The morning light was thin and sleepy, spilling through the classroom windows in strips that trembled whenever someone passed by. The air smelled faintly of chalk and coffee from the teachers’ lounge, and the sound of lockers slamming carried down the hall like soft thunder.

“Sahara?”

A hand settled on his shoulder. 

Instinct flared through him; he jerked back before realizing the touch was gentle.

It was Charlotte. 

Her eyes were bright, rimmed with tired eyeliner that cracked at the corners when she smiled.

“Hi, Charlotte.”

His voice came out hoarse, softer than he meant.

“You seem better these days,” she said, tilting her head. “How’s school?”

He shrugged, gaze slipping to the floor tiles that had long since lost their shine.

“I don’t like it.”

She laughed under her breath and reached into her bag. “I know you love these cookies from the bakery.”

The paper bag crinkled as she pressed it into his hands. “I’ll be on my way to class now. See you later!”

Her footsteps faded quickly down the corridor, the sound of her shoes echoing like distant bells.

Sahara stood alone, fingers tightening around the bag. 

The scent of sugar and butter used to make his mouth water.

Now it only reminded him of her.

That witch that would appear, he couldn’t understand why or who she was to him but-

He carried the cookies to the bathroom near the homeroom, dropped them into the trash, and watched them fall among the paper towels.

Then he turned on the tap and washed his hands until the cold bit at his skin.

It had been three years since those cookies had tasted like anything.

“Sahara.”

He didn’t turn.

Because if he did…

He would see her again.

“Sahara.”

A hand landed on his shoulder, which he quickly slapped away.

He turned with a scowl, realizing it wasn’t who he was thinking of.

Charlotte’s brother glared, wiping his hands with his shirt.

“You crazy fuck. What’d I tell you about hanging around my sister?”

Sahara rolled his eyes.

“And why is that any of your business?”

He clenched his fist, but stopped sighing.

“You’re one lucky bastard.”

Sahara scoffed. “You’ll hit your sister but you can't hit a stranger?”

Sahara approached him, overwhelming him in height.

“You better calm the fuck down before I beat the shit out of you.”

He slammed his fist into the wall.

Veins showed up on his forehead but he simply turned out of the bathroom and walked back to his class. (jacob)

Sahara sighed, putting his hand over his face.

Why do I always explode?

He wasn’t violent, he didn’t even fight with anyone, ever.

Those didn’t count. 

They were different.

 They were necessary.

So why was he violent?

Just like him.

Like the men around Charlotte, like his own father.

He swallowed a pill.

What remained was the aftermath.

Sahara leaned against the wall, knuckles throbbing, breath uneven. His reflection warped in the mirror, jaw too sharp, eyes too wild. 

He flexed his fingers and winced.

You did it again.

He could already hear the words forming in other people’s mouths.

Violent.

Unstable.

Just like they said.

Charlie hadn’t looked at him when they passed.

That hurt worse than the fight.

Sahara slid down until he was sitting on the floor, head bowed, hands clenched into prayer with his rosary in the middle.

“I ruin everything,” he muttered. The words felt rehearsed. 

Familiar. 

True in the way a prayer is true when you’ve said it long enough.

Footsteps approached.

He didn’t look up.

Didn’t want to see who’d come to finish the sentence for him.

Instead, someone crouched down in front of him.

Not close enough to corner him.

Close enough to stay.

Snow.

“You’re bleeding,” Snow said calmly.

Sahara laughed, sharp and humorless. “Yeah. That’s usually how it goes.”

Snow tore a strip from a napkin he’d grabbed somewhere and held it out.

He waited.

After a moment, Sahara took it. 

Their fingers brushed.

Snow didn’t flinch.

“I shouldn’t have done that,” Sahara said quickly, the words spilling out before he could stop them. “I knew better. I always know better and then I..” 

He shook his head hard. “I don’t know why you’re even still here.”

Snow tilted his head, studying him, not his hands, not his posture, not the damage.

Him.

“Because you didn’t start it,” Snow said.

“That doesn’t matter,” Sahara snapped. “I finished it. I always do.”

Snow was quiet for a beat.

Then: “You stopped.”

Sahara froze. “What?”

“You could’ve kept going,” Snow said evenly. “You didn’t.”

Sahara swallowed. 

His chest felt tight, like something was pressing in from the inside. “That doesn’t make me good.”

Snow’s mouth twitched.

Not a smile, not quite. “I didn’t say it did.”

He shifted, sitting beside Sahara on the floor like this was normal. 

Like Sahara wasn’t something dangerous that needed space.

“You scared?” Sahara asked suddenly, voice low. 

Almost hopeful in the worst way.

Snow glanced at him. Really glanced.

“No,” he said.

Not after a pause.

Not with reassurance.

Just no.

Something in Sahara cracked.

“You should be,” he whispered.

Snow leaned back against the wall, shoulders relaxed. “I’m not.”

Sahara stared at him then, searching for it, the guarded distance, the careful tone, the silent decision to leave.

