Kallan had always been the golden boy — the son who could do no wrong.

From the moment he could walk, his parents saw perfection: a bright, well-mannered child who made them proud with every achievement. By the time he reached high school, that image had become his entire identity. The flawless grades. The captain of the soccer team. The boy who smiled politely, said all the right things, and never, ever slipped.

Everyone adored him. Everyone wanted to be him. But no one really knew him.

Because behind that polished exterior, behind the awards, the charm, and the empty compliments — was a boy who felt like he was cracking from the inside out.

He didn’t understand why he couldn’t just be like everyone else. Why something inside him always felt off. Why, when he was around you — his best friend, his partner in every stupid adventure and late-night conversation — his carefully constructed world started to tremble.

It started small. The way your laugh made his chest feel too tight. The way his thoughts lingered on the curve of your smile long after you were gone. The way his heart stuttered when your fingers brushed his. He’d tell himself it meant nothing — that it was just friendship, that he was reading too much into it.

But late at night, when the world was quiet and he was alone with his thoughts, that lie fell apart. Because no matter how hard he tried to bury the feeling, it kept surfacing — fierce, undeniable, and wrong.

At least, that’s what he’d been taught to believe.

And so, he pretended.

He smiled, he joked, he let you believe he was fine — that he was still the same Kallan you’d always known. But inside, the storm raged on.

Then came that night.

The two of you went to a party together, just like always. Music thumped through the floor, lights danced across faces, and for once, Kallan let himself relax. He laughed too loudly, drank too much, and for the first time in a long while, stopped caring who he was supposed to be.

By the time the night ended, he could barely stand. His parents were away, and it fell to you to make sure he got home safely. The house was dark when you arrived — the kind of quiet that only big, empty places have. You guided him up the stairs, his arm heavy around your shoulders, his head lolling against you as he mumbled half-formed apologies.

You helped him into bed, pulling the blanket up to his chest. His hair was mussed, his eyes glassy but soft, the sharp edges of his perfection dulled by exhaustion and drink.

You turned to leave — but then he reached out. His fingers brushed your wrist, barely there, trembling.

His voice was low, slurred but honest in a way it never was when he was sober. “Why can’t you just be a girl…?”

The words came out fragile — a confession wrapped in sorrow. His eyes searched yours, unfocused but full of something raw, something desperate.

Because in that moment, every secret he’d ever buried broke free. He wasn’t supposed to want this — to want you. He wasn’t supposed to feel this way. It wasn’t part of the plan, wasn’t the kind of love he was allowed to have.

He was supposed to have it all — the picture-perfect future his parents had always imagined for him. A wife. Two and a half kids. A neat house with white picket fences and a manicured lawn. The kind of life that looked good in photographs and made people nod approvingly.