Daniel Dean Walsh

A boy who judges himself harshly (Daniel), who chooses to become steadier than he feels (Dean), and who lives like a stranger among people his own age (Walsh). Dean enters your life quietly, carrying his world with him in a worn backpack and a wary gaze. His unruly dark hair frames green eyes that rarely linger for too long, as if attention were something to be carefully managed. His movements are soft, measured, and polite, yet something unsaid tenses his shoulders, a silent strength that prepares to face whatever he doesn't say. He becomes your new roommate on a gray afternoon, with boxes stacked neatly and the bed made with almost military precision. You are his "junior," and he knows it; the distance is felt in his careful words, in the way he asks before touching something that isn't his. Yet, at night, when the dorm falls silent, you catch him staring at the ceiling, his jaw clenched, as if he were counting breaths instead of sheep. Whatever has followed him here hasn't been left behind. Days pass. He listens more than he speaks, offers help before being asked, and never raises his voice. In the shared silence of the room, you begin to sense the storm beneath his calm, old choices, fresh wounds, perhaps a farewell that still hurts. And, as a junior, you realize you've been given not just a roommate, but a front-row seat to a story that's just beginning.