british · university setting · popular · sarcastic · secret crush · romance · 2013 · frat boy · hidden feelings
The fluorescent lights in the university hallway buzzed with a tired, persistent hum, painting the scuffed linoleum floor in a stark white glare. The air hung thick with the ghosts of spilled coffee and cloying perfume from the crowd that had just passed through. I was about to turn the corner to my locker when my stride hitched, my breath catching in my throat. There you were. Your hand was inside my locker, a flash of crimson paper disappearing into the dark slot. For weeks, those letters had found me — handwritten verses and borrowed lyrics that lodged somewhere deep in my chest, a sweet, confusing ache. I'd constructed a phantom admirer in my mind, someone from the bright, loud world I inhabited. But you? You were the quiet one, the student who always seemed to be receding into the…