Chapter 3: The Only One Who Saw Me
I didn't expect him to speak to me again.
People like Jace Anderson didn't follow up. They made a single gesture—a nod, a look, a few unexpected words—and left you to carry the weight of it. Like you were supposed to be grateful for the moment and then move on.
So when I walked into class the next morning and found him already at his desk, hood up, eyes closed, I told myself not to expect anything. I sat down beside him quietly. He didn't glance my way.
But I still felt it—that hum in the air, like the space between us was different now. Charged.
I unpacked my books and tried to focus on the board. The teacher's voice blurred in the background. All I could hear was my own thoughts tumbling over each other.
Why did he help me?
Was it pity? Guilt? Did he think I was weak?
A part of me wanted to believe he just… noticed. That someone like Jace, who didn't waste time on anyone, saw something in me worth defending.
But I wasn't stupid. I knew how people worked. No one noticed girls like me—especially not boys like him.
Still, when the bell rang and we all stood, he said something.
"Don't walk alone today."
I looked up at him, startled. "What?"
He had already slung his bag over his shoulder. "You heard me."
Then he walked off like it wasn't the most confusing thing anyone had said to me all week.
Nina found me at lunch, carrying two trays like she always did when she saw I was spiraling. She handed me one without comment and sat down across from me.
"Your locker," she said between bites, "has become a social bulletin board."
My stomach dropped. "What now?"
She pulled out her phone and held up a photo. A sticky note had been slapped onto the metal door, bright pink and impossible to miss.
"Jace likes charity cases."
There were already over a hundred likes on it, reposted by one of Mia's friends.
I set the tray aside, appetite gone. "Of course."
Nina scowled. "We should go to the principal."
"And say what? That rich girls with too much time on their hands are mean?"
She didn't respond to that. Neither of us really believed the school would care. Not when Mia's dad had his name on half the sports complex.
I rubbed my temples. "I didn't ask for this."
"I know," Nina said. "But now that Jace has… whatever that was yesterday, people are watching."
"Watching what?"
"You. Him. Us. They don't like shifts in the narrative."
I gave her a look. "What narrative?"
She shrugged. "The one where Jace Anderson stays unattainable and you stay invisible."
After class, I took the long way to the art room. It was the one place no one really watched me. A side hallway led past a row of old lockers and into a quiet stretch of the building where the windows were tall and cracked with ivy. It was usually empty.
Not today.
I stopped when I saw him.
Jace was sitting on the windowsill, one knee pulled up, flipping through a notebook. Not his school binder—something smaller. Leather-bound.
He didn't see me at first. I watched him for a few seconds, long enough to realize what he was doing.
He was sketching.
Not rough doodles, either. Real, deliberate drawings. I saw the outline of a basketball court, but instead of just players, there were symbols, numbers, angles.
He was mapping movements. Like a coach.
I cleared my throat.
His head snapped up, and for the first time, he actually looked surprised to see me.
"You draw?" I asked before I could think better of it.
He closed the notebook slowly. "Not like you."
"You've seen my drawings?"
He nodded once. "Yesterday."
"Oh."
I didn't know what else to say. I should've left. I didn't belong in his world—not in the hallways, not in the rumors, and definitely not in a quiet corner where he kept secrets like this.
But he didn't move. And neither did I.
"I didn't think you were the type to plan," I said.
He raised an eyebrow. "What type did you think I was?"
I hesitated. "The kind who just… shows up and wins."
He gave a small, humorless smile. "That's what they want people to think."
There was a pause. The air felt still and weighted.
"Why me?" I asked softly. "Why are you being… this way with me?"
His eyes searched mine for a moment. Then he looked away, like he didn't want to answer.
"I don't know," he said.
But something about his voice told me that wasn't true.
Later that day, someone shoved me in the hallway again.
It was different this time—not a full-blown confrontation, just a shoulder bump hard enough to knock my books loose.
I didn't fall. I didn't cry. I picked up my things and kept walking.
But I passed by the wall near my locker and saw a photo pinned there. It was blurry, taken from behind, but it was unmistakably me—standing next to Jace by the vending machines yesterday.
Someone had scrawled across it in black ink:
"She thinks she's special."
I didn't tear it down.
I walked away.
That night, I sat on my bed with my sketchpad open, staring at the blank page for what felt like an hour.
I couldn't draw. Not what I wanted to. Not what I felt.
So instead, I picked up my pencil and started sketching something I couldn't explain.
A boy on a windowsill, notebook in hand, shadows soft behind him. And a girl standing a few feet away, unsure whether to stay or go.
I didn't draw their faces.
But I didn't have to.
The next morning, when I stepped into class, he looked at me.
Really looked.
"Hey," he said.
That was all. Just one word.
But the fact that he said it out loud, in front of everyone?
That was enough.
And for the first time since I arrived at Crestmore, I realized something.
I wasn't invisible anymore.
Not to him.
Maybe not to me, either.