Chapter 8

At seventeen, a teenage boy’s metabolism meant he could realistically eat an entire cow and still be hungry.

The back street right outside the campus gates was a chaotic battleground of cheap food stalls. The competition was brutal; if a place was too expensive or the food tasted like garbage, they went out of business within a month. Gary dragged Warren into a cramped Korean spot with a violently colorful menu. Warren hated wasting time analyzing food options, so his long, elegant finger simply tapped the number-one best-seller: a stone pot bibimbap.

"Tania said this place is amazing," Gary said, scanning the menu. "You’re really just getting rice? Add some Korean fried chicken to that."

Warren shook his head. "Don't worry about me. I don't want it."

Gary kept flipping through the menu, deeply tempted by the bright red spicy rice cakes and the beef stew. After a brief internal struggle, he ordered the beef stew and a plate of fried chicken. The restaurant was completely packed, and the single server was drowning in orders. Warren was already deeply regretting letting Gary drag him here. He leaned his elbow on the table, resting his chin in his hand, and stared down at his watch, his patience thinning rapidly.

Perfect.

It had been thirty minutes since they ordered.

Gary’s stomach was practically digesting itself, but since he had picked the restaurant, he stubbornly defended his choice. "All the girls in our class love coming here, so it has to be good! Maybe once we try it, we'll become regulars."

Warren’s tone was completely flat. "I am never coming here a second time."

That was just ruthless. Gary rolled his eyes. "Don't speak too soon."

Maybe it was because they were essentially starving, but when the food finally hit the table, their expectations were through the roof. Gary took a giant gulp of the beef stew. His taste buds exploded. "Well? How is it?" he asked, his mouth completely full.

Warren mixed his bibimbap and took a bite. His expression didn't change even a fraction. "Average."

Because they had wasted so much time waiting for the food, they had to practically sprint to the bookstore to grab the SAT prep materials. Their absolute last stop was the campus cafe. They had a decent variety of drinks, and the Frappuccinos were still on the summer menu. Gary pulled out his wallet, realizing he had blown all his change on lunch. He only had large, hundred-dollar bills left.

The cashier, a young girl, looked deeply stressed.

The coffee was only six dollars. Just five minutes ago, someone had paid with a hundred-dollar bill. If she had to break another one now, her register was going to be completely wiped out of change.

"I've got it."

Warren casually handed over the exact change. The cashier looked like she was going to cry tears of gratitude as she took the money, bagged the coffee, and handed it over.

The two boys crossed the street and headed back onto campus. Gary had completely drained his spicy beef stew, and the heavy salt and spice were catching up to him. His throat felt like sandpaper. Before they even reached the academic building, he stopped and clapped Warren on the shoulder. "The salt is killing me. I need to run to the convenience store for some water. Go on without me."

Without waiting for an answer, he turned and sprinted toward the store with the surprising speed of a very athletic, flexible big guy.

Warren obviously wasn't going to stand around and wait for him. He carried the bagged coffee into the stairwell. The building was eerily quiet, the silence broken only by the steady echo of his own footsteps. If he hadn't wasted so much time waiting for that completely average lunch, he would be asleep in his dorm right now.

It was already 1:30 PM. There was no point in going back to the dorms now.

He walked up the stairs, passing several empty classrooms. Class Three was basically a ghost town. Glancing through the open back door, he saw only two or three students slumped over their desks, dead to the world. He intentionally softened his footsteps, not wanting to wake anyone up.

He was exactly one step away from Julie Carven’s desk when another boy—someone completely unfamiliar—suddenly stepped up from the other aisle.

The boy stretched out his hand. He was holding a large, heart-shaped fruit jelly.

Their eyes met.

At the exact same second, Warren placed the neatly packaged iced coffee directly onto Julie’s desk, right next to her messy stack of colorful notebooks.

The boy completely froze.

He knew this was Julie’s desk. He had specifically snuck into the classroom early during the lunch break just to leave her a snack.

The jelly was cheap, so he hadn't planned on leaving a name. It was just a sweet, anonymous gesture.

But what the hell was happening right now?! Setting aside whatever relationship the terrifying Class Rep had with Julie, strictly from a financial standpoint, a cheap fruit jelly completely lost to an expensive iced coffee from the cafe outside.

It was only a fraction of a second, but the boy’s brain went into absolute overdrive. Moving with terrifying speed and agility, he aggressively pulled his hand back, slapped the heart-shaped jelly onto the desk directly behind Julie's, and practically sprinted out the back door.

Warren stood alone in the aisle. He slowly shifted his gaze from the retreating boy to the incredibly cheesy heart-shaped jelly sitting on Dan Butler's desk.

He could easily guess exactly what had just happened.

Finding the situation deeply ridiculous, Warren let out a low, amused scoff and walked back to his own seat.

Meanwhile.

Julie violently slammed her hand down on her alarm clock, cursing under her breath as she dragged herself down the ladder from her top bunk. The dorm windows were wide open, and the humid breeze fluttered the pages of the textbooks on their desks. The girls were aggressively elbowing each other at the sink, splashing water on their faces. None of them had slept enough, but they washed up and threw on their shoes with terrifying speed, refusing to waste a single second.

Julie was still radiating pure, murderous corporate rage as she hurried back into the classroom.

But the second her eyes locked onto her desk, her entire mood flipped.

Sitting there was a beautifully cold Frappuccino, the whipped cream just starting to melt. A genuine smile broke across her face. She quickly dug the straw out of the plastic bag, stabbed it through the lid, and took a desperate sip.

It was incredibly sweet. She had to really focus to find even a trace of actual coffee flavor buried under all the sugar.

But honestly, it was better than nothing.

She popped her head up, looking across the room. Gary wasn't back at his desk yet. She’d have to ask him how much it cost after class and pay him back.

Beside her, Beth was practically dead, resting her chin on her hand and nodding off.

"Ah! AHHHH!"

Suddenly, a literal groundhog scream erupted from directly behind them. Both girls violently flinched, snapping their heads around to find Dan Butler staring at his desk, his face twisted in absolute, pure shock.

"Are you insane?!" Beth cursed, clutching her chest.

Julie shot him a deeply annoyed glare.

Dan was holding the massive heart-shaped fruit jelly in both hands, his voice physically trembling. "Who left this?"

He looked back and forth between Julie and Beth with intense, desperate expectation.

He obviously wasn't hoping they had left it. Given how ruthlessly the two of them treated him, they clearly gave off a vibe that said they wouldn't date him even if he were the last man on Earth. He was fully expecting them to deny it, which would mean an unknown, secret admirer had snuck into the room just for him.

Julie blinked, her gaze shifting to meet Beth's.

In the next second, Beth looked like she was ready to commit murder. She aggressively dragged her hands through her hair. "Julie Carven, why the hell are you looking at me like that?!"

Julie instantly snapped her gaze back to Dan, falling back into her corporate apology reflex. "I'm so sorry, boss. Please forgive me, I haven't fully woken up yet..."

Dan completely ignored their icy, soul-crushing exchange. His heart was practically beating out of his chest, his confidence skyrocketing to absolute maximum levels.

"Someone," Dan announced, clutching the jelly to his chest like a holy relic, "is secretly in love with me."