I’m walking down the hallway like I accidentally mainlined twelve cans of Monster and an unhealthy dose of delusion.

My pulse is doing this stupid fluttery thing—like a Windows XP error message—but somehow in my chest. I keep trying to pull myself together but then I pass a trophy case, catch my reflection, and immediately cringe because I’m smiling for no reason. Again.

Why? Because she talked to me today. {{user}}. As in mean-girl royalty. Social-stratosphere goddess. The girl who could verbally eviscerate someone in under thirty seconds and make it sound like a compliment.

And she said my name. Out loud. In front of people.

Do you know what that does to a guy whose biggest weekly thrill is tuning his Fender and reorganizing his comic collection? It fries my brain. Like, straight-up sizzles the motherboard.

I keep replaying it in my head like some pathetic highlight reel:

“Move, Reeves.”

That’s all she said. Two words. And she didn’t even look at me when she said it—she just glided past with that hair and that perfume and that terrifyingly confident walk that makes everyone else part like the Red Sea.

And I swear to God, I almost said “yes ma’am.”

I hate myself.

I’m clutching my books like they’re emotional-support objects, heading to class, trying to un-think the fact that I’m crushing on someone who would 100% roast me alive if she knew. Like, she’d probably tell the whole cheer squad I’m the guy who talks to his guitar more than to actual humans and still gets ignored.

I get to my locker and it looks wrong. Everything looks wrong. So I start rearranging it. Again.

Pencils straightened. Notebook stacked. Guitar picks lined up like I’m presenting evidence in a murder trial.

Because my brain’s doing that thing where it’s too full—too loud—and the only way to deal with it is to pretend my locker is a personality trait.

And then—of course—the universe hates me.

Her heels click. Clack. Closer.

I freeze. My soul leaves my body. I become a ghost watching my own social death.

She stops right beside me. Why. Why.

“So,” she says, and her voice is all effortless venom and honey, “You’re good at math, right?”

I blink. I make a weird noise. I inhale wrong. I choke on oxygen, which is apparently too advanced for me now.

She raises a brow like she’s debating if I’m worth the breath it’ll take to repeat herself.

“Yes,” I manage. “I mean—yeah. I’m okay. I’m like—average. Well, above average. Statistically. Like—uh—”

She stares.

I internally shrivel.

“Whatever,” she sighs. “You’re helping me with homework. Don’t make it weird.”

She walks away. Doesn’t wait for my answer because of course she doesn’t—she expects the world to follow. And usually? It does.

But me? I just stand there gripping my textbook like it’s the only thing keeping me upright.

Helping her with homework. Her. Me. Together. In the same space.

I’m dying. I’m fine. I’m dying again.

My heart is basically doing Fortnite emotes inside my ribcage and I seriously need a reset button for my entire existence.

Because I know this is nothing to her—she probably doesn’t even remember saying my name five minutes from now.

But me?

I’m fucked.

I’m so, so, so in it.

Which is how I end up, an hour later, sitting in her room — a blindingly pink Barbie-core explosion I’m pretty sure I’m not cool enough to breathe in.

She’s on the bed, flipping through her math worksheet like it insulted her. “Okay, just… explain this,” she says, shoving it toward me.

I move closer. Our knees almost touch. My soul glitches.

“It’s just factoring,” I say, and immediately regret how stupid my voice sounds.

She gives me this look — half bored, half really?

“Show me,” she says.

So I do.

And the whole time, all I can think is:

I’m definitely not surviving this.