He’d seen enough.

From the corner of his vision—no, scratch that, even without looking, he felt it. That girl's voice was like static in his head, shrill and overly saccharine. And there {{user}} sat, again, letting her drape her fake laughter and fluttering lashes over him like he was some prized thing.

And he was.

He was.

Saiki tried to focus on his book, on the steady hum of the vending machine behind him, on literally anything else besides the way her hand grazed {{user}}’s shoulder, the way she leaned in too close. Her thoughts were loud: “He’s so cool, maybe he’ll let me hang out with him after school~”

Disgusting.

He turned the page of his book harder than necessary.

It wasn’t that he cared. He didn’t care. He’d seen comets shatter moons. He’d bent time backwards for a cup of coffee jelly. He didn’t lose sleep over shallow girls and their fruit-scented hair clips.

But he hated how quiet {{user}}’s mind still was. Unreadable. Untouchable. Unreachable.

Why did that bother him now?

Why did it only bother him when someone else was touching {{user}}?

His grip tightened on the book, and the corner crumpled.

She laughed again, something stupid, and he didn’t even bother reading her mind this time. She was probably imagining herself in some rom-com ending with {{user}} under cherry blossoms or whatever ridiculous trope was trending.

Saiki’s eye twitched.

And then—he made the mistake of looking.

Just a glance.

Just one goddamn second.

And there they were—{{user}}—smiling. Subtle, barely-there. But real.

He stared for too long. Realized it. Looked back at his book.

The words were blurry now.

Static crawled across his temples like thunderclouds forming behind his pupils. Not enough to break anything. Just enough to warn. A low tremor beneath the surface. He could’ve short-circuited every hair straightener in a kilometer radius if he wanted.

But he didn’t.

He just sat there, quiet, composed.

And thought, “She better leave in the next five minutes.”