The classroom smelled like dry erase markers, teenage apathy, and the faint ghost of whatever chemicals they used to mop the floors before anyone arrived.
Sebastian dropped into the seat nearest the window and let his bag hit the floor. The buzz of the fluorescent lights overhead flickered unevenly, as if the universe had a dimmer switch and couldn't quite decide how dramatic to be.
He leaned back in the creaky chair-
And for the first time since that surreal cafeteria scene… it was quiet.
Not silence, the shuffle of students, rustling of backpacks, the usual cough or muttered complain from the students that filled the air was still there… but it was quiet in the way that mattered.
No one was talking to him.
No one was watching him.
Not even her.
And with that, his thoughts did what they always did when no one was looking, they turned.
He tapped the pencil against the desk, once, twice, then stopped.
What the hell was that?
He didn't need to define it. He knew. The bond. The tether. The magnetic. metaphysical cosmic-glitter-vortex that yanked him into Alice Cullen's gravity like a satellite caught in a star's burn.
And it didn't just happen. It landed. It stuck.
And now he was here, in some high school in the wettest corner of the continental US, sitting at a desk made for someone who still got detention for chewing gum, trying to wrap his mind around the fact that fate just fortune telling vampire ballerina in front of him and said:
"Yours."
He exhaled through his nose.
It would've been easier if she'd been disappointing. If she'd been weird or too obsessed with her own clairvoyant cryptic mystique. If she'd just not met his gaze like it was a scalpel peeling back his defenses one layer at a time.
But no.
She'd smiled.
Not like she knew everything. More like she wanted to.
Like she saw him, and wasn't afraid of what she had found.
That was the worst part.
The way she didn't flinch.
Because he was flinching.
Not on the outside perhaps, no. Outwardly, he was calm. Cool. The usual blend of sardonic charisma and slouching menace. But underneath? His thoughts were ricocheting through a maze of emotional gravity wells, and not a single had a clear exit.
He ruffled his hair.
It wasn't that he didn't like her. He liked her to fast, if anything. That was the problem. There was no runway. No time to build walls. No clever comments thick enough to deflect the immediate truth:
She mattered.
Already.
And that… that scared him more than he was willing to admit, even to himself.
His mind reached back, like it always did, searching for a pattern, for cause and effect, for some logic.
He'd traveled. He'd fought. He'd bent physics and tangled with things no one should've survived. He'd been powerful. Controlled. Alone.
That last one?
He'd made peace with it. Or he'd convinced himself he had.
Until she walked in and smiled like she'd been waiting.
Like this wasn't quite weird.
Like this wasn't a problem.
He didn't trust it. At least not fully.
Trust wasn't really a switch for him. It was more of a puzzle box. And Alice Cullen had waltzed in with a cheat code.
And maybe that was what was gnawing at the back of his skull now, while some teacher droned about the industrial revolution the only revolution Sebastian cared about was the one he had going on in his chest.
He wasn't scared of her.
He was scared of what she meant.
Of what she saw in him and might see.
Of how much he himself was willing to hand over without a fight.
He scribbled a meaningless mess in his notebook just to keep his hand occupied.
A spiral. A few sharp lines. The shape of something looking like a heartbeat, if you tilted your head sideways.
Then he stopped, stared at his mess, and let out a small breath.
"Damn," he muttered under his breath. "This might actually matter."
That was the worst part of it all.
Not the bond.
Not the eyes.
Not the smile.
But the terrifying possibility that, for once, he might actually care. Not because he had to. Not because it was written in some ancient prophecy. But because she felt real in a way nothing had before at least in a long time.
He rested his chin on his hand and stared out the window, watching clouds drift by like they didn't care who he was or who she was or what any of this shit meant.
That at least, was a slight comfort.
Clouds didn't bother with human problems.
But he did.
And that was what scared him.
And he was starting to think… maybe that was what made it feel real.
END OF CHAPTER 15