You’d die for his laugh.

It comes out of him unannounced, like sunlight cracking through heavy clouds, filling up the spaces between conversations with a brightness that doesn’t belong to anyone but him. Justin Rhodes laughs like the universe itself is in on the joke, and every time you hear it, you swear it paints the air in color.

He doesn’t even notice. Of course he doesn’t.

He’s sitting across from you now, legs sprawled out carelessly under the café table, one hand curled around a chipped ceramic mug. Tall and golden in the fading afternoon light, he looks like something pulled out of a dream you’ve been trying to forget: warm tan skin, sharp jaw softened by the hint of stubble, brunette hair that always falls just a little too long into his honey-brown eyes. Those eyes—swirls of gold and amber—hold more passion than he’ll ever admit.

You shouldn’t be staring, but you can’t stop yourself.

Sometimes you wonder if it all began there—that first day, that ridiculous twist of fate. You’d been running late, arms full of too many things you shouldn’t have carried at once, when the strap of your bag snapped right in the middle of the campus quad. Books, papers, pens—everything scattered across the pavement in humiliating slow motion. And he was the one who knelt down, gathering your things with an easy grin, brushing the dirt from your notebook like it mattered.

“Bad day?” he’d said, handing you back your life piece by piece.

You’d mumbled something awkward, cheeks burning, but he’d only laughed—that laugh—and for some reason, you’ve been hearing it ever since.

That was two years ago. And somehow, against all odds, he never faded into the background like people usually do. Justin Rhodes became the constant you didn’t ask for but can’t imagine being without now. Study sessions, late-night runs for food, him crashing on your couch because his dorm was “too loud to think.” He just… stayed.

And you? You’re hopeless. Hopelessly captivated by someone who thinks love is overrated. You know it’s ridiculous. You know he’ll never see himself the way you see him. But still—you’d stop time and space, just to make him smile. Just once. Just for you.

“Earth to you,” Justin’s voice slides into the quiet, low and smooth, as if the syllables know where to land. He says your name, and you feel it vibrate through you like he’s plucked a hidden string. He doesn’t even mean to do it, but he does—he makes your whole body listen.

“I’m here,” you answer too quickly, forcing your eyes to the street outside the window. Pedestrians pass by in blurs, their laughter spilling into the city hum. You clutch at anything but him.

Justin tilts his head, studying you in that absentminded way he does, like you’re both an old book and an unsolvable riddle. He has no idea how transparent he is to you—how you can see the hidden fire in him, the dreams he thinks he’s good at locking away. He thinks he’s unreadable, untouchable. He’s wrong.

You laugh, soft and nervous. “We’re such polar opposites, you know?”

He smirks, not offended, but amused. “You make me sound impossible.”

“You kind of are.”

He grins at that, teeth flashing, and you want to bottle the moment. Freeze time. Because that smile—it’s the thing you’d give up entire galaxies for. You’d move planets, stop clocks, unravel the rules of the world, just to make him smile like that again.

But he doesn’t know. He can’t know.

Your heart pounds, loud enough you’re afraid he might hear it. And maybe he does, because Justin leans back in his chair, arms folded, eyes holding yours with a weight that makes your breath hitch. For one second, one impossible second, it feels like he sees straight through you. Like he knows.

The air between you shifts—electric, dangerous. One wrong move and you’ll both be burned.

You imagine it anyway: leaning across the table, closing the space, his lips against yours. You can already feel the electricity sparking at the thought, so sharp it almost hurts. Just one kiss—you know it would be enough to undo you. One kiss and you’d never come back from it.