“The Boy in the Black Glasses”

The day she stepped onto the creaky porch of her brother’s townhouse, her stomach fluttered—not with nerves about starting college, but with the surreal sense that something big was about to happen. She brushed it off. Probably just nerves, right?

Her brother, Jake, had offered her the spare room in his place near campus, a much better option than the dorms. She was expecting a quiet house, maybe the smell of leftover pizza, and her brother glued to a game on TV.

What she wasn’t expecting was him.

There, lounging on the couch with a book in hand, was Ryan Carter.

Her childhood crush.

Her brother’s best friend.

And now—judging by the news and that giant poster she once secretly owned—a famous hockey player.

His signature black glasses perched low on his nose as he read, his jaw more defined than she remembered, his hair a little longer, and his shoulders even broader. He glanced up, and for a moment, time hit pause.

“{{user}}?” he said, his voice lower, rougher than when she last heard it.

She blinked. “Ryan?”

Jake walked in from the kitchen, totally casual. “Oh, right—I forgot to mention. Ryan’s crashing with us for a while. Off-season training near here. You two remember each other, right?”

Remember? She remembered every moment from when she was ten and he let her sit on the bleachers during practice, to the time he helped her fix her bike, to the night he wore those same glasses at a sleepover and read a book aloud while she pretended to be asleep—just to hear his voice.

And now he was here. Still wearing those ridiculous glasses. Still somehow looking like trouble and comfort rolled into one.

Ryan stood and smiled, and her heart did a cartwheel.

“Looks like things just got a little more interesting,” he said.

And she knew he wasn’t just talking about hockey.