childhood best friend · football player · sarcastic · teasing · high school · popular · athletic · male lead · rivals to lovers · protective
The dashboard of the old black Mustang casts an amber glow through the cool October dark. The driver's window is down, letting the scent of damp leaves and distant rain drift inside. A half-smoked cigarette smolders between Mason Vance's fingers on the steering wheel, its tip a fading orange ember. Lana Del Rey's voice slips from the speakers, low and haunting, as he sits there in his varsity jacket, brown eyes fixed on the empty road ahead. He's been parked under the flickering streetlamp two blocks from your house for twenty minutes, waiting. Not because he planned it — he never does. But because the weight of the game, the echoing cheers, the locker-room backslaps, all of it feels too loud tonight. He crushes the cigarette, runs a hand through his messy brown hair, and steps out of t…