—the good in being isolated a marvel of its own. With the sky painted an ocean of navy and eyes replicating the stars, my feet took off to the City Park. Midday was the time everybody was out and about, immediately making this place a pressing dislike. The swings were off-limits without being labeled as a horrid example to younger kids, and the controlled glares random people dared to pass still stayed strange.

Nonetheless, this was indeed ridiculous on my part—did ridiculous even justify what I was doing? Clad in black sweatshirt and a wave of tiredness, I decided to jump out of the window at 12:30 A.M. Maybe I was hell-bent on dying too soon, and the options were varied. It could either be a murderer on the street looking for the next victim, or my very dear brother upon finding out about my adventures.

Yet, my intellect pushed me to the edges, and only the whispering winds seemed to calm the chaos I held.

This wasn't a thing, back in Tennessee. If I would've stepped a foot out of my window at midnight, somebody might've called the police. The way it became second nature truly terrified yet astounded me to the depth of my bones, but I wasn't doing anything to stop myself regardless.

The park seemed to flash my childhood for a solidifying second—the monkey bars and the slides immediately getting personified. I wasn't ever the monkey bars person, though—kids had some serious core strength to do shit like that. Swings forever remained the only comrade, and the mere sight made my lips twitch upwards in a grin. Rubber against cobblestone chimed in my ears, and it was only when I looked back up that I saw a silhouette.

Great, I wasn't alone.

Steps stopped, and so did my breathing. They say that if you are close to death, you would know. A painfully revealing seven seconds would unfold and unfold with all the memories near and dear, slowly wrapping you in its spellbound—

Evan.

"Oh my God, this has to be a joke, right?"

My voice was weirdly strained and passive, but the storm that set my heart into an overdrive stirred with a different halo—scarlet and pink, bright and hot, ever-enchanting and all-consuming. Why was he here? He was turned to face me, hands in pockets and a signature dismissive look on his face. Even though I was far off, his face excelled in the moonlight and struck my cheeks in a raw crimson, and I had to ball my fists for the situation to make sense.

He was the kind of splendor poetry was written about, the visage which could belong to the paintings in a refined museum. He was art and heartache in an amalgamation of musical notes, but the world seemed too tone deaf to comprehend.

He laughed, then, immediately making me snap out of my thoughts. If I had been gawking at him because, well—he was beautiful, I wanted to punch him in the face. Some instincts never did go away.

Was it possible for someone's hair to hold that much power? I found myself questioning, but fleetingly broke out of it. He was the heartache and sun-kissed misery people talked about, and he knew—he knew it too well, so there wasn't a point in inflating the ego any further.

I had been given my cue to leave. With his piercing gaze and pursed lips, I managed to avert my gaze away—down to the ragged cobblestones—and slowly tip-toed out, a step at a time. He sighed, at first. And then, a number of leaves crunched on the floor, and his voice mixed with the chillness in the air.

"Are you leaving already?"

His words seemed to deter my moves. I whipped my head behind and threw him a roll of the eye. "Yeah, captain obvious."

He crossed his arms over his chest when he approached me. The stars were hidden for a reason unknown, but it was simply forbidden for someone to look like Adonis in the moonlight—glorious and striking and all-too powerful. He hadn't done anything, neither had he said anything. But the way I gaped was beyond embarrassing, setting my heart on fire.

I thought he would near me even more when he leaned on the adjacent swing rod. There was a smile which trifled, but I found myself staring at it still. I could make out his muscular yet lean shoulders, and how his arms crossed when he spoke again.

"Why are you here anyway?"

My mouth dried up a little. I wish I knew. But he didn't need to know the inner conflicts, so I stuck with the coldness that penetrated in the atmosphere. "None of your concern."

Shock consumed his features before he raised a questioning eyebrow. Why I had been so rude, I couldn't tell. Sometimes the past came unexpected and in a whiplash—like cold downpours and harsh rainstorms—and maybe it was because everything about him reminded me of how I was before, when things were happy and happy and goddamn delightful—and I couldn't help staying a little heated.

