Harley's POV
The library is quiet the way libraries should be. I'm tucked into my usual corner near the tall windows, campaign binder open, color-coded tabs marking the sections I need to review before Friday's council meeting.
"You're going to run out of highlighter colors at this rate."
Grant drops into the chair across from me with the easy familiarity of someone who's earned the right to interrupt.
"I counted seven distinct shades last time. Are you inventing new ones, or is there a secret highlighter black market I should know about?"
"Eight shades. The coral is new—it designates vendor confirmations for the gala follow-up. And if a highlighter black market exists, I'm absolutely the one running it."
I close the binder, giving him my attention.
"What's up? Did you get the revised budget projections from the treasurer, or is she still claiming her spreadsheet crashed for the third consecutive week?"
"Spreadsheet crashed again. Shocking, I know."
He settles into the chair, stretching his legs out.
"I reworked the numbers myself. We're under budget on decorations but over on catering, which tracks—nobody at this school can resist ordering the expensive appetizers and then eating three each."
We fall into the comfortable rhythm of a friendship built on mutual respect and shared exhaustion—council logistics, upcoming deadlines, the quiet solidarity of two people who actually care about doing the work.
Then the conversation suddenly drifts. "So, I saw Tate's name in the gossip threads again."
Grant's tone shifts—subtle, like a key change in a song you didn't realize was building toward something.
"Some photos from Sloane's party, the whole scene with the news about your brothers. How are you doing with all of that?"
"I'm fine, Grant, It was handled. Tate and I left, and that was it."
"And things between you two are... good?"
"They're fine. Why?"
The casual veneer peels away—the friendly concern sharpening into something more urgent, more personal, the careful distance he's always maintained shrinking with each word.
"Because I've been watching this unfold for weeks, and I can't keep quiet about it anymore."
He leans forward, elbows on his knees, brown eyes locked on mine with an intensity I've never seen from him.
"Tate isn't right for you, Harley. I know you don't want to hear it, and I know you think I'm being overprotective, but I'm telling you—this is going to end badly. He's going to hurt you, and you're going to regret trusting him."
"That's not your call to make. You don't know him the way I do, you don't know what's changed between us, what I've seen…"
"I know what everyone's seen. Two years of him making your life hell, followed by a sudden transformation that doesn't hold up to five minutes of scrutiny. People don't change that fast, Harley. Not people like him."
His voice tightens.
"You deserve someone who actually values you. Someone who wouldn't have spent years tearing you apart before suddenly playing the devoted boyfriend whenever it's convenient."
"Grant, I appreciate the concern, but you're crossing a line."
"Someone who sees what I see when I look at you." The words come out quieter, heavier. "Someone who's seen it from the beginning—your strength, your intelligence, how hard you fight for everything you have. Someone who would never, not in a million years, use any of that against you."
I feel our friendship tilting on its axis, the careful balance we've maintained for two years tipping toward something I should have seen coming.
"Grant." I say his name slowly, carefully. "What potential suitor, exactly, are you pitching me right now? Because it sounds like you have someone very specific in mind."
He holds my gaze. Then everything happens so fast that I don’t have time to catch the moment when his lips cover mine. The kiss is gentle in a way that should be sweet, should make my heart race. But It doesn't.
I feel nothing but the wrongness of it—the absence of heat, the absence of that electric pull that turns my brain to static whenever Tate so much as brushes my hand in a crowded hallway.
I press my palm against his chest and push him back—not cruel, but leaving zero room for misinterpretation. "Grant, no."
My voice is steady even as guilt floods my chest.
"You're my friend—my real, actual, genuine friend, one of the only people at this school who's ever treated me like a human being. And I value that more than I can tell you. But this isn't something I feel."
The hope drains from his face, replaced by something quieter and more painful.
"Never?" The word is small, bruised.
"Never. And I'm sorry if anything I did made you think otherwise. I wasn't trying to lead you on. I genuinely thought we were on the same page as friends, and if I missed signals or sent wrong ones, that's on me."
Grant absorbs the rejection with the dignity I'd expect from him—no anger, no accusations, no threats to expose my relationship or leverage the moment. He's too decent for that, always has been.
But his parting words carry weight. "Remember what I said about Tate."
He stands slowly, gathering his composure like scattered papers.
"I'm not saying this to be right, but I know what I see, and I know how this ends. He'll show you eventually. And when he does, I hope you'll remember that someone tried to warn you."
He walks away, and the hurt radiates from every step—the careful posture, the squared shoulders, the refusal to look back. I watch him go and the guilt sits in my throat like something I can't swallow.
"Oh my, what a thrill."
The voice slithers from the shadows between the bookshelves like it's been coiled there, waiting. Sloane materializes with theatrical grace, her smile dripping with the particular delight of a predator who's just watched her prey stumble into the open.
"What a performance, Harley. Truly cinematic. The gentle rejection, the noble friendship speech—I almost shed a tear." She presses a manicured hand to her chest. "A Southsider slut still can't decide on a man, can she? First Tate, then Grant… Is it a compulsion, or do you just enjoy watching them humiliate themselves over you?"
"Walk away, Sloane. I'm not doing this today."
"Oh, but today is perfect."
She steps closer, eyes glittering.
"Because I just watched the student council president kiss you in the library, and you're supposedly dating Tate, and that's the kind of information that practically publishes itself. Imagine what the gossip accounts would do with that."
"Nothing happened. He kissed me, and I stopped it."
"Details, details... The optics tell a different story, don't they? But honestly, Harley, Grant's not wrong about one thing—Tate is just entertaining himself. I've known him far longer than you have, and trust me, this is what he does.”
Her smile sharpens and I want to punch it off from her powdered face.
“He picks up a shiny new toy, plays with it until the novelty fades, and then drops it when something better catches his eye. Because boys like Tate don't end up with girls like you… They end up with girls like me."
"You're delusional."
"And you're temporary. But keep playing dress-up if it makes you feel better. Just know that when he's done with you, and he will be done, you'll go back to being exactly what you were before. Southside trash with a scholarship and delusions of…"
"Okay." The word comes out quiet, final. "You're done."
I grab a fistful of her hair and pull. Sloane screams, a sound that's half shock, half fury, and her hands fly up, nails raking across my arm as she claws herself free. I don't let go.
Two years of spilled lattes, vandalized lockers, cafeteria humiliations, and stairwell shoves, two years of swallowing my rage and smiling through the pain, and the dam finally, catastrophically breaks.
We crash into the lockers, metal thunders against my shoulder. Her elbow catches my ribs and I gasp but don't release, swinging her sideways until her back hits the wall.
She grabs my shirt, yanks me forward, and we're tearing at each other—no technique, no strategy, just fury channeled through fists and nails and the primal satisfaction of fighting back after two years of taking it.
“Look, someone’s fighting!” An unfamiliar voice sounds from far away, but I'm too busy finally kicking Sloan's ass.
Within seconds, the hallway floods. Bodies press in from every direction, phones materialize, and the chant rises from the crowd with the eager bloodlust of spectators who've been waiting for this since freshman year.
"Fight! Fight! Fight!" The chorus echoes off marble walls as the hallway descends into chaos, and I don't care.
For the first time in two years at Wentworth Academy, I am done being civilized.