The bell rang, and the class spilled into the hallways in a rush of voices and slamming lockers. Aiden stepped out, sliding his headphones down around his neck, and nearly collided with someone.
She was small, pixie-like, her lithe frame almost weightless as she shifted back. Skin pale to the point of translucence, features so fine they could have been carved from glass. Her short black hair stood in jagged, deliberate spikes, each strand catching the hallway's thin light. She moved with a quiet, fluid grace, not a stutter of hesitation in the motion.
He knew her, at least, he'd seen her before. Just last class, in the hallway. She'd stood out without trying to.
Aiden took half a step back. "Sorry," he muttered, his voice barely above the hallway noise.
Before he could sidestep, she was already retreating into the arms of the tall boy behind her. He was striking in a different way, lean and towering, easily 6'3", with hair the color of warm honey brushing against the collar of his coat. His skin was just as ghostly pale, his posture still and deliberate.
Aiden walked into French class without a word, slipping into his assigned seat at the very back, next to the rain-streaked window. The outside world looked like it had been dipped in ink—the sky a deep, brooding gray, clouds swollen with the weight of another downpour.
He leaned into the corner, resting his temple against the cool glass, letting the muffled percussion of raindrops blend with the low hum of conversation in the room. Sliding his headphones into place, he thumbed his phone and let ASTN – Happier Than Ever drift through the speakers, the soft, aching melody sinking into his bones.
The bell rang for the second time, its chime slicing through the haze. Reluctantly, he tugged one earbud free.
At the front, Miss Hoff was already scrawling looping French words across the whiteboard, her bright scarf spilling color over her shoulder. She turned, a practiced smile curving her lips.
"Bonjour, class," she greeted, voice light and clipped. "Today, we begin your French history and invention projects. You'll be working in assigned pairs."
From her desk, she lifted a small, colorful box, shaking it just enough for the folded slips of paper inside to flutter.
"At the end of class, each pair will draw from this to determine their topic."
Aiden's mouth twisted in a faint grimace. Group projects. Always the same story—he did the work, the other person coasted, and in the end he was the one exhausted. He'd have killed for a solo assignment.
They moved into another round of vocabulary drills. The girl next to him—bubbly, talkative, and only slightly less grating than Jessica, leaned into the task with more enthusiasm than skill.
"Le… um… table… is… la tablé?" she guessed, stumbling through the words.
Aiden suppressed a smirk and corrected her quietly, tapping the right spelling in her notebook. "La table. No accent on the 'e.'" His tone was even, not condescending. To her credit, she took the help without bristling, scribbling his notes down.
"Teacher's pet," the entity's voice slid through his mind, low and cold.
"So polite… so harmless. Almost believable."
Aiden ignored it, focusing instead on the faint patter of rain beyond the window.
The hour bled away faster than he expected. When Miss Hoff returned to the front, the box still in her hand, she held a clipboard in the other.
"Alright," she said, tapping the pen against the board, "time to draw your topics. When I call your name, come up with your partner and pick one."
The box rattled again, the sound sharp in the otherwise soft room. Aiden straightened slightly, waiting for his name, the lingering melancholy of the song still echoing faintly in his head.
One by one, students approached the front, rifling through the box under Miss Hoff's watchful eye. The room filled with groans, bursts of laughter, and a few smug cheers.
Some pulled slips with famous inventors, others landed safely with food-related topics, while a few unlucky souls were stuck deciphering the legacies of obscure 18th-century painters.
"Rosalie Hale and Aiden White," Miss Hoff read.
Aiden pushed his chair back, the scrape of wood against the tile oddly loud. He rose, heading to the front, but midway, the air around him shifted. Heavy. Charged.
And then he saw her.
Rosalie stood with unhurried grace, as if the moment itself bent to her pace. Her golden-blond waves spilled like liquid silk over her shoulders, glowing warm against the stark pallor of her skin.
She was tall, poised, regal in the way she carried herself, but not cold in the way most regal things were. She had a heart to her. A simmering sensuality restrained beneath immaculate polish.
