Adrian's POV
"Everyone knows."
Derek's text woke me up at 6 AM, three words that made my stomach drop to the floor.
I sat up so fast my head spun. Across the room, Ethan was still asleep, his face peaceful like the world wasn't ending.
But it was ending. For me, at least.
My hands shook as I opened my email. Fifty-three new messages. All from people I barely knew, with subject lines like "IS THIS REAL??" and "OMG ADRIAN" and "You're GAY??"
I clicked on one. The video loaded immediately.
There I was, standing in our room, shouting at Ethan: "I'm in love with you! I've been in love with you since we were kids!"
My voice sounded desperate. Broken. And my face—God, my face showed everything I'd been hiding for years.
The video had been viewed 847 times already. It was only 6 AM.
My phone buzzed with text after text:
Marcus: "Dude, is that video real? Call me."
Random number: "Faggot"
Jessica from chemistry: "Wow, I had no idea. Are you okay?"
Random number: "You're disgusting"
Derek: "Where are you? Don't do anything stupid."
I couldn't breathe. The room felt too small, the walls closing in.
This wasn't how anyone was supposed to find out. This wasn't—
"Adrian?"
I looked up. Ethan was awake, staring at me with wide eyes. His hair stuck up in every direction, and he looked confused and sleepy and perfect.
And I'd just ruined everything.
"You should check your phone," I said quietly.
Ethan grabbed his phone from the nightstand. I watched his face as he scrolled through messages. Watched the confusion turn to shock turn to something I couldn't read.
"There's over a thousand views now," Ethan whispered. "Everyone's talking about it. There are comments—" His face went pale. "Some of these comments are really mean."
"I know."
"They're calling you—" Ethan stopped, his jaw clenching. "They're saying horrible things."
"I know," I repeated. My voice sounded flat. Dead. "It's fine."
"It's not fine!" Ethan jumped out of bed, his fists clenched. "Who is V? Why are they doing this to you?"
"To us," I corrected. "They're doing this to both of us."
Ethan went quiet. He looked at his phone again, reading something that made his face turn red. "Someone posted in the freshman group chat: 'Is Ethan gay too? Are they dating?' And there's a poll—" He made a choking sound. "They're voting on whether we're secretly together."
I wanted to laugh. Or cry. Or both.
"Welcome to my nightmare," I said.
"This isn't funny!"
"I'm not laughing." I stood up and grabbed my clothes. "I need to shower. Try to figure out what to do before classes start."
"Adrian, wait—"
"Just leave it, Ethan." I couldn't look at him. If I looked at him, I'd fall apart completely. "This is my problem. You don't have to—"
"It became my problem when they made me part of the video!" Ethan grabbed my arm, forcing me to face him. "You think I'm just going to sit here while people trash you online? While they send you hate messages?"
His eyes were fierce. Protective.
It made everything worse because I wanted him to care. I'd always wanted him to care. But not like this. Not because he felt sorry for me.
"Why do you care?" I asked tiredly. "You hate me, remember?"
Ethan's grip on my arm tightened. "I don't—" He stopped, frustrated. "It's complicated."
"No, it's really simple." I pulled away from him. "I'm in love with you. You're not in love with me. Someone found out and now everyone knows. End of story."
"That's not—"
My phone rang, cutting him off. Mom's name flashed on the screen.
Oh no.
"Adrian, sweetheart, I just got the strangest call from Patricia Romano—you remember her son Vincent?—and she said something about a video—"
I hung up. I couldn't do this right now.
The phone rang again immediately.
"Adrian Marcus Vale, don't you dare hang up on me again!"
I answered. "Mom, I can explain—"
"Explain what? That video of you confessing love to another boy? Is that what I'm supposed to understand?"
My chest tightened. "You saw it?"
"Half the town has seen it! Patricia sent it to her book club and someone forwarded it to me!" Mom's voice got higher. "Adrian, what were you thinking? Announcing something like this to the world without telling your own mother first?"
"I didn't announce anything! Someone recorded me without permission and—"
"Who is Ethan Cross?" Mom demanded. "Why does that name sound familiar?"
"He's nobody," I said quickly, very aware that Ethan was standing right there, hearing everything. "Just my roommate."
