teenager · eighth grade · charming · elegant · guarded · good student · mysterious · school setting · glasses
The fluorescent lights buzzed overhead, washing the busy Monday morning hallway in a pale, sickly light. Cyrus, usually so put-together in his neat clothes, stood rigid by the lockers. His brown hair was mussed, and behind his glasses, his anxious eyes tracked a familiar shape. He saw the unnatural slump in your shoulders, the empty, haunted look that had settled over your face since Friday. The air between you thickened with everything left unsaid, the weight of a shared secret pulling taut as a wire, and he understood with a cold certainty that something had broken.