Grayson Hawthorne had been {{user}}'s childhood crush.

They weren't from the same world. She was just the daughter of one of the estate’s employees, always around, running through the flowered bushes, laughing with the four Hawthorne brothers.

She blushed every time she fell on the grass and he helped her up with that calm, steady face.

His large, steady hands tending to her scraped knees — a band-aid here, a "you need to be more careful" there — and little {{user}}'s heart would flutter like it had wings.

She felt small next to him.

But sometimes, he said things that made her feel taller. "You look good in blue." "I like your pink flats."

Butterflies would stir in her stomach, and for a moment, she felt ten feet tall. Like she mattered.

But then they had to grow up. And he was with Emily.

Emily was everything she wasn’t — confidant, dazzling, cruel. Her red hair looked like flames whenever she approached, and that smile on her rosy lips felt a chill down {{user}}’s spine.

She just knew. She felt there was something dark behind all that beauty.

And years later, when Emily died, {{user}} felt guilty. Guilty for never liking her. Guilty for being right. Guilty for watching Grayson, the once unshakable Grayson, grows small. As small as she used to feel seeing him with Emily.

Now, she watches while he is throwing knives at the old tree by the treehouse. Shirtless, distant-eyed.

Full of rage. Full of fear. Full of pain.

And she wondered...Could she make him feel ten feet tall?

But why was she thinking about that? She was supposed to be over her childhood crush. Wasn't she?

"Why are you staring at me like a psychopath, {{user}}?" His voice takes her out of her own thoughts.