After we broke up, the campus golden boy made our relationship public. I posted on my Instagram Story: "Thanks for asking. Loved him once." He replied to my story the very next second: "? That's not what you were saying in bed last night." 01 I was drunk. Friends were egging Carter on, telling him to pick the type of girl he liked from the crowd. He lazily peeled his eyes open, pointed straight at me, and said, "Her." That day marked exactly one hundred days since we broke up. 02 In a blurry, drunken haze, Carter and I ended up sleeping together. When I woke up the next morning, I let out a scream. "What are you yelling for?" he mumbled, rolling over lazily. "It's not like we haven't slept together before." I kicked out my leg and shoved him right off the bed. 03 He got annoyed. Grabbing my ankle, he yanked me down with him. I rolled over and crashed right into Carter’s chest. It was rock hard. My face flushed hot. Above me, I heard him ask, "Haven't felt enough yet?" I bit the bullet and shot back, "More like you haven't felt enough." I underestimated Carter’s shamelessness. He grabbed my hand, pulled me back down, and stared at me lazily like a dozing lion. "Wanna feel some more?" Feel your ass! Unable to win against him, I scrambled up, wanting to bolt out the door, but he caught my wrist. He gave me a look. "Stay here. Don't run around." He opened the door, and I heard the sounds of his frat brothers teasing him in the hall. "Morning, Carter. Rough night?" "Who's in there, man? Why won't you let us see?" "Fuck off." A breeze swept in, followed by the slam of the door. The noise died down. Once it was completely quiet, I sneaked back to my own dorm room. Chloe was already awake, standing by the door. She asked, "Riley, where did you go?" I clutched my stomach. "The toilet in our suite broke. I had to use the one downstairs." "Are you... sure about that?" It wasn't until I reached the bathroom mirror that I realized what a mess I was. My clothes were wrinkled, my hair was a bird's nest, and my lipstick was smeared all over my face. I looked exactly like someone who had just done something very bad. Chloe pulled up a chair, sat me down, and said, "Confess and you get leniency; resist and face the consequences. Did you stay out all night fooling around with that dog of an ex?" Just kill me now. 04 On the campus shuttle, I bumped into Carter again. You could tell everyone was buzzing. Even Chloe whispered, "Doesn't he drive? Why is he squeezing onto the campus shuttle with us?" I didn't know. I found a seat as far away from him as possible and sat down. I pulled out my sleep mask, just wanting to nap, when he walked over, tapped my shoulder, and handed me a box of motion sickness pills. I was stunned. At that exact moment, Ethan, a senior I knew from my journalism club, also walked over and handed me a box of motion sickness pills. I genuinely didn't know which one to take. In that moment, I deeply understood the awkwardness of a female protagonist in a rom-com. Carter let out an incredibly low, icy scoff. He grabbed my hand, shoved his pills into my palm, and I shot Ethan an apologetic look. Carter blocked my line of sight to Ethan, pinched my cheek, and said, "You broke up with me to find a guy like this?" "Riley, you need to get your eyes checked." Why the personal attack? Wait, did he just out our relationship? After dropping that bomb, Carter walked away, looking cool as hell, leaving me completely windblown and panicked. Ethan handed me his pills and gave a bitter smile. "I didn't realize you two were involved. No wonder you kept rejecting me." Rejecting you? When did you ever even ask me out? He walked away looking depressed, and I became a human target. Suddenly, I was entangled with two campus heartthrobs, and there was no explaining my way out of it. Chloe snapped out of her shock and asked, "So last night... you slept with Carter?" I'm cooked. I covered her mouth and offered an awkward smile to the rest of the bus. "Don't believe the rumors, don't spread the rumors." Too late. I saw someone already typing furiously on the college Confession Page. Help. I'm going to get assassinated by his fangirls. 