Her suit fit like it had been cut for her alone: gray, tailored to every curve with deliberate precision. A white shawl draped loose around her shoulders, softening the sharp lines, while the black-and-silver brooch at her chest seemed designed to draw the eye downward, forcing a choice between staring and looking away.
Each step of her heels on the polished tile echoed like punctuation, the subtle sway of her hips betraying just enough of her body's rhythm to set it apart from perfection, too human, too alluring, too dangerous.
She looked sculpted from ice but warmed by fire, her beauty balanced precariously on the line between worship and ruin.
Then their eyes met.
And something in Aiden clicked.
It wasn't recognition, at least, not one he could name. It was deeper. Instinctual. A haunting sense of familiarity, like déjà vu wrapped in static.
Her face was marble, a flawless mask of cool disinterest. But her eyes… her eyes broke through. Golden-amber, luminous against her alabaster skin, glowing in a way that made her less real and more ethereal. Untouchable.
Her hand slid into the box with a motion too elegant for such a mundane act. She plucked a slip, withdrew it, then turned toward him.
And in that instant, her lips curved, quick, sly, sensual. A grin like a blade drawn across silk. Fire flashing through frost. The kind of smile that promised both pleasure and pain, if only you were brave, or foolish, enough to step closer.
Then it was gone. Vanished, buried beneath the regal mask as if it had never existed at all.
She extended the slip to him. Her fingers brushed his. Cool. Delicate. But lingering just long enough to make him question whether she'd done it by accident.
Aiden looked down.
Topic: French Love and Hate Poems.
Of course.
"Perfect," the entity stirred, its voice cold and mocking in his skull.
"Love, which you've never held. Hate, which has already made its home in you. Tell me, boy—will you write of both, or will you discover they're the same thing?"
He walked back to his seat, jaw tight, the words team assignment already grating on his nerves. Teamwork was a scam.
"Write of love and hate."
It echoed in his mind.
The phrase lingered louder than it should have, pulsing faintly in his mind.
Outside, the rain pressed against the windows again, soft, patient, inevitable. Aiden exhaled through his nose, the slip of paper heavy in his hand.
"Love and hate poems. Great. Just perfect."
But that wasn't the main problem.
Every time it played out the same, his partners coasted, and he did all the work. He didn't mind responsibility, but he hated being used. It left a bitter taste that lingered long after the grade was posted.
His seat creaked, sliding the paper into his notebook without even glancing at Rosalie. Already his mind was burning. Team projects always played out the same. He carried the weight, did the research, polished the final draft, and somehow still ended up paired with someone who never showed up until presentation day.
No thanks.
He preferred solitude. It was cleaner. Predictable. At least when he worked alone, he knew who to blame if things fell apart.
"Oh, but this one is different, boy… I can feel it."
The voice slithered into his thoughts, low and mocking, like ice sliding across steel.
"She's not just a partner. She's the perfect partner. Regal, untouchable, the kind of creature who should never even spare you a glance, and yet now, bound to you. Fate is generous, isn't it?"
Aiden set his jaw, pulling out a pen just to have something to do with his hands. He began scribbling nonsense in the margins of his notebook.
"Shut up"
"Why shut me out? Imagine her voice close, her eyes fixed on yours while you work side by side. Imagine hours alone with her… her perfume, her cold beauty, her lips forming words meant only for you."
The laugh that followed was sharp, biting, cutting straight into his ribs.
"You could tell her everything. All those secrets you bury. The anger, the loneliness, the scars your father never sees. You could pour it all into her, and maybe she'd even understand."
Aiden gripped his pen so tight the plastic cracked. His heartbeat ticked in his ears.
She doesn't care. She won't. Nobody ever does.
"Oh, there it is," the entity purred, savoring the admission.
"The bitter little truth you cling to. You want to believe she's ice, a mask, untouchable, because it's easier than imagining what she could be if she saw you. If she really saw you. That terrifies you more than failure, doesn't it?"
Aiden pressed his palm against his temple, staring hard at the rain-streaked window. He let the music bleed from his earbuds, drowning the voice, at least a little.
But the words clung, sticky and poisonous.
"If she really saw you…"