I winced, but at the same time, I was so damn proud of this flash of temper. He’d spent so long being a ghost that to hear him lose his shit was somehow a good thing.
“I know?—”
“I’m finding my words, and I’m telling you that what you just did was out of order and?—”
“Your eyes,” I blurted. For a moment, I thought he’d run. But he stayed, though his scowl deepened.
“What’s wrong with my eyes?”
“Nothing.” My throat went dry as I fumbled for the right words. Beautiful? Expressive? Captivating in a way that felt almost unfair. But something in his stance—the subtle way his fingers twitched at his sides as he braced for impact—held me back. He wasn’t ready to hear those words, not yet. So,instead, I swallowed them down. “They’re… striking,” I said instead.
Tyler exhaled and looked away, a flush creeping up his neck. “You’re full of shit,” he muttered, but his voice lacked its usual bite.
I huffed a quiet laugh. “So Alex tells me. But I mean it.”
His lips parted as if he were about to argue, but then, he shook his head and pointed at the worst of his scars running from the temple down to the corner of his eye. “Do my eyes outweigh the ugly?” he asked, and he sounded so damn sad.
Where was Alex when I needed his insight into the complexities of the human mind? He always had a way of cutting through the emotional noise and making sense of the chaos. But he wasn’t here, and I was left to fumble through the mess in my head, unsure if I’d just made things worse.
Set a broken bone, stitch a wound, ease physical pain—those were things I could handle. Tangible injuries with clear solutions. But the mind? Emotions? The scars people carried inside. That was a different battlefield, one I had no roadmap for. I wasn’t trained for this kind of healing or equipped with the right tools to mend what couldn’t be seen. And yet, here I was,fumbling through it, hoping I wasn’t making things worse.
I shook my head, stepping forward on instinct. “Jesus, Tyler, nothing about you is ugly.”
His jaw tightened, a muscle jumping in his cheek. “Fuck you, Marcus. Fuck you,” he snarled, his voice raw with something I couldn’t quite name. Before I could respond, he turned and stormed off up the stairs.
I took the steps two at a time to follow him, my breath coming fast when I reached the top. “I’m sorry,” I said, my voice low, but it made him whirl on me, his eyes blazing.
“You’re not supposed to be the one who lies to my fucking face!” His hands curled into fists at his sides, his entire body tense with frustration, maybe even pain. “I’m supposed to be able to trust you!”
“Youcantrust me!” Ignoring every rational thought telling me to back off, I squeezed his shoulder gently. “I’m not lying, Tyler. You carry your scars, yeah. But they don’t define you. And I’m so damn sorry if I crossed a line. I just—” I exhaled, shaking my head. “I just need you to know that your eyes are extraordinary, and I was staring at them because, for a moment, I forgot to breathe. Something about them—about you—demands tobe seen, Tyler. And I know you don’t want to hear it, but everyone deserves to know they are remarkable and more than just the sum of their scars. Especially you. I know you don’t want to hear it, but everyone deserves to hear they’re beautiful, Tyler. Especially you.”
Tyler scoffed, his flush deepening. “You’re ridiculous.”
“Maybe,” I admitted, tilting my head, “but I’m not lying.”
He let out a shaky breath, glancing away as if he didn’t know what to do with my words. “It doesn’t change anything when other people who matter see the ugly.”
He counted me as someone who mattered—why did that make my chest hurt and my pulse pound? I swallowed hard, forcing my voice to steady, then let my hand fall from his shoulder.
“They’re idiots,” I said. “Anyone who looks at you and sees anything less than strength, than resilience, than someone worth knowing—they’re the ones who don’t matter.”
Something broke then, and a mask dropped. “What happens when it’s family?”
“Tyler—”
He held up a hand. “I need to go. I have an appointment with Elena.”
His voice was steady, but his eyes flickered with something I couldn’t quite grasp—hurt, frustration, maybe even regret. Before I could reach for the right words, he turned and walked away, his steps brisk, his posture rigid.
I watched him go, the weight of what he’d said pressing my chest. I wanted to call him back, make him listen, and tell him that he wasn’t alone, no matter what he believed. But all I could do was stand there, hands clenched at my sides, and let him leave.
Because, if his family had cut him from their lives, how could he ever mend wounds reopened by their absence? Healing required more than time; it needed acknowledgment, connection, and something to hold onto. And right now, I wasn’t sure he had any of that outside Guardian Hall.
And what he had today was me and my stupid-ass staring.
Messing things up.
Listening to conversations I shouldn’t have been listening to and telling him his eyes were beautiful.
