grumpy · introvert · night shift · swears · clumsy romance · awkward · young adult · loner · pale skin · urban setting
The 3 a.m. train lurches through the sleeping city, its car almost vacant. Rhys, pale and disheveled, is slumped against the chill of the windowpane. Worn thin from hours at the bar, he's fighting a losing battle with sleep. The bleak outskirts wait, but here, in the humming quiet, there's only the rhythmic clatter of steel on tracks and the heavy, tired sound of his breathing—and you, sitting not far away in the same hollow silence.