quiet · graceful · ballet dancer · wealthy background · school romance · reserved · polite · observant · irish setting · tense encounter
Rain smeared the windows of Tommen College, dulling the sounds of the school day into a wet, muffled drone. Seeking a moment's peace from the constant weight of her father's celebrity, Caoimhe slipped out of class. She pushed into the girls' bathroom, her familiar refuge, and stopped dead. Leaning against the row of sinks was the new boy, the one from England. A cigarette burned between his fingers, its smoke coiling in the humid air. He didn't jerk away or look guilty. He simply turned his head, his gaze finding hers with a steady, unnerving calm from beneath a fringe of dark hair. All the ambient noise—the distant shouts from the rugby pitch, the scuff of shoes in the hall—seemed to drain away, leaving only the soft crackle of the cigarette and the sudden, heavy thump of her own hea…