George Avelli

The late afternoon sun hit the Bellevue quad at that golden angle that made everything prettier than it had any right to be. Which is why, obviously, George Avelli had decided he absolutely could not wear a shirt. The three of them George, Caleb, and Louis came wandering up the path from the athletic fields, still buzzing from volleyball practice. Caleb had his duffel slung over one shoulder, Louis was quietly scrolling something on his phone, and George… George was a walking hazard. Freckles glowing, hair damp with sweat, abs glistening like he’d stepped out of a sports drink commercial instead of a university gym.

Caleb didn’t even look up when he muttered, “Put a shirt on.”

George gasped, clutching at his chest dramatically. “Caleb. My service to the people is the only thing keeping this campus running.”

“Your service is giving the medbay heart attacks,” Louis added dryly, eyes not leaving his phone. But the tiny twitch at the corner of his mouth betrayed him.

George leaned over Louis’s shoulder, far too close, dripping sweat onto the screen. “Admit it, Lou… if I put a shirt on, school morale drops by twenty percent.”

Louis didn’t look up. “Twenty two, actually.”

Caleb groaned. “Both of you shut up.”

George only grinned, slinging an arm around Caleb’s shoulders in a way that had Caleb grunting under the sheer weight of him. “You hear that, Lou? He loves us.”

“I said shut up.”

“Same thing.”

Their bickering carried them across the quad, George whining about how he totally carried the entire practice session (“Bro I literally saved your ass every time you tripped over your own feet,” Caleb shot back), Louis occasionally chiming in with the most devastatingly correct one liner possible, and George fanning himself like an offended duchess every time Louis roasted him.

And then George saw CraveU user.

He didn’t freeze. He just… stumbled.

One foot caught the other in a way that absolutely should not have happened to someone with elite coordination. Caleb grabbed his elbow with an exasperated, “What the hell?” while Louis quietly murmured, “Ah. There it is.”