Chapter 3

The classroom was too warm.

Not comfortable — stifling. The radiators were old, temperamental things that hissed like animals in pain, and today they were overcompensating for the cold snap outside. The windows had fogged in uneven patches, and Noah kept his eyes on the one nearest him, watching a drop of condensation slide down the glass like it was trying to escape.

Professor Marek was mid-lecture, reading from a battered edition of The Waves with that same dry theatricality that made every line sound like a prophecy. Noah wasn't sure if the heat or the lack of sleep was giving him a headache, but something was pulsing low behind his eye, steady and irritating.

"'Nothing thicker than a knife's blade separates happiness from melancholy,'" Marek read, then glanced up. "Discuss."

There was a shuffling of papers, the squeak of a chair adjusting. Somewhere behind him, a girl cleared her throat and launched into a soft-spoken interpretation about Woolf's metaphor of duality — the usual performance. A few students nodded like they were thinking hard.

Noah sat in the second row from the back, left side, where the windows filtered in just enough cold light to offset the radiator's aggression. His notebook was open to a blank page. He hadn't written a single word all morning.

He was trying not to think about them.

The seat across the aisle remained empty, as always. No jackets hung from the back. No books stacked on the desk. But his attention kept drifting there, like his body was preparing for something before his mind could catch up.

Then — the door.

It opened not with force, but certainty. A shift in the room's gravity, a recalibration of heat and light.

The twins entered — late, again, but not late enough to be scolded.

Elián walked first, scarf slipping from one shoulder, his curls damp from the fog outside. His hands were bare despite the weather, ink staining one knuckle. He moved with the easy grace of someone who didn't need to ask for space — space arranged itself for him.

Adrian followed at a slower pace, dressed in black down to the collar. The kind of black that swallowed light. His hair was pushed back, neat but not soft. His face was expressionless — not cold, but flat, like a sculpture just before the artist decides to break it.

They didn't scan the room. They didn't have to.

People noticed them without invitation.

Noah dipped his head, but not before catching the flick of Elián's gaze in his peripheral vision — sharp, downward, brief. Not long enough to be an acknowledgment. Not short enough to be nothing.

Adrian paused by the professor's desk. "Apologies. The studio ran late."

It wasn't quite cold — just absent of apology.

Professor Marek raised an eyebrow, then waved them off. "Sit."

They did. Today, closer.

Noah's spine stiffened as he realized their new seats were no longer across the room, but two rows forward and slightly right. He could see the backs of their heads clearly now. Elián tilted his to the side, already sketching in his notebook. Adrian sat perfectly still, arms crossed loosely, like he was waiting for the rest of the room to catch up with him.

Discussion resumed. Something about stream-of-consciousness. Something about Woolf's method of isolating emotion in image. But the sound around Noah felt blurred, muffled.

He watched his own hand turn a pen between his fingers — something to do, to tether himself.

Don't be dramatic, he told himself. They're just people.

Beautiful. Strange. Possibly dangerous.

But still people.

When the professor asked for group discussion, desks shifted. Chairs scraped. A girl named Lena plopped down beside him with a grin and a dog-eared copy of the book.

"I didn't finish the reading," she whispered conspiratorially.

Noah offered the barest curve of a mouth. "Me neither."

They were paired off. Across the room, Elián was with a student from the engineering track — tall, bored, not nearly interesting enough to hold his attention. Adrian had no partner. No one approached him.

He didn't seem to mind.

Their voices didn't carry. But their presence did. Even from a distance, they felt aware — not of the room, but of each other. Every small motion echoed in the other's stillness.

Lena was still talking. Something about Woolf's water imagery. Noah nodded, but his focus was locked just behind her shoulder, where Elián's hand moved across the page. Sketching, again. He didn't look up.

But Noah felt him watching. Like a mirror that didn't need eye contact to reflect.

Class ended before he was ready.

Students stood, stretched, collected bags with the rustle of paper and fabric. Noah kept his head down, waiting for the room to thin.

As he moved toward the door, someone passed behind him — not close enough to touch, but enough to feel a change in temperature. A faint smell clung to the air: cedar, cool linen, something vaguely metallic.

