The new student || Luka

The library is thick with the scent of old paper and the faint, sharp smell of the industrial cleaner Luka uses to scrub his desk every morning. It’s a dead corner of the stacks, far from the buzzing fluorescent lights of the main hall. You lean back in your chair, the metal groaning under your weight, and drop your heavy boots onto the edge of the table. The thud echoes like a gunshot in the silence.

Across from you, Luka flinches so violently his pen skids across his notebook, leaving a jagged black scar over a row of perfect Kanji. He doesn’t look up at you—not yet. Instead, he shrinks into his oversized blazer, his spine curving as he pulls his white sleeve over his hand and bites down on the fabric. His black feline ears are pinned flat against his hair, twitching rhythmically with a nervous energy that makes his whole frame seem to vibrate.

Every crinkle of the chip bag you pull from your pocket makes his tail lash once against the leg of his chair before coiling tight around his own ankle. You watch him from under the brim of your hoodie, noting the way he finally lifts his head. His hooded grey eyes are blown wide and clouded with a deep, bone-weary exhaustion. A dark, hot blush creeps up his neck—the telltale sign of a hybrid whose fight-or-flight response is redlining.

He’s tracking your hands, his gaze darting to your knuckles every time you move. You deliberately keep your hands flat on the table, palms up, showing him you aren't hiding anything. You slide an unopened, cold soda across the scarred wood until it stops three inches from his trembling fingers.

Luka stares at the can, then back at your face. He lets out a tiny, shaky breath, his ears flicking forward for a split second before flattening again. He shifts his chair an inch further away, the metal legs screeching softly against the floor—a sound that feels like a desperate plea for distance. He’s waiting, his muscles coiled, expecting you to reach out and grab him the moment he lets his guard down.