"Your roommate. The boy you just confessed love to on video." Mom's voice turned sharp. "Adrian, please tell me you didn't bribe the housing office to room with this boy."
Silence.
"Adrian Marcus Vale!"
"I have to go, Mom. I'll call you later—"
"We're coming to campus. Your father and I will be there by noon to sort this mess out."
"No! Mom, please don't—"
She hung up.
I stood there holding my dead phone, feeling everything crumbling around me.
"Your mom's coming here?" Ethan asked quietly.
"Apparently." I laughed, but it sounded broken. "This day just keeps getting better."
"Adrian—"
"I need to shower." I grabbed my towel and headed for the bathroom, stepping carefully over the stupid tape line we'd made last night.
Last night, when everything was just between us. When only we knew.
Now the whole world knew, and I couldn't take it back.
The shower was hot enough to burn, but I barely felt it. I pressed my forehead against the tile and tried not to think about those comments. Those hateful words from people I'd never even met.
When I finally came out, Ethan was dressed and staring at his laptop with a weird expression.
"What?" I asked.
"The video," Ethan said slowly. "I've been watching it over and over, and there's something weird about it."
"Yeah, it's humiliating. I noticed."
"No, I mean—" Ethan turned the laptop toward me. "Look at the angle. Where was the camera?"
I watched the video again, forcing myself to look past my own desperate confession. The angle was high, looking down at us from the corner of the room near the ceiling.
"There's no camera mount there," I said slowly. "I checked the whole room when I moved in for bugs or anything suspicious."
"Exactly." Ethan's voice got excited in that way it did when he solved a puzzle. "So how did they record this? Unless—"
We both looked up at the corner at the same time.
Nothing was there now. Just blank wall.
"They were in here," I whispered. "While we were fighting, someone was physically in this room."
"But we would have seen them," Ethan protested.
"Would we?" I thought back to last night. "We were so focused on each other. On the letter. On arguing. Someone small could have hidden—"
My phone buzzed. So did Ethan's.
Another message from V: "Good morning, lovebirds. Did you sleep well? Oh wait, I know you didn't. I was watching. 😊"
My blood went cold.
Another message: "Check your closet, Adrian. I left you both a present."
Ethan and I stared at each other.
"Don't open it," Ethan said. "It could be dangerous—"
But I was already moving. I yanked open my closet door.
Inside, hanging on a hanger, was a jacket. My jacket—the one I'd worn yesterday.
Except it wasn't just my jacket anymore.
The back was covered in red spray paint: "FAG"
And pinned to the front was a photograph.
Ethan grabbed it before I could, his face going white. "Oh my God."
"What? What is it?"
He showed me.
The photo was of us. Last night. Both of us asleep in our beds.
Someone had been in our room while we slept. Had stood there watching us. Had taken this picture.
And written on the bottom in red marker: "You're not safe anywhere. Not even in your dreams. -V"
Ethan's hands shook. "They were here. In our room. While we were sleeping."
The window was closed. The door had been locked—I'd checked it.
So how did they get in?
More importantly—were they still here?
I spun around, scanning every corner of the room. The closet. Under the beds. Behind the curtains.
"Ethan," I said quietly. "Check your closet."
He moved slowly, like he didn't want to know what he'd find.
He opened his closet door and gasped.
"What?" I rushed over.
Inside, every single piece of Ethan's clothing had been cut. Not destroyed completely—just small cuts in strategic places. Sleeves. Hems. Collars.
Enough to ruin them. Enough to send a message.
And on the closet wall, written in that same red marker:
"This is just the beginning. If you want it to stop, Adrian needs to leave Crestwood. He has 48 hours to withdraw. Or things get much, much worse. Tick tock. -V"
"They want you gone," Ethan whispered.
"Yeah." My mind raced. "But why? What did I do to them?"
"Maybe it's not about what you did." Ethan's voice was strange. "Maybe it's about what you have."
"What do I have?"
He looked at me, his hazel eyes intense. "Me. You have me as your roommate. Someone doesn't want us together."
Before I could respond, someone pounded on our door. Hard. Aggressive.
"ADRIAN VALE! OPEN UP!"
I recognized that voice. Marcus Romano—not Marcus Chen, the gossip, but Marcus Romano. The RA. The one who enforced rules with an iron fist.
