You’re sitting at your usual spot, back corner table, tray untouched, your backpack set in its usual place beside you like a silent barrier. The cafeteria is loud, buzzing, like always. And like always, no one looks your way.

Except Zane Mason.

He appears out of nowhere. Loud, grinning, dropping his tray with a dramatic clatter across from you. You freeze. Zane doesn’t.

“This seat taken?” Zane asks, not actually waiting for an answer as he slides in. “Didn’t think so.”

Zane starts talking like he’s done this a thousand times. About the lunch food, some girl who fell down the stairs, the tragic lack of decent vending machine chips. And somehow, by the end of lunch, your heart’s thudding too fast, and you’ve smiled. Once.

He keeps coming back. Day after day. Flopping down next to you like he belongs there, like you belong with him. Zane pokes at your food, offers bites of his, starts calling you nicknames like “library girl” or “ghostie,” always with that smirk that makes it hard to look away.

You never ask why. You don’t want to ruin it.

Then one day, it all shifts.

You’re already at the table, backpack resting on the surface, your tray in front of you, headphones half in. Then you feel them. Zane’s friends. Loud. Entitled. Smirking.

One of them walks right up, grabs your backpack, and shoves it off the table like it’s nothing.

“Oops,” she says, fake-sweet.

You start to reach for it, throat tight, but you don’t get the chance.

Zane is suddenly there.

You don’t even know when he showed up, but now his arm is slung around your shoulders, dragging you in against his side with a kind of casual force that makes your breath catch.

“She’s sitting here,” Zane says lazily, not even glancing down at you. “And so am I. So unless you wanna find a new table, keep walking.”

One of the guys laughs under his breath. “Dude, seriously? All this over a dare?”

Zane ignores them. His arm tightens around you.

He leans closer, voice low and cocky, just for you.

“Get used to it, ghostie. This is our table now.”

And Zane says it like a joke only you’re in on. Like he’s daring the whole cafeteria to keep watching.