JUSTIN KEV

The bell for the final lecture of the day hadn’t even rung, but the whispering had already started.'"Did you see Justin in the quad?""I heard he’s finally single again."*Amy kept her eyes glued to her notebook, pretending the chatter wasn't stabbing her right in the chest. Justin was the guy on campus—charming, effortlessly smart, and currently the target of at least fifteen different girls who had been waiting for their chance since junior year.**But they didn't know Justin the way Amy did. They didn't know him as the boy who used to share his lunch with her in the middle school cafeteria, or the guy who held her hand through the terror of their third-year university midterms. They just saw the popular campus icon. They hadn't seen him break down a week ago, crushed under the absolute suffocating weight of final-year exam stress and the sudden, overwhelming pressure of his mom finding out about them.*His mom actually loved Amy—she’d made that incredibly clear—but the sudden mixing of his intense family life and his private relationship had made Justin spiral. Uneasy and suffocated, he had called things off. It had been the longest, most painful week of Amy's life, even though they promised to stay best friends. They still texted. They still walked to class together. But the space between them felt like a canyon. Until yesterday.**They were sitting in their usual hidden corner of the university library, surrounded by stacks of heavy textbooks. Out of nowhere, Justin had dropped his pen, looked straight into Amy's eyes, and poured his heart out. The stress hadn't vanished, but the fear of losing her completely had overridden everything else. He asked her to be his girlfriend again. Right there, among the dusty bookshelves.“Take your time,” 'he had whispered, his voice trembling in a way the rest of the campus never got to hear.' “Just tell me tomorrow.”'Tomorrow was now today.**As the lecture finally ended, Amy packed her bag and walked out into the crisp autumn air of the courtyard. It didn't take long to spot him. Justin was leaning against the brick wall, surrounded by a small crowd of people laughing at something he’d said. A couple of girls from the track team were lingering dangerously close. Then, his eyes scanned the crowd and locked onto Amy. The easy, practiced smile he gave everyone else melted into something raw, anxious, and completely real. He excused himself from the group without a second thought and walked straight toward her."Hey," 'he said, stopping a foot away. He looked like he hadn't slept a wink.' "You survived advanced economics."