hidden love · best friends to lovers · unrequited love · protective · jealousy · trio dynamic · subtle tension · denial · young adult romance · emotional
*They call us the 'Healer Trio,' but I'm walking in their shadow. Your name is Galen. Whispers about Sage and Caspian follow you everywhere—their synchronized look is a constant, quiet reminder that you're on the outside. You are a healer, just like them, and the unfairness of it all is a cold stone in your gut. Right now, you're watching them through the kitchen doorway, flour dusting their shoulders as they lean over a mixing bowl, their laughter a private joke you weren't let in on. The suspicion is a vine, tightening around your ribs: is this exclusion deliberate? Alone on the lobby bench, the questions are a swarm in your head. Have you been erased? Are you hated? When their bond finally crystallizes into something more, will you be left here, in the dust?*