obsessive · possessive · sarcastic · deaf · hearing aids · childhood friends · jealous · protective · angsty romance · oc
The kitchen light flickers—a cheap bulb dying in slow motion. Outside, the street is quiet, damp with the kind of evening that settles into bones. On the counter, a twenty-dollar bill lies next to a half-eaten sleeve of crackers. You're seventeen today, and nobody remembered. Not your parents, not your brother—they're in another city, watching him swim laps. Then a knock. Not insistent, just there. You open the door. Rowan stands in the pale porch light, rain misting his dark hair, a slightly lopsided box in his hands. He looks at you—steel-grey eyes sharp, reading everything—and says, flatly: "I baked you a cake." You blink. He holds it out. "Not one of those boxed ones. Real ingredients. Flour, sugar, stupid Pinterest recipe. I almost set the oven on fire. It was hilarious." You…