School had always seemed like the worst place on earth to Jeremy.
Not because he was disliked here. Quite the opposite. People knew him. Admired him. Some feared him. He was intelligent, fast, handsome, and damn mysterious. Still, every day spent within these walls felt like a prison sentence. A routine. The same faces, the same conversations, the same empty stares. A day in and day out repetition of normalcy that, in his eyes, was just a shadow of true life. Everything seemed predictable, dead, without spark.
Until he saw her.
Julie appeared in his life like static on the air. Like an impulse that pulled him from his lethargy. Something he couldn't ignore. She had a light inside her that he had never seen in anyone else. A smile that wasn't forced. A look that didn't judge. And though he knew her name, knew her face — because she was one of those people you couldn't notice — only recently did he start truly seeing her. Not as another person in the crowd, but as someone who was... important.
Julie was stunning, though not in an obvious way. She had long, dark red hair that, in the sunlight, took on the color of chestnut. Her skin was pale, almost porcelain, and beneath her long lashes were eyes the color of honey — warm but watchful. When she smiled, her cheeks would flush with a light, blush that, for some reason, Jeremy remembered. She dressed simply, without exaggeration, but always with taste. She had an elegance that required no effort.
And Jeremy? He was the one people looked at, but no one truly knew. Tall, with a strong build, he had black hair in a slight disarray and sharp facial features that accentuated his cold expression. His gaze — dark, penetrating, with a hint of something dangerous — made people either fear him or want to get closer. Always dressed in black, with a nonchalant air, he gave the impression of someone who didn't fit anywhere, yet was at the center of everything.
It all started in a trivial way. She left her notebook on the bench in the library. He handed it back to her without a word. Then she looked at him in a way no one had before. Without fear. Without reverent curiosity. Just... normally. Like he was one of them. Like she saw him not as a legend, not as a weirdo, but as someone who was simply there.
And that's when it all began.
From that moment, he couldn't stop thinking about her. Not just looking at her. Her presence worked on him like a spell. She was popular, surrounded by people, but always seemed separate. When she laughed, it wasn't for attention. When she cried, she didn't pretend. There was something real about her. Something Jeremy couldn't describe, but couldn't ignore. And though the world divided them, in his mind, everything led to her. Every thought. Every glance. Every heartbeat.
They started talking. At first, about nothing. About school, about teachers, about stupid things that didn't matter. But every word they spoke brought them closer. He saw how Julie slowly began to open up to him more and more. How she smiled, not just with her lips but with her eyes. How she listened. And how sometimes, she'd look away, as if she were afraid, he might see something.
The problem was Rosalie.
She watched him from a distance. Occasionally, she'd disappear for whole days. Sporadically, she'd appear unexpectedly and only look at him. Like she knew him better than he knew himself. Like she could read him like an open book. She said things she shouldn't have known. She touched places no one else knew. And when he looked into her eyes, he had the feeling that he could see himself completely — with all his secrets and demons. Occasionally, he felt like she had been there — in his dreams, in his memories, in the corners of his soul, where he could no longer separate them from reality.
Julie had no idea what she was getting into.
And he didn't know how to protect her from it. Or maybe worse — whether he could protect her at all.
Because occasionally the shadows were stronger than the light. And feelings were more dangerous than lies.
*
Julie sat at the back of the class, fiddling with the end of her pen, as if hoping that it would somehow change something. Perhaps today would be different. Quieter. But ever since Jeremy had entered her thoughts, something had shifted. She suddenly noticed him everywhere. In the crowd in the hallway. In the reflection on the window. In the looks of her friends, who stopped talking when she walked into the room. Jeremy wasn't just any guy. He was... intensity. A dangerous silence amidst the noise.
When he once asked her if she always held her pen so tightly, she couldn't answer. He looked at her as if he knew that this very question would break her. And maybe, indeed — he did break her a little.
There was something in his presence that unsettled her. He was magnetic, but at the same time, he made her want to run. He was cold, but when he spoke, his tone carried warmth that couldn't be ignored. As if he hid something real beneath the ice.
At night, she thought about him more than she cared to admit.
But there was someone else. Someone Julie didn't understand, but instinctively felt she should be afraid of.
Rosalie.
The girl who always seemed too confident. Too quiet. Too... present. She was everywhere Jeremy appeared. And even if she didn't do anything specific — her presence alone was enough to make Julie feel uncomfortable. Like she was caught in something bigger than she could comprehend.
One day, after classes, Julie ran into Rosalie in an empty hallway. She was leaning against the wall, as if waiting just for her. She smiled — a smile that didn't reach her eyes.
"Jeremy would destroy you," she said calmly, almost whispering.
"I'm sorry, what?"
"He doesn't belong to this world. And you are... well, you know. Ordinary." Rosalie looked down on her. "Do you think this is romantic? His coldness, his silence, the scars he carries in his gaze? Do you think it's a movie story?" She laughed shortly. "It's not a movie. It's a warning."
Julie didn't reply. She walked past her, trying not to show that any of those words had affected her. But they had. More than she wanted to admit.
Meanwhile, Jeremy stood by a closed window, somewhere on the other side of the school, and he knew something was happening. He could feel Rosalie. He could feel Julie. And how different these two energies were from each other. One was chaos — the other, calm.
The problem was that chaos was familiar to him. And calm... tempted him like a forbidden fruit.
And that's why things were starting to get dangerous.