05 Do modern college students really have this much free time? We hadn't even gotten back to campus yet, and my phone was blowing up with people asking me about it. So this is what being a celebrity feels like. I posted on my Instagram Story: "Thanks for asking. Loved him once." Carter replied instantly: "? That's not what you were saying in bed last night." Lord, save me. I could jump into the ocean and still not wash myself clean of this. That screenshot of my Story, along with a candid photo from the bus, ended up on the campus Barstool page. Great. The comments were incredibly unified. They were all calling me ugly. Turning my grief into anger, I texted Carter: "Square up. What exactly do you want?" "Get back together, or keep getting hated on. You pick." "Lmao, you say that as if I won't get hated on if we get back together." "Fair point." "But at least you'll have a handsome guy keeping you company while you get hated on. It's a win for you." Absolute idiot! I blocked him! 06 The reason I didn't delete his contact entirely... Was because I couldn't bear to lose our chat history. Even though there wasn't much of it. Carter preferred calling. Back then, I used to hide on my balcony and stay on the phone with him all night. Everyone knew I was dating someone, they just didn't know it was Carter. They thought I was in an online relationship, or being scammed by some creep. Carter wasn't a creep, but he was a player. We broke up because of how he treated me. Even though he constantly argued that he didn't do anything, I didn't believe him. I saw it with my own eyes. That girl texted him: "Baby, hop on CoD?" When I broke up with him, he didn't even try to make me stay. He just asked, "Are you sure?" "I am absolutely, one hundred percent sure." He never said another word to me after that. Originally, I thought that if he just coaxed me a little, if he just explained himself, maybe I would forgive him. But I forgot. He was Carter. The golden boy. Why would he ever lower his pride to coax anyone? 100 days. It took me 100 days to finally crawl out of my misery, and now he was messing with me again. He was the worst. 07 I went to sleep as soon as I got back to the dorm. I dreamed of Carter again. That toxic ex. He was holding hands with another girl, and she was yelling at me: "Ugly freak!" "You're the ugly freak!" I wanted to scream back, but I couldn't open my mouth. The sound of my ringtone woke me up. I was drenched in sweat. It was Carter calling. "What?" "Come downstairs." "No." I was about to hang up when I heard him threaten me: "Then I'll just yell from right here. I'll yell until you come down." Who's afraid of who? "Yell all you want. As long as you're not afraid of the RA screaming at you." I hung up. I strained my ears. I actually heard Carter yelling my name from the courtyard. No way. He's actually playing this game? 08 I threw on a jacket and went downstairs. Seeing me, he stopped yelling. It was late, and he had already caused a minor commotion. I grabbed his arm and dragged him into the trees near the quad, accidentally bumping into a couple making out. He chuckled low in his throat, lightly scratching my palm with his thumb. "Dropping hints?" I dragged him right back out. Carter let me pull him along, his temper surprisingly good, until we reached an empty clearing. He glanced around. "You want to do it here? I mean, it's not impossible." "Fuck off." I let go of his hand and crossed my arms. "Spit it out." He dropped the smirk, handing me the paper bag he was holding. "Mango Frappuccino." In the past, whenever I got motion sickness, I always craved a Mango Frappuccino. He would always run out off-campus to buy me one. Pathetic, right? A single Mango Frappuccino could make me this happy. I didn't take it. I looked at him. "Carter, what exactly do you want?" "Get back together. That's your only option." "Is playing with my feelings fun?" He stopped talking. He just looked at me. It was hard to believe that even now, I could still be moved by how incredibly handsome he was. Hot guys are truly terrifying. He saw right through my fake tough exterior. He smiled. "Afraid to look at me?" "Don't flatter yourself. If you don't have anything real to say, I'm going back upstairs." Carter grabbed my wrist and shoved the bag toward me, forcing it into my hand just like he did with the pills. I refused. We pushed and shoved. The bag dropped to the ground, ripped open, and the drink spilled everywhere. We both froze. He crouched down, a self-deprecating smile forming on his lips. "Is it really... completely impossible?" 09 For the first time ever, Carter looked vulnerable in front of me. My heart gave a sharp, painful twinge. "Get up first." "Promise me first." "..." "Then you can stay squatting." He grabbed my wrist, stood up, and hugged me tightly from behind, resting his chin in the crook of my neck. "Riley, I'm miserable." My heart was pounding. My throat tightened. I tried to ignore his body heat and struggled. "Stop acting pitiful." "I really am miserable." I couldn't break free. He was too strong. "Then what do you want?" "A kiss will fix it." "...Fuck off." He reached into my jacket pocket, pulled out my phone, and said, "Or, take me off your blocked list." Damn it. He unlocked my phone. He probably didn't expect it himself. He froze for a split second. In that tiny window, I shoved him off. Yeah, I was pathetic. Even though we broke up, I couldn't bear to delete his Face ID from my phone. I snatched my phone back. "I'm going inside." Carter chased after me, not saying a word, following me the whole way. After I got upstairs, I ran to the balcony. I saw him still standing down there, staring blankly at his phone. 