Detention was nothing like I imagined. No shouting teachers, no chaos just silence so heavy it felt like a punishment on its own.
The classroom we were sent to was half-empty, rows of desks lined neatly like soldiers. The clock on the wall ticked too loudly, each second dragging like it was mocking us. Charlie sat beside me, his posture stiff, his eyes fixed straight ahead. Mumeen was across the room, slouched in his chair, smirking whenever he caught me looking his way.
The supervising teacher scribbled something on a notepad at the front, barely paying us attention. But the real eyes, the ones that mattered, were the students walking by the open door. They slowed down, peering in, their whispers floating just far enough for me to catch fragments.
That's them.
Coral and Charlie.
I told you, it's true.
I clenched my fists under the desk, pretending I could not hear, but every syllable dug deeper.
Charlie shifted, finally glancing at me. His eyes softened for a second, the tiniest spark of reassurance, before he turned away again. He knew. He heard it too.
I told myself to breathe, to survive these endless hours of silence and suspicion. But with every tick of the clock, I could not shake the feeling that detention was not just punishment it was a stage. A place where everyone could watch us unravel.
Minutes dragged like hours. My pen tapped against the desk without me realizing, the only sound breaking the stale air.
From across the room, Mumeen chuckled under his breath. The kind of laugh meant to cut.
I forced myself not to look, but then he muttered, just loud enough, Boyfriend's bodyguard.
Heat rushed to my face before I could stop it. My chair scraped as I shifted, but Charlie's hand brushed against mine under the desk a silent warning, a tether holding me in place. His calm steadied me, but only barely.
Mumeen leaned back in his chair, smirking like he had won. The teacher glanced up briefly, then back down at his papers, uninterested. To him, we were just another set of names on a detention list.
Charlie exhaled slowly, shoulders stiff. Ignore him, his eyes seemed to say. And I tried. I really did. But the whispers outside the door, Mumeen's smirk inside, the tick of the clock it was all pressing, pushing, clawing.
I lowered my gaze to the desk, nails digging into the wood grain. Detention was supposed to be silence, but to me, it was louder than any fight we had ever been in.
When the final bell rang, the supervising teacher dismissed us with a wave of his hand, too tired to care. Chairs scraped as we stood, the heavy silence breaking all at once.
I grabbed my bag, eager to leave, but Mumeen blocked the doorway with that same smug grin.
"Careful, Coral," he muttered, his voice low but sharp. "Next time, let your boyfriend fight his own battles."
My chest tightened. Before I could speak, Charlie stepped forward, his presence filling the space between us. His voice was calm, but I knew the edge beneath it.
"Back off, Mumeen."
For a moment, no one moved. The hallway buzzed with curious eyes, kids slowing down to catch the show.
Mumeen smirked, leaning closer. "See? Proving my point."
Charlie's fists clenched at his sides, but he didn't swing. He just stood there, unflinching, until Mumeen finally scoffed and shoved past him. The crowd dissolved with disappointed whispers, denied the drama they craved.
I exhaled shakily. Charlie looked at me then, and though he didn't say a word, the message was clear: This isn't over. Not with him. Not with the whispers. Not with any of it.
And I realized he was right. The fight in the classroom had been only the beginning.
That evening, the house felt even colder than usual. I shut my bedroom door and leaned against it, the echoes of the day circling in my head like restless ghosts.
Mumeen's words replayed over and over. Careful, Coral. Let your boyfriend fight his own battles. It was just a jab, meant to get under my skin but it stuck. Not because it was cruel, but because of how close it came to the truth.
I sank onto my bed, staring at the ceiling. Charlie had always been the one stepping in, steady where I stumbled, calm where I burned too quickly. He called it protecting me. I called it love. But the world, the people watching, they called it something else. And maybe they weren't wrong.
My phone buzzed on the nightstand. A message from Charlie. Don't let him get to you.
I typed back slowly, deleting words as fast as I wrote them. In the end, I sent nothing. Instead, I placed the phone face down and closed my eyes, wishing silence could drown everything out.
But silence could not erase the whispers. It could not stop the memory of my father's voice last night, sharp and merciless. It could not soften the way Charlie's jaw had tightened when Mumeen pushed.
The truth pressed harder than ever. We were running out of places to hide.