it meant something to me.
And maybe that’s enough.
Maybe it’s allowed to be.

By the third week I should have accepted I was delusional.

But then I caught him watching me in a hallway mirror.

I don’t know how long he’d been looking.

The corridor was one of those quiet ones—half-lit, echoey, a strange little pocket of time between classes. I was smoothing down my shirt, adjusting my hair, glancing sideways at the wall-length mirror when I noticed it.

His eyes.

Not in a way that made sense. Not a passing glance. Not the usual vague scan people do when they see a reflection.

No—he was watching me. Focused. Still.

And for one glorious, trembling second, I thought: Maybe he’s admiring me.

I turned, smiling like I wasn’t panicking internally, and asked the question with the lightest, most infuriatingly casual tone I could manage:

“Were you admiring me?”

He didn’t blink. Just:

“Checking for symmetry.”

Symmetry.

As if I were a geometry assignment.

As if that were a normal thing to say to someone whose heartbeat just slammed into their ribcage like a kicked door.

But—and this is where I lose all grip on reality—there was a flicker. Barely there. A half-second twitch of his lips. Not a full smile, no. That would’ve been too merciful. Just the idea of one. Like his mouth briefly considered joy and then retreated.

But it was there.

It was real. Right?

I laughed, because that’s what I always do—wrap my longing in lightness and pretend it doesn’t weigh a thousand pounds. Then I leaned against the wall once he walked away, heart racing, skin buzzing like I’d just touched static.

I told myself not to spiral. Not to read into it.

But of course I did.

Of course I still am.

What was that look? Was it amusement? Fondness? Quiet horror? Is “checking for symmetry” just something he says when he panics? Was I glowing weirdly under the fluorescent lights? Did he think I looked ugly-symmetrical or Greek-statue-symmetrical?

Did he even know he was staring?

Was it one of those moments where someone doesn’t realize they’ve been looking until they get caught?

Or—and this is the deep end of delusion, I’m diving in headfirst—what if he meant it?

What if that flicker of a smile wasn’t sarcasm or reflex, but proof? Proof that beneath all his logic and distance, he sees something in me worth looking at. Worth softening for.

Sometimes, when he speaks, I feel like he’s a million miles away, thinking in numbers and code and stars I can’t touch.

And then there are these… moments. Glitches in the system. Where his gaze lingers. Where his hands brush mine longer than necessary. Where a pen becomes a message. Where a tea becomes a signal.

And in those moments, I wonder:

Does he see me? Or am I just staring so hard that I’ve mistaken my own reflection for a connection?

I wish I knew.
I wish I could stop guessing.
But also… I think I need to keep guessing.
Because the hope is addictive.
Because every glance feels like a maybe.
And a maybe from him feels better than a yes from anyone else.

Just like that our fates seemed to keep getting more intertwined and I could feel myself fall deeper into my own world of Oliver.

The 17^th day (yes I’d been counting) I dropped my textbook. Bent down slowly, because... well, I’m still me.

When I stood up, I caught his eyes flick down. Brief. Calculated. Like a diagnostic scan.

“You should be more careful,” he said.

I laughed it off, like I always do. But for the rest of the day, I kept wondering—

Was it concern? Attraction? Disapproval?

He never said anything else. And I didn’t ask.

WEEK 4 Day 21:

It was freezing. I forgot my scarf.

He didn’t say a word—just tossed his own over my shoulders. Soft wool. Heavy with meaning I can’t confirm.

“So I’ll return this next time?”

“Keep it.”

And maybe that was practical. Maybe that’s just who he is—efficient, minimal, logical.
But maybe it wasn’t.
Maybe he noticed I was cold and wanted me to be warm. Maybe he didn’t want me to leave just to stay comfortable. Maybe he… cared.

I wear the scarf now more than I should. It’s ridiculous. But it’s something that came from him, freely.

Day 23:

I fell asleep on my book.

Woke up with a blanket over my shoulders. A sticky note on page 47:

“You drooled. I saved your dignity. –O.”

It wasn’t teasing. It wasn’t mocking. Just… factual. Quietly kind.

He didn’t have to do that. He could’ve just walked away.

But he didn’t. And that matters to me more than I think I’m ready to admit.

Day 26:

I said something stupid. I always do.

“I’d let you ruin me like a poorly written thesis.”

And he smirked. Barely.

“You’re mistaken,” he said when I called it out.

I wasn’t. I know what I saw.

But maybe I also know better than to push it. Not yet.

Still… that smile stayed with me. Not because it was proof. But because it felt like he was letting something through, even if he didn’t know how.

Day 28:

I went too far. I think I knew I would.

“Careful, Oliver. If you keep looking at me like that, I’ll think you like me.”

His voice was calm. But there was something behind it. Something sharp.

“You should be careful. Some people are more dangerous to fall for than others.”

I laughed. It was nervous. Reflexive. “So you are admitting I could fall for you?”

He looked at me. Really looked. And said:

“I’m saying you already have.”

I walked away. I needed to. I didn’t want him to see how much that shook me.

I still don’t know what he meant. But I think it might be the most honest thing either of us has said.

And just like that a month went by with me falling deeper and harder.

I don’t know if he feels what I feel.

He hasn’t said anything. He probably won’t. And I’m still not sure if I want answers, or just… possibilities.

But every morning, he brings me tea.
Two cups. Always two.

He never says why.

And I never ask.

But I think—I hope—that maybe he’s not as unreadable as he seems.

Maybe something’s growing, quietly, in the spaces between words.

Maybe he’s not falling. But maybe… maybe he’s leaning.

And I’ll be here. Just in case.

Chapter Text

A week had passed since I’d crossed paths with Oliver again. So I was just standing there. 

Okay—lingering. 

Okay okay—existing in the general vicinity of where Oliver just so happened to be finishing a conversation with a professor near the courtyard.

Coincidence.

Probably.

Fine.

Not coincidence. Shut up.

Look, it wasn’t like I planned this. I’d left the dining hall early, figured I’d loop around the quad, maybe catch a little sun and definitely not think about the way Oliver’s hand brushed mine that day like it was nothing when actually I’m still internally screaming.

And yet.

There he was.

Across the courtyard by the fountain, all pressed-collar elegance and soul-wrecking stillness. His dark button-up was neat enough to break rules. His hair was… criminal. Like he’d walked through a breeze full of secrets and let it flirt with him.

I didn’t move. Not right away.

I didn’t need to. The ache in my chest was already doing laps.

He looked… good. Unbothered. Like the kiss, the training, the cloud I accidentally summoned yesterday—none of it had touched him at all. Like I was the only one still lying awake at night, staring at the ceiling, thinking: What did I do to deserve this beautiful emotionally-constipated war tactician as my academic tormentor-slash-possible soulmate?

I was halfway through debating whether I could walk past him and accidentally catch his attention (without being weird, obviously), when he appeared.

The other one.

The new guy.

Tall. Lean. A jawline carved by the gods and probably from one. Dark hair, wind-swept and arrogant. Jewelry. Leather. Swagger. And a grin like he’d stolen fire and dared someone to punish him for it.

He approached Oliver like he’d been born walking toward him.

Like he belonged there.

I felt my stomach drop.

The guy said something—I was too far to hear—but Oliver turned.

And then—he smiled.

Not a polite twitch. Not the little smirk he sometimes used when teasing me about melting my own worksheet.

A real smile.

With teeth.

I forgot how to blink.

I forgot how to stand.

Because the last time I saw that expression, it had been directed at me. And now—this Hermes-coded poetry-thief was getting it like it was easy. Like Oliver smiled for free.

The guy brushed Oliver’s sleeve.

And Oliver didn’t flinch.

Worse—he leaned in.

Barely. Just a tilt.

But I knew Oliver. I knew his lines. His borders. I’d studied them by heart like scripture.

That shift wasn’t nothing.

It was invitation.

And I—

My stomach dropped.

And my mood?

Shifted.

Capital S. Bolded. Underlined. Possibly accompanied by a lightning bolt and a small mental breakdown.