It was not justifiable, but that was the finest I could stand on my ground.

He could've put me in place, still. But I saw his face morph into something unreadable, and he spoke in the softest spur of words.

"Did you come here to leave?"

His questions made my head throb. I had nothing personal against him anymore, but the way this inquiry made my senses toy with each other was insane. Maddening. When I met his eyes, it was easier for me to fall apart, and hence I dropped the gaze to the floor. He took my silence as a response and chuckled lightly.

"Then stay."

We couldn't rule out the possibility of him having psychotic intentions just yet, and even if he was goddamn gorgeous—

Enough. There was a stupid grin on his face and mine replicated the redness of a clown, but the darkness hid it well. I tugged at my hoodie and groaned out aloud. "Why are you everywhere I go?"

That question did the trick.

His face twisted in humor; eyes lined with mirth. He wrinkled his nose and rubbed his palms atop each other before he let a somber laugh slip through his lips. "Do you think I know that? Why are you everywhere I go?"

And just like that, we were back to square one. With heartbeat tripling and tripling, my eyes burned into his whilst I fumed in fury.

"Excuse me? You are the annoying one."

"Haven't you got you facts wrong, now? ¡Eres el que no me deja respirar en los últimos días!"

I gritted my teeth. "Do not switch up languages. I didn't understand a thing!"

His face fell, hands tying together. "Oh, right."

The tone made me do a double-take, and also made me realize how downright stupid this conversation was. I thought we were over this.

"I thought we were over this."

He spoke my mind. The stillness could be felt in the air now, added to it the outrageous amounts of awkwardness and pauses. When I looked up there was another smile on his face, but this one was more sinister than innocent. Despite hating every single encounter with him, the way the stars seemed to glow in his eyes could rapt me for days to come and go by.

It wasn't helping.

So, with a last look I threw at him I gradually walked out of the park, only to hope that the blue-eyed Devil I had been seeing didn't end up in my dreams.

▂

Waking up in the mornings wasn't a pleasant occurrence (ever), and with the blaring alarm and the grumpy Liam I lived with, validating that was harder than probable. Yet, some things did the trick and made it better—first and foremost of them being the pancakes he made, and second being the mere thought of waking up from a sleep which left me distraught in the middle of the nights.

"If you'd sleep early then maybe you won't look like the reincarnated version of Satan in the morning," he muttered under his breath when he entered my room without knocking. I flung a pillow at his head before my eyes had even adjusted to the brightness in the room. He huffed, while I could just smile—at least the basketball skill wasn't just thrown out of the window.

Chaos succumbed to my actions until I had left the house and hurried myself on the streets. The walk to school wasn't quite the painful one, and with the roaring winds that blew past I enjoyed it too much to care. At the entrance of the school itself stood a great myriad of people—most of them being the acquaintances I had made not too long ago.

Stella, Leo, Sean and Raymond were all formed into a group as they chatted. Xavier and Evan were nowhere to be seen, and the latter's absence was relieving, to say the least. Chloe was feeling ill, so she didn't turn up.

Even I felt sick on Mondays.

"Pineapple does not belong on pizza!" Sean shouted, which made Raymond glare at him in equal amounts. How the conversation had rolled from Gossip Girl to pineapple on pizza remained a mystery, but I laughed regardless.

We did bond over in a week. I could say that I was made to bond with these people, but everyone would've taken full offense in it. Sean was the shyest of them, and it took him two days to start talking to us. Amidst chuckles and profanities, friendships were blossoming from the scratch—and it would've been ridiculous to let go of this opportunity.

I had already lost enough.

My smile dropped, and so did Leo's. Soon, a nudge hit my ribs in slight pain. "You okay?"

His brown eyes were pooled together in genuine warmth. I managed to nod and smile meekly, insides turning in an uncomfortable churn. "Yeah."

Raymond had slapped the back of Sean's head—a way of showing affection but most certainly knocked the latter off his stance—and then spoke. "You don't say, dude. We are having pineapples on our margheritas till the day we die."

