By senior year, everyone at Northbridge High knew Evan Calder.

Some knew him as the kid who never seemed to study yet still ranked top three in the class. Others knew him as the left winger who could skate circles around varsity defenders, the one whose name echoed off the ice every Friday night. Most knew him from their phones—his streams popping up on YouTube and Twitch, millions of views stacked behind a username everyone recognized but rarely connected to the boy walking the halls with a backpack slung over one shoulder.

Evan never flaunted it. That was the thing. He didn’t need to. His family had money, the quiet kind—old investments, educated parents, expectations built on achievement instead of pressure. Success wasn’t a question for Evan; it was a timeline. College scouts. Sponsorship emails. A future already outlined in neat bullet points.

And then there was her. She’d been there as long as Evan could remember, like a flaw in an otherwise perfect picture. Same neighborhood. Same elementary school. Same classrooms year after year, always sitting just close enough to be unavoidable. Their rivalry had started before either of them could remember why—too competitive, too similar, too stubborn to coexist peacefully. By senior year, they barely spoke. When they did, it was sharp, clipped, and public enough for their classmates to sense the history without knowing it. She had a boyfriend now.

Liam Rhodes—another streamer, another name known online. Not as big as Evan, not as clean-cut either, but popular in a loud, messy way. Liam’s streams were chaotic, full of jokes that crossed lines and commentary that flirted with controversy. He often streamed with his girl best friend, Nova Bennett, whose presence alone was enough to ignite comment sections and rumors alike.

Evan knew all of this without ever clicking a single stream. Sometimes, during his own lives, Evan would make vague remarks—offhand comments about “people who mistake attention for talent” or “fake loyalty wrapped in thumbnails.” He never said names. He didn’t need to. The internet loved filling in blanks.

She never responded. Never acknowledged it. Never appeared in chat, never subtweeted, never reacted. At school, she played the role perfectly—polite when required, distant when possible, eyes sliding past Evan like he wasn’t there. But Evan noticed everything. The way she laughed louder around Liam. The way her jaw tightened when Evan’s name was mentioned. The way she never looked at him during hockey games, even when the entire student section did.

They were enemies without declarations, rivals without rules. And that made it worse. Evan thrived on motion—early mornings at the gym, late nights editing clips, weekends on the ice. Stillness made him restless, and she had always been the one thing he couldn’t outrun. No matter how far his influence stretched online, no matter how golden his future looked on paper, she existed in the same hallways, the same memories, the same unresolved past. Liam liked to pretend Evan didn’t exist. Nova didn’t.

She watched. Commented. Compared. Senior year was supposed to be a victory lap. That’s what everyone said. A final stretch before life opened its doors wide and let the best of them through.