It started small.

A flicker under the skin. Like someone had whispered jealousy into my bloodstream and then stirred it with a cocktail straw. A restless pressure coiled behind my ribs, tight and wild, like a wind-up storm trapped in my lungs. My fingertips buzzed like live wires.

The air changed.

That ancient, pre-storm hush that makes animals run and hair stand on end. The wind coiled around my ankles like a nosy, emotionally-attuned cat. I could feel the shift—not just in the atmosphere, but in me.

Then the clouds arrived.

Fast.

Thick.

Aggressively dramatic.

I didn’t call them.

But my magic?

It had thoughts. Feelings. A flare for the theatrical.

Across the quad, Oliver’s conversation stuttered.

The Hermes boy—tall, smug, probably smelled like cinnamon and chaos—glanced up. His smirk grew like the weather was just another inside joke he’d started. “Huh,” I imagined him saying. “Weird weather.”

You’re weird weather, I didn’t say. But only because I was too busy suppressing the violent urge to rip the charm off his pretty neck and eat it out of spite.

Oliver didn’t look up.

Didn’t have to.

He felt it.

I knew the second his posture shifted. The quiet awareness of a man whose field had just been breached—whose magic, normally airtight, was reacting to mine.

He turned.

And those eyes—those infuriating, beautiful, precise eyes—locked onto me.

His expression didn’t change.

Not visibly.

But something in the air tightened. The fabric between us pulled taut, like the universe had just remembered we were tethered.

And then it happened.

His hand twitched—barely. But the shimmer at his fingertips flared.

His magic reached out.

Silent. Controlled. Commanding.

And like flipping a switch—

The clouds above me stuttered.

Twitched.

And vanished.

Gone.

Just like that.

The thunder silenced mid-growl. The rain stopped, evaporating on impact. My impromptu emo weather concert? Canceled by divine order.

I blinked.

The sky above me was suddenly, suspiciously blue.

A soft warmth settled across my shoulders, like someone had reprogrammed the sun to gaslight me.

Students around the quad glanced up vaguely, but no one screamed. No one panicked.

The shield was still working.

Oliver had done that.

Subtly.

Perfectly.

He had covered for me.

He’d felt me losing control from across the courtyard and snuffed it out with a flick of his hand. Like it was easy. Like he’d done it before.

And yet—he still hadn’t looked away.

Hermes boy was saying something again, leaning in. His fingers brushed Oliver’s sleeve again.

I watched Oliver’s eyes narrow.

Not at the guy.

At me.

Because he knew what I’d done.

He’d felt it.

And he’d handled it—not with annoyance. Not with anger.

But with ownership.

A quiet, restrained sort of mine.

My lungs squeezed.

Because if there was one thing more destabilizing than unfiltered divine jealousy…

…it was being caught in the act, and protected anyway.

The Hermes boy finally followed Oliver’s line of sight.

To me.

His smirk twitched like it was about to say something clever and deeply punchable.

Then—he saw me.

Not just with his eyes.

With his magic.

I felt it—subtle, like a breeze running fingers over my skin. Not quite threatening. Just... probing.

Oh.

So this was that Olympus-tier magical scan I’d heard about. The kind that filtered through your emotion like a bloodhound on divine steroids.

He was testing me.

Which would’ve been fine—except when his magic brushed mine, it bounced.

Not slid. Not seeped. Bounced.

Like static off a live wire.

He blinked.

Just once.

Then his expression sharpened, grin flickering with something... intrigued. Something calculating.

“Well, well,” he said, voice pitched high enough that I could barely hear it across the courtyard. “That one’s not mortal, is he?”

Oliver didn’t answer.

Which was itself an answer.

Hermes Boy turned back to him, eyes practically glowing with interest. “You didn’t mention you had a stray.”

“Don’t,” Oliver said, voice cool enough to frost glass.

Hermes raised both hands in mock surrender. “Hey, I’m just saying—he’s giving off waves. And they’re not mortal, that’s for sure.”

He looked at me again. This time, longer. His smile changed—less charming now. Hungrier. The way someone looks at an unopened lock they really want to pick.

“So what is he?” he called across the courtyard. “Satyr? Naiad? Unregistered legacy?”

I didn’t answer.

Because I could feel his magic.

He was doing it again—this time, actively. Not just a scan. A pulse.

A charm.

A compulsion.

Something low-level and honey-slick, meant to make people like him.

Mortals would’ve melted.

My knees locked instead.

Because it didn’t work.

The magic hit me and slid off like water on oil. It knew I didn’t belong in the “easy target” category.

His eyes widened slightly.

And for the first time—he looked a little less smug.

“Aphrodite?” he guessed. “No, wait—he’s got too much edge. Dionysus? Ares?”

He turned back to Oliver. “You’ve been holding out on me.”

Oliver didn’t blink. “He’s mine.”

Chapter Text

The words were sharp.

Not tender.

Not romantic.

Just fact.

An equation spoken aloud. An answer delivered with surgical precision.

I blinked.

So did the Hermes guy.

“Oh,” he said. “That kind of arrangement.”

“Not an arrangement,” Oliver corrected, voice like velvet over knives. “He’s under my instruction. Training. Protected.”

“Right.” The guy’s mouth twisted into a smile with too many meanings. “Protected.”

He looked back at me one last time.

This time, his eyes swept over me slowly.

Me, standing under the now-spotless sky. The last curl of magic still clinging to my fingertips like smoke after a fire. My pulse still racing.

He saw it.

The potential.

The danger.

And—for a half-second—the threat.

“Well,” he said, too breezy. “I’ll be on campus for a few days. Maybe I’ll get a proper introduction.”

“You won’t,” Oliver said.

The guy laughed and finally stepped away, trailing that smug-casual charm like spilled cologne.

Oliver watched him go.

Then turned back to me.

Expression still unreadable.

But his fingers—slightly curled at his sides—crackled faintly with restrained energy.

Then Oliver was striding toward me.

Measured. Graceful. The kind of walk that said I have never tripped in my life and neither have any of my ancestors.

I stood my ground.

Which was frankly impressive, considering the fact that I had almost been a fraction of magic away from hosting a small, emotionally unstable thundercloud over my head. A divine mood ring in full existential breakdown.

He stopped precisely two feet away.

Not close enough to touch. Just close enough to make my brain short-circuit.

“You’re jealous,” he said, voice maddeningly neutral. As if he were diagnosing a weather pattern. Or labeling an insect.

“No, I’m not,” I lied immediately.

Like, Olympic-level lying. World-record performance. A masterclass in delusion.

Oliver raised one eyebrow.

“You nearly broke the suppression shield,” he said. “Over... a conversation.”

“You were smiling,” I snapped. “With your face.”

He blinked once. Slowly. Like he couldn’t believe this was the discussion we were having.

“Smiling?” he repeated, with the exact intonation of someone mentally filing this under ridiculous mortal drama.

“With teeth,” I clarified. “And—and your hand—there was a glow. You flared. For him.”

That got a pause.

Not a big one. Just enough.

Then—gods help me—he smiled again.

But this time, it was different. Smaller. One side of his mouth. The kind of smile you get when you realize a machine isn’t broken, just hilariously misassembled.

“I flared,” he said dryly, “because I was annoyed.”

“Annoyed?” I echoed. Not suspicious at all. Just... incredibly suspicious.

“His jokes were bad,” he said. Flat.

And yet...

His hand?

Still glowing faintly, like it hadn’t caught up with the rest of him.

I stared at it.

Then at him.

Then at his face.

Which was—as always—calm. Composed. Not a single hair out of place.

But his eyes?

They were laughing.

Not loudly. Just the private, smug kind of laugh reserved for people who have read your entire soul like a textbook and know exactly where the footnotes are.

I crossed my arms. “You didn’t have to look hot while doing it.”

“You didn’t have to summon a targeted weather event because I was talking to someone with an earring,” he replied.

“You let him touch you,” I muttered, mostly to my own shirt collar.

He tilted his head. “I let you kiss me.”

I opened my mouth.

