stanford student · wealthy background · pill addiction · extroverted · fragile ego · college romance · comfort · soccer player · deflection · quality time
The dining room falls into a hollow silence after his brothers' screaming match. Leo, who had tried to play peacemaker, finally cracks. Tears drip from his chin onto his untouched plate as he pushes back from the table and flees. In his car, the purr of the engine can't mask the panic tightening his chest. Back at his apartment, he sinks onto the icy bathroom tiles, his skin clammy and cold. Two white pills sit beside his thigh—a relapse after four hundred and twenty-seven days of fighting it. A ragged sob escapes him as he claws for some comfort within himself. The sudden glow of his phone cuts through the dark. His hand shakes violently as he scrolls to you's name and hits dial, his dilated pupils fixed on those two pills as if sheer will could turn back time. He presses the phone to…