He knew who it was without turning.

Noah hesitated at the doorway — and for a split second, looked back.

Elián was watching him.

Not smiling.

Just observing.

Like someone tracing a line they weren't ready to draw.

And then, without a word, he looked away.

The library's upper floors were older than the rest of the building.

The ceilings bowed inward slightly, as though the books themselves had weight enough to bend the architecture. The windows were narrow, the panes smudged with years of condensation and fingerprints. The lighting was uneven — warmer near the circulation desk, colder and flickering the deeper you went.

Noah drifted past a half-lit row of linguistics journals, following no real direction.

He had a reading list in his pocket, a summary to write by tomorrow, and two messages from Emrys asking if he was "dead or just decaying beautifully." He ignored all of it.

Instead, he let himself sink into the smell of paper and polish, the quiet hum of fluorescent bulbs and distant typing.

There was a kind of safety here — not from people, exactly, but from needing to speak. He didn't want to explain himself. Didn't want to answer questions about the way his thoughts had started circling again, the way he couldn't stop replaying Elián's glance, the weight of Adrian's silence like a physical thing pressing on his chest.

He rounded a corner and found himself near the art archives, a place mostly used by third-years who needed obscure references for visual history. No one ever talked here.

Except now.

Two girls sat cross-legged on the floor between shelves, heads tilted close, their voices a low rush of gossip thick with performance.

Noah didn't mean to eavesdrop.

But something in their tone made him pause just behind a row of oversized portfolios and pretend to study a collection of sculpture catalogues.

"I'm just saying," one of them whispered, "it always starts the same way."

"With who?"

"With anyone," the first girl said. "That's the point. They pick someone. And then it's like... the person stops existing outside of them."

"You mean like dating?"

"No. Not dating. Consuming."

The second girl snorted. "You sound like Callie."

The first one went still.

"Callie left, didn't she?" she said after a pause.

"Yeah. Mid-term."

Noah's chest tightened.

"Exactly," said the first voice. "One month with them. One. After that? Gone. And remember Jules?"

"Oh my god, Jules."

"Right? He used to be so smart. And then suddenly he's quoting Rilke in the rain and talking about how Adrian sees through time."

A soft laugh.

"I heard he carved their initials into his mirror."

"No. That's not—"

"I saw it."

The second girl shivered audibly. "That's so cult behavior."

"They're not a cult," the first one said, quieter now. "They're just... not normal. Too close. Too in sync. Like you're not dating one of them — you're dating both, even when you're only sleeping with one. They don't separate. Ever."

"You think they do that on purpose?"

"I think," the first girl said, her voice suddenly serious, "they don't know how to be apart. I think if you come between them, something snaps."

There was a pause.

Then: "Why are we whispering?"

"Because they're probably listening."

They both laughed — high and a little nervous. The sound echoed against the books.

Noah realized his hand had curled into a fist in his coat pocket.

He didn't know what bothered him more — the absurdity of the rumor... or the pieces of it that felt true.

He stepped back from the shelf quietly and moved toward the stairs, suddenly cold despite the library's heat.

The girls hadn't seen him.

But the words clung like dust.

**************

The café was too small for lying, but Noah was determined to try.

He sat by the front window, hood still up, coat zipped to his throat. Outside, the wind nudged branches like it was trying to pick a fight. The street shimmered from an earlier drizzle. Inside, the music was soft, jazzy, and unbearable.

Across from him, Emrys set down two mugs and a look of long-suffering patience.

"I got you the bitterest thing on the menu," they said. "No sugar, no milk, no hope."

Noah stared at the cup. "That's dramatic."

"So are you."

He said nothing.

Emrys exhaled. Sat. Leaned in. "Okay, let's stop pretending this is about caffeine."

Noah narrowed his eyes. "What is it about then?"

"You," Emrys said plainly. "And the fact that you're circling those twins like you want to fight them or marry them, and I can't tell which."

Noah stiffened. "I'm not— I'm not doing anything."

