Maison de Lune

Saint Jude was not the kind of town people moved to—it was the kind of place people returned to, dragging behind them heavy boxes and heavier silences. The kind of place where childhood bedrooms stayed preserved, and neighbors remembered what kind of kid you used to be.

It had old sidewalks cracked open by tree roots, and telephone wires that dipped low enough to whisper. Before the rain, they hummed just a little louder, like the town was holding its breath. There were three stoplights, two churches, and one main road that forked off into woods thick enough to forget yourself in. If you blinked too slow, you might miss it entirely.

Or worse—you might not.

Nicholas Reyes arrived at the tail end of summer, when the cicadas were still loud and the leaves were just beginning to dry around the edges.

He stood out, in a way he’d learned to ignore—six-foot-two and broad-shouldered, with soft dimples that made people think he smiled more than he actually did. His hair was dark, always a little tousled no matter how many times he ran his hand through it, and his eyes were that sharp, lakewater blue that didn’t give much away.

The kind of face that made teachers remember his name before he spoke.

The kind of presence that made people assume he had something figured out.

His mother said the air smelled cleaner here. Nicholas thought it smelled like something had been buried.

The house they moved into had wood paneling that warped at the corners and windows that groaned if you tried to open them. The carpet in the hallway had a pattern that made you dizzy if you stared too long, and the ceiling fan clicked in a slow, mechanical rhythm—like it was counting down something.

It was fine. He didn’t need a view.

His first week at Saint Jude Preparatory felt like stepping into a painting someone else had already finished—an oil portrait in muted colors, already framed and hung. Everyone had a role. Everyone had a face they wore.

The school itself was older than most of its teachers. Red brick walls held together by ivy that clawed into the mortar, as if trying to keep secrets from slipping out. The iron gate groaned when it opened each morning, and the hallways always smelled like lemon wax and aging paper.

Inside, the floors creaked just enough to feel intentional. The lights overhead buzzed when the air turned damp, and lockers slammed with the sharpness of punctuation.

It wasn’t hard to find his place. It never was.

Nicholas didn’t talk much, but he listened well. People liked that. They liked having someone quiet to look at while they talked themselves into sounding smarter. He became a fixture—present, polite, and forgettable in a way that made people feel safe around him.

The students at Saint Jude wore self-awareness like perfume. Not too obvious—just enough to linger. Their uniforms were neat but personally altered: skirts hemmed just a little high, ties loosened at the perfect angle. Even the kids who looked like they didn’t care had spent time perfecting the illusion.

Messy buns that took twenty minutes. Jeans that were technically against dress code but cost more than Nicholas’s whole closet. There were no true rebels here. Just soft defiance in designer sneakers.

Nicholas dressed simply. Button-downs with a wrinkle or two, sleeves rolled halfway up his forearms, sneakers with dirt left on purpose. He didn’t draw attention, but he didn’t vanish either. In a school like Saint Jude, not vanishing was enough to be noticed.

His second week, someone asked him if he liked the town.

He’d said, “It’s quiet.”

They’d replied, “That’s just on the surface.”

He remembered that.

***

The cafeteria was a cathedral of noise and carefully filtered conversation.Voices rose and fell like hymns—just enough laughter to signal comfort, but never enough to echo. The space was sterile but loud, too polished to be warm. Trays slid across tables. Sneakers squeaked on the linoleum. Someone’s water bottle tipped and rolled in a slow arc until it hit a chair leg.

The tables were more geometry than friendship—triangles of athletes, clusters of debaters, lone outliers at the edges. You could tell who belonged where by where their shoulders turned.

Nicholas ended up beside Micah Sloane.

Micah was the kind of guy people liked by instinct. Captain of the basketball team, all easy charm and confident slouch. He smiled with his whole face and could talk to anyone without really saying anything.

They sat together most days now. Micah didn’t ask questions Nicholas didn’t want to answer. That alone made him rare.

“Don’t look now,” Micah said around a mouthful of something suspiciously beige, “but I think you’ve officially been absorbed.”

Nicholas raised an eyebrow. “Absorbed?”

Micah gestured broadly. “You’re sitting in the unofficial okay-to-exist zone. You made it. Congrats.”

Nicholas smirked. “Do I get a sticker?”

“Better. You get tolerated.”

Across the table, Rina Valdez didn’t look up from her phone, but her voice slid in smooth and dry. “Micah thinks he’s funny. He’s not.”

She wore her confidence like perfume—intentional and impossible to ignore. Gold rings on nearly every finger. Hair so precisely brushed it looked like it had been painted on. Her nails were the color of bruised cherries and always tapped against her phone screen with rhythmic ease.

