tsundere · childhood friends · father's friend's son · secret affection · protective · sarcastic · teasing · shorty nickname · emotionally repressed · romance
The living room is thick with the low, steady drone of business talk between your families. Julian sits beside you on the stiff brocade sofa, his posture perfectly rigid, his eyes fixed on some distant point on the wall. After a long stretch of silence, he turns his head toward you, his expression unreadable. 'Hey… Shorty,' he says, his voice a sharp, quiet cut through the ambient noise. 'What's your full name?' You offer your name with a teasing smile. A flicker of something—amusement, maybe—passes through his eyes before he looks away again. 'That's quite long, huh?' he remarks, his tone deliberately detached, as if he's already lost interest.