Which is why, when I see him waiting for me after last bell, in the open this time, not hiding in the shadows, my whole chest lifts.
He's leaning against the wall by the gates where everyone can see him, and heads turn, of course they do, the strange dangerous transfer boy standing in plain sight waiting for the fish girl, and I feel the whole schoolyard notice and I find that I don't care even a little. He straightens when he sees me, and something in his face opens, careful and warm, and the pull between us goes tight and sweet across the whole yard.
"You're not hiding," I say, reaching him.
"I'm done hiding." He says it simply, but I understand what it costs him, this boy who's spent three years being no one, standing in the open where the whole world can see him choose me. "If they'