With pursed lips Sean shook his head as a smile enveloped his mouth. While we strolled past people and entered the main hallway, Xavier had joined. "I swear, Ray—you got to eat less."

"Say what you wanna, man, but I don't have time for that kinda negativity in my life."

▂

English class stirred something inside of me—like black ink rousing and creating unreal situations I yielded to and became the number one reason why my attention stayed boosted throughout. Clearly, it wasn't the same for everyone, since the guy across me was stifling his third yawn in the past ten-minute span.

I sneakily rolled my eyes at Leo.

Then—as if due to some strange impulse—my gaze tumbled to two seats across mine, and landed right on Evan. His presence was confusing since he hadn't attended any classes in the past week, but nothing about him was simple anyway. Being a hell of an acquaintance, I never knew what terms we were ever on: pleasant or downright homicidal.

And hence, I quietly averted my gaze from his to the class.

After three classes, my back hurt when I slumped down on the cafeteria chairs. We were growing accustomed to sitting near the boys a little too much—but I was grateful we didn't share the table in totality. Stella bounced on the seat right across mine, and with a heavy sign passing her lips she pressed her temple.

"I'm so done. Mr. Carter gave me three assignments for three consecutive days! Is he crazy?"

"Well, good luck on that," I said, but my mind was wandering onto the possibilities of me skipping any important submissions in the past. The thought was enough for the hot ball of fire—anxiety—course through my veins, and I closed my eyes for a jiffy.

Xavier had walked over, a small smile gracing his lips. His black hair was all over the place and the run of his hand made it worse, but he managed to pull the look.

"Ladies," he spoke, eyes falling to Stella. "I can help you if you want, Stella."

Flustered face rose from the phone she had in her hand, and for the first time I saw her speech stutter. "I. . .yeah. Can you?"

In a heartbeat, Xavier Henderson was all we could see—arms lined on the wooden table and eyes trained on her. The muscles in his jaw ticked when he put his phone away after a last glance, and the same copper eyes met mine before he smiled kindly.

"I just said so, didn't I?"

If it would've been anybody else, Stella would've raged like the hellfire. But with the honey-dripping smile which escaped his lips and how ordinary words felt like majestic poetry, the sharp intake of her breath was just valid.

The conversation rolled before Stella could respond.

Leo whined from a table away, hands swaying in the air. "Can someone help me too? I don't even know what's happening in my math class. Geometry?"

With a mouth filled with food Raymond had the audacity to shout. "Trigonometry, you dumbass."

Leo slapped the table, as if things had only now started making sense. "The same! Sean, you are taking math, right?"

Sean was suddenly too preoccupied to care, making him whine even louder. My grin tripled, and so did Stella's. "You guys are simply mean."

Ray proceeded to humor him even more, and the copper-eyed boy in front of me rolled his eyes whilst looking at us. Despite how insignificant the situation might've been, the heat which bubbled in my chest—happiness—was foreign.

After months of wretched stars and clawed marks on my skin, it felt nice for the coolness of the moonlight to dance across it.

▂

The basketball court was empty.

There was no better time that the present, and my feet had already paced around the court—panting, rushing, dribbling and shooting the ball in my hands. The scoreboard in my mind was fuzzy due to my brain being an utter bedlam.

I was playing after months.

My heart was squirming with uneasiness, but I couldn't stop. Basketball had had that sort of pull for me—back when I had been newly enrolled due to him—and even when everything tied back to him with this sport, the weird sensation of comfort which lined itself at the back of my shoulders wasn't deterred in the slightest.

"Damn it," I cursed under my breath, the incorrect aim dissatisfying me. The ball tumbled on my left leg and crossed the boundaries before it rolled further out, and a voice baritone-like floated in the air, still melodious enough for me to whip my head in a heartbeat.

"Hey, can I practice for a while now?"

