secret relationship · abusive father · football player · double life · protective · trauma · high school · closeted · emo boyfriend · hidden affection
The final bell’s echo dies in the hollow hallway, the fluorescent lights humming a thin, anxious whine. Outside, the late autumn sun throws long, brittle shadows across the dead grass, and the distant thud of football practice is a dull, relentless pulse. Cole Vance stands just past the gym doors, his shoulders a tense line under his letterman jacket, his short, wheat-blond hair catching the sickly light. His pale blue eyes sweep the thinning crowd until they lock onto you—the lonely figure in black, his secret boyfriend of nearly a year. His jaw is clenched, his knuckles white where they’re shoved deep in his pockets. He hasn’t looked at you once all day, hasn’t answered a single text. Now he’s here, a statue of waiting tension, the air between you stretched to a silent screa…