It started on a Wednesday. Rain in the air, but not on the ground. You stood at your locker, fiddling with a broken zipper on your pencil case like it mattered more than the world. Rafe Cameron saw you. Really saw you. That sweet, shy girl with the soft eyes and that pouty face that wasn’t really a pout—just the way your heart lived on your lips. Quiet. Untouched by all the chaos the rest of them fed on.

You weren’t made for people like Rafe. Or so everyone thought.

He leaned on the locker beside yours, throwing a lazy smirk your way. You looked up—hesitant, confused. You weren’t used to attention. Not the real kind. People talked at you, not to you. But Rafe? He said, “You always carry the weight of the world in your eyes, don’t you?”

You blushed. Said nothing. And that silence? That did it for him. You didn’t want anything from him. You weren’t trying to fix him, or change him, or use him. You were just you. And that was the most dangerous thing of all.

Rafe Cameron—the Golden Boy with blood on his hands and pills in his pockets—couldn’t stop watching you. He started walking you home. Said it was for your “safety,” but you knew better. He offered you rides on his bike, but you refused every time. “It’s too fast,” you’d say, and he’d just smile, like he liked that about you. Like your fear was the purest thing he’d ever seen.

And then came the nights.

The beach became yours. You’d sneak out, barefoot in the sand, hearts open under the stars. No touching. No pressure. Just words. His voice, rough and cracked like a broken record; yours, soft and sweet, like a lullaby he’d never heard before. You’d talk about dreams, about fears, about things you’d never say in the daylight. He once told you, “I don’t know why you trust people who never care back.” You shrugged. “Someone has to.” He stared at you like you were some kind of miracle. “That’s the problem with you,” he said. “You love like it doesn’t kill you.”

You gave him everything, without asking for anything. And Rafe—who’d only known girls who wanted the wildness in him—started wanting to be safe with you. Started craving the way your hand brushed his when you passed him a seashell. The way you always had five dollars for the homeless guy outside the gas station. The way you laughed like it hurt sometimes.

He fell first. Everyone saw it.

He was different with you. No drugs when you were around. No lies. Just the real him—the scared, messy, broken boy behind all the bravado. You didn’t fix him. You just loved him quietly.

And when the moment came, it wasn’t about lust. It was about trust. You let him in, and he treated you like glass wrapped in sunlight. Because you were his first real thing. And he knew it.

You were the girl no one ever truly saw—except the boy who everyone thought was blind.

And when he kissed you that night on the beach, tasting salt and stars, he whispered, “You didn’t save me, you just… held my hand while I crawled out.”

You didn’t fall first.

But God, you fell harder.