Grade 10 arrived already bruised.
Rhianna's absence wasn't loud. It didn't scream or beg for attention. It hollowed him out instead. Seeing her with someone else—someone shorter, darker, unfamiliar—didn't spark anger. It created vacancy. Like a room that had been stripped of furniture and left echoing.
Aiden replayed memories obsessively. Old videos. Archived messages. Laughs preserved in pixels. Each swipe pulled him further from the present and deeper into a version of life that no longer existed. The past became a place he visited too often and stayed in too long.
At school, his body showed up. His mind drifted.
Teachers spoke. Chalk scratched the board. Fans hummed overhead. None of it reached him. He stared at ceilings, railings, empty corners of classrooms, wondering how someone could feel so present yet so disposable at the same time.
There were moments—quiet, dangerous moments—when he stood too close to edges and imagined silence. Not death exactly. Just the end of noise. The end of effort. But imagination never became action. Something in him, stubborn and unfinished, refused to let go.
That was when Janothon noticed him.
Janothon didn't move like other students. He carried authority without permission. A leader of the school's rougher crowd—not reckless, but strategic. He watched Aiden for days before speaking.
Then one afternoon, he did.
"Stop letting girls run your head," Janothon said plainly. "You think emotions make you strong. They don't. Loyalty does. Power does."
He offered structure. Belonging. Protection.
"Roll with me," he said. "I'll make sure nothing touches you."
Aiden didn't join out of admiration. He joined out of exhaustion.
That was the beginning of the split.
The soft version of him—the one that trusted deeply, loved openly, broke easily—was pushed into hiding. Aiden gave that part a name and locked it away. What remained was something sharper. Calmer. Detached.
This new Aiden didn't chase affection. He collected attention.
Girls came and went. Some overlapping. Some unaware of each other. He learned how to listen without revealing, how to mirror desire without offering vulnerability. Charm became a tool, not a feeling. Winning replaced wanting.
For a while, it worked.
Sedreeka was kind. Consistent. Easy to talk to. Their connection grew quickly—too quickly. She trusted him. He enjoyed the closeness, but not enough to stop scanning the room for something else.
And then there was Tamia—just out of reach, already claimed. Janothon noticed her first. Aiden pretended it didn't matter.
He drifted again.
Then Rhianna returned.
Not fully. Not honestly. Just enough to reopen wounds that hadn't healed. When she leaned into him, when she touched his hair, when she smiled like old times, his guard weakened. Hope slipped in quietly and rearranged his priorities without asking permission.
He believed they were rebuilding.
She didn't.
When he saw her talking to another boy—casual, unbothered—reality struck late and hard. What he thought was mutual was one-sided. What he guarded so carefully had already been given away.
At the same time, Britany passed briefly through his life—bright, attractive, temporary. That ended quickly, leaving no damage but reinforcing a pattern: nothing stayed.
Eventually, Rhianna faded again.
This time, he didn't chase.
As exams approached, something shifted. The chaos lost its appeal. The games felt hollow. Distraction stopped working. Aiden redirected the pressure inward—toward work, focus, control.
Asheana reappeared then. Familiar. Gentle. She didn't demand explanations or promises. She simply sat with him during lunch, talked when he wanted, stayed quiet when he didn't.
That steadiness mattered more than romance.
When exams came, Aiden locked in.
Late nights. Early mornings. Discipline replacing impulse. Bentley pushed him quietly, competitively. They rose together.
Results came back.
Aiden ranked first.
Bentley followed close behind.
For the first time in months, Aiden felt something real—not excitement, not relief, but grounding.
He hadn't lost his mind.
He hadn't disappeared.
He hadn't jumped.
He had survived another version of himself.
And though the mask still fit, cracks had started to show.
Because power without purpose always collapses.
And somewhere deep beneath the layers he built, the softer part of him was still breathing—waiting to be acknowledged, not erased.
The war wasn't over.
It was just changing shape.