LIZA

Everyone thinks the beautiful ones have it easy. Like, that beauty is like armour or something. But it's not. Sometimes it's a target, a package and beautiful embroidery covering invisible scars while you wave through it all, smiling brazenly even while broken just to avoid anything tampering with the image of perfection the world has of you at all times.

I discovered that at a young age.

You walk down the corridor with hips that sashay too far, curves that refuse to fit neatly into polite bounds, and suddenly everyone has a name for you. Temptation. Distraction. Sin.

I never asked for that. I just wanted to be invisible and map my world in silence.

It failed.

Not then. Today.

And certainly not when Steel-Steel-looked at me like that.

Like I was something more or less than the name they called me.

As if I were a mermaid.

When he saved me that day, I was already hanging by a thread. That prof... I'd always known he creeped me out the first day. The way his gaze lingered on me too long, the way his hand rested on my back without reason. I should have spoken up about him. I didn't. Some part of me believed no one would ever listen to me. Or, worse, that they would blame me.

But Steel?

He came out of nowhere like a storm I was not expecting. 

The look in his eyes when he knocked that thug out was not just anger. It was ownership. Like the idea of somebody laying hands on me without me wanting it provoked something deep in his very heart.

Nobody ever did that for me before. 

Nobody's ever looked at me like this.

Then, later, I should have been frightened of him. He's a threat-I've heard the gossip. Tattoos, a leather jacket, riding a behemoth of a motorcycle and giving commands to the Vikings like royalty. But perched on the stairs with him as the sun dropped below the admin building, I did not feel threatened.

I felt safe.

And that terrified me more than anything.

"Angel Mark," he'd said deliberately, savouring my name after all those years of silence.

I hadn't heard that name in ages. It used to be soft and hopeful-sounding. But that version of me got lost a long time ago.

I reminded myself to leave. To suit up. But then he smiled at me.

Not the smug, arrogant smile that everyone describes him wearing like a mask. No, this was not like that. This was different. Sincerely, Almost shy. Like he was afraid to breathe too hard and ruin the moment.

And so, bit by bit, my defenses crumbled.

We started talking more. At first, I just lost things. He'd walk me to class, get me coffee with the wrong name written on the cup intentionally, and come to my art presentations even when I didn't ask him to.

He made me laugh.

He made me want to talk again.

I learnt about him too. Like how he grew up in an orphanage until the sheriff adopted him. How he never quite felt like he belonged, even when he was a soccer team captain. Loyalty was the one thing that mattered most to him because he never had any as a child.

I could see it in the way he gazed at me. Protective. Curious. Gentle, even when he didn't say a word.

One evening, I asked him why he kept showing up.

He rested against his bike, arms folded, wind blowing on his shirt, speaking in a low voice.

"Because I blew my chance once. I'm not going to do it again."

My heart missed a beat.

Because while we never spoke in high school, he paid attention to me. And I paid attention to him too.

The angry boy who fought against everyone.

The one who walked the halls as if defying someone to touch his boils.

And maybe that's what this is-two battered souls feeling something familiar in one another.

A beginning we never realised we needed.

Or maybe something we've always longed for.

They started coming for me in whispers first.

Catty comments down the hall, obligatory smiles twisted across lip-glossed lips.

"Enjoy it while it lasts," a girl snarled at the lockers. "Steel gets bored quickly."

"Did he tell you he was with Madison last semester? Or Ava the semester before that?"

I never replied. I never did. But the words burrowed into my skin like needles.

Steel wasn't just popular-he was in demand. Almost worshipped on campus. Soccer team captain, biker king, strolling Original Sin with a jawline that appeared chiselled by gods. I wasn't blind. I knew he was gawked at. I knew a decent half of the women on campus would crawl if he so much as looked at them.

So why me?

Even my best friend, Catalina, warned me.

"Liza", she said to me one night as we sat in the dorm courtyard. "I love you, but you need to be realistic. Guys like him don't settle. They experiment. And you're just the latest flavour."

I hoped she was wrong.

But that seed of doubt? It rooted itself deep.

Until Steel came along. Every time.

When he caught one of the girls "accidentally" pushing my sketchpad into the fountain, he wasted no time. Pulled her aside, voice firm but as cold as a blade.

"Touch her stuff again, and I'll see to it you never walk this campus feeling secure."

And when I ghosted him for a day, unaware, drowning in voices that were not my own, he hunted me down behind the studio building.