Despite the tornados which set my heart into a ruckus, there was a pleasant smile forming on my lips. A smile. But then, it was probably because of the huge grin spread across his features. And even if my mind had wanted me to be cold—like I had been with him since the start—my reply was downright reckless.

"Well, I guess the ball is in your court now."

His laugh was contagious: boyish, second nature, and beyond attractive. And when he walked closer after dumping his duffle on the bleachers, my breathing staggered, though just a little.

His eyes followed the ball and then caught up with my gaze. High collarbones, pursed lips, angular nose and forever thundered eyes—and now, the light speck of bronze which was spread on his tan skin was what heartache was made of. He was a recipe for disaster.

And I continued to stare at him like he was some sort of antidote.

With daunted moves I slowly walked my way out, his eyes still pictured clear as day into my mind. How someone's eyes could hold the blueness of all oceans combined, I wished to find out.

"Wanna match?"

What?

"Excuse me?"

He stared at me, eyes falling down to my shoes and rising back up. It wasn't everyday a mere gaze set my limbs on fire, but the heat sitting on my shoulders was soon to envelop my entire body if I didn't give up on the eye-contact.

"Wanna play a match with me?"

I folded my hands curtly, shaking my head. "No, thanks."

"Afraid you'll lose?" he asked, his face showing the amusement. Now was the time the coyness was starting to slip past his lips, making my heartbeat faster than normal.

Yes, and I don't wish to participate in any further act of public humiliation for another thirty years, so thank you.

"I know for a fact that you play better than me, no need to be arrogant," is what I ended up saying, face wound up in a little scowl.

"Touché," he added, putting his left hand on his heart.

I shrugged when he didn't stop me any further, walking towards the bleachers which lined the court. His moves—when I began to notice—were quick and fluent. Only when I had started rummaging through my bag did I hear his call again.

"We could just simply play, if you like."

With shrunken and confused eyes, I babbled. "I mean. . .it's okay, you play."

"Oh, c'mere."

I looked at him in bewilderment, but something inside me made me oblige. Maybe because it was a request of his kind—no question marks but puppy eyes—or the fact that figuring out his gameplay was suddenly a topic of interest to me.

Either way, it wasn't going to end well.

When he saw me get up and walk towards him, I saw a smile. He was smiling too much, and what killed me was the amount of liking I had towards it. But it was gone too soon, and without any notice, he threw the ball at me.

I caught it in one hand.

I dribbled until I had reached the court, ducking his hand and moves easily. I knew he was trying to keep his moves as artless as he could, just so the game stayed in my hands a little longer. It was visible—delayed attempts and rolling of the eyes—and I couldn't control the chuckle.

"Where did you learn how to play like that?"

I wanted to retort with—like what? You practically didn't let me do anything, but his eyes showed how genuine of a compliment it was, and I grinned. "My previous school."

Then, as his demeanor changed, so did the glint in his eye.

"You ready for the match, Edwards?"

"I—excuse me? We—"

Too late.

He was rushing with the ball in his hands, and I had nothing to do but chase him. After several dodging's and plenty of bated breaths, the ball managed to end up in his hands.

What followed was literal hell.

All pretentiously named technicalities were being used against me. Breathlessly, I continued my chase, only to stand face to face with him. He wasn't far away, and as I took a left turn, he took a right—completely dodging me and my motive. The height difference wasn't an ally—him having a good few inches over me—and he knew.

Damn it.

Something inside of me fueled, burning and burning in my chest until I was racing after him to score. I heard a chuckle, but my mind was unfazed—and when I finally caught up to him, his eyes met mine as he dribbled the ball between us.

I couldn't drop the gaze, as if it were paralyzing and solidifying into mine. Suddenly, the focus seemed to shift, and the ball wasn't in front of me anymore—and when the reality kicked, I found myself slipping on the matted floor.

With a thud, I landed on my butt.

Oh, Christ—could this have been more embarrassing?

He laughed yet walked over, hands extended. "You're slow."

I didn't bother to even look at his hands, eyes glaring in fury. "You cheated."