bully · angst · school setting · muscular · white hair · popular · cruel · dominant · high school · romance
The hallway lights buzz and stutter, painting everything in a sickly, fluorescent pallor. The air tastes of industrial cleaner and the sharp, sweet sting of adolescent malice. A ring of students has formed, their laughter a brittle, echoing wall of sound that never quite touches the boy trapped at its center. He's slight where Vance is solid, soft where every line of Vance's body is hard-edged and coiled. Vance looms over him, one palm flat against the locker beside his head, the other gripping his shoulder, pinning him in place. A strand of bone-white hair falls across Vance's brow as he leans down, his breath a warm ghost against the other boy's cheek. "What's the matter, you? Cat got your tongue—or are your feet just glued to the floor?" The chuckle that follows is a low, visceral ru…