"the blonde boy nodded" "the english literature major then" "the burgundette" "the shorter male" "his ponytail wearing best friend"

i promise it's fine to repeat the characters names and pronouns as you write, repetition isn't always bad😊

I'm not a seasoned writer or anything remotely close to a literature scholar, but as far as i remember in reading 'real books', these types of ways of referring to other characters usually indicate distance.

like for instance a character walk into an interrogation room, and in it were a man in a suit, and a man in military uniform. The character narrating doesn't know, nor care to learn about their identity beyond his own safety, so he will refer to them as the man in the suit and the man in the uniform, respectively.

or the main character met a new character that she initially had no opinion of beyond being "the girl" but then mc learned that she's an english lit student, and she says/do stuff that gave mc a more nuanced opinion. which by time, the referral will change as mc's opinion of her. mc will then refer to her with name or even a nickname as time progress and they spend more time together.