POV: Avery Knox
Two days after the "gas explosion" that killed a quiet girl from his art history class, the world felt like it was made of glass. Avery moved through the halls of Crescent High like a ghost, terrified that any sudden motion would cause everything to shatter and rain down around him.
Sasha Reid was dead. The news said it was a tragic accident, faulty appliance. But Avery knew. He'd seen her name in the cached article search. He'd felt the digital ghost watching him. And now she was gone. Coincidence was a fairy tale for people whose lives weren't a horror story.
And now, there was Leo.
Leo, who had found him walking alone at night. Leo, who had texted him right after his lights mysteriously went out. Leo, whose brother had another name, a name from a fire.
Every time he saw that dark, perfect head in the crowd, a cold wire tightened around Avery's lungs. He developed a radar for him a sixth sense that screamed danger whenever Leo was within thirty feet. He took new routes to class. He ate lunch in the dusty yearbook closet instead of the courtyard. He perfected the art of becoming part of the wall.
It didn't work.
He was at his locker, head down, fumbling with a combination that his trembling fingers kept messing up, when the air changed. It grew still. Heavy. The chatter around him seemed to fade into a distant hum.
He didn't need to look up. He knew.
"Struggling?"
Leo's voice was quiet, calm, and it came from directly beside his shoulder. Too close. Avery flinched, a full-body jerk that made him smack his elbow against the metal door. The pain was a bright, sharp distraction from the terror.
"S-sorry," Avery mumbled, staring fixedly at the dial. Go away go away go away.
"Here, let me." A hand long-fingered, elegant reached past him. Leo's scent, that clean, sharp, expensive smell, enveloped him. Leo's chest was almost against his back. Avery stopped breathing.
With three swift, precise turns, the lock clicked open. Leo didn't move his hand away. He held the locker door open, caging Avery between his body and the metal.
"See? Easy," Leo murmured, his voice a low vibration Avery felt in his bones.
Avery couldn't speak. He just gave a tiny, frantic nod, staring into the dark interior of his locker like it was a sanctuary.
"You've been avoiding me," Leo said. It wasn't a question. It was a gentle accusation.
"I haven't," Avery whispered to his trigonometry textbook. Please believe the lie.
"Avery." Leo's voice was so soft it was almost kind. "Look at me."
It was the last thing he wanted to do. But the command in that gentle tone was undeniable. Slowly, Avery turned his head. He kept his eyes lowered, fixed on the crisp line of Leo's jaw.
"There," Leo said. His expression was one of concerned curiosity. The perfect mask. "I just wanted to check on you. After the other night. And with… everything that's happened." He didn't specify. He didn't need to. Sasha's death hung between them, an unspoken, poisonous thing.
"I'm fine," Avery choked out. His voice was too high, too thin. He sounded like a scared child.
Leo's head tilted. His eyes, those depthless dark eyes, scanned Avery's face, reading the panic like a book he'd written himself. "You don't seem fine. You seem scared."
The directness was a shock. Avery's gaze finally flicked up, against his will, meeting Leo's. For a second, he saw it not concern, but a deep, intense interest. The look of a scientist observing a fascinating, frightened specimen.
"I'm not," Avery insisted, forcing his eyes back down, focusing on the school crest on Leo's blazer. Don't look at me. Don't see me.
"Okay," Leo said, not sounding convinced. He finally took a half-step back, giving Avery a sliver of space to breathe. The relief was instantaneous and dizzying. "But if you are… if you need to talk. About anything. I'm here. I mean that."
He said it like a vow. It sounded nothing like a promise of friendship. It sounded like a sentence.
Leo reached out then. Not to touch Avery, but to gently tap the cover of the sketchbook poking out of his locker. Avery recoiled as if struck.
Leo's hand paused. A shadow, fleeting and cold, passed over his face. Then it was gone, replaced by that polite, concerned mask. "Still drawing, I see." He smiled, a small, tight thing that didn't reach his eyes. "I'd love to see your work sometime."
It wasn't a request. It was a declaration of intent.
Before Avery could formulate a denial, Leo gave a slight nod. "See you around, Avery."
He walked away, moving with that easy, confident grace through the crowded hall. Students parted for him like water around a stone.
Avery stood frozen, his hand pressed against the cold metal of his open locker door, the ghost of Leo's proximity clinging to his skin. He felt marked. Seen in the worst possible way.
He didn't want Leo's attention. He didn't want his help. He wanted to be invisible, to be a smudge on the wallpaper, to be so uninteresting that the terrifying, beautiful eye of Leo Maddox passed right over him.
But he knew, with a certainty that sank into his gut like a stone, that it was far too late for that. Leo had seen him. And now, he would never look away.