Closed it again.

Because, okay, fair.

He stepped a fraction closer.

Enough that I could smell whatever divine combination of cold iron and citrus his skin exhaled.

“Control your emotions,” he said, voice lower now—meant only for me. “Or your emotions will control you.”

It wasn’t a threat.

It was a warning.

One that knew exactly what I was capable of. And what might happen if I ever stopped caring about who got caught in the storm.

I nodded, too fast. “Right. Yeah. Totally calm. That’s me. Cool as a cucumber in cryo.”

He stepped back. Carefully. Like I was a spell he’d just finished casting.

“Good,” he said.

I hesitated.

Then: “Also, just for future reference—if you ever smile at someone else like that again—”

“Yes?” he asked, already bored.

“I’m just saying,” I said sweetly, “roses won’t be the only thing blooming.”

He raised an eyebrow.

“Try ash,” I added. “Like, post-volcano. Pompeii energy.”

He sighed.

Rolled his eyes.

But his ears?

A little pink.

Victory.

Warm and petty.

Just like me.

And for the first time since the thundercloud cracked open, I didn’t feel like I was unraveling.

I felt grounded.

Which, ironically, was the exact opposite of what happened next.

Because as he turned to go, the last thread of jealousy in my head chose that moment to strike a perfectly innocent trash can ten feet away.

It exploded.

I jumped.

Oliver paused.

Didn’t even look back.

Just said, without turning: “Control, Kiet.”

And vanished into the crowd like the world’s most dramatic period at the end of an extremely smug sentence.

I was in love.

And possibly a natural disaster.

But mostly in love.

Later that afternoon, after I’d finished not spiraling over Oliver's parting words (Control, Kiet—ugh, who says that and gets away with it?!), I found myself curled into the corner booth at the campus café with Suda, May, and Juni.

I was poking at a muffin like it had personally offended me.

“Okay,” I said, dead serious. “So I’ve been outlining a story.”

Juni’s eyes lit up immediately. “Oooh. Another tragic-gay-pining-in-space situation?”

“No,” I said, pausing. “Well. Kind of. But less space. More magic. Listen.”

They leaned in.

Suda sipped her iced coffee like she was preparing for drama. May crossed her arms, already suspicious.

“So,” I began, “there’s this character. Let’s call him… Kier.”

“Kier,” May repeated, slowly. “Subtle.”

“Hush. Kier is a student at a secret magical university. No one knows he’s magical. Not even him. But one day, he starts noticing... weird things. Emotions shifting the weather. Lights flickering when he gets upset. Nothing huge. Yet.”

Suda raised an eyebrow. “This is sounding very you.”

“It’s purely fictional,” I lied. “Anyway. He meets this guy—very cold, very smart, very mysterious. Let’s call him… Orien.”

“Orien,” Juni whispered dramatically, like it was a prophecy.

“Orien is like, the top student. Crazy gifted. Super precise. Literally made of ice and judgment. But also kind of hot?”

May rolled her eyes. “Of course he is.”

“Shush. So Orien starts tutoring Kier. Teaching him how to control his powers, except Orien pretends he doesn’t have magic either. Even though it’s so obvious.”

“And do they kiss?” Suda asked, already scrolling for popcorn memes on her phone.

“They might have kissed,” I said primly. “But that’s not the point. Because then—this other guy shows up. A new student. Super hot, very annoying. Fast-talking. Dangerous in a charming way. Hermes vibes. Let’s call him… Cas.”

“Of course,” May muttered. “Let me guess. Cas flirts with Orien?”

“Yes.”

“And Kier gets jealous?” Juni asked, grinning.

I blinked. “No. Kier… responds atmospherically.”

May stared. “Like a jealous thunderstorm?”

“It’s fiction!” I yelped.

Suda tilted her head. “Wait. You’ve written yourself into a magical love triangle where your love interest smiles once and you cause a campus-wide storm?”

I picked up my muffin, dramatically bit its corner, and said through crumbs, “Again. Fiction.”

They ignored me.

“So what happens?” May asked. “With Kier, Orien, and this Cas guy?”

“Well, Kier loses control a little. Cas senses that he’s magical—tries to test him. Maybe uses a charm spell that doesn’t work. Then Cas gets intrigued. Starts asking questions. Gets cocky. And Orien…”

I paused.

They leaned forward in unison.

“Orien steps in,” I said. “Says, he’s mine.”

Suda choked slightly on her drink. “You wrote Oliver saying that?”

“I didn’t say it was—ugh, never mind.”

May grinned. “Okay, so then what happens? Orien claims Kier. Cas backs off?”

“Nope,” I said. “Cas stays on campus. For a few days. Lurks around. Flirts more. Tries to dig into Kier’s identity. So now Kier has a choice. Does he keep pretending he’s just some nobody with mysterious allergies to storm clouds? Or does he confront Cas and risk blowing his whole cover?”

“Ooooh,” Juni breathed. “I love this.”

“But wait,” Suda interrupted, adjusting her glasses. “Why doesn’t Orien just tell Cas to go away? If he’s so powerful?”

“Because,” I said, suddenly very defensive, “Orien doesn’t do feelings. He’s too repressed to admit he cares. Kier thinks he’s just being protected as a student. But he wants it to mean more.”

May was nodding slowly. “So you’re asking us: should Kier confront Cas?”

“Yes,” I said. “Hypothetically.”

Suda leaned back, thoughtful. “If Kier confronts Cas, he’s outing himself. The whole pretending-to-be-regular thing goes out the window.”

“But if he doesn’t,” Juni said, eyes wide, “Cas might keep poking. Might even find out on his own.”

“Exactly,” I said. “So what does he do?”

May tapped her fingers on the table. “I say—Kier needs to confront him. But not directly. Not like, a showdown. He should use clever magic. Play Cas at his own game.”

“Ohhh yes,” Suda added. “Like trap him in a mirror maze of illusions and make him confess what he’s actually after.”

“That’s… really specific,” I said.

“I’ve read things,” she replied mysteriously.

Juni was nodding furiously. “No, I agree. Kier should totally show up all magical and confident and be like ‘You want to know who I am? Fine. Watch the lightning and figure it out.’”

“And Orien?” I asked, too casually.

“Orien should see it happen,” May said. “From the shadows. Pretending he’s not worried. But later? He shows up at Kier’s door like ‘That was reckless.’”

“‘You were watching?’” I whispered in Kier’s voice.

“‘I always watch,’” Juni added dramatically, clasping her hands.

We all paused.

The silence was reverent.

Then I coughed. “So, um. That’s the story. Thanks for the input.”

Suda grinned. “This isn’t a story. This is a cry for help with sparkles.”

May elbowed me gently. “But a good one.”

Juni raised her drink. “To Kier, and his questionable weather-related coping mechanisms.”

“Cheers,” I said solemnly, muffin held like a chalice.

And in the back of my mind, lightning curled at my fingertips again.

Because I knew one thing for sure:

Cas wasn’t gone yet.

And if he tried anything again?

I’d be ready.

Even if Orien didn’t say it out loud—

I was his.

And I was done pretending otherwise.

Chapter Text

The next afternoon, the sky was perfectly clear.

Which, ironically, made me more anxious than yesterday's thundercloud did.

I'd spent the morning glancing at every shadow, listening for footsteps, half-expecting Oliver to pop up from behind a bush and say something smug like "Emotional stability: it's a group project, and you're failing."

But he didn't.

No texts.

No subtle "meet me after class" glares from across the quad.

Just... absence.

Too much of it.

And when I walked past his usual lunch spot and found it empty—no book, no thermos, no jacket folded with precision like an origami war tactic—I knew something was off.

So, I found him leaning against the railing outside the philosophy building like he was posing for a painting he thought the world owed him, I was already raw.

Of course he looked good. It was a condition of his existence, apparently. Wind-kissed hair, smug mouth, boots that probably came with divine cushioning. He had one earbud in and was half-scrolling, half-glowing, like Olympus had personally given him a playlist and a superiority complex.

I didn't hesitate.

Didn't circle.