10 "Ry, Ry, wake up! Carter posted on the Confession Page! He said he likes you!" I woke up instantly, thinking I was still dreaming. Chloe tossed her phone onto my bed. "Look for yourself." [This is Carter. Not hiding anonymously. Confessing to Riley from the Journalism program. I like you. I really like you.] [Will you give me a chance to pursue you?] There were blessings, people eating up the drama, and some passive-aggressive comments saying the campus golden boy had mediocre taste and that I was just 'average'. He replied directly to that person: "Better than you." All his frat brothers flooded the comments. "Better than you." "Better than you." "Better than you." ... That comment got pushed to the very top. I couldn't hold back. I replied to it too: "Better than you." 11 I unblocked Carter again. I had barely typed a few letters before he texted: "Awake?" He sent a screenshot. It showed the chat box with me currently typing. "Were you waiting for me?" "Yeah. Didn't sleep all night. Just waited for you to come find me." "Why did you go say all that weird stuff on the page?" "The Confession Page? Isn't it used for confessing? You blocked me, so this was my only way." "You couldn't use iMessage?" I said the wrong thing. I quickly unsent it. "Saw it." "Next time I'll use iMessage. But this was good too. Let everyone know you're mine. I want to see who dares to flirt with you now." "You're overthinking it. No one flirts with me." "They're blind. Good thing I'm not blind." I didn't want to humor him. I asked him, "If you like me, why did you break up with me?" "You're the one who brought up breaking up." "I brought it up because..." I stopped halfway. I couldn't type the rest. What if Carter really did have someone else? What would I do? Could I handle it? It was better to just leave it like this. A clean break, keeping whatever dignity I had left. I quietly deleted the text and sent: "Whatever." 12 Actually, when Carter and I first got together, I was the one who made the first move. Obviously, right? He was the most popular guy on campus. If I hadn't made the first move, he never would have noticed me. It was love at first sight for me. I manufactured all sorts of encounters just to get close to him, just to make him notice me. One night, I texted him: "The moon looks beautiful tonight." After I hit send, I threw my phone across the bed, buried my head under the covers, and didn't dare to look. Ten minutes passed. No, maybe it was only five. I peeked out, quietly grabbed my phone. He hadn't replied. My subtle flirting failed. He definitely wasn't interested in me. I wanted to cry. The disappointment was suffocating. I tossed the phone away again. Ten minutes later, refusing to give up, I checked it again. A notification! He replied! "Come downstairs." My hands shook. "What?" He sent a photo. He was standing right outside my dorm building. "You came over?" "Yeah. The moon is really beautiful. Come down, I'll take you to see it." 13 Back then, just to chase Carter, I registered for the same elective class as him. Now, karma had come for me. When I got to the lecture hall, there weren't many empty seats left. I found an empty spot in the back row. As soon as I sat down, a backpack was tossed onto the desk, and Carter hooked the chair with his foot and sat down. There were clearly other empty seats. Why did he have to sit next to me? I stood up, wanting to change seats. As soon as I walked over to one, his buddy sat down in it. "Seat's taken." I walked to another empty seat. Another one of his friends sat down, placing his backpack on the chair next to him. "Taken too." I couldn't hold back. I asked the guy, "Are you even registered for this class?" The guy just put his head on the desk and pretended to be asleep. I turned around. Carter was resting his chin on his hand, watching me. Looking completely smug. "Did you literally pay half your frat to come take up seats for you?" "More than that." He smiled, the corners of his mouth lifting in a devilish arc. "I even Venmo'd strangers to hold seats." He pointed a finger, randomly gesturing to a few people, clearly making it up on the spot. "Him, him, him, him, him. I paid all of them." "What a shame. I guess you have to sit next to me."
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