When Brandon and Beth walked into the student lounge that afternoon—late again, as usual—everyone stopped pretending not to care.
It wasn't just that they were together. It was how they looked together.
Brandon had his arm slung around Beth like it belonged there, protective and casual all at once. Beth didn't shrug him off, didn't glare or snap like she usually did when someone got in her space. If anything, she leaned into him slightly, as if her bruises hadn't quite finished healing or maybe she just… didn't hate being close to him.
That was suspicious enough.
But the real kicker? They both looked wrecked.
Like they hadn't slept properly in days. Like they'd spent too long in the dark, doing something no one else would ever understand. Brandon's hoodie was pulled low like he was hiding more than just exhaustion, and Beth's makeup—usually sharp and defiant—was smudged like she'd given up pretending. Her hair was tied in a messy bun that didn't feel like a choice so much as a necessity.
They looked like survivors of a war no one else saw.
The Deadfast Club noticed immediately.
And they immediately had thoughts.
"I give it two weeks before one of them stabs the other," Kym muttered, sipping her soda with the dramatic flair of a gossip columnist who'd seen it all. "Or makes out with them. Possibly both."
"Definitely both," Liv said without hesitation, eyes squinting like she was trying to decode some hidden signal in the way Beth walked a half-step behind Brandon. "You don't not hook up after surviving whatever they just did."
Manny leaned forward on the couch, elbow bumping Amir. "Wait, are they like… actually a couple now? Or are we still in the weird limbo phase where it's like, 'will-they-kill-each-other-or-kiss?' Because I've got a bet going with Sara from Chem."
"I thought they were already dating," Amir whispered. "Beth said they were."
"Beth says a lot of things," Liv replied, eyes narrowing. "Half of them are threats. The other half are probably coded serial killer manifestos."
Deion, sitting at the edge of the group with his hood pulled low, just gave them all a look.
"They've been gone for three days. And now they show up like that? Yeah. Something happened."
"Something always happens," Manny said, glancing over at the pair. "They're like… gravity wells for chaos."
Beth and Brandon, oblivious—or maybe just willfully ignoring the stares—walked over to their usual corner of the lounge. Brandon let go of her long enough to drop into a chair with a tired grunt. Beth didn't sit beside him.
She sat on the armrest of his chair.
Another first.
A quiet hush rippled through the room as people tried—and failed—not to gawk.
Beth, clearly noticing the silence, lifted her gaze to the group. Her expression was unreadable, somewhere between smug and dead-eyed. "What?" she asked, flat and unimpressed.
No one answered.
Even Liv, who could usually talk her way through nuclear fallout, stayed quiet. For once.
Brandon, with a faint smile that was either ironic or just exhausted, pulled his hood down and rested his head back against the chair.
"Y'all act like you've never seen two people hang out before."
"Hang out?" Liv echoed.
Kym snorted. "Pretty sure you're hanging on each other at this point."
Beth smirked. "Jealous?"
"Only of your apparent ability to disappear for days without catching academic probation," Manny said.
Deion finally spoke again. "So what happened?"
Beth shrugged. "Stuff."
Brandon echoed, "Things."
Amir frowned. "Okay, that's not suspicious."
"Everything about them is suspicious," Kym said, arms crossed.
"I'm choosing to believe they were off murdering someone together as part of a highly organized vigilante justice initiative," Liv declared, then looked between them. "Which is weirdly romantic."
Beth gave her a look that might have been gratitude. Or annoyance. It was always hard to tell.
Brandon just chuckled under his breath.
Kym tilted her head. "Are we sure they're not trauma bonding their way into a dysfunctional relationship?"
"They're both hot," Manny pointed out. "It was inevitable."
Beth rolled her eyes and hopped off the armrest, finally settling into the actual seat beside Brandon. "You people need hobbies."
"You are our hobby," Liv said sweetly. "You and your murder boyfriend."
Brandon raised an eyebrow. "Murder boyfriend?"
"Look at you," she shot back. "You're literally glowing with post-homicide intimacy."
Ashes—because of course the smug little cat had followed them—chose that moment to strut into the room like she owned the place. She leapt onto the table, sat primly, and began cleaning her paw as if she too had just gotten away with something criminal.
Everyone stared.
Beth looked down at her.
Brandon sighed.
"I don't even know how she got out," he muttered.
"She's magic," Beth replied absently.
"Wait, wait, wait—you brought a cat to campus housing?" Kym asked, aghast.
"She's not just any cat," Beth said, deadpan.
"She's a co-conspirator."
"Great," Deion muttered. "Even the animals are suspicious now."
Despite the tension, despite the exhaustion—despite the very obvious something hanging over Beth and Brandon's heads—there was an odd, fleeting moment of ease.
Of weird peace.
Of the group accepting that their two weirdest members were now… something.
Friends. Fakes. Lovers. Killers.
No one really knew.
But everyone had a theory. And the theories only got wilder as the lounge filled with murmurs and whispered bets.