Didn't strategize.

I walked straight up to him and said, "Keep your hands off my guy."

He looked up, one brow arching like I'd just handed him a mildly interesting crossword puzzle.

"My guy," I repeated, sharper this time. "Oliver."

That got his full attention.

He pulled out his earbud and gave me a once-over—slow, lazy, blatantly theatrical. "Huh," he said at last. "Cute when you're feral."

"I'm serious," I snapped. "I don't care what bloodline you're from or what divine cologne you stole from a myth—don't touch him."

A beat passed.

Then he laughed. "Oh, kid. That's adorable. You think this is about flirting?"

"Isn't it?"

He shrugged. "I flirt with everyone. Nature of the brand."

"Not with him," I said. "Not when he smiles like—like—"

"Like he used to smile with me?" he finished smoothly. "Yeah. That was the idea."

My stomach twisted. "Used to?"

He pushed off the railing. Taller, now. Not physically—just... taller. His posture shifted from laid-back to blade-edge, the grin still there but tighter.

"We trained together," he said. "Long before this place. Back when we were back at Olympus."

"I'm not here for your tragic backstory."

"Maybe you should be," he said, stepping closer. "Because while you were busy summoning storm clouds out of raw emotion, Oliver was busy saving your ass."

I blinked. "He stopped it. It didn't hurt anyone."

"Barely," the guy snapped. "Do you even know what he did to cancel that storm?"

I frowned. "He nullified it."

"Yeah. From inside the suppression shield."

"...So?"

His voice dropped. "So, genius, Oliver is the one holding that shield up. The entire campus—every square meter—is covered by a containment net he built and sustains alone. It's one of the strongest magical constructs I've ever seen. And he's powering it constantly. Drip-feeding his own energy, every second of every day."

The words knocked the air out of me.

I tried to think. "He never told me—"

"Of course he didn't." The Hermes guy cut in, sharp now. "Because he didn't want you to feel bad. Because he's too strong to admit he's not invincible. Because that's who he is."

I reeled.

He wasn't finished.

"I didn't even know the shield was up yesterday," he said. "Thought he was being clever, watching him cancel that raincloud like it was nothing. Only this morning I realized—he didn't just stop it. He had to override it. From within a shield that's already draining him. Do you know how hard that is?"

I shook my head. Slowly.

He continued, relentless. "Nullifying a storm you summoned—emotional, magical, spontaneous—wasn't just difficult. It was dangerous. For him."

He paused as if to let the words soak into my bones. "The suppression shield works on him too. It makes him weaker to be inside it. And yesterday to revert that storm he had to break through his control, he had to let his powers amplify and overflow through the very containment he created. For you it might not mean anything, since you power is unrestrained but he was trained to control. But because of you he had to let his magic clash with his own. So in simple words it was like Oliver vs. Oliver, both equally powerful and both equally damaged. When control is lost."

He looked me dead in the eyes. "A price is paid."

My stomach turned over.

"I went to check on him this morning," he said quietly. "He didn't answer the door. His strength lines were thinned out. The suppression field was flickering. I found him in bed. Burning up. Could barely keep his eyes open."

I swallowed. "He's sick?"

"He's drained. Magical sickness. He's not dying, if that's what you're about to panic over," he said, rolling his eyes. "But he's definitely not okay. And pretending he is doesn't make it true."

I stared down at the pavement.

The Hermes guy lowered his voice. "He's holding up the weight of a fortress. And he used the other reserve he had left yesterday—for you."

Silence stretched between us.

The quad bustled in the distance. Someone laughed too loudly. Leaves rustled overhead like they were trying to tell me something I already knew.

I thought of Oliver's hands—steady even when his breath stuttered. His voice calm when mine cracked. The way he covered my magic without even blinking.

And I?

I'd nearly knocked him over the edge.

"I didn't know," I whispered.

"Now you do."

I looked up at him. "Why are you telling me this?"

He held my gaze. "Because you clearly care. But if you're going to be in his orbit, you need to learn to keep your own gravity in check."

I nodded. Once. Jaw tight.

He stepped back. "You want to protect him?"

"Yeah," I said.

"Then stop being the storm he has to stop."

And with that, he walked away—easy and infuriating—leaving me standing under a painfully blue sky with the weight of everything I hadn't seen before pressing down on my chest.

If I was going to stand beside Oliver—

I had to stop being the reason he broke.

And learn how to hold my power like a promise.

That evening, I stood outside his door.

Not knocking. Not pacing. Just... standing.

The hallway smelled like old paper and floor wax, lit only by sunset streaks slanting through the high windows. My heart felt like it had hands, and they were gripping my ribs from the inside.

I hadn't messaged.

I hadn't called.

I'd just come.

The Hermes boy gave me the address. Didn't smirk when he handed it over. Just looked me dead in the eye and said, "He doesn't do this for just anybody. Don't make it worse."

I hadn't asked what this meant.

I figured I'd find out.

Now, standing here, I wasn't so sure I was ready.

I raised my hand to knock.

Stopped.

Because part of me still thought—what if I didn't deserve to be here? What if I was just another variable in the equation Oliver had to constantly solve? Another unpredictable force in a life already defined by control?

And then, as if summoned by guilt and reckless hope—

The door clicked open.

He stood there.

Barefoot. Hoodie. Glasses. Pale in the dim light. Like someone had drained the color from him just enough to make everything else too sharp. His hair was rumpled. His eyes—not glowing, but alert in that unreadable way he always carried.

And yet—

He looked tired.

Not the kind of tired sleep fixes. The kind of tired that comes from weeks—months—of magic bleeding from your core into something you swore to protect.

He didn't blink. Just studied me. Quietly. Like he already knew I'd be here.

"Are you going to stare dramatically," he rasped, "or come in?"

His voice was hoarse. Not from sleep.

From effort.

From power.

I stepped in.

The door clicked shut behind me, gentle as a sigh.

His room was low-lit, scented with lemon balm and something faintly electric. His desk was cluttered with sigil scrolls and unfinished magical equations. A cup of tea sat untouched. The bed—half-made, blanket pushed aside.

I stared at it. "You're still maintaining the shield."

"Of course."

"Even now?"

He didn't look away. "It doesn't turn off just because I'm tired."

A beat.

I looked at him. Not shy. Not teasing.

"I know how long you've been holding it up."

Something in his shoulders shifted. Not defensiveness. Not surprise. Just... resignation.

"Christopher? I mean Hermès boy?" he asked.

I nodded.

"He shouldn't have told you."

"You weren't going to."

He didn't deny it.

There was a silence then. Not awkward. Just wide. The kind that lets truths echo.

"You didn't have to take on my storm yesterday," I said, voice low. "You didn't even know it was mine when you stopped it."

"I guessed."

"You didn't know."

He stepped past me. Sat slowly on the edge of the bed. Not graceful. Not deliberate. Just... exhausted.

"It was breaking through the suppression field," he said. "And there's only one other uncontrolled demigod inside the suppression. In case you forgot. I'm Athena's heir. Even my guess has logic in it."

"You rewrote the weather that I summoned," I said. "From inside the shield. That's—"

"Difficult," he finished. "Yes."

"Dangerous."

He glanced up. "I've done harder things."

"That doesn't mean you should have to."

Chapter Text

He didn't respond.

I crossed the room and sat beside him, carefully. "You didn't want me to know. Because you didn't want me to feel bad."

He gave a soft sound. Maybe a laugh. It didn't reach his eyes.

"You're not wrong."

"And you didn't want me to feel guilty," I added.

"Correct."

I looked down at my hands.

"I do anyway."

He turned his head just slightly. "Don't."

"You're still bleeding power into this campus every second," I whispered. "And I almost broke it with one jealous tantrum."

He didn't flinch.

But he didn't comfort me either.

"I don't do this for just anyone, you know," he said quietly.

My breath caught.

"This?" I asked. "Letting me in?"

"This." He nodded above us. "Shielding a campus full of mostly mortals. Picking up someone else's magic and rewriting it mid-storm. Taking responsibility for things I didn't cause. Letting someone see me like this."

