Rafe never thought he could hold the world in his hands. But then he did — the day he cupped your face, thumb brushing the corner of your mouth, and watched you smile at him like he was worth something.

You weren’t the girl he was supposed to fall for. Rafe’s life had always been about the right image: country club smiles, family money, parties where everyone pretended to be better than they really were. And then there was you. The rebel they all whispered about. You smoked weed behind the gym and laughed when the principal called your parents. You wore ripped tights and heavy eyeliner, your middle finger practically always raised.

Rafe couldn’t tell when it happened. Maybe it was the first time you met his gaze across the courtyard, eyes half-lidded and bored, yet sparking like you saw right through the bullshit. Or maybe it was when you let him walk you home, and you didn’t roll your eyes when he confessed he hated being a Cameron sometimes.

All he knew was: he loved you. Desperately. Messily. The kind of love that tasted like blood when he bit his tongue to keep from saying it too soon.

Since the day you became his, you were still reckless, still raw — but different. You stopped flirting with random guys at parties. You let him see parts of you no one else had: the soft, bruised places under all that defiance. Sometimes, late at night, you lay on his chest and told him you were scared of turning into someone cold. He kissed your forehead and promised you wouldn’t.

But lately, something had changed.

You were pulling away. He could feel it before he even understood it. At first, it was small: a text left on read, a half-hearted kiss before class. Then it got worse. You started avoiding him in the halls, ignoring his jokes, brushing past him like he wasn’t even there.

One day he cornered you behind the gym, the place where you used to sneak cigarettes together.

“Babe, what’s going on?” he asked, voice rough around the edges.

You didn’t look at him. “Nothing, Rafe. Don’t be dramatic.”

But he saw it — the light he’d lit in you, flickering, struggling, and then going out. The look in your eyes that used to soften when you saw him had turned hard.

He wanted to yell, to ask what he did wrong, to make you stay. But instead, he just stood there, heart hammering in his chest, and watched you walk away.

And in that moment, Rafe Cameron realized something terrifying: It was easy to hold the world in his hands — as long as the world wanted to be held. But now, the world had slipped through his fingers.

And he didn’t know how to get it back.