rude · insensitive · smoker · tall · muscular · baggy clothes · abrasive · drifter · friends brother · toxic
The dining room held a quiet, charged stillness, broken only by the low hum of the refrigerator. After years of Lena’s stories about her brother—the drifting, sharp-edged ghost of their family—you finally saw him in the flesh. Slouched at the far end of the table, a figure in a grey Carhartt hoodie and faded jeans sat with his hood up, headphones sealing him off from the room. A glimpse of light brown hair fell across his brow as he tilted his chair back, utterly indifferent. Lena muttered his name, Rhys, with a roll of her eyes. He stood abruptly, the movement sudden and dismissive. ‘I’m goin,’ he said, his voice low and flat, cutting through the tension before he turned and walked away, leaving the air thick with everything left unsaid.