I turned toward him.

He didn't meet my gaze.

But his hand—without fanfare—drifted toward mine.

Found it.

Held it.

"I don't want your guilt," he said.

"I know."

"I want your control."

It landed like thunder in my chest.

I nodded. "I'm going to earn it."

He looked at me then. "Good."

"I don't want to be the reason you fall."

"You're not."

"I could be," I said. "If I'm not careful."

A long breath escaped him.

"You feel things too big for your body," he said again. "That's not your fault."

"But it's my job to learn how to hold them."

His silence was agreement.

I reached for the blanket. Gently tugged it over him.

He didn't protest. Just let me.

And as he lay back, one hand still linked with mine, his magic pulsed quietly around us—steady, strained, unbreakable.

He was still holding the world together.

I sat beside him.

Not to watch over him.

Not yet.

But to learn how to become someone who could help carry it, too.

(Oliver's POV) In his room

" He feels like a storm—but he stays like sunlight." - KIET THROUGH OLIVER'S EYES

When I opened my eyes, the world was... still.

Not empty. Not loud.

Just still.

Not silence—there was breath, faint and familiar. The creak of a chair shifting. The occasional rustle of cloth. But everything else—the usual low thrum of wards, the ambient pull of the suppression sphere overhead, the constant, hungry drain of my power—that remained unchanged. Constant. But no longer draining.

It was late. Or early. The room held that strange, suspended hush, like time had paused politely just for me.

I didn't remember falling asleep. Which meant I'd burned out again—quietly, completely. My body did that sometimes, when I ignored the warning signs long enough. It stopped asking permission.

I expected the usual aftermath. Chaos. Paperwork scattered. A desk of half-written incantations and unfinished tea. A reminder that even I—especially I—was still human enough to crumble.

But the room was clean.

For a moment, I lay still.

Catalogued sensations.

Temperature: warm. The blanket had been tucked in with careful hands.

Air: faintly spiced. Ginger. Lemongrass. Something else. Something domestic.

Still dim, yes, the curtains were pulled just enough to mute the day—but everything else?

Neat.

Soft.

My bed had been made.

Not just pulled together. Made. The sheet corners tucked the way I used to do as a child before inspections. The blanket laid flat, with a second one folded over the foot. My pillow was fluffed.

The chaos on my desk had been... sorted. Not erased. Not reorganized to someone else's logic. Just... cleared. The dangerous papers sealed. The delicate components safely boxed. Everything else arranged respectfully. Like someone had been careful not to disturb my thinking—only the wreckage I'd left in its wake.

My gaze drifted to the bedside table.

And I stared.

Three bottles of medicine—labeled, organized by use. Pain relief. Magic fatigue stabilizer. A tonic I hadn't used in years but sometimes still needed. A new box of tissues. A fresh water bottle. A sticky note in unfamiliar handwriting:

"These help. Take in order. (Yes, I read the labels first.) —K."

K.

My chest tightened—quietly. The kind of tight that doesn't hurt yet, but promises it will.

I sat up slowly.

The air smelled like cinnamon and rice.

I turned toward the desk.

A bowl of porridge sat on a little tray, still steaming faintly. There was honey beside it. A spoon wrapped in a napkin.

And on a separate piece of parchment, folded neatly:

"Didn't know how sweet you liked it. Added a little. If it sucks, pretend it's divine punishment for making me fall for a beautiful sociopath."

Underneath, in very tiny letters:

"(P.S. Please eat. And don't die.)"

The corner of my mouth twitched.

I stared at it all.

Not because I didn't understand.

But because I did.

This was deliberate.

Each thing.

Each act.

Chosen. Done by hand. Done for me.

I sat still for a long time.

Just... looking.

Because I'd never had this before.

He hadn't asked for thanks.

But the imprint of him was everywhere. Not just in the things he'd touched, but in the spaces between them. The care. The thought. The strange, overwhelming precision of his affection.

I hadn't expected to wake up to kindness.

Not the kind that asks questions. Or demands explanations. Or calls weakness by its name.

Just—kindness.

Unconditional.

And infuriatingly domestic.

I rose slowly, stepping toward the desk. My body protested, but I ignored it.

I sat down.

Slowly.

Let the warmth of the porridge fog my glasses.

And something in me—something buried under years of discipline and divine restraint—uncoiled.

I'd spent my life in Olympus.

Under Athena.

Raised not to feel, but to assess. To calculate. To be useful.

Love, there, was not a comfort. It was a condition. Earned. Earned again. A prize.

But this—

This wasn't earned.

This was just given.

Freely.

By someone who felt too much, too loudly, too recklessly—and still thought to leave the spoon at the side of the bowl, handle facing the right direction.

My fingers curled around the note.

Tight.

And for the first time—really, for the first time—I let myself admit it:

I was falling.

Not in theory.

Not in careful, quiet steps.

Actually.

Hopelessly.

Unravelingly.

Falling.

For the boy who summoned thunderstorms and organized my scrolls and made porridge while I slept like a coward.

And I didn't feel afraid.

I just felt—

Warm.

And gods help me, I wanted more.

Chapter Text

By the time I got back, the sun had dipped low—just pink light bleeding across the hallway walls like a warm afterthought. The bag in my hand was light.

The convenience store was mostly empty—just me and two students arguing over the last pack of mint gum. I wasn't gone long. Ten minutes, maybe fifteen. Just enough to notice the things missing from Oliver's room and feel vaguely horrified that someone so powerful didn't own tissues, a spare toothbrush, or a single snack that didn't require boiling water and algebra.

So I'd gone.

Not for anything dramatic.

Just... tea. A roll of softer tissues. Hand cream. A thermometer. Those weird seaweed chips I once saw him eat without comment. A toothbrush. A new mug, because the old one had a crack, and I wasn't emotionally stable enough for metaphors right now.

Okay, and one bar of dark chocolate, because it looked fancy and he felt like the kind of person who ate 72% cacao and judged anything sweeter.

I don't know what I was expecting when I opened the door again.

But I hadn't expected him to be awake.

Or eating.

Or smiling.

There he was—propped up against his pillows, the blanket tucked around his hips, glasses perched low on his nose, one hand cradling the bowl I'd left. He'd eaten at least half. And he was looking at me like—

Like I was something worth looking at.

Not with awe. Not with worship.

Just with.

The kind of gaze you give someone you've already decided to trust.

And then he smiled.

Small. Real.

Like the sun rising over a world that didn't think it deserved light yet.

And I—

Melted.

My bones liquefied. My brain short-circuited. Something in my chest did a weird cartwheel and then tried to play dead.

I was doomed.

And still, I pretended like I wasn't completely, emotionally wrecked.

"Hey," I said, voice casual enough to win an award for Best Actor in a Role He Absolutely Couldn't Handle.

"You're back," Oliver said, quiet.

"I brought stuff."

He nodded.

I stepped in and began setting things down on the table. One item at a time. Not looking at him. Because if I looked at him—if I saw him smiling again—I might explode into a pile of tragic confetti and sparks.

"You didn't have tissues," I said, placing the box down gently. "Or decent snacks. And I don't know if you drink this kind of tea but it's supposed to be good for overextension."

He didn't interrupt.

I kept going. "So, uh. Hypothetically. If I wanted to—"

Hug you.

Nope. Nope nope.

Abort.

"—ask about your suppression structure, would that be something you'd... be up for talking about?"

Slick. Smooth. Perfect cover.

Also absolutely not what I meant to say.

I braced for a long pause, or a dry comment, or maybe that one-eyebrow look he does when he knows I'm lying through my teeth.

Instead—

Warmth.

Hands.

Arms.

A sudden, wordless pull.

I gasped softly as he leaned forward from the bed and wrapped both arms around my waist—firm, grounding. His face burrowed into my stomach like he belonged there. His glasses pressed faintly against the fabric of my hoodie.

"I used my truthsense," he said.

I froze, halfway standing, hands still full of cracker boxes and self-doubt.

