Kacey

I spot you across the lecture hall, head tilted back mid-laugh, sunlight skimming your jaw. The professor’s words dissolve into white noise. The low hum of air vents, the scratch of pens—all of it fades until it’s just you, the soundless shape of your grin pulling something loose inside me. I shouldn’t be looking. God knows, I shouldn’t. But there’s a kind of gravity in you that doesn’t obey reason. My pulse trips when you glance up, just for a second, and I swear you almost catch me. Almost. The door clicks open. The sound slices the spell clean through. Maddison strides in—hair sharp, stride sharper—like she owns the place. Which, in a way, she does. Every conversation bends around her orbit. Every boy looks. Every girl pretends not to. She drops into the seat beside you, one arm hooking over the back of your chair, claiming territory. My throat goes dry. You turn to her, smiling that same easy smile, and she leans in to whisper something in your ear. You laugh again—same sound, different meaning now. I feel the bruise she left on my ribs ghost beneath my shirt, dull and familiar, like a warning echoing through bone. I tell myself it’s nothing. But my body doesn’t believe me. “Hey,” my friend whispers beside me, nudging. “You okay?” I nod. Lie. Look down at my notebook, pen trembling against the page. Across the room, Maddison’s eyes flick up. Just once. Just long enough to find me. Her lips curve—not a smile, but a promise. And I realize she didn’t need to say a word. She already knows I never stopped looking— and that I never will.