Sat beside me for a minute without uttering a word before speaking in a low voice, "If I scare you off, I'll leave. But if it's them causing you to question us... I'll spend every damn day proving them wrong."

I turned to face him then, my throat lodged in my chest.

"I don't know how to do this," I gasped.

Steel's calloused fingers wrapped around mine like a vow.

"Then we learn together. But I'm not going anywhere, Sin. Not unless you tell me to."

And with that, the cloudy mood dissipated.

The uncertainty dulled.

Because no matter how hard the world boomed, Steel was louder. Not with words-but with presence. Action. Complacency.

I was still learning how to trust.

But Steel?

He made me want to.

SIN

It was a sunny day at the library when his dad, the sheriff came looking for me;

"Angel Mark?

I tensed. He wasn't looking at me like others did-starving, teasing, curious. No. His eyes were calculated. Heavily weighted. Guarded in a way that had me thinking this wouldn't be one of those quick chats.

"Angel Mark?" he echoed, deep, determined voice.

My throat constricted. No one other than Steel ever called me that anymore.

"Yes, sir," I breathed.

He looked at me for an incredibly long time before nodding to the benches. "Walk with me?"

I walked alongside him, heart thudding.

We sat down, a silence drawn between us. He spoke finally, his words picked with care.

"See, my son matters to me. He's my son. Not biologically, but by choice. I saved him from a system that would have eaten him and spat him out. I've spent years ensuring he had a shot at something better than what he deserved." 

I nodded, fingers twisting in my lap. "I know."

He sighed, his gaze out at the horizon. "He's got potential. Potential he doesn't realize. He's smart. He's a good friend. He could do something with his life, something good. But he's also self-sabotaging. He feels everything so deeply, so quickly. And then there's you..."

He turned to me then, his eyes sharp but not unkind. ".you're a distraction."

It was a hard word to hear, but I didn't budge.

"I don't mean it meanly," he continued quickly. "I see that you do care about him. And he cares about you, too. But the world doesn't stop turning because you two hit it off. He does have a future, Sin. A good one. And I can't let anything jeopardize it and him. Not even you."

I took a deep breath, pressing the pain down. He wasn't wrong. I'd thought as much late at night when fear crept in.

"You think I'll destroy him," I said softly.

I believe you'll steal his focus," the sheriff stated. "And he can't pay that price. Not now. Not when everything is laid out before him. Steel's heart is. dangerous when it becomes attached. He'd incinerate the whole world for you if you asked him to. And while that would sound romantic-it isn't. It might cost him everything.".

His words should have cut deeper, but all I felt... was comprehension. Because this wasn't jealousy. Or malice. This was love. Fear on the part of a father.

I sat there for a long time, then leaned forward to whisper, "So you want me to leave him."

The sheriff's jaw tightened. "I want him safe. I want him to be stable. If that means you are stepping back. then yes."

The sheriff's words hung in the air between us, heavier than the dropping sun.

I gazed at my hands, chipped black polish on my fingernails in small moons of abandonment. My heart wasn't racing the way I'd thought it would be. It was level. Sad, yes. But level.

Because I knew.

He wasn't attacking me. He wasn't speaking things to me that the rest of the world said. He wasn't telling me that I wasn't good enough because he was angry.

He was afraid. For his son.

And this fear, I knew.

"You love him," I said finally, speaking almost too soft.

The sheriff's jaw pushed forward, his eyes glancing away towards the horizon. "More than anything."

I nodded once, slowly. "Then I understand."

He blinked, surprised. "You... do?"

I smiled, small and genuine and tired. "Most people stare at me like I'm the problem. The danger. The temptation. You're not the first person to tell me I'll ruin someone's life. But you're the first person to do so because you want to protect him, not because you hate me."

His forehead furrowed, the sharp planes of his face softening. "Sin-

I raised my hand. "It's okay. You don't have to tell me. I understand Steel is everything to you. I see it in your eyes the way you look at him. And... you're right. He would destroy the world for me if I asked him. That frightens me too."

The sheriff took a breath, his shoulders relaxing by a fraction.

Silence between us, broken only by the drone of distant traffic and the cry of a bird in the fading light.

Finally, I said, "Do you believe that I care nothing about his future?"

The sheriff's gaze flicked back to me, more acute.

I didn't give him time to respond. "Because I do. I love him more than I love myself. Maybe too much. And the last thing I want, the very last thing I want, is to be the reason he loses what you've worked so hard to give him."

He looked at me then, really looked at me, as if weighing every single word.

"You're not like I imagined," he admitted.

