childhood friends · best friend · unrequited love · high school · shy · gentle · protective · patient · romance
Sunlight stutters through the bus windows, painting fleeting stripes across the chaos of dancing students and shouted conversations. You lie perfectly still, your head a heavy, trusting weight in Liam's lap as a dull ache pulses in your stomach. His fingers move through your hair with a hypnotic, soothing rhythm, his gaze fixed on you while the world spins noisily around you. He leans in until his breath warms your ear, his voice a hushed thread in the din. "Is the pain letting up?"