All Chapters of To the two boys I like: Burn me the safe way: Chapter 1 - Chapter 10

87 Chapters

The Days That Followed

It should have been a long, long memory anyway. But it wasn't for her. Elena wasn’t in the car when her father and brothers died but that didn’t stop her from imagining the crash every single night.She hadn’t slept on the flight from Heathrow. Hadn’t spoken more than necessary at customs. Hadn’t cried since the funeral three weeks earlier, because crying felt like admitting the accident had won.Now the town car stopped in front of a low cream house on a palm-lined street in Pacific Vista. The sky was the wrong color—too bright, too endless. Her mother, Claire, turned off the ignition.“We’re here,” Claire said quietly.Elena stared at the sage-green front door. It looked like it belonged to someone else’s life.Inside, boxes waited like unwelcome guests. Claire immediately started unpacking kitchen things, moving with the frantic energy of someone trying to outrun memory. Elena carried her duffel upstairs to the room assigned to her: gray walls, white bed still wrapped in plastic,

Eyes in the Back Row

Elena woke before the alarm, heart already racing like she’d been running all night.She stared at the ceiling, replaying the alley over and over: the crack of bone, the scar slicing through that dark brow, the way those eyes had pinned her for one frozen second before he vanished. She hadn’t told her mother. Hadn’t told anyone. What would she even say? Some stranger beat up three guys for me and then disappeared like a ghost? It sounded insane. It felt insane.She dragged herself out of bed. The navy blazer hung stiff on the closet door, the plaid skirt still creased from the packaging. She dressed mechanically—white shirt buttoned to the top, tie knotted too tight, hair pulled into a low ponytail. Every movement felt borrowed, like she was wearing someone else’s skin.Claire was already in the kitchen, coffee brewing, forcing brightness into her voice. “You look ready. Nervous?”Elena shrugged. “It’s just school.”Claire handed her a travel mug of tea. “You’ll be fine. They’re expec

Cracks in the Armor

Elena walked home from Pacific Crest under a sky turning the color of bruised peaches. The uniform skirt chafed against her thighs, the blazer felt like armor she didn’t ask for.She kept her head down, replaying the day in fragments: Liam’s easy laugh in the hallway, the way he’d waited by her locker after last period just to say “see you tomorrow,” the brush of Noah’s shoulder that still burned hours later.She pushed open the green door. The smell of garlic and tomatoes hit her first—Claire was at the stove, sleeves rolled up, stirring something that looked like actual effort.“Hey, sweetheart.” Claire turned, smile tentative. “How was the first day?”Elena dropped her bag by the stairs. “Fine.”Claire’s spoon paused. “Just fine?”“Yeah.” Elena started up the steps. “Tired. Homework.”She didn’t wait for the follow-up question. Door shut. Locked. She sank onto the bed, still in the blazer, staring at the wall until the light outside faded to navy.Dinner was quiet. Claire tried aga

Forbidden Pull

Noah’s fist froze mid-air. Sweat dripped from his brow, catching the moonlight like shards of glass. His chest rose and fell hard, eyes narrowing on the shadow where Elena stood.“What the hell are you doing here?” His voice cut through the quiet lot—low, rough, edged with something dangerous.Elena’s mouth went dry. She stepped forward into the weak spill of the floodlight, heart slamming against her ribs. “I was… just passing by.”He let out a short, humorless laugh. “Passing by. At one in the morning. In an empty lot behind closed shops.” He wiped his forehead with the back of his wrist, then reached down and gripped the hem of his soaked black T-shirt. In one smooth motion he peeled it off, tossing it onto the heavy bag.Elena’s breath hitched. She couldn’t help it. His torso was carved—lean muscle shifting under bruised skin, fresh red marks blooming across his ribs, old scars crisscrossing like a map of every fight he’d refused to lose. Sweat gleamed on his abs, trailing down th

Breaking Point

Elena stood in the kitchen doorway, twisting the hem of her hoodie between her fingers. Claire was at the sink, rinsing dishes, the soft clink of plates the only sound in the house.“Mum?”Claire glanced over her shoulder. “Yeah, love?”“I… was wondering if I could go out tonight.” Elena kept her voice even, casual. “Liam invited me to a bonfire at the beach. Just a small thing. A few people from school.”Claire turned off the tap. Dried her hands slowly on a towel. “Tonight?”“Yeah. It starts at eight.”Claire studied her for a long moment. The lines around her eyes deepened. “You’ve been quiet this week. Distant.”“I know.” Elena swallowed. “I just… need to get out. Breathe. Please.”Claire sighed. Set the towel down. “You’ll be careful?”“I promise.”“No drinking. No wandering off alone. Text me when you get there, and when you’re on your way home.”“I will.”Claire hesitated another beat. Then nodded. “Okay. But if anything feels off—”“I’ll come straight home.”Claire pulled her

