a mirror in the sun ☼ l.s.

nine - eggshells

"Harry, could you do me a favor?"

His head snapped up from his desk, where he was busy scribbling out an interview checklist for one of their upcoming journalism projects. He realized far too late that he already had the entire class's attention, their eyes boring into his pink-dusted cheeks.

"Sorry," he said. His voice came out loud enough that he winced, then apologized again.

"Some of your classmates are having a hard time finding a solid direction for their projects," his teacher said. "Do you think you could share what you're working on?"

"I -- um."

He glanced down at his page. He only had a partial plan for the next assignment -- a fairly simple historical project focusing on the selection of their school's mascots. The three separate sections of the school each had different mascots, and Harry wanted to do a few interviews with students and teachers to see if the distinct mascots actually hurt students' sense of community. The alpha, beta, and omega parts of the school were already isolated, but he was interested to hear opinions about the impact of mascots on solidarity in athletics.

"I don't need an official report, Harry. Just tell us your idea, and maybe give a brief explanation of how you're going about planning it."

He set his pen down on the table carefully, swallowing hard enough that he nearly choked. Louis sat across from him, looking at him just like his classmates were -- except it wasn't unusual at all for him to catch Louis's attention. The entire class's attention, on the other hand, was something that Harry always tried to avoid.

"Right. Yeah, I'm not sure that I have a very good idea for the project either," he lied. He could tell that his teacher saw right through him; normally, she cut him some slack on speaking up in class and doing oral presentations, but recently, she had been trying to push him more and more out of his comfort zone.

Harry liked his comfort zone. He was safe in his comfort zone, secure in the fact that none of his classmates could judge him the way that they judged each other.

He would much rather be a mystery than a failure.

"I read a bit of what you've written so far," the teacher encouraged him. She crossed both arms over her chest, leaning back against her desk. "Just give us an idea. One sentence."

"Right. A sentence, like -- right. Okay."

Stars, the words just kept pouring out of his mouth, but none of them were quite right. None of them actually meant anything. Sure, he could speak, but he definitely couldn't form a coherent sentence and the other alphas in his class were looking at him like he was a completely different species.

He was almost scared to see the look on Louis's face. He couldn't resist glancing across the table anyway.

Louis was staring at him, just like the rest of the class. As soon as their eyes met, Louis dropped his gaze back down to the table, busying himself with whatever he had been writing on his own worksheet. His fringe fell over his eyes, a barrier between them, and for the first time since that very first day in the cafeteria, Harry felt like he might be truly and terrifyingly alone.

Ever since he had agreed to go on a date with that omega, Louis had barely spoken to him. Each answer was one word; each look was cold and fleeting. He wished that they could just sit down and talk about what was wrong -- what Harry had done wrong -- but between Louis's sparring matches and Harry's family obligations, there was never a right moment.

The teacher's patient tone was fading, and she tapped her foot against the ground loudly enough that the sound echoed. "Harry? Any thoughts? Anything at all?"