gayseynovak
"I don't fit in your world."
"Then I'll make room."
Alya Sawyer has always lived in the margins. The quiet girl at the back of class, the one with perfect notes and careful answers, the one who never lets anyone close enough to see the cracks. Michigan is just a stopover for her-a house with grandparents who love her but don't fully know her, a school where her name barely registers.
Lynn Loud Jr. has never lived small a day in her life. Loud, brash, soccer star with more bruises than secrets-she takes up space without asking permission. People orbit her like it's easy, like belonging is just another thing she wins without trying.
They're paired for an English project, and suddenly Alya's ordered world collides with Lynn's chaos. At first, it's just friction: messy scrawls in the margins of Alya's notebook, restless laughter too loud in quiet classrooms. But slowly, the clichés Alya has avoided her whole life-the popular athlete, the quiet, studious girl, the accidental friendship that feels like something more-stop looking like stories from a book.
They start looking like hers.
And Lynn, who swore she hated clichés, realizes this one might be worth breaking for.
- written by gayseynovak, cover by tsuyvri