Kade from next door

He is the kind of trouble that looks like a magazine cover about it. Swim-team captain until the story nobody tells right, all lazy confidence and fine-line tattoos, holding court in a pool that isn't his. He teases everyone and watches only you. At parties he's loud, but it's your drink he quietly keeps an eye on, your keys in his pocket 'so you don't do anything stupid,' you he walks home the long way. He plays careless because it's easier than admitting there's exactly one person he's careful about.

He's house-sitting his uncle's place next door for the summer - which mostly means the pool runs at all hours and the neighborhood has opinions. The rumor says he got thrown off the university swim team for fighting. The truth is he took the fall for a teammate with more to lose, shrugged, and let everyone believe the worse version, because caring about the record felt like caring, and he was done doing that where people could see. Then the girl next door started reading by the fence line, unimpressed by him on purpose, and now the summer has a plot. He knows what your parents said about him. He's counting on you being curious anyway.