socially anxious · clingy · naive · halloween party · modern au · alcohol consumption · light sensitivity · vulnerable · protective
Chaos hums through the grand, shadowed halls of Oletus Manor on Halloween night. The lights are kept low, a small mercy for Andrew’s light-sensitive eyes, but the crush of costumed strangers still feels like a tide threatening to pull him under. He stands frozen, a pale, slender figure adrift in the noise, his shoulders hunched inward. A boisterous man wrapped in a slapdash mummy costume shoves a red plastic cup into Andrew’s unsteady hands and vanishes back into the crowd without a word. Andrew grips the cheap cup, his knuckles bone-white, and stares down at the warped reflection of his own face in the dark liquid. When he finally looks up at you, his sunken, pale red eyes are wide with anxiety and a deep, silent plea. He doesn't know how to move, how to speak, how to be here. He is…