read my silence

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Rowan

The back row of bus number 42 belonged to me. It always had.

I had my headphones pushed down around my neck, half-listening to Miller rehash last night’s game, when the bus lurched to a halt at the corner of Elm Street. The doors folded open with a loud hiss, and a girl stepped on.

She was completely new. I knew every face in this town, and I’d never seen her before.

She moved down the aisle like she was trying to blend into the cracked vinyl floorboards, clutching a worn leather backpack tightly against her chest. She had dark hair falling in loose strands around her face, and eyes that looked entirely too big for her small frame. As she neared the back, she realized the only open space left was the empty spot right next to me.

She froze for a fraction of a second, then quietly slid into the seat, keeping as close to the window as physically possible.

I leaned back, resting my arm along the top of the seat behind her, and let a familiar, easy smirk slide onto my face. “New here?” I asked, keeping my voice smooth. “I’m Rowan. What’s your name?”

Nothing.

She didn’t giggle. She didn’t blush. She didn’t even give me a shy, polite smile. Instead, the new girl slowly turned her head. She locked her eyes onto mine—a gaze so fierce and guarded it caught me completely off guard—and then, without a single word, she turned right back to the window, completely dismissing me.

Behind us, Miller burst into a loud, mocking laugh. “Damn, Mercer. Looks like the new girl just completely shut you down.”

My smirk vanished. My jaw clenched so hard a muscle ticked in my cheek. I stared at the side of her face, watching the quiet, defiant rise and fall of her shoulders.

Fine, I thought, a sudden, sharp spike of irritation flaring up in my chest. You want to play the arrogant, silent type? Let’s play.

The rest of the twenty-minute ride to school was pure torture.

Usually, I ignored the scenery blurring past the window, but today, I couldn’t tear my eyes away from her reflection in the glass. She sat rigidly, her small hands still white-knuckling the straps of her backpack like it was a life vest. She didn’t look at her phone. She didn’t fidget. She just stared out into the grey morning, completely tuning out the chaos of the bus around her.

“Hey, Mercer,” Miller leaned forward, chucking a crumpled-up candy wrapper at my shoulder. “You gonna let her do you like that? Man, your reputation is in the gutter before homeroom.”

“Shut up, Miller,” I muttered, not breaking my glare from the side of her face.

She didn’t even flinch at the noise. It was infuriating. I was used to people reacting to me—whether it was guys trying to pull one over on me or girls trying to get my attention. But this girl? She treated my presence like a mild inconvenience. Like I was nothing more than exhaust fumes.

When the bus finally screeched to a halt in front of Ravenwood High, the brakes let out a deafening squeal. The aisle immediately flooded with loud, shoving teenagers eager to escape.

She didn’t move. She waited, keeping her back pressed against the window, letting the crowd thin out.

I stood up, towering over her in the cramped space, and deliberately took my time grabbing my gym bag from the overhead rack. I paused right in front of her seat, blocking her exit.

“See you around,” I said, dropping my voice so only she could hear, making sure it carried a sharp, promise-filled edge. “Enjoy your first day.”

She finally looked up. Her eyes caught mine, dark and unreadable, but there was a flicker of something intense passing through them before she looked away. I smirked, turning on my heel and stepping off the bus into the crisp morning air. She wanted to play cold? Fine. But Ravenwood High was my turf, and I wasn’t about to let her forget it.

Daisy

My heart was hammering against my ribs so hard I was convinced the boy sitting next to me could hear it.

Stepping onto bus number 42 felt like walking straight into a firing squad. Everyone was staring, whispering, assessing the new girl. I kept my chin up, clutching my backpack like a shield, and headed for the only open seat left. Right next to a guy who practically radiated trouble.

He was leaning back, completely relaxed, wearing a varsity jacket with a bold ‘R’ on the chest. When I sat down, he turned to me with a lazy, confident smirk that told me he was used to getting exactly what he wanted. ‘New here?’ he asked, his voice smooth and entirely too loud in the cramped space. ‘I’m Rowan. What’s your name?’

Panic seized my throat. My hands shook against my bag. My notebook was buried at the very bottom of my pack, and my phone was locked in my pocket. I couldn’t just magically summon a voice to tell him I couldn’t speak.

So, I did the only thing I could do to protect myself. I turned, looked him dead in the eye with every ounce of fierce defiance I could muster, and then turned away to stare out the window.

I heard his friends laughing behind us, mocking him for getting ‘shut down.’ Through the reflection in the glass, I could see his smirk vanish, replaced by a hard, dangerous clenching of his jaw. He was angry. He thought I was being arrogant.

Good. Let him think I have an attitude. It’s much safer than letting him know I’m broken.

I let out a breath I didn’t realize I’d been holding the second his massive shadow cleared the bus doors.

My lungs ached from how shallowly I’d been breathing. Rowan Mercer was dangerous. It wasn’t just the varsity jacket or the way the other boys looked to him for approval; it was the sheer intensity of his focus. When he looked at me, it felt like he was trying to peel back a canvas to see what was hidden underneath.

I waited until the bus was completely empty before I finally stood up, my knees slightly trembling. Pulling my backpack onto my shoulders, I stepped down the rubber stairs and into the courtyard of Ravenwood High.

The school loomed ahead—a massive, intimidating brick building that felt more like a fortress than a place of learning. Hundreds of students clumped together in cliques on the lawn, laughing, shouting, and living in a world entirely dominated by sound. A world I was completely locked out of.

I walked toward the main entrance, keeping my head down, but I could feel eyes on me. Word traveled fast in a town like this, and I already knew what the whispers would be about. The new girl who ignored Rowan Mercer.

As I reached the heavy glass double doors, someone deliberately stepped into my path.

I stopped short, my sneakers scraping against the concrete.

It was him. Rowan was leaning against the brick pillar next to the entryway, surrounded by a couple of guys from the bus. He had a smirk playing on his lips, his dark eyes locked onto me as he tossed a coin up and down in his hand. He didn’t say anything this time. He just watched me, a silent challenge clear in his posture: Let’s see how long you can keep this up.

My chest tightened, but I refused to let him see me break. I tightened my grip on my backpack straps, squared my shoulders, and walked right past him, the cool air of the school building swallowing me whole.

I didn’t have a voice. But I had my pride, and I wasn’t going to let Rowan Mercer take that away from me.

This story was a request story by @Wen yifan thanks for the suggestion dear 💖