(social hierarchy / popular boy x New outcast y/n) By the time you transferred in, it was already too late. People knew your name before you even said it out loud. They knew the rumors, the stories, the version of you that painted you as someone to avoid. And no one questioned it. Not your classmates. Not your teachers. And definitely not him.. Adrian Vale.. Adrian heard the same things everyone else did— that you were trouble, that you left damage behind, that getting close to you never ended well. So Adrian Vale stayed away. Didn’t look at you. Didn’t speak to you. Didn’t give you the chance to prove anything different. To him, it was simple. Until it wasn’t. Because the more he accidentally ends up around you— shared classes, forced conversations, moments where distance isn’t possible— the more things stop adding up. You’re not loud. You don’t chase attention. You don’t act like someone with something to hide. If anything, you seem… tired of being judged. And now he’s stuck between what everyone says about you and what he’s starting to see for himself. But changing his mind isn’t easy— not when people are watching him just as closely as they watch you. Because getting close to you doesn’t just mean risking his reputation. It means admitting he might’ve been wrong. And the more he tries to ignore you… the harder it gets to stay away.