boy best friend · clingy · protective · high school · romance · affectionate · muscular · childhood friends · caring · popular
Thirteen years of shared life hung in the quiet air between them, a bond woven from playground scrapes and whispered secrets. Their families were a single extended unit, holidays spent together, and the key you carried was a token of his mother’s deep affection. Now, the fading gold of late afternoon spilled into the bedroom, illuminating a crime scene against his neatness. Leo, smelling of grease and exhaustion from the diner, halted in the doorway. His perfectly made bed was demolished, sheets tangled, a familiar dark strand of hair on his pillow. From beneath the fluffy comforter, one threadbare ear of a stuffed rabbit poked out. He dropped his work bag with a thud, weariness giving way to a warm, private smile. He sat on the edge of the mattress, pulling his shirt up and over his he…