(MASON’S POV)
(THE PRESENT)
The whispers didn’t die when the girls and boys finally drifted back to their seats.
They just turned into something quieter, sharper—like the whole class was holding its breath, waiting for the next explosion.
I dropped into my chair, pulse still hammering from everything that had happened this morning, and tried to pretend the world hadn’t just tilted sideways.
Caleb on the other hand didn’t pretend.
He leaned in the second the others were gone, voice low and venomous, it was the type of tone he used to save for guys who looked at me the wrong way back when he still pretended to be my protector.
“What the hell is going on, Mason?” His breath brushed my ear, hot and angry.
“You show up with Blue Gem?
After everything people say about him?
After he’s bullied you for years?”
I kept my eyes fixed on the blank page in front of me, pencil spinning between my fingers so I wouldn’t have to look at him.
“Nothing’s going on.
And besides Blue wasn’t bullying me—he was just being his usual weird self, that’s all.”
“Bullshit.” His hand landed on the edge of my desk, his knuckles turning pale.
“Stay away from him.
He’s dangerous.”
I finally turned my head.
The words came out before I could stop them, quiet but razor-sharp.
“Unlike you?”
Caleb’s jaw locked so tight I heard the click.
For a second he looked like I’d slapped him.
Then the mask slid back into place.
That arrogant, superiority mask he always wore, the same face he’d worn when he smashed my cake into the floor.
“This isn’t funny, Mason.”
“It wasn’t funny when you called me a disease either,” I said quietly.
The memory still burned, fresh as the day it happened.
“Leave me alone, Caleb.”
He didn’t.
Of course he didn’t.
The teacher walked in for first period, but Caleb kept going—leaning over every time the man’s back was turned, his voice a constant, poisonous drip in my ear.
“You’re being ridiculous,” he hissed during roll call.
“Throwing away eight years of friendship over one stupid fight?
One little rejection?
That’s not you, Mason.
That’s pathetic.”
My pencil snapped in half.
I didn’t even flinch.
He kept pushing, voice getting tighter, meaner.
“Blue’s a freak.
Everyone knows it.
He doesn’t talk to anyone.
He looks at people like he’s deciding which bone to break first.
You start hanging around him and they’ll say the same shit about you.
‘Mason’s gone crazy.’ ‘Mason’s hanging with the psycho.’ You really want that label?”
I felt my blood heat, slow and dangerous.
He still hadn’t apologized.
Not once.
Not for the cake, not for the words, not for the way he’d looked at me like I was something contagious.
He just expected me to roll over and be grateful he was still willing to sit next to me.
“You have no right to judge him,” I said under my breath, finally turning to face him.
My voice shook, but not from fear—from pure, burning anger.
“You don’t know anything about Blue.
And you need to stop disturbing me, Caleb, or I swear I’m going to lose my patience for real.”
Caleb blinked like I’d grown a second head.
“You’re really talking to me like this?
After everything I’ve done for you?”
I laughed once—short, bitter.
“Done for me?
You destroyed me in that lab and then acted like I should thank you for it.”
He opened his mouth, but the bell cut him off.
Two more classes dragged by the same way—Caleb whispering, me ignoring, the tension between us so thick the air felt like it might snap.
Every time he tried to pass me a note or lean in, I stared straight ahead like he didn’t exist.
I could feel the frustration rolling off him in waves.
By the time recess finally hit, I was vibrating with it.
Caleb didn’t let up.
He spun in his seat the second the teacher left, eyes wide and almost desperate now.
“Mason… come on.
It’s only been two days since you confessed.
You said you loved me.
You really don’t feel anything anymore?
If you actually loved me like you claimed, you wouldn’t be acting like this.
You wouldn’t be throwing everything away for some guy who’s probably going to use you and toss you aside.”
The words landed like a punch I wasn’t ready for.
For a heartbeat, the old ache flared—sharp, familiar, the part of me that had worshipped Caleb for eight years still bleeding.
But right behind it came something hotter.
Cleaner.
Rage.
I met his eyes and let the truth fall out, cold and final.
“Maybe I didn’t love you like I thought I did.”
Caleb’s face went slack.
The color drained from his cheeks.
For once, the golden-boy mask cracked, and I saw it—real hurt, raw and unguarded.
His eyes actually glistened for half a second before he blinked it away.
It should have made me feel guilty.
It didn’t.
It felt satisfying.
Like justice.
Like watching the same pain I’d carried for days finally land on the person who put it there.
Before he could recover, before he could twist it back into something about me being “too sensitive,” a shadow filled the doorway.
The entire classroom went dead silent.
Blue stood there in the doorway like he owned every inch of the room, shoulders broad enough to fill the frame and then some.
That black button-down clung to him like it had been custom-tailored by someone who knew exactly how lethal he looked—sleeves rolled just high enough to show the corded muscle in his forearms, fabric stretching tight across his chest with every slow breath he took.
His eyes swept the crowded space once, cool and detached, like none of it mattered.
The noise, the people, the lights—none of it touched him.
Until they landed on me.
Everything shifted.
His gaze sharpened, locked in, and the corner of his mouth curved into this small, private smile.
Not the cocky kind.
Not the one he gave everyone else.
This one was quiet, almost secret, like the rest of the world had just blinked out of existence and it was only the two of us left standing in the ashes.
My pulse kicked hard against my ribs before I could stop it.
Damn.
“Lunch?” he asked, voice low but carrying, like he didn’t care who heard.
I stood up without thinking.
Caleb’s hand shot out and locked around my wrist, grip bruising.
“Stop,” he hissed, voice shaking with fury now.
“Stop hanging out with him.
He’ll hurt you.
This isn’t over, Mason.
You’re going to regret this.”
I looked down at his fingers, then back up at his face.
Slowly, deliberately, I pulled free.
“Watch me.”
I walked straight to Blue.
The hallway parted like the sea as we moved through it, every single pair of eyes burning into us—classmates, strangers, teachers pretending not to stare.
Phones came out.
Whispers exploded behind us.
But Blue didn’t look left or right.
His hand brushed the small of my back once, guiding, protective, and something warm and terrifying unfurled in my chest.
I didn’t know it yet, but Caleb’s words weren’t just angry.
They were a warning.
And regret was already waiting for me around the corner, sharp teeth bared and smiling.