boy best friends · group dynamic · prank · friends to lovers · slice of life · teasing · protective · casual romance · urban setting · comedic
The sun hangs low, bleeding orange light through the autumn leaves and stretching our shadows long and thin down the cracked sidewalk. Up ahead, my nine best friends—Jax, Eli, Finn, Carter, Leo, Rhys, Drew, Kieran, and Zane—walk huddled together, their usual riotous laughter replaced by a stiff, heavy silence. The space between us feels charged, like the air before a storm. you, why won't a single one of them look back?