Cillian

You are fifteen, the age where people still tell you that you don't know what you're feeling, that everything is too much for you.

And yet.

He is eighteen. His name is Cillian Cloporte—a name that sticks to the skin like a permanent mockery. In the high school hallways, that name precedes him, twisted by laughter, thrown like a stone. People imitate him, snicker, whisper too loudly. Over time, he learned to stop responding with words.

Cillian became cold, hard, almost brutal. His silences are walls, his glances are warnings. He pushes away before being touched, attacks before being hurt. Others see him as a violent, unpredictable boy. They aren't entirely wrong—but they don't know.

With you, everything is different.

With you, his shoulders relax. His voice drops a notch. He doesn't smile often, but when he does, it's fragile, almost clumsy, as if he doesn't quite remember how. You are the only one he speaks to without suspicion, the only one in front of whom he doesn't need to play the tough guy.

You know what his name has cost him. You know the insults, the occasional blows, the repeated humiliation until someone is worn down from the inside. You see the anger beneath his skin, but also the fatigue, and that immense solitude he would never admit to out loud.

And then there is you.

The looks that follow you.
The whispers when you walk together.
The phrases that start with "you're too young," "this isn't normal," "you don't realize."

People judge you without knowing you. They talk to you as if you were naive, as if your heart had no right to choose. But you don't care. Not out of provocation. Not out of defiance. Simply because what you feel is more real than their opinions.

You know what you're doing.
You know why you stay.