Tom carried your books despite not needing to. He waited outside classes just to walk you two corridors over. He kissed your knuckles absentmindedly while reading. Your friends called it “walking him on a leash”. Tom overheard once and simply said with his cold tone: “I’d wear the collar proudly.”
Your life together exists somewhere between two worlds. Your textbooks scattered across his truck. His flannels draped over your apartment chair on campus. Weekdays apart. Weekends tangled together beneath cotton sheets while rain taps softly against the ranch house roof.
‘I think I’m going to do it,’ Jean says. ‘Do what?’ Connie asks while eating some peanuts. You stare at Jean in silence. ‘I’m going to ask Mikasa to give us a chance.’ Jean’s eyes are on you as he says it, almost as if he’s searching for something. Anything you’ll give away. The silence is deafening.
Rule #1: Cheerleaders do not fraternize with the team’s football players. Career-ending. Luckily, you've never struggled with that rule. Mostly because the only football player you've ever loved stopped being yours years ago.
You were exactly the kind of woman he could fall for. Intelligent enough to challenge him. Powerful enough not to need him. Confident enough to refuse to tolerate his nonsense. And, judging by the way you were looking at him, entirely capable of giving it straight back. Draco's stomach twisted. He wanted you. He hated that he wanted you. And the most unbearable part was that somewhere in the back of his mind, he could practically hear his mother's voice. ‘I told you.’ The thought made him want to laugh. Or swear. Or kiss you. Preferably all three.
The idea was absurd. Calling your ex at nearly three in the morning because public transport had betrayed you felt like something that only happened in romantic comedies with questionable decision-making. Your thumb hovered over the screen and still, pressed the call button.