It wasn’t there.

Snow was still here. Like Sahara hadn’t crossed some invisible line.

“I’m sorry,” Sahara said, quieter now. “About Jacob. About Charlie. About… everything.”

Snow didn’t answer right away.

When he did, it was simple.

“I know.”

And for the first time, Sahara wondered, not for the last, how Snow could say that without fear.

“You don’t scare me when you’re hurting. You scare me when you stop caring.”

He grinned with his same stupid smirk. 

“Afterall, you’re still here.”

Snow turned to the door.

“Cmon. Let’s go decorate.” He smiled brightly,

Sahara tagged along.

Around them, students unpacked decorations—paper bats, plastic cobwebs, orange streamers pulled too tight across the walls.

“What should we do for the activity?” Charlotte asked, glancing at Sahara.

He shrugged. “Whatever.”

Alex perked up immediately. “A haunted house?” He waved his hands. “Ooo—”

Justin scoffed. “Come on. We’re not little kids. Let’s do a café.”

“So you can flirt?” Charlie muttered, sweeping the corner with exaggerated force. “Let’s do something fun. Like—” They paused, then grinned. “A Halloween beauty thing.”

Before anyone could object, Charlie dug through a box and pulled out a white wig, holding it up triumphantly.

“Snow,” they said. “Put this on.”

Snow looked up, brows knitting together in confusion. Still, he took it and slipped it over his hair.

Alex burst out laughing. “Why does it actually suit him?”

Charlotte glanced over and blinked. “Oh.”

Charlie beamed, like they’d just unveiled a masterpiece.

Snow stood, adjusted the wig, then leaned over and lightly tapped Sahara’s shoulder.

“You like my hair?” he joked, smiling.

Sahara didn’t smile back.

His chest tightened. The room felt suddenly hollow, like sound had drained out of it.

It wasn’t the wig.

It was the words.

Snow’s voice—too close to something buried, something old—had brushed against a memory Sahara didn’t know how to name yet.

To everyone else, it was nothing.

To Sahara, it felt like seeing a ghost where no one else was looking.

Sahara ran out of the classroom, the door banging softly behind him.

Snow blinked, the smile still half-formed on his face.

“Huh?”

Justin, Alex, and Charlie burst into laughter.

Snow exhaled slowly, fingers tightening at his sides. “Am I really that ugly?”

Charlotte shook her head immediately. “No. You—” She hesitated. “You look the part.”

Snow reached back into the decoration box, pulling out a paper snowflake, turning it between his fingers.

“Wow,” he said dryly. “That really helped.”

Charlotte stepped closer and lowered her voice.

“I think you just made him mad.” She glanced toward the door Sahara had disappeared through. “Years ago… something happened to him. Around this time of year.”

Snow paused.

The white wig still sat crooked on his head, catching the fluorescent light. For a moment, the paper snowflake in his hand reflected the same pale brightness.

Charlotte swallowed. “Back then, there was someone.”

Snow didn’t respond right away.

He adjusted the wig, the motion small, almost unconscious—like he was trying to make himself look softer.

“I didn’t mean to,” he said quietly.

Charlotte nodded. “I know.”

But Snow kept staring at the decoration in his hand, the thin paper edges trembling slightly.

As if kindness, too, could cut if you held it the wrong way.

Snow found him by the sinks.

Sahara was gripping the edge of the counter like it was the only thing keeping him upright. His reflection stared back wrong—too pale, eyes too wide, breath uneven.

“Sahara,” Snow said carefully, stopping just inside the doorway. “Hey. I didn’t mean to—”

“Don’t.”

The word came out sharp, final.

Snow froze.

“I didn’t mean to embarrass you,” he said. His voice softened, instinctive. “I was just joking. You know that, right?”

Sahara laughed once, breathless. It didn’t sound like laughter.

“Why do you do that?” he asked, still not turning around.

“Do what?”

“That,” Sahara snapped, finally facing him. “That voice. That look. Like you’re trying to calm a wild animal.”

Snow’s brows knit together. “I’m just trying to help.”

There it was.

Help.

The lights above them hummed. Snow stood there in the doorway, pale under the fluorescent glow, hair still dusted white from the wig he hadn’t taken off completely. It caught the light the same way the classroom decorations had.

Too clean.
Too gentle.

Sahara’s chest tightened.

“You always do this,” Sahara said. “You act like you understand. Like you’re different.”

Snow took a step forward. “I am different. I wouldn’t hurt you.”

Something in Sahara cracked.

“That’s what she said.”

Snow stopped short. “Who?”

Sahara’s hands shook. “She said she just wanted to help. She smiled like it was a gift.” His voice rose despite himself. “Do you know how easy it is to destroy someone when you pretend you’re saving them?”

Snow’s mouth opened, then closed.

“I’m not her,” he said quietly.

“You don’t get to decide that,” Sahara shot back. “You don’t get to wear that softness and expect me to feel safe.”