I giggled softly, but too snappishly for what I'd intended. "People usually tell me that after I've already disappointed them."

He shook his head. "No. That's not it. I was expecting you to rant. To dig in. To tell me I had no conception of what I was saying."

I shrugged. "What would I do? You know him better than I do. You were the one who brought him up. You gave him something no one else could. Of course you're going to want what's best for him."

The sheriff rested back on the bench, his expression still. For a long time, neither of us spoke.

Then he leaned forward, speaking quietly, "I don't hate you, Sin. I want you to understand that. But when it comes to Steel, I can't play games. He's been burned enough. If you're going to be in his life, you have to understand the weight of it."

I swallowed convulsively, my throat closing down.

"I do," I said flatly.

I was awake that night, in my bed and looking up at the ceiling of my dorm room. Catalina slept before me, her headphones still emitting a soft glow. The sheriff's words rang in my mind.

A distraction.

He'd burn the world for you.

If you're in his life, understand the weight of it.

I shifted over, pressing my face into the pillow. I didn't cry-not because I wasn't in pain, but because the hurt was too intense to be cried out.

The truth was, the sheriff wasn't wrong.

Steel scared me sometimes. Not him, not what he was-but the intensity of what he felt. When he looked at me, it was like everything else in existence didn't matter any longer. That kind of adoration had the power to save me or kill us both.

And I didn't want to be the one to cause his tomorrow to go up in flames.

But here's the thing nobody tells you: when somebody like Steel chooses you, really chooses you, leaving isn't simple. It's not just closing a door. It's taking away a piece of you.

I thought about how his hand encircled mine. How his laughter burst open something inside me that I thought was dead. How he'd said, "I'm not going, Sin. Not unless you want me to."

How could I ever manage to tell him to?

The following morning, I bumped into him outside the studio, leaning against his bike as he always was, slouching black jacket loose, hair blowing in the morning gusts. His eyes twinkled at the sight of me.

"Hey, Angel."

My chest constricted at the name. I walked towards him, forcing my steps to be even.

You okay?" he asked, regarding me in that same way he always did, like he could see past the lie I was about to tell.

I swallowed. "Yeah. Just. exhausted."

He tilted his head, unconvinced. "Tired of me already?"

I tried to smile, but it wavered. "Never."

Steel wrapped his fingers around my hand, tracing his thumb across my knuckles like he'd done a million times before. "Then what is it?

I stalled, the sheriff's words echoing in my head. A distraction. Don't let him ruin his future for you.

But looking into Steel's eyes, I knew I couldn't say it. Not yet. Not when the prospect of pushing him away was like cutting off my own oxygen.

"Nothing," I breathed eventually. "I just... needed to see you."

And God, how his face softened at that... it nearly destroyed me.

Because I knew then. No matter what the sheriff said, as logical as it was, I wasn't yet prepared to let him go.

Not yet.

Perhaps never.

Later that evening, I sat alone in the courtyard, sketchbook in my lap. The sheriff's words still weighed heavily on me, but I remembered something Steel had told me.

"If I scare you off, I'll leave. But if it's them... I'll prove them wrong."

Maybe this was another test. Another voice trying to tell me that I wasn't good enough.

But with a difference. The others were from spite or indifference.

This was from love.

And that made it harder.

But as I outlined Steel's face to memory-the messy hair, the scar under his jaw, the way that his eyes always seemed to hold secrets-I knew something.

If I left, I'd be proving every rumor true. That I wasn't strong enough. That I wasn't worth risking.

But if I didn't.

If I stayed, then Steel would not simply destroy the world for me, perhaps we'd save ourselves.

SIN

I tried to keep some distance between us, the rumours were flying around wildly and overwhelming, female teachers were telling not to ruin my great academic start up life, basically everyone warned me off him so I decided to give a little bit of space but his eyes lingered too long, his hand stayed too long on my back and I should've been scared of him. Everyone said he was dangerous. Tattoos. The leather jacket. The motorcycle that roared like thunder. The way he gave orders to the Vikings like he was their president but sitting with him on the admin steps as the sun set? I didn't feel threatened. I felt safe and that scared me more than anything.

"Angel Mark," he'd said softly.

Nobody had called me that in years. It used to sound like hope. Now it felt like he was digging up bones I buried.

I told myself to get up, to walk away. But then he smiled at me. Not the cocky smirk everyone else knew him for. This was different. A little shy, a little careful. Like if he moved too fast, he'd break the moment.

And little by little, my walls began to crack.

We started talking more.