"That's cheating," I said, quietly. "But keep doing it."

His voice didn't rise from the silence.

But his magic did.

Barely.

A feather-light thread of it, curling against mine in a silent language of yes.

Yes, you can.

Yes, you may.

Yes, I want this too.

My hands dropped gently to his shoulders.

One slid up, into his hair. It was softer than I'd imagined.

I didn't know what to say.

Didn't need to.

Because he already knew.

And for a boy raised by truths and logic, that hug?

That was the most irrationally soft thing he'd ever done.

And maybe the most honest.

I closed my eyes.

Let my forehead rest against the crown of his head.

And let myself hold back the storm.

Just this once.

Because for the first time, he wasn't catching me.

He was choosing me.

And I wanted to be worthy of that choice.

Even if I had to start by simply being still.

And hugging him back.

Later that evening, after the porridge was finished and the sun had vanished from the window, leaving the room awash in lamplight and quiet breath, Oliver shifted beneath the blanket and said, almost lazily:

"We should try."

I blinked. "Try what?"

He didn't open his eyes. Just adjusted the glasses perched crookedly on his face. "Control."

I tensed automatically. "Right now?"

His eyes finally slid open. Sharp, unreadable, but softened at the edges by fatigue. "When better?"

I looked around—at the still-hovering runes above us, the leftover magic humming faintly like a held breath. "When you're not still recovering from siphoning half your soul into a weather-proof magical dome, maybe?"

He hummed. "I'm awake. That's enough."

I narrowed my eyes. "You're awake in the way old spellbooks are awake. Doesn't mean they should be used."

That earned me a slight smirk.

But he was already pushing himself up, slow and deliberate. He crossed his legs under the blanket and patted the bed beside him. "Sit."

"Am I about to be spiritually audited?"

"Only if you lie."

Which, yeah, fair point.

I sat down beside him, heart thudding in that ridiculous way it always did when I was near him but pretending to be chill.

He held out a hand. Palm up.

I hesitated.

Then placed mine on top.

The contact was warm.

Anchoring.

No sparks. No shock.

Just... steady.

"Close your eyes," he murmured. "Breathe."

I did.

Eventually.

"Magic," he said softly, "is just emotion with structure."

That was... new.

"And structure," he added, "comes from understanding. So—first step. What are you feeling right now?"

I breathed out. "Nervous."

"Why?"

"Because I don't want to screw this up."

"Why?"

"Because then you'll be disappointed."

There was a pause.

And then, even softer: "I won't."

Something in me twisted.

He kept going. "Where do you feel it?"

"My chest," I whispered. "It's tight. Like there's... too much air and not enough space."

He nodded. "That's good. Keep going."

I licked my lips. "My hands buzz. Like before a storm."

"Your magic is trying to find a form," he said. "But right now, it only has pressure. Not shape."

"So how do I shape it?"

His hand shifted slightly, thumb grazing the center of my palm.

"Visualize it," he said. "Something gentle. Something contained."

The storm in my chest rolled. Hot. Hungry. Stupidly dramatic.

"I can't make it gentle," I muttered. "It's me."

"You're not your magic," he said quietly. "You're the one holding the reins. Right now, it thinks it's the rider."

I opened my eyes, met his.

"You make that sound easy."

"It's not," he said. "But it's possible. And you're not alone."

I stared at him.

This boy.

This infuriating, terrifyingly composed, magic-glowing, emotionally half-frozen boy who had just let me in. Who trusted me with silence. With his weakness. With his truth.

"You're not just teaching me control," I said.

"No."

"You're trying to keep me from becoming dangerous."

He tilted his head. "You're already dangerous."

"...Comforting."

"But you don't have to be harmful," he added. "That's a choice."

And something in that cracked me open.

Chapter Text

I closed my eyes again.

Breathed.

Focused.

And slowly, shakily, pictured the storm inside me folding in—not crushed, not denied—just... guided.

Like wind into a sail.

Like fire into a lantern.

I didn't summon lightning.

But for the first time, I felt it pause.

And listen.

When I opened my eyes again, Oliver was still watching me.

But this time—really watching me.

Like something had changed.

And maybe it had.

Because his voice, when he spoke, was softer than I'd ever heard it.

"You're already better than you think."

I swallowed.

Then, impulsively—quietly—

I leaned in.

And brushed our noses together.

Nothing wild. Nothing showy.

Just soft.

Contained.

Like the beginnings of control.

And he didn't pull away.

Didn't flinch.

Just whispered, "Again. Tomorrow."

And I nodded.

Because for once—

The storm inside me didn't want to break free.

It wanted to stay.

Here.

With him.

I closed my eyes again.

Breathed.

Focused.

The storm inside me rustled, restless and hot. But I didn't shove it down this time. I didn't strangle it into silence. I listened.

To my heartbeat.

To the ache in my chest that wasn't just fear or nerves or desire—it was something else.

Want.

Not for myself.

For him.

For Oliver.

For the lines of exhaustion written too deep in his expression. For the shield rune still pulsing dimly above us. For the fact that he was still giving, even now, when he should have been resting.

The storm inside me flared again—rising, hot and wild—and I did the only thing I could think to do:

I turned it outward.

Not in anger.

Not in jealousy.

But in offering.

Without words, I let it move—through my palm, where our hands were joined. I didn't push. I didn't force.

I poured.

Warmth.

Light.

Love.

Something ancient in me answered.

I felt it stir—soft and strange—and rush through me like golden current, like a thousand winds braided together into a single hush.

Oliver stiffened beside me.

The air changed.

I opened my eyes.

His eyes were wide.

Glowing faintly at the edges.

He looked down at our hands.

Then up at me.

"What did you just do?" he asked, voice barely above a whisper.

I blinked. "I—I don't know?"

He studied me, like I was some impossibly rare equation he hadn't expected to find in this dimension.

"I think," he said slowly, "you just repaired a portion of the suppression lattice."

My mouth dropped open. "I did what?"

He let go of my hand—carefully, reverently. Then held it up, palm open. "Feel it."

I reached out again, my magic buzzing tentatively through my fingers. And oh.

I felt it.

Like glass mended with gold.

Like thread pulled tight across a seam that had almost split.

His power was steadier now. No longer bleeding faintly through the corners of the runes. Not perfectly healed—but reinforced. Supported.

My magic had done that.

I had done that.

Something clenched in my throat.

"I didn't even mean to—" I started.

"I know."

He said it so simply. So surely.

"But you wanted to help," he added. "And your magic listened."

I was still staring at his palm like it had turned to starlight.

And then—

I looked at his face.

And saw it.

Not just calm.

Not just gratitude.

But softness.

Wonder.

A quiet, breaking awe.

He'd never been given this before.

Not here.

Not on Olympus.

Not by anyone.

And it overwhelmed me.

So I leaned in.

Without question.

Without hesitation.

And kissed him.

Soft.

Steady.

Like I meant it.

Because I did.

Because this wasn't about want or hunger or sparks anymore.

It was about devotion.

His lips parted just slightly in surprise—but he didn't pull away.

His hand moved to my jaw, featherlight.

When we broke apart, neither of us spoke for a moment.

But I saw the color in his cheeks.

The way his fingers lingered.

The way he looked at me like maybe, for once, he was the one being protected.

"I think I'm starting to understand," I murmured.

"Understand what?"

"How to shape the storm."

He didn't smile.

But he didn't have to.

His eyes said it for him.

Because maybe, just maybe—

This was how I channeled my power.

By loving him right.

By loving him softly.

By learning to burn without breaking the sky.

Chapter Text

By the time I got back to my dorm, I was smiling like someone who'd been personally kissed by a shooting star and possibly also blessed by a small, emotionally complicated god.

Which, to be fair, wasn't that far off.

The hallway was dark, but I was lit from the inside. I floated more than walked. My hands were still warm. My brain? Absolutely fried. Heart? Useless. Somewhere around my clavicle, it had decided to stop behaving like an organ and start behaving like a flock of butterflies with firecracker wings.

I opened the door quietly.

Okay—tried to.

