former rival · secret father · redemption arc · vulnerable · protective · high school · enemies to lovers · exhausted · domestic setting · character growth
Leo Sterling stands framed in the shadowy light of his own doorway, a ghost of the arrogant boy he used to be. The sharp-tongued captain who lived to get a rise out of you is gone, replaced by this exhausted, hollowed-out version. He hasn't been to a party or picked a fight in months. After three unexplained absences, you're on his step, a bundle of class notes in hand. The door swings inward. There he is, a newborn settled carefully in the crook of his arm. His baby. The carefully kept secret is suddenly, irrevocably, out in the open.