"Oh, sweetie," Emrys said, resting their chin in one hand. "You are absolutely doing something. You just haven't figured out what yet."

Noah leaned back, folding his arms. "They haven't even spoken to me. Not really. Elián said my name once."

"And Adrian's been watching you like you're a mirror he forgot he owned," Emrys said. "So...?"

"So nothing," Noah snapped. "They're strange. That doesn't mean I'm interested."

"You keep staring."

"I'm trying to understand them."

"No, you're trying to understand yourself around them."

Noah's jaw clenched.

Emrys's expression shifted — not smug, but concerned. "Look, I'm not trying to label you. I just... I've seen people fall into them before. And it never ends clean."

"Well, good news then," Noah said coolly. "I'm not falling."

Emrys raised an eyebrow. "Noah."

"I'm straight," he said, firmer now. "I know who I am."

"And yet your voice just cracked when you said that."

Noah slammed his hands down on the table — not loud, but enough to make the mug rattle. "Jesus, Emrys, not everything has to be about sexuality. Some people can be curious. Or confused. Or weirded out. It doesn't mean I want them."

"I didn't say you did."

"Then stop talking to me like I'm already halfway in their bed."

"I'm talking to you like someone who's trying to keep you from losing yourself."

That landed harder than either of them expected.

Noah looked away. His chest felt too small for his lungs.

Emrys continued, quieter. "They do this. They find someone, pull them in. And even if you don't touch them, even if you never cross a line — it still changes you."

Noah gripped the edge of the table.

Emrys reached across, gently. "You're allowed to be who you are. Whatever that ends up being. But don't let them be the ones who decide it."

Noah stared down at his drink, jaw tight, throat tight.

"I'm not like that," he whispered. "I'm not... like them."

Emrys didn't reply.

They just sat there, watching, as Noah tried to sit still in a body that suddenly felt unfamiliar.

**************

Noah wasn't sure how long he'd been walking.

The campus looked different after five o'clock — not darker, exactly, but drained of movement. Shadows stretched farther. Sounds thinned. The air was damp with a kind of clean cold that seeped under sleeves and behind buttons.

He kept to the outer paths, the ones that curved along the back of the main buildings where ivy climbed brick and everything smelled like wet stone. His boots clicked in uneven rhythm against the flagstones. One of the laces had come loose, but he didn't stop to fix it.

He wasn't heading anywhere, but his body moved like it was being pulled — gently, then insistently — toward the art wing.

It rose ahead of him like an abandoned chapel: old limestone bones, high windows, the kind of arches that made everything echo louder than it should. Most of the lights inside were off, the hallway strip lights flickering behind high frosted glass. Students rarely lingered there after dark.

But someone was still around.

Noah slowed as he entered the stone corridor that bisected the wing, columns on either side forming a low cloister open to the sky. He knew the layout well enough now — one side led to the sculpture rooms, the other to printmaking. He paused under one of the arches, half-shadowed, fingers flexing against the cold.

Then—

His name.

Soft. Measured. Without surprise.

"Noah."

It wasn't a question. It wasn't flirtation, or recognition blooming late. It was almost... familiar. As though Elián had been rehearsing it in his mouth for days, waiting for the right moment to let it slip free.

Noah turned slowly.

Elián stood alone at the far end of the corridor, leaning against the edge of an iron-framed doorway. One boot balanced against the wall, shoulder tilted, hands stuffed into the pockets of a camel-colored coat left unbuttoned against the wind.

He looked—

God, he looked unreal in the blue-grey light. Like someone walking out of an oil painting with something beautiful but unfinished behind his eyes.

His curls were windblown, a little damp at the temples. Ink still marred his knuckles — as if he'd come straight from class, or never left it. A few pencil shavings clung to the front of his sweater, and there was a smudge near his collarbone like someone had touched him with charcoal fingers.

"Hi," Noah said, quieter than he meant.

Elián smiled — but not in the way most people did. It wasn't wide or polished. It was... personal. Tilted. A small curve that crinkled at the eyes just slightly.

"You're always walking alone," he said, not accusing, just noticing.