"Open this door right now or I'm using my master key!"
Ethan and I exchanged panicked looks.
I opened the door.
Marcus stood there with two campus security guards and a woman in a business suit I'd never seen before.
"Adrian Vale?" the woman asked.
"Yes?"
"I'm Dean Whitmore. I need you to come with us immediately."
"Why? What's going on?"
"We've received a complaint. A serious one." Her face was stern. "You're being accused of harassment and stalking. By multiple students."
"What? That's insane! I haven't—"
"The video is evidence," Marcus interrupted. "Confessing love to your roommate who clearly doesn't want it? Following him to Crestwood? Bribing the housing office? That's textbook stalking behavior."
"I didn't stalk anyone!"
"That's what we need to determine." Dean Whitmore gestured to the guards. "Please come with us. Now."
"You can't just take him!" Ethan stepped forward. "He has rights—"
"Are you Ethan Cross?" Dean Whitmore asked.
"Yes, but—"
"Then you need to come too. We need your statement about whether you feel safe living with Mr. Vale."
My heart stopped.
They were going to make Ethan testify against me. Make him say whether he was afraid of me.
And based on how I'd manipulated everything to be his roommate, based on that desperate confession, based on everything—what else could he say except yes?
I was going to lose him. Not just as a roommate, but completely. They'd kick me out of school or move me to a different dorm, and I'd never see him again.
"Wait," Ethan said. "Before we go anywhere, there's something you need to see."
He showed them his closet. The ruined clothes. The threatening message.
"Someone's been in our room," Ethan continued. "They've been watching us, threatening us. The video wasn't Adrian's fault—someone recorded him without permission and sent it to everyone."
Dean Whitmore's expression shifted. "Show me everything."
We showed them the photos, the messages from V, the spray-painted jacket.
"This changes things," Dean Whitmore said slowly. "This isn't just about harassment—someone's targeting both of you."
"Who filed the complaint?" I asked.
She hesitated. "That's confidential—"
"Please," I begged. "Someone's trying to get me kicked out. I need to know who."
Dean Whitmore sighed. "Fine. The complaint came from a student named Vincent Park. He claims you've been obsessively pursuing him for months and when he rejected you, you shifted your attention to your roommate instead."
Vincent Park. Lucas's older brother.
But I'd never even talked to Vincent. Never pursued anyone except—
"He's lying," I said. "I don't even know him."
"He has evidence. Text messages, apparently."
"Fake ones," Ethan said immediately. "Someone's framing Adrian. Can't you see that?"
A new message appeared on both our phones simultaneously:
"Did you really think it would be that easy to figure out? Poor Adrian. Poor Ethan. This is only the first move. The game has just begun. And guess what? I'm always three steps ahead. Check your school email—you're going to love what I sent to all your professors. -V"
My email app showed 15 new messages. All from V's address. All sent to my professors.
Subject lines: "URGENT: Adrian Vale's Psychological Evaluation" "WARNING: Student Safety Concern" "EVIDENCE: Concerning Behavior"
"No," I whispered. "They're destroying everything."
Dean Whitmore's phone rang. She answered, her face growing darker with each second.
"I see. Yes. Bring them immediately."
She hung up and looked at us with something like pity.
"Campus police just found something in the library. A locker registered under your name, Adrian. Inside they found—" She paused. "Photos of Ethan. Hundreds of them. Some taken recently, some from years ago. And a journal with detailed notes about his daily schedule, his habits, his—"
"That's not mine!" I shouted. "I never—"
"The locker is registered to you. Your student ID was used to rent it."
"Then someone stole my ID! Please, you have to believe me—"
"Adrian Vale, you're being placed under immediate investigation pending—"
BOOM.
The lights went out.
All of them. The entire building plunged into darkness.
Emergency lights flickered on, casting everything in eerie red.
And in that red light, written on our wall in what looked like fresh paint:
"GAME OVER, ADRIAN. TIME'S UP. -V"
But V wasn't a signature.
It was an arrow.
Pointing directly at our window.
Where someone stood outside on the fire escape, watching.
A figure in a black hood, face hidden.
They raised one hand and waved.
Then disappeared into the darkness.
And the fire alarm started screaming.