I am 15 chapters ahead on my patreón, check it out if you are interested.
https://www.patréon.com/emperordragon
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Chapter 57: The Light I Didn't Know I Needed
The morning air in the hallway was filled with the usual hum of locker doors slamming, sneakers squeaking, and voices rising in conversation. Sam stood by her locker, methodically placing her notebooks in order—history, then lit, then calc. Her hands moved on instinct, but her thoughts were somewhere else entirely. No, not somewhere—someone.
She closed her locker, and as she turned, her eyes landed on him.
Jon stood about twenty feet away, at his own locker. Terry was beside him, saying something animatedly. Whatever it was must have been funny, because Jon threw his head back and laughed.
That laugh. Open, unguarded, real. The kind of laugh that made you feel like the world wasn't quite so sharp around the edges. Sam had seen that laugh hundreds of times, but now—after days without it—it hit her like a wave.
Her breath caught.
She didn't even realize how much she'd missed seeing it. Or hearing it. The way Jon laughed like he had nothing to prove, like joy was just something he carried in his pocket, ready to share with anyone who needed it. There was something… warm about it. Disarming. Comforting.
And for a fleeting moment, just watching him laugh made something flicker back to life inside her.
A soft, stolen piece of light.
But just as quickly as it arrived, it vanished.
Jon, still smiling, closed his locker and walked into a nearby classroom. The door swung shut behind him, and the hallway's noise filled the space he left behind.
Sam sighed, pressing her back against the cold metal of her locker.
No wonder it scared me.
She swallowed hard.
It wasn't about Jon. Not really. It was about her. About what it meant to feel this way. To need someone so completely, so quietly, so quickly—without even realizing it was happening.
He had become the light in her world.
Not in a dramatic, cinematic way. Not in a poetry-worthy, soulmates-on-the-moon kind of way. But in the subtle, everyday way that made her look forward to mornings. That made her laugh a little louder. That made hard days a little easier.
And that kind of need was terrifying.
Because when someone becomes that important to you—when they become a part of your rhythm, your balance, your very oxygen—the idea of losing them doesn't just hurt. It unravels you.
So she asked for space. For a break.
Not because she didn't care. But because she cared too much.
Because trusting someone with your whole heart meant giving them the power to break it. And she hadn't been ready for that. Not really. Not yet.
But now...
Now all she could think about was how much she missed him. Not just the sound of his voice or the way he looked at her like she mattered more than anything else. She missed him. His calm, his curiosity, his stupid puns and the way he always had the right words, even when she didn't know what she needed to hear.
And now, standing in this crowded hallway, she felt the weight of what she might've broken. Not just a relationship, but something rare. Something beautiful.
What if I pushed him away for nothing?
The thought stabbed at her chest.
What if the fear of losing him made her actually lose him?
What if, in trying to protect herself from getting hurt, she hurt him worse than he ever would've hurt her?
A pang of regret twisted inside her.
She took a deep breath and steadied herself. She wasn't going to cry—not here, not now. She wasn't that girl.
She turned her head and looked at the classroom Jon had entered. For a second, she imagined walking in, calling his name, telling him everything. Apologizing. Explaining. Asking for another chance.
But just as the impulse rose, so did the fear.
What if he didn't want her back?
What if the break hadn't given him time to miss her—but time to move on?
What if she'd already done too much damage?
Her heart thudded heavily against her ribs as she forced herself to look away.
Not today.
She couldn't risk it today.
Sam took one more breath, squared her shoulders, and turned toward her own class. But as she walked, she carried that quiet ache inside her—both a wound and a whisper.
The light wasn't gone.
It had just moved a little farther away.