june___writes
To the rest of the university, freshman Lyra Dia is the definition of effortless elegance. She moves through the campus with quiet grace, wearing a perfectly curated mask of warmth and composure. No one looking at her would ever guess that inside, she is completely broken.Molded by a childhood spent hiding from her parents' explosive arguments, and suffocated by their constant, cruel critiques about her body and appearance, Lyra has learned a painful lesson: rely only on yourself, look flawless, and never make a mistake. For Lyra, a stained sweater or a torn page isn't just a minor accident-it's an immediate trigger for a silent, suffocating panic attack. When the noise in her head gets too loud, she hides behind her Computer Science code and retreats into the healing world of her favorite music, praying her firewall never crashes. She is determined to keep her secrets locked away forever.Then there is Ethan Ren.A freshman Practical Science prodigy carrying a sharp, graceful charm, Ethan has the most brilliant mind on campus-and absolute, icy indifference to the human race. He treats the world and the people in it with a cold, unbothered detachment, viewing human behavior as entirely predictable and illogical. To him, the crowded university is just background noise, and Lyra is just another random face in a massive lecture hall.Until a tiny, insignificant mishap causes Lyra's elegant mask to slip for a mere fraction of a second.While the rest of the world completely misses it, Ethan's analytical mind flags the sudden, chaotic anomaly. He catches a fleeting glimpse of the quiet panic attack she works so hard to hide. For a guy who handles broken variables for a living, he finds himself doing the one thing he swore he never would: paying attention.In a university full of noise, judgment, and unrealistic expectations, Ethan's cold indifference becomes the ultimate protective shield for a girl who is quietly breaking inside.