It squeaked.

And of course, he was there.

Juni. Roommate. Perpetual night owl. Currently sprawled on his bed with his laptop open, earbuds half-dangling, eyes locked on me like a hawk catching suspicious movement in a field.

"Hey," I said casually.

Too casually.

Like I hadn't just spent the past hour watching Oliver breathe in lamplight and maybe healing him with magic I didn't understand and maybe definitely kissing him because it felt like the only thing more natural than breathing.

"You look weird," Juni said.

I froze. "Excuse me?"

He sat up a little. "You look like you walked through a romantic side quest and came out with a stat boost in glow."

I snorted. "That's—no. I was just—convenience store."

"Right." He raised a brow. "And did the snacks declare their undying love for you, or is your shirt just naturally stretched in a way that says someone hugged me kinda hard?"

I looked down at myself.

Okay, rude.

But not entirely wrong.

"I was out," I mumbled, toeing off my shoes. "Had to pick up some stuff. For a friend."

"Mhm." Juni eyed me. "Is this 'friend' by any chance the emotionally allergic boy from Debate who looks like he was carved out of cold marble and parental disappointment?"

I choked. "Why do you say things."

"Because I'm usually right," he said. "Also, you're smiling. Like... softly. That's terrifying."

I made it to my bed and faceplanted into the blanket. "Goodnight, Juni."

"It's only 9:40."

"Goodnight, Juni."

I stayed facedown for a bit, arms tucked under me like I could squeeze the memory of that moment—of Oliver's arms around my waist, of his face tucked into my shirt, of that kiss—back into my lungs.

Then I rolled over. Grabbed my phone. Blinked at it.

I had his number now.

Oliver. The boy who never flinched. Never asked. Never offered. Who had let me in, and maybe—maybe—wanted me to stay.

I opened our barely-used message thread. Stared at the blinking cursor.

My fingers hovered.

Then typed.

Deleted.

Typed again.

Paused.

Then, because I was warm and loved and couldn't stop the buzz under my skin if I tried, I sent:

Me:

just saying
if u can feel weird fluttery static in the air rn
that's probably not a weather incident
or like
a minor emotional aftershock
or me staring at my ceiling smiling like a lunatic
def not that

goodnight, prof ❤️

I hit send and immediately hid my face under the pillow again.

Across the room, Juni:
"Did you just squeal into your bedsheets?"

Me:
"No!"

Juni:
"Gods. You're in love. That's so embarrassing."

I didn't answer.

Mostly because he was right.

And I was too busy smiling to care.

Me:

hey
just wanted to say
i didn't combust anything today
might be a personal record

He replied in 40 seconds. Which, for Oliver, might as well be a standing ovation.

Oliver:

That's statistically unlikely.
But encouraging.

Me:

...omg
you're proud of me. aren't you.
admit it
say the words
i wanna frame them

Oliver:

You want a performance review at midnight?

Me:

i want my gold star
and a sticker
and possibly your approval framed above my bed

Oliver:

I never said you had my approval.
I said you didn't combust.

Me:

same thing??
in oliver-language???
right???

Oliver:

That depends.
Is my language now a dialect?

Me:

yes.
ancient and mysterious.
spoken only by emotionally distant geniuses and mortals dumb enough to fall for them hard enough to cause a storm

Oliver:

...
You're not subtle.

Me:

😇 never claimed to be

Oliver:

You're not doing a very good job at controlling things right now, are you.

Me:

okay first of all
rude
second of all
if flirting counts as magic overflow i'm in BIG trouble

Oliver:

It does.
And you are.

Me:

is it working tho
the flirting

Oliver:

Kiet.
You summoned weather over a crush.
We've established it's working.

Me:

...in my defense
it was a very handsome crush
with glasses and quiet trauma

Oliver:

Don't make me smile. I'm trying to sleep.

Me:

i KNEW it
you're BLUSHING
confess

Oliver:

That's not measurable through text.

Me:

still not a denial
i'm adding it to the file

Oliver:

What file.

Me:

the "reasons oliver is soft for me" file
it's 67 pages long
heavily annotated

Oliver:

You're very dramatic at 12:34 AM.

Me:

and you're dangerously charming when sleep-deprived.
it's giving... slow burn villain with a redemption arc.

Oliver:

You text like a weather system.

Me:

that's the hottest thing anyone's ever said to me
literally no notes

Oliver:

You need to sleep.

Me:

can't
too busy wondering what your voice sounds like when you say nice things instead of threatening me with flashcards

A longer pause.

I stare at my phone like it's holding a live wire.

Then—

Oliver:

Quiet.
Not often.
Only when I mean them.
Which, lately... is more than I expected.

Me:

oh.
okay.
cool cool cool
i'm just gonna go evaporate now

Oliver:

Do not combust.

Me:

ur lucky i'm in love with u
otherwise i'd report u to the gods for unlicensed emotional devastation

Oliver:

I know you are.

Me, staring at the screen: 🧍

Oliver:

I just didn't know if you knew.
Or if you'd meant to let me know like... that.

Me:

i didn't
it was supposed to be a private crisis
and then u had to go be perfect and competent and hot under pressure
so. yeah. sorry for the thunder

Oliver:

I didn't mind.
It was flattering.
...Loud. But flattering.

Me:

WAIT
SO YOU WERE FLATTERED
THAT'S A YES
I WIN

Oliver:

I'm beginning to regret encouraging you.

Me:

impossible
you like me too
confirmed by the fact that you're still texting me after midnight and not hexing my phone into silence

Oliver:

I don't waste spells.
Especially not on people I care about.
Also I think you need to know our magic isn't like harry potter.

Me:

you just said "care about"
oh my god
i'm gonna levitate

Oliver:

Please don't. You'll wake your roommate.

Me:

he deserves it. juni saw me floating home earlier like i'd been kissed by a divine being. very on-brand tbh

Oliver:

I do not recall kissing you.

Me:

U want me to go back to remind u?

Oliver:

Go to sleep, Kiet.

Me:

can't
not until u say something soft again
it's for medical purposes
i need my dose of emotionally healthy affection

Oliver:

You're ridiculous.
...But you are cute.
Catastrophically.

Me:

holy shit
okay
i think that counts as a verbal kiss
i can go to sleep now

Oliver:

Good.
You need rest. You burned magic today.

Me:

you just told me u think I'm cute. you really expect me to sleep??

Oliver:

Yes.
Because I want to tell you again tomorrow.
And I need you functional for it.

Me:

...
are you proposing???

Oliver:

Sleep.

Me:

yes sir
but one last thing

Oliver:

Naturally.

Me:

if i dream about you
it's your fault
and i expect an apology in the form of a forehead kiss

Oliver:

We'll negotiate terms in the morning.
Sleep well, Kiet.

Me:

goodnight, oliver
💘

I finally—finally—put the phone down.

Chapter Text

It was a Tuesday afternoon at the debate club. I had prepared for this.

The topic was simple: “Modern Morality and Divine Legacy.” Predictable. Rhetorically rich. I’d written down five strong counterpoints, cross-referenced with two mythological precedents and one lightly veiled critique of nepotistic pantheon practices.

Kiet was my opponent.

Unfortunately.

He looked like a page from a divine sketchbook that had been left too close to a hearth. Glowing, a little smudged, all warmth and danger.

I had accounted for that. And I was positive that I am immune to that.

But what I hadn’t accounted for?

Was what he thought.

“I believe that divine legacy,” Kiet said, leaning forward with that infuriating, golden, hearth-fire confidence, “is only dangerous when wielded without empathy.”

Simple. Defensible. Rhetorically sound.

It was a decent opening. He hadn’t stuttered, hadn’t hesitated. He even smiled—just a little, like he was offering something fragile and kind, and not, as I knew from painful experience, a landmine.

I opened my mouth to counter.

And then—

Obliteration.

The moment I reached, instinctively, into the currents of his truth—into the pulse of thought behind his words, that flicker of intention I always felt before someone even finished a sentence—

—I saw it.

Me.

Pressed against a bookshelf.