Snow’s jaw tightened. For a moment, something colder flickered beneath his expression.

“I stayed,” he said. “I keep staying.”

“That doesn’t make you good,” Sahara said. “It just makes you patient.”

The words landed harder than Sahara intended.

Snow flinched.

The room went silent.

“You think I’m lying to you,” Snow said, voice low now. “That I’m pretending.”

“I think you don’t even know when you’re pretending,” Sahara said. “That’s worse.”

Snow caught himself against the wall, palm slapping flat against the tile.

Sahara’s fingers curled instinctively around the inside of his jacket.

The pill bottle was there.
Warm from his body.
Solid.

For a split second, the practiced calm slipped.

It wasn’t rage.

Not exactly.

It was something sharp and contained—like a door unlatched too fast.

“You think I don’t know when I’m pretending?” Snow asked.

His voice was still even. Too even. But his eyes weren’t. They were focused in a way that felt measured, assessing, like he was suddenly counting something Sahara couldn’t see.

Distances.

Exits.

Him.

Sahara felt it immediately—that shift. The same wrongness he felt when a room went quiet before something broke.

“I think,” Sahara said, forcing the words out, “that you learned how to sound kind without ever letting yourself feel it.”

That did it.

Snow’s jaw tightened. His fingers curled once at his side, then loosened, deliberately. Like he was choosing not to do something.

“You don’t get to say that,” Snow said.

Not angry.

Controlled.

That scared Sahara more.

“I stay,” Snow continued. “I show up. I don’t disappear when things get ugly. That’s not an act.”

“Then why does it feel rehearsed?” Sahara shot back. “Why does it feel like you’re watching me instead of standing with me?”

Snow inhaled through his nose.

“You want to know why?” he said quietly. “Because standing still gets people hurt.”

The words were out before he could stop them.

The room seemed to tilt.

Snow realized it a second too late.

Sahara stared at him. “What does that mean?”

Snow didn’t answer right away. His gaze flicked to the door, then back—an old habit, automatic. He rubbed his thumb against his knuckle, grounding himself.

“It means,” he said carefully, “that kindness isn’t always soft.”

The fluorescent lights hummed overhead. Snow’s reflection in the mirror looked wrong—too sharp around the edges, like someone else was peering through his face.

“I don’t look away,” Snow added. “Not because I’m brave. Because I learned what happens when you do.”

Sahara’s chest burned.

“That’s not comfort,” he said. “That’s surveillance.”

Snow flinched at that. A real one this time.

The mask slipped again—but now it was something like regret tangled with frustration, like he’d shown too much and not enough all at once.

“I’m not her,” Snow said. “But I’m not what you want me to be either.”

Sahara stepped forward without thinking and shoved him.

The contact was brief.

Clumsy.

Raw.

Snow didn’t retaliate.

He absorbed it, back hitting tile, breath hitching once before he stilled completely.

That was the worst part.

He wasn’t afraid.

Snow looked at Sahara—not with judgment, not with anger—but with a steady, unreadable acceptance that felt unbearable.

“See?” Snow said softly. “You’re not the thing I’m scared of.”

Sahara recoiled like he’d been burned.

Snow left.

The door closed softly behind him.

Sahara slid down the counter, knees pulled tight to his chest. His hands shook now—too much, too fast. He fumbled the bottle out of his pocket, staring at it like it might answer him.

Just one, his father’s voice echoed.
Just to quiet it.

He twisted the cap open.

The pills rattled faintly, obscene in the quiet.

Sahara hesitated.

In the sink, the white wig lay half-soaked, strands clinging to the porcelain like shed skin. A visual he couldn’t shake—someone else’s kindness, someone else’s softness, something that had once felt safe.

His hand hovered over the bottle.

Then he swallowed.

Dry.
Fast.
Automatic.

The buzzing dulled almost immediately, not gone, just padded, like the world had been wrapped in cotton. His thoughts slowed enough to breathe.

He hated that relief.

He slumped back against the cabinet, eyes unfocused. The mirror reflected him wrong again, edges blurred, pupils too dark.

Snow hadn’t been afraid.
That was what stuck.

He’d seen the shove.
Seen the anger.
And stayed steady anyway.

That calm hadn’t been pity.

It was understanding.

The bell rang somewhere down the hall.

Sahara didn’t move.

Charlotte and Charlie

“Hey, Charlie!”

Charlotte’s voice chimed through the hall.

Charlie looked up from their locker, startled. “Oh hey.”

She stopped in front of them, hands fidgeting with her sleeves. “I’m sorry about yesterday,” she said quickly, bowing her head a little.

Charlie scratched the back of their neck. “It’s fine.”

Her gaze dropped to their hands. “Your nails are pretty. Who made them?”

Color rose to Charlie’s cheeks. The blue-and-pink polish glimmered faintly under the fluorescent lights.

“I did. You like them?”

Charlotte smiled, genuine and small. “They’re really nice.”