She liked making entrances. She liked Nicholas’s face, too.

“You’re new,” she’d said the first day she sat across from him without invitation. “But your face isn’t. You look like someone I had a crush on once.”

Nicholas hadn’t known what to do with that, so he hadn’t done anything at all. Just offered the faintest twitch of a smile and looked back down at his tray.

The lunch period passed in pieces. People came and went. Someone knocked over a chair; someone laughed too loudly at something that wasn’t funny. By the time the bell rang, half the table was already halfway to the door.

Micah stood with a groan and nudged Nicholas with his tray. “You trying out for volleyball later?”

Nicholas blinked. “Yeah. Coach told me to show up.”

Micah nodded. “You’ll do fine. You look like you can jump.”

Nicholas gave a half-smile. “I’ll let gravity decide.”

***

The gym smelled like sweat and lemon cleaner.High ceilings made every sound stretch longer than it needed to—sneakers on polished wood, the slap of a ball against palms, a whistle that echoed even after it stopped.

Nicholas stood near the edge of the court, waiting his turn. His shirt clung damply to his back. Someone beside him popped their knuckles one by one. Another kid did short hops in place, eyes locked on the coach like this was life or death.

When his name was finally called, Nicholas stepped forward without adjusting his shirt or fixing his hair. He didn’t need to perform. He just needed to not screw up.

The drill was simple: receive, pass, set, repeat. But every move felt louder in front of people. Every small misstep became a headline.

Nicholas moved cleanly. He wasn’t flashy—he didn’t dive unless he had to, didn’t spike for attention—but his reflexes were sharp, and he adjusted fast. A pass came too low, and he crouched instinctively, knees bending just enough to save it. Another came too far right, and he reached with a calm steadiness that didn’t look rushed.

He didn’t try to show off. But he didn’t shrink, either.

Some of the guys already on the team watched from the side of the court—juniors, seniors. A few nodded, murmured something under their breath. One of them, a tall guy with bleached hair and a knee brace, leaned into another and said something that made them both smirk.

Nicholas wasn’t sure if it was about him.

But when the drill ended, the coach gave a short, noncommittal grunt and scribbled something on his clipboard. Then he looked up briefly and gave Nicholas a once-over.

“Nice control,” the coach said, barely loud enough to count.

Nicholas nodded once. “Thanks.”

As he stepped off the court, one of the older players passed him on the way in—broad-shouldered, already wearing the school’s team hoodie. He bumped Nicholas lightly with his elbow.

“Clean work, Reyes,” he muttered, without looking directly at him.

Nicholas blinked. It was the first time someone outside his grade had used his name.

He dropped onto the bench, chest still rising from exertion. The kid next to him gave a quick thumbs-up. Nicholas returned it without thinking.

For a second, he let himself relax.

He’d done fine.

He wouldn’t be captain. But he’d make the team.

That was enough.

A few others sat nearby—some checking their phones, some watching the court, some pretending not to care. At the far end of the bench, three boys were talking low between themselves. Older. One of them wore a hoodie pulled over his cap. The kind who’d already made the team years ago and just showed up for fun.

Nicholas wasn’t listening.

But the gym carried sound too well.

“Marrow Street,” one of them muttered. “Heard it’s still running.” “Only on certain nights. Invitation-only.”

They weren’t watching the court.

Laughter—not the loud kind. The kind that meant someone knew something they weren’t supposed to.

Nicholas didn’t turn.

He just looked at the floor—at the faded lines, the way someone’s shoelace had been left trailing—and felt something he couldn’t name flicker behind his ribs.

The next name was called. Someone jogged to the front.

Nicholas stayed seated.

He didn’t understand what they were talking about. Not really.

But later, he’d remember that moment.

The way the voice dipped just slightly too low.

The way the gym lights buzzed overhead like they were trying to drown it out.

***

The next day moved slower.

Gray clouds pressed against the sky like they were trying to hide something, and the halls of Saint Jude felt colder than usual—less like school, more like a waiting room.

By third period, Nicholas had already forgotten half of what the teachers were saying. He’d spent most of the morning listening without hearing, going through motions that hadn’t fully settled into habit yet.

And then came AP Literature.

The students at Saint Jude talked about a lot of people. But they talked about Llewellyn Hart like he was a myth they’d made up and then accidentally enrolled.

Llewellyn wore pressed collars and polished shoes. Not a thread out of place. His glasses didn’t slide. His posture didn’t falter. He wasn’t older than the others, but he felt like it.

Students circled around him like satellites. No one got close. They didn’t tease. They didn’t laugh with him. They just observed. Respected. Maybe feared.

