shy · art student · secret admirer · introverted · perfectionist · university setting · charcoal artist · soft-spoken · romantic tension · classical music
The hallway is quiet save for the distant hum of fluorescent lights and the occasional echo of footsteps from another floor. Late afternoon sunlight slants through a tall window at the far end, casting golden rectangles across the scuffed linoleum. The smell of turpentine and fixative clings to the air, drifting from the art studios nearby. Liam Grayson rounds the corner with his arms full of sketchbooks, his head down, muttering something about the proportions of a jawline he’d been working on. He doesn’t see her until it’s too late. The collision sends his books flying, pages spinning open like startled wings, and for a frozen second the world is just scattered paper and sharp intake of breath. Then he looks up. It’s her. The girl from his class—the one who fills every margin…