Alex's POV
It had been a year.
A full year since he first met Ava with her oversized sweater and stubborn stare. A year since she threw a box of band-aids at his face and called him a moron. A year since he stopped being the guy who picked fights in hallways and dated girls just to forget how alone he felt.
Now? Now he sat with her legs tangled in his, sprawled out on a worn-down blanket in an abandoned part of campus, trying to memorize the curve of her smile without making it obvious.
They met here every Thursday after school. It wasn't official or planned. It just became their place. Her notebook always open, his head usually in her lap. She didn't ask him about fights anymore. He didn't start them anymore. Not unless someone talked about her. Then all bets were off.
"You're staring," she murmured, not looking up from her sketchbook.
Alex blinked. "No, I'm not."
"You always stare when you're thinking about something stupid. Like stealing the art teacher's car or jumping off the roof into the lake."
He snorted. "That was one time."
"You didn't even know how to swim."
"I was going through something."
She laughed. He felt it in his chest. That sound. It cracked him open every time.
He reached for a strand of her hair, twisting it absently around his finger. "Do you remember the day I got suspended?"
"Which one?"
"Ouch. Okay, fair. The one where Kevin said he liked you."
Her cheeks flushed. "Oh, that one. You punched him."
"Twice."
"You're lucky I didn't punch you."
"You threw band-aids at me. It hurt. Emotionally."
She looked at him then, full and direct. Like she always did when he felt like hiding. Like she knew where the shadows clung and decided to sit in them with him anyway.
"You didn't have to hit him, you know. I wasn't interested."
"I know," he said quietly.
She tilted her head. "Then why did you?"
He didn't answer right away. He didn't know how to tell her that when Kevin said her name, it sounded like he was trying to own it. Like she was a prize. A game.
And Ava wasn't a game. She was everything.
Instead, he asked, "Do you ever think about what it would be like if this wasn't temporary?"
She blinked. "This?"
"Us. If we weren't just playing at something fragile."
Her sketchbook slid off her lap.
"Alex."
He looked up.
Her eyes were wide. Her mouth parted. But the words didn't come.
And neither did his.
Because the truth was, he was terrified.
Terrified that if he said the words—I love you--she'd pull away. Or worse, she wouldn't.
Because once it was real, it could break. And he couldn't stand the thought of losing her. Not now. Not after everything.
So he smiled instead. Nudged her knee with his.
"Don't worry. I'm not going soft. Still punched someone last week for trying to touch your locker."
She groaned. "You're impossible."
"But lovable."
She didn't say yes.
But she didn't say no.
And as the wind rustled through the grass and her fingers curled into his hoodie, he thought maybe, just maybe, the things they didn't say were loud enough anyway.