Fallout

Elena walked back to the bonfire with sand in her shoes and Noah's warmth still pressed into her skin like something she'd never asked for and couldn't give back.She almost turned around twice.Didn't.The fire had gotten bigger—someone had thrown on more driftwood—and the group was louder, drunker, easier. A girl was doing a terrible impression of their Spanish teacher and everyone was losing it. Normal. God, so embarrassingly, achingly normal. Elena stood at the edge of the circle and blinked at it all like she'd just surfaced from underwater."Hey." Liam materialized at her elbow, appearing from nowhere the way he always seemed to. He handed her a drink—just lemonade, she realized, fizzy and cold, like he'd somehow known. "Where'd you disappear to?""Just needed some air." She took the cup. Wrapped both hands around it. "It got loud."He nodded. Didn't push. But his eyes moved over her face, slow, like he was cataloguing something—the flushed cheeks, maybe. The slightly too-delibe

Distance Games

Noah didn't look at her once.Not in the morning when she passed him in the hallway. Not in English when she sat two rows ahead and felt the back of her neck go hot for forty straight minutes. Not when their shoulders nearly collided outside the biology lab door and he just—stepped around her, smooth and practised, like she was a lamppost. An obstacle. Something to avoid without breaking stride.She told herself it didn't matter.She told herself that approximately eleven times before first period ended.AP English was its own specific kind of torture. Ms. Rivera was still doing Gatsby—the green light, the longing, the whole exhausting architecture of wanting something you've already lost—and Elena sat in the second row with her pen moving but her brain somewhere completely else. Behind her. Specifically in the back corner where Noah was doing that thing he did, that total physical stillness, like he'd decided to stop existing in any way that could be perceived or felt or—"Elena. Wha

First Crack

Elena almost ate lunch alone again.She'd gotten good at making it look intentional—picking a spot near the window, opening a book, wearing the expression of someone who preferred their own company. It wasn't entirely a lie. People were exhausting. Conversation required energy she kept running out of before noon.But the tray landed across from her before she'd even opened the book."You're the British girl, right?"Elena looked up.The girl who'd sat down had long dark hair falling perfectly straight over one shoulder, sharp eyes that were already assessing her with the particular efficiency of someone who decided things fast and rarely changed their mind. She was wearing the uniform like it was a choice rather than a requirement—blazer open, one sleeve pushed up, small gold hoops catching the light. Effortlessly put together in a way that didn't look like effort at all."JoJo Reyes," the girl said, stabbing a fork into her salad. "Before you ask—yes I know everyone, yes I will tell

Collision Course

Well it happened because she took the wrong staircase.That's what she told herself after. That it was geography. A wrong turn. The east stairwell instead of the west, because she'd been distracted and her brain was still half-inside the history essay she'd been mentally drafting since third period. Completely accidental. Totally innocent. She would have taken any available staircase and the same thing would not have happened because the same person would not have been there.Except he was.The east stairwell was tucked behind the science wing, narrower than the main stairs, the kind of space that existed in schools purely as a pressure valve—somewhere to decompress between classes, to eat lunch if you didn't want to be seen, to exist without anyone requiring you to perform being fine. She used it sometimes for exactly that reason. Apparently so did he.She pushed open the door on the third floor landing and Noah was there.Sitting on the steps, two stairs down, back against the wall,

Lines Drawn

Elina made a decision in the bathroom mirror that morning.Not dramatic. No internal speech, no moment of cinematic clarity. Just her, toothbrush, seven-fifteen am, looking at her own face and thinking: stop it. Stop dissecting stairwell silences. Stop cataloguing the exact way his jaw tightens when he's holding something back. Stop replaying four seconds of contact—barely even contact, knuckles against a cheekbone, almost nothing—like it meant something he'd confirmed it meant.He'd walked up the stairs. Not after her. Up.She spat, rinsed, made herself eat breakfast, left the house before her mother could ask how she was.The answer was badly, but that wasn't new.Liam was at her locker before she got there. He did that sometimes—arrived first, leaned against the adjacent one, scrolling his phone with the unhurried ease of someone who had nowhere better to be. He looked up when he heard her and smiled. Immediate. Unguarded. No calculation in it."You eat breakfast?" he asked."Yes."

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