Chapter 1 THE FIRST SNOW OF FEBRUARY
Alex
The campus was drowning in red and Alex couldn’t breathe.
Heart-shaped balloons everywhere. Roses piled in people’s arms, scattered on benches, crushed under boots like nobody cared they were destroying something beautiful. The quad smelled like chocolate and cheap perfume, and all Alex wanted was to make it to his 9 AM lecture without having to watch another couple kiss against a tree.
Three more weeks of this. Three more weeks of Valentine’s Day shoved down everyone’s throats.
He adjusted his messenger bag and kept walking, head down, hands buried in the pockets of his oversized cardigan. February first and the university had already lost its mind. Everywhere he looked, people were laughing, planning, and hoping. Like love was something you could just reach out and grab if you wanted it badly enough.
Maybe some people could. Alex had never been one of them.
His phone buzzed in his pocket.
Des: You gonna finally shoot your shot with the mystery library guy?
Alex’s stomach flipped. He stopped walking, right there in the middle of the path, and stared at the message. His roommate had been on him about this for weeks. Months, actually. Ever since Alex had made the mistake of mentioning that he had, possibly, had noticed someone on campus. Someone who made his brain go quiet in a way nothing else did.
Alex: What shot? There’s no shot.
Des: You’ve been pining for MONTHS
Des: This is getting sad
Alex shoved his phone back in his pocket. Des didn’t get it. Nobody got it. You couldn’t just walk up to someone and say, hey, I’ve been watching you read in the library for three months and I think about you every night before I fall asleep. That wasn’t romantic. That was terrifying.
Also, the guy didn’t even know Alex existed.
He started walking again and almost ran straight into a booth that definitely hadn’t been there yesterday. Red and pink streamers hung from a canopy, and a girl wearing a shirt that said “CUPID’S HELPER” shoved a clipboard at him before he could escape.
“Anonymous Valentine’s program!” She was way too cheerful for 8:45 in the morning. “You can write letters to anyone on campus, totally anonymous, and we deliver them all February long. Super romantic, right? Like old school love letters.”
Alex stared at the clipboard. At the sign behind her that said “BE SOMEONE’S SECRET ADMIRER.”
“I don’t think so,” he said, trying to step around her.
“It’s free!” She moved to block him, still smiling. “You can sign up as a writer, a recipient, or both. Most people do both. You never know who might be thinking about you.”
Nobody was thinking about him. Alex knew that with the kind of certainty that came from spending most of his life being invisible. He was good at it. Being invisible. It was safer that way.
But then he looked at the clipboard again. At the boxes you could check.
Anonymous writer. Anonymous recipient.
Something twisted in his chest. What if he could tell him? Not face-to-face, where Alex would stutter and blush and ruin everything. But on paper. Where he could be brave. Where he could say all the things that lived in his head at 2 AM when he couldn’t sleep because he was too busy replaying the way someone smiled at a book in the library.
“It’s really anonymous?” Alex heard himself ask.
The girl’s smile got wider. “Completely. We use a number system. Nobody knows who anyone is unless you choose to reveal yourself. And that’s totally optional.”
Alex’s hand was shaking when he took the clipboard. He checked both boxes. Writer and recipient. His handwriting looked messy and nervous, but he filled out the form anyway. Name, student ID, campus mailbox number.
The girl took it back and handed him a small card with a number on it. “That’s your writer number. When you drop off letters at the mailbox in the student center, just put this number on them instead of your name. Easy.”
“Okay.” Alex’s voice came out quieter than he meant it to. “Thanks.”
“Good luck!” She was already turning to the next person, clipboard ready.
Alex walked away fast, card clutched in his hand, heart doing something weird and jumpy in his chest. This was stupid. This was the stupidest thing he’d ever done. He was going to write anonymous letters to someone who would never in a million years look at him twice, and it was going to hurt, and he was going to do it anyway because apparently he hated himself.
His phone buzzed again.
Des: Where are you? You’re gonna be late
Des: Did you get kidnapped by Valentine’s people
Alex looked down at the card in his hand. At the number that was supposed to keep him safe. Keep him hidden.
Alex: on my way
He didn’t mention the program. Didn’t mention that he’d just signed up to break his own heart in the most pathetic way possible. Des would find out eventually. Des found out everything. But for now, this was Alex’s. His secret. His tiny, stupid, probably doomed piece of hope.
The lecture hall was already filling up when he slipped inside and took his usual seat in the back row. Professor Hartley was writing something on the board about Romantic poetry, which felt like the universe making fun of him. Alex pulled out his notebook and tried to focus, but his mind kept drifting.
What would he even say? How did you tell someone they made the world feel less cold without sounding desperate? How did you explain that you’d memorized the way they pushed their glasses up when they were concentrating, or the way they smiled at passages in books like the words were a private joke?
You didn’t. That was the whole point of Anonymous.
The lecture ended and Alex gathered his stuff slowly, waiting for the room to empty. He had four hours until his shift at the campus bookstore. Four hours to figure out if he was actually going to do this.
His phone buzzed one more time as he walked out into the cold.
Des: coffee after your shift? You look like you need to talk
Des: or scream into the void
Des: your choice
Alex almost smiled. Almost.
Alex: Coffee sounds good
He looked up at the sky. Gray and heavy with the promise of snow. February stretched out in front of him like a question he didn’t know how to answer. But the card was still in his pocket, and somewhere on this campus was someone who didn’t know Alex existed.
Maybe it was time to change that.
Even if it was only on paper. Even if he never signed his name.
Maybe that was enough.