Noah shifted his weight. "I like the quiet."

Elián's gaze lingered for a second too long.

"Quiet's rare around here," he said. "It's easy to forget what it sounds like."

Then, without waiting for a reply, he turned and pushed open the studio door beside him. The hinges gave a soft groan — too soft for the building's usual shrieks. Noah realized the door must've been oiled recently.

Elián stepped inside but paused — not looking back, not beckoning, just waiting a second too long before disappearing into the darkness beyond the frame.

The door whispered shut.

And then he was gone.

Noah exhaled slowly. It misted in the cold air, curling past his mouth like smoke. His pulse was uneven, not frantic, but sharp in the center of his chest.

It hadn't been a conversation.

But it had felt like something.

Something that didn't make sense. Something that didn't need to.

He stared at the door Elián had disappeared through for another ten seconds, then turned back toward the path.

That's when he saw it.

Not clearly — just a shape. A tall figure across the courtyard, beyond the sculpture garden. Still. Watching. Positioned exactly where someone would stand if they wanted to see without being seen.

Adrian?

Noah's heart stuttered.

But when he blinked, the figure was gone.

Only the trees remained, swaying under the first breath of wind that smelled like rain.

**************

Noah told himself he was going to study.

That was the lie of the evening — quiet, noble, and immediately dishonest. He told it again when he climbed to the third floor of the library. Repeated it in his mind with each creaking stair. Whispered it beneath his breath as he passed the rare books room, then the worn poetry aisle, and finally found a corner table tucked under the curve of the mezzanine.

The third floor was different at night. The ceiling felt lower. The silence wasn't passive — it listened.

Only three other students were up there. One with headphones hunched over architectural blueprints. Another asleep on a pile of highlighted Marxism texts. The third moved like a ghost between the shelves, never stepping too hard.

Noah sat. Opened his book. Flipped past the pages he was supposed to read and settled on a sentence he'd already underlined, not remembering when.

"Life escapes; and perhaps without life nothing else is worth while."

He stared at it for a long time, his fingers curled slightly against the edge of the paper. The ink shimmered faintly under the old library lights — weak, uneven fluorescents that cast shadows in directions they shouldn't.

It had been hours since Elián said his name.

And Noah still felt the echo of it in the bones behind his ears.

The softness of it. The assumption in it. Like his name belonged to a song already written.

He blinked and looked down at his notes — a mess of half-thoughts, dates, literary terms he'd once cared about. Now it was just graphite dust and smudges.

He sat back, stretching slightly.

And paused.

There it was again.

That pressure. Invisible, but surgical.

His body tensed before he registered why.

Not footsteps. Not breath. Just a presence. Something behind his skin, under his ribs. A pulse of awareness that narrowed his vision.

He looked up.

And saw him.

Across the mezzanine. Between two shelves.

Adrian.

Standing still — so still — in the narrow aisle near the psychology section. No book in hand. No pretense. His coat was open just slightly, catching the low light like obsidian. His hands hung calm at his sides. His face—

Emotionless.

Not blank. Not empty. Just... focused.

Directly. Unapologetically. On Noah.

It wasn't a gaze.

It was a measurement.

Noah's lungs tightened. His first instinct was to look away — but something stopped him. Some unspoken dare.

The silence cracked.

Neither moved.

Noah's fingers slid off the table, his palms now on his knees, gripping.

He couldn't read Adrian's face. Couldn't place the stillness. It wasn't hunger. Not exactly. But it wasn't indifference either.

It was attention. So rare. So precise.

That kind of attention you don't give something fragile unless you already know how it breaks.

Seconds passed — maybe a dozen. Maybe hundreds.

Noah's pulse pounded behind his teeth.

Then, without blinking, Adrian tilted his head half a degree.

No smile. No shift.

Just that.

And then he walked away.

Noah didn't move.

Not immediately. Not for a full minute after Adrian had disappeared behind the shelves.

Even then, he didn't stand. He simply folded his hands together in his lap to keep them from shaking and stared down at the page again.

"The eyes that see you are the ones you never escape."

He hadn't written that.

But it was true.