Although muted, a voice managed to penetrate the throbbing. “Are you okay?”

I hadn’t heard anyone enter the courtyard, not a single footstep, making his voice seem as if it came from out of nowhere. I must have jumped or shrieked because the look on his face mirrored the uncertain pounding I was now feeling in my chest.

“I didn’t mean to startle you.”

I cleared my throat. “No, not at all. I mean, I’m okay.”

Looking up, I found myself staring into an unfamiliar face. The most beautiful face I had ever seen.

The tall boy stood in front of me, his features soft, yet chiseled, and I couldn’t help but notice the way the sunlight played with his sandy hair. The way it curled loosely around his face, capturing the specks of light that fell onto us from between the branches. But…his eyes. They were the warmest, most endless aqua — and inhumanly hypnotic. Suddenly, I couldn’t recall any sort of discomfort in my head, just a soothing warmth flowing within me, and the panic of the morning — the taunting, the winged mirage in the hall — simply melted away at the sight of him.

“I’m Garreth.”

I sat like an idiot, staring at his hand, which was extended toward me. To my embarrassment, I couldn’t speak. I tried desperately to find my voice but I was entranced. I had to speak soon or he would assume I was socially dysfunctional and at this particular moment that was a fate worse than death.

“Teagan,” I replied, at last finding my voice. I took his hand.

It was so warm I didn’t want to give it back. He smiled at me and I felt my cheeks redden. I guess I held it a little too long. He was staring at me and I quickly looked away, feeling panic rise in my chest. But it was a good panic. The nice kind.

Garreth unfolded a thin piece of paper that I recognized as a student schedule. His brow furrowed before he looked at me again.

“Would you happen to know how to get to room 303?”