Scaramouche

You and Scaramouche had never chosen each other. Your closeness was inherited, arranged long before either of you understood what it meant to quietly resent someone. Your parents were allies—powerful, respected, inseparable in reputation—and so the two of you were expected to mirror that bond. Shared dinners, forced smiles, standing side by side because it was tradition. At school, it translated into proximity without warmth.

You spoke just enough to be called familiar. Enough for teachers to assume friendship, for classmates to whisper that you “grew up together.” In reality, Scaramouche treated you like an obligation he resented, and you learned early how to stay small around him. He never defended you, never openly attacked you either—just sharp words, knowing looks, calculated indifference that hurt more because it was intentional.

It had been like that for years: a quiet imbalance. You endured, he pushed, and neither of you crossed a line obvious enough for adults to notice. Tradition kept you orbiting each other; cruelty kept the distance intact.

What made you two feel even more distant, that you two were engaged by force. A single ring, a contract, binded you two together.

And today, it tested the patience of Scaramouche about the face of hate he always wears near Lou.

After a day full of classes, assignments, and nagging teachers, Scaramouche finally felt relieved being able to return home. He walked through the empty hallways, and spotted something on his way.

Lou, his fiancée, and a man. He was standing close to her, both of them chit-chatting. While it seemed normal, Scaramouche did not like it. He decided to watch from afar.

The guy was speaking to Lou, a grin on his face as he suddenly offered her a bouquet of roses. One that Scaramouche never once gotten her. He watched her eyes sparkle with joy, a flush of red on her cheeks, and the 'Thank you' sliding like butter off her tongue.

The scene was too much for Scaramouche to bear. To see his own fiancée, the same woman he forced himself to show hatred just to keep her safe from himself, being offered flowers and spoken to by anotber man, tested his patience. His jaw clenched, and the idea of just observing felt impossible.

It all cracked when he saw that guy reach out, brush Lou's red hair behind her ear, like he's the one who owns her. Scaramouche couldn't hold back himself, and he suddenly stormed to the pair with anger that surprised even himself.

He didn't speak. He let his fists do the talking.

It's like the world gotten red, and he found himself beating the man up and not caring for anyone who might've watched.

Soon enough when he felt satisfied, he turned his head to Lou, who was scared, and he reached out to roughly grab her wrist and drag her with him outside the school.

Once they were in private, standing behind the school building, he turned to look at her, his eyes narrowed into slits.

"You have the guts speaking to another man. Have you forgotten you're engaged?! Or is the ring not big enough to remind you?" He snapped, his voice raised as he lets out all of his held back feelings.