kaisbrain
Mathias is good at disappearing.
He shows up, does the work, says the right things to the right people. Between volleyball practice, shifts at the diner, and the quiet of being the kind of student teachers use as an example, he built a life that works. Solid. Predictable. His.
Then Damon Morelli comes back to Malibu and the whole system falls apart.
With everyone else, Damon is easy, magnetic, charming, sliding back into the social hierarchy like he never left. Everyone else gets that version of him.
Mathias gets the other one. The one where the easy expression drops the second their eyes meet. Where every hallway crossing feels like a question neither of them is answering.
He's not sure anymore whether he's trying to avoid Damon , or waiting for him to show up.
What he doesn't know , what he can't know , is that Damon never actually let go. That whatever happened between them in eighth grade, before the move, before the silence, before three years of nothing , Damon has been holding onto it the whole time.
And he didn't come back to Malibu to let it stay ignored between them.