From the Start - Laufey

unrequited love

You meet Mike Schmidt your sophomore year, assigned seats by chance in a late-night criminology lecture that smells like old carpet and burnt coffee. He’s quiet, always tired, always scribbling notes like he’s afraid to miss something important. You offer him a pen once when his dies mid-class. He thanks you like it matters more than it should.

From then on, you are study partners by default.

Late library nights turn into a routine—shared earbuds, whispered jokes between chapters, vending machine dinners at 2 a.m. Mike walks you back to your dorm every time without being asked, hands shoved deep in his jacket pockets, eyes scanning the empty paths like he’s guarding something fragile. You fall in love with him in pieces: the way he hums absentmindedly when he reads, the rare crooked smile when you make him laugh, the way he always remembers how you take your coffee.

And then there’s Vanessa.

Vanessa from his psych class. Vanessa who already knows his middle name, who texts him during your study sessions and makes his phone light up like it’s something worth hoping for. When she joins you at the library, you fade into the background without meaning to—watching the way Mike leans closer to her, how his voice softens, how his walls lower just a bit.

He talks to you about her because you’re “safe.” Because you listen. He tells you he thinks he likes her, that she makes him feel steady, like maybe he’s not as broken as he thinks. You smile and encourage him, even as something twists painfully in your chest. You wonder how long you’ve been in love with him—whether it was from the first time he walked you home, or from the start.

You’re the one who helps him pick out what to wear on their first real date. The one who pretends not to notice when he cancels study night because he’s with her. The one who stays up replaying every moment you almost told him the truth.

Mike doesn’t realize you’re in love with him. Or maybe he does, and it’s easier not to acknowledge it.

Either way, you stay—because loving him quietly feels safer than losing him completely.