At first, it was light. Him walking me to class. Bringing me coffee with fake names scribbled on the cup-Princess Consuela Banana-Hammock one time, Mrs. Steel another. Sitting in the back row during my art presentations even when I hadn't invited him.

He made me laugh. He made me want to talk again.

One afternoon, I asked him, "Why do you keep showing up?"

He leaned against his bike, arms crossed, hair messy in the wind. His voice was low when he answered.

"Because I blew my chance once. I'm not doing it again."

Catalina, my best friend, once again tried to warn me.

"Sin, I love you, but be real. Guys like him don't settle with girls like you, stop giving him the chance to use you.

His kind experiment and you're just the new flavour."

I wanted her to be wrong. But the doubt? It rooted itself inside me.

Until Steel showed up again.

One afternoon, I caught a girl shoving my sketchbook into the fountain. Before I could react, Steel was there. He grabbed her by the arm, pulled her aside, and his voice was calm but sharp as a knife.

"Touch her stuff again, and I'll make sure you never walk this campus feeling safe again."

The girl paled, stammered something, and ran.

Steel turned to me, his jaw tight. "You good?"

I nodded, clutching my sketchbook like it was my heart. "Yeah. Thanks."

He studied me, eyes softening. "Don't thank me. Just... let me be here."

Another time, I tried to disappear. One day, I didn't text him back. Didn't meet him after class. Didn't answer his calls. I drowned in everyone else's voices until I couldn't hear my own.

He found me anyway, sitting behind the studio building.

He didn't speak at first. Just sat down beside me. Our shoulders almost touched. A minute passed, then two. Finally, he said quietly,

"If I'm the one scaring you off, I'll go. But if it's still them? Then I'll spend every damn day proving them wrong because I'm not going to leave Angel."

My throat closed up. "I don't know how to do this," I whispered.

His hand found mine, rough and steady. "Then we'll learn together. But I'm not leaving, Sin. Not unless you tell me to."

Something in me broke open then. Because everyone else always had one foot out the door but not him. Not Steel.

He showed up in other ways too.

Like the morning I overslept before a big exam and thought I'd blown everything. I ran out of the dorm in a panic, only to see him parked right in front of the building, helmet in hand.

"Get on," he said.

I blinked at him. "How do you even know-"

"You always oversleep before exams," he cut in, smirking a little. "Now hurry. I'm not letting you fail because you missed a bus."

I climbed on behind him, clutching his jacket, and he roared us across town like the devil was chasing us. I made it to class with seconds to spare.

He winked at me before I ran inside. "Told you. I've got you."

Or the night after my presentation, when my piece got torn apart by a professor. I held it together until I got outside. Then the tears came.

Steel was leaning against his bike again, waiting. His smile fell the second he saw my face.

"What happened?"

"Nothing," I sniffed, trying to brush past him.

He caught my arm gently. "Angel. Talk to me."

I shook my head. "They hated it. Said it was messy. Said it didn't mean anything. I worked on it for weeks and-" My voice cracked.

Steel didn't argue. Didn't try to fix it. He just pulled me into his chest and let me cry. His hand stroked the back of my head, slow and steady.

When I finally calmed down, he tilted my chin up. "You know what I think?"

"What?" I croaked.

"I think they're blind and I think your art scares them because it's too real."

I laughed wetly. "You're just saying that."

He shook his head. "No. I don't say shit I don't mean."

For the first time that day, I believed him and instantly felt enormous relief.

Steel shows up in big ways. In loud, dramatic ways that make people step back but he also shows up in small ways.

Like the way he texts me good luck before every class, even when he's busy.

The way he makes sure I eat when I skip meals, shoving a sandwich into my hands with a gruff, "Don't argue, just eat."

The way he notices when I'm too quiet and won't leave until I admit what's wrong.

The way he looks at me-not like I'm Sin, the distraction, the temptation-but like I'm Angel. The girl I used to be before the world buried her.

One night, I asked him again. "Why me, Steel? You could have anyone. Why me?"

He didn't hesitate. "Because you don't want anything from me except me. You don't see the captain, or the biker, or the guy everyone whispers about. You just see me, believe in my future without being told and nobody's ever done that before."

His eyes locked on mine then, steady and sure.

" I'm not letting you go. Not again."

And that's how I knew.

The world could whisper, they could sneer, they could throw doubts at me until my skin bled with them. But Steel?

Steel would always show up.

And that made me want to show up too.

For him.

For us.

For the first time in my life, I wasn't just surviving.

I was beginning to live.