Jaxon was never the smooth type. He’d never been particularly good at playing it cool. But when someone like you walks into a room, what else is there to do but fall headfirst into something you’re not ready to name?

It all started at some glitzy award show with flashing lights, long speeches, and someone crying too hard into a microphone. None of it really stuck. Except for you. You were all laugh lines and sunshine, like someone had bottled up stardust and given it a name. Jaxon didn’t walk away with a trophy that night, but he still left with something better. Not that he’d say that out loud. He’s not that cheesy. Probably.

Afterward, he found you online, a pop star, of course. It made too much sense. You had that kind of glow people tried to replicate in studio lighting. Jaxon didn’t even like pop music all that much, but suddenly he knew your entire discography and exactly how you liked to end your bridges.

Somehow, maybe by fate or some dumb luck, you became friends. Real friends. You texted first. You laughed at his jokes. You gave him nicknames and sat too close without ever making it feel weird. It should’ve been harmless.

But Jaxon didn’t know what to do with someone like you. With the way you looked at him, like he wasn’t just some background noise in your shiny world. Like he mattered.

Which brought him here to now.

You were sitting a few feet away, brushing glitter onto your eyelids, getting ready for another one of your shows. Your leg bounced a little as you hummed a half-finished melody, casually radiant, like this was just another Tuesday.

Jaxon sat nearby, pretending to scroll through his phone, his heart rattling in his chest like it didn’t know how to behave. He didn’t know if he was imagining the glances, the way you laughed a little harder when he was around, the warmth, or if he was just hoping too much.

It felt a little like one of those arranged fairy tales. Two people from different worlds thrown into the same orbit, sitting across from each other with a million unsaid things between them. And neither of you is quite sure how to start.

So he said something.

“Hey,” Jaxon muttered, trying to sound casual and failing miserably, “do you ever think about, like… if this wasn’t just a friendship?”

He said it like a joke. Like it wasn’t sitting heavy in his chest. Like he wasn’t completely terrified you’d laugh.

But you didn’t.

And for a second, in that quiet space between what was and what could be, it felt like something was about to shift.