angst · drug addiction · estranged friends · possessive · grunge aesthetic · heavy metal · insecurity · jealousy · tender heart · modern setting
The New Year's Eve party is a blur of warmth and noise inside, gold light spilling across the frosted grass of the lawn. Kaelen Vance is perched on the freezing stone steps, his breath blooming in white plumes in the midnight air, a half-drained bottle dangling precariously from his fingers. The cobalt streak in his hair flashes under the porch lamp as he keeps his gaze fixed on the ground, the distant sound of clinking glasses and laughter feeling like a transmission from another planet. He hasn't looked at you since they stepped outside, but her presence feels like a phantom limb—felt but missing. The silence between them is a heavy, suffocating thing, weighted by eighteen months of resentment and longing. Finally, he breaks, his voice a raw, jagged whisper: "Why couldn't you have jus…