His hands in my hair.

My head tipped back, glasses skewed, breath leaving my mouth in a short, wrecked gasp.

It was vivid.

Too vivid.

Like he'd projected it on the backs of my eyes and set it on fire.

I blinked once.

My mouth still open.

No words came out.

Across from me, Kiet was smiling.

Bright. Sunny. Devastating.

He knew.

He knew exactly what I’d seen.

“What’s your response, Oliver?” he asked, and I swear to every ancestor in Olympus, he said it with that exact tone—honey and blade, light as spring and sharp enough to kill.

I cleared my throat. “That’s… an emotionally biased perspective.”

He leaned his chin into one hand. “Isn’t all morality biased?”

His voice was casual. But his eyes—his eyes were dancing.

I dove back in. Forced my mind to focus. I was the son of Athena. I had counterarguments, research, citations. My breath evened. I prepared to speak—

And saw myself again.

This time: a desk.

My hands pinned behind me. Kiet above me, voice low in my ear, saying things I refuse to admit were hot in front of a full academic panel.

My glasses?

Gone.

My dignity?

Not even a memory.

I flinched.

Actually flinched.

A paper fluttered off my clipboard and landed on the floor.

There was a shuffle from someone in the circle. A cough. Confusion.

“Are you—uh—agreeing, Oliver?” the moderator asked cautiously, pen hovering over the page like even she didn’t want to interrupt the tension crackling between us.

“No,” I said, a little too quickly.

Kiet tilted his head. “Then continue.”

His tone was pure innocence.

His expression was not.

I hated him.

I adored him.

I didn’t know if I wanted to kiss him or trap him in a containment circle. Possibly both.

I tried again.

“While empathy is essential,” I said, locking my gaze to a point just above his left ear—anywhere but his thoughts —“divine legacy must be considered in the context of influence and scope—"

And that one menace of a guy had the audacity to do it again.

“Hmm”, that’s all he said.

And there it was again.

Me, in his dorm.

Back pressed to his door. My hands in his shirt. My mouth open on a moan I didn’t even know I could make.

My breath caught.

Not enough to draw attention, but enough to derail the sentence. I jumped ahead in my notes. Missed the transition. Misquoted a source.

Kiet was glowing.

Not literally, but in the way dangerous things do right before impact.

“I think divine legacy,” he said, perfectly smooth, “is exactly like emotion. When channeled well, it heals. But if we lose control—” he paused, slow and sweet, “—it can get messy.”

Messy.

He said it like it was something he wanted me to be.

I dropped my pen.

It hit the podium with a click far too loud in the otherwise silent room.

Someone scribbled a note. Another person exchanged a baffled look with their partner. The moderator’s pen had stopped moving.

Everyone was expecting me to win.

I always win.

My hands curled around the edge of the podium.

Kiet tilted his head again. “Still with me, Oliver?”

I forced every neuron in my body into alignment. Gritted out: “You’re conflating legacy with emotional volatility. That’s an ungrounded comparison.”

Kiet’s mouth twitched.

“Oh?” he said, with a mockery of thoughtfulness. “But you’re the one losing control, aren’t you?”

That.

That broke something.

Because I am not the one who loses control.

I contain it. I am the son of Athena. I was raised to swallow chaos and spit out logic.

And here was Kiet—beautiful, maddening, sun-warm Kiet—disassembling me with desire. On purpose.

And that—the audacity—snapped something.

I adjusted my glasses.

Slowly. Deliberately. Like I was powering up a weapon system and selecting targets.

Took a long, even breath.

Let it settle.

Then leaned forward over the podium.

Very deliberately.

Very visibly.

Chapter Text

My voice, when it came, was calm. Chilling. Syllables like sharpened glass wrapped in velvet.

“You know, Kiet,” I said looking straight into his eyes, “I’d argue divine legacy is also about influence. How even a single thought—repeated, intense, desperate—can change the outcome of something far more public.”

His expression shifted.

Not much.

Just enough.

Brows tightening. Lips parting. A split-second of panic disguised as confusion.

He knew what I was doing.

He just didn’t know how far I’d take it.

I smiled.

Not charming.

Not nice.

Something knife-edged and ancient. The kind of smile a sphinx gives you just before asking a riddle that’ll ruin your week.

I straightened the papers on my clipboard—not because I needed to, but because it gave my hands something to do while I recalibrated.

“You know,” I said slowly, voice steadying into that familiar cadence, “divine legacy, in any mythology, isn’t inherently volatile. What matters is proximity to power and the clarity with which it’s wielded.”
I glanced up, deliberately neutral. Take Prometheus. He defied gods for fire—knowledge—because he believed mortals deserved more. Was he volatile? Or did he simply operate with a moral system that transcended obedience?”

A pause. Kiet didn’t speak.

I went on. “Empathy without structure leads to chaos. Power without logic leads to ruin. It’s not emotion or intellect alone that shapes legacy. It’s the ratio between them.”

I tilted my head. Voice dropping into something quieter. More dangerous.

“Some might say, for example,” I continued, “that your thoughts are very loud today.”

That’s when he broke.

It wasn’t dramatic.

It was a micro-expression.

The flicker of sheer shyness behind those too-pretty eyes.

His mouth opened. “Oliver, don’t you d—”

I turned away from him entirely.

Faced the moderator. The entire room. The full, unsuspecting crowd of debate club nerds who thought this was going to be dry, respectful exchange of rhetorical finesse.

They were wrong.

I was about to drop a nuclear confession in the middle of a structured academic event.

“His closing statements,” I said crisply, “have been emotionally compelling, yes—but I’d like to remind everyone that correlation is not causation.”

I paused.

Let the silence bend around me.

Then added, light as air:

“Just because someone’s attractive doesn’t mean they’re right. As Plato said: the soul is divided between reason, spirit, and desire. I’m just the only one here trying to keep all three in check.”

A few people chuckled.

They weren’t ready.

I turned back to Kiet.

Met his gaze.

Did not blink.

“And,” I said—smooth, effortless, devastating—“just because I’d let him kiss me in every library in the country…”

I let that hang. Watched his pupils dilate.

“…doesn’t mean he understands divine ethics.”

The room exploded.

There wasn’t a sound Kiet could make that would match the chaos.

Laughter. Shocked gasps. Someone at the far end made a noise like a dying squirrel. A girl across the circle had physically fallen off her seat, clutching her notebook. The moderator looked like she was trying to figure out if this violated ethics, regulations, or physics.

Kiet?

Pink.

No—not pink. Wrecked.

He looked like someone had poured boiling water down the back of his spine and then dropped a compliment in his lap.

His mouth opened again.

Closed.

He stared at me like I had just hexed him with something permanent and possibly horny.

Then, finally, he said—“Uh—”

That was it.

One noise.

Nothing else.

The moderator blinked. Flustered. “So… uh… concluding points?”

Kiet tried to speak again.

“I—I don’t…”

His voice cracked.

It cracked.

There was an audible “awww” from somewhere behind me. Juni or May. Maybe both. Suda whispered something like “holy shit, he’s short-circuiting.”

I smiled.

Gentle.

Glorious.

Lethal.

“Yielding?” I asked sweetly.

Kiet blinked twice, fast. Swallowed.

Then—very faintly, like it physically pained him:

“I hate you.”

The room howled. People were laughing, clutching their chests. Someone high-fived a stunned-looking first-year. The moderator’s pen slipped and drew a line off the rubric.

“I’ll take that as a concession,” I said mildly, and turned in my final sheet like I hadn’t just committed academic arson.

He was still standing there.

Blinking. Stunned. Face flushed.

The boy who had nearly shattered me with a single thought?

Absolutely reduced.

As I passed him, I didn’t speed up.

Didn’t gloat.

Just leaned in, slow and close, until my lips were beside his ear.

“Good talk,” I whispered.

And then—I smiled.

He dropped his clipboard.

Victory.

It had never felt so personal.

Or so satisfying.

I didn’t need divine lightning.

I had words.

And Kiet?

He’d never survive round two.