No one really knew him, so they invented:

“He’s part-time at some lab.”“He models in the summer.”“He owns a piano worth more than your house.”

Llewellyn let it all stand. Lies were easier than confessions.

Nicholas had heard a few things, even before that morning. Half-whispers in the hallway. Locker doors closing too fast.

Nicholas saw him—really saw him—for the first time in that classroom.

Llewellyn was sitting with perfect posture near the windows, back straight, expression unreadable. He didn’t raise his hand—he didn’t need to.

Teachers asked for his opinion more than his attendance. “Llewellyn, could you guide the discussion?”

He did.

He sat straighter than anyone else, hands folded neatly on the desk, pen aligned with surgical precision beside his notebook. When he spoke, his voice didn’t waver. It moved with quiet certainty, like it belonged to someone who had already worked through every version of the conversation alone—twice.

“In The Maids, the ritual of roleplay isn’t about fantasy,” he said, tone even, gaze direct. “It’s a performance that becomes survival. Solange and Claire wear their mistress like a second skin because becoming her is the only way they can touch power—if only in simulation.”

He didn’t blink. Didn’t pause.

“They don’t want to destroy her. They want to disappear into her.”

Silence followed—not the kind that begged to be filled, but the kind that confirmed no one else had anything close to that in their notes.

The teacher’s face lit up like someone had handed her a live wire.

The air shifted.Not dramatically—but just enough that Nicholas noticed.Someone two rows up actually stopped chewing gum.

The teacher’s smile flickered somewhere between admiration and something closer to relief.

Nicholas didn’t retain the rest of the answer.

He just kept watching Llewellyn, wondering how a voice could sound both rehearsed and honest all at once. Wondering how someone could look so still, and yet somehow untouchable.

The air didn’t quite return to normal after Llewellyn stopped speaking.

Even when the teacher called on someone else, the energy in the room felt… uneven. Like something had been shifted slightly out of place, and everyone noticed but didn’t want to admit it.

Nicholas scribbled a few words on his paper without thinking. He didn’t know why. He wasn’t listening to the next answer, but he wasn’t still watching Llewellyn either.

He’d seen the type before. Polished. Precise. The kind of student teachers adored and peers avoided.

Still, there was something about the way he spoke.Not dramatic. Not showy. Just… controlled.

Measured.

It stayed with him longer than he expected.

“Alright,” the teacher said, snapping a textbook shut. “Since we’re moving into comparative analysis, I’m assigning partners today. You’ll have two weeks. Use your time wisely.”

A soft wave of tension passed through the room—shuffling notebooks, hopeful glances toward friends.

Nicholas didn’t look up. He was already bracing to be paired with someone who wouldn’t do the work.

The list began. Names called, reactions muted.

Then—

“Nicholas Reyes and Llewellyn Hart.”

It was said like punctuation. No room to protest.

Nicholas looked up. Llewellyn didn’t turn.

He sat two rows ahead near the window, still and unreadable, his pen resting against the margin of his notes. He didn’t acknowledge the pairing. Didn’t nod. Didn’t shift in his seat.

For a second, Nicholas wondered if he’d even heard it.

But then the teacher kept going, reading names off with clinical rhythm, and the moment passed.

Llewellyn didn’t glance his way. Didn’t speak.

Neither did Nicholas.

The teacher launched into a final ten minutes of material—something about symbolic doubles, assigned pages, upcoming deadlines—but Nicholas only half-heard it. His eyes kept flicking toward the window.

When the bell rang, Nicholas took his time gathering his things.

He slid his notebook into his bag, capped his pen, slung one strap over his shoulder— then looked up.

Llewellyn’s seat was empty.

No sound of a chair moving. No glimpse of him walking out. Just—gone.

Nicholas blinked.

Of course.

Maybe he hated group projects too.

Or maybe he just had a better exit strategy than most.

Nicholas zipped his bag the rest of the way, pushed in his chair, and stepped out into the hallway.

That’s when he saw him.

Llewellyn.

Leaning against the wall just outside the classroom, arms folded, back relaxed. One ankle crossed over the other, head tilted slightly like he’d been listening to a distant conversation only he could hear.

His gaze flicked toward Nicholas—brief, unreadable.

“Thursday. Library. 4:30.”

Then, quieter—an afterthought delivered with perfect control.

“I don’t like repeating myself.”

Not a threat. Not exactly.

Just information.

And then he pushed off the wall and walked away.

Unhurried.

Not dramatic.

Just done.

Nicholas watched him go, unsure if he’d just been warned or scheduled.