My Fake Boyfriend Is the School Bad Boy novel Chapter 126

Chapter 126 The Boy Who Watched Me

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“It is about Francie Nolan,” I explained. I gripped the edge of my wooden desk. “She survives a harsh environment. She does not have a trust fund or a massive house. She has a public library card and a fire escape. She reads books to escape the noise of a crowded, struggling household. It shows that you can build a life out of concrete if you refuse to quit.”

Silence stretched across the room. I poured my quiet, working-class truth into the classroom. I offered them a piece of my soul.

Trent Lawson sat in the middle row. He leaned back in his plastic chair and offered a loud, theatrical sigh.

“Fascinating, Trent drawled. “So you relate to being broke and sitting on a fire escape. Did you bring us a visual aid? A tin cup, maybe?”

The surrounding students offered muffled, cruel laughter.

“That is quite enough, Mr. Lawson,” Mrs. Gable snapped.

The reprimand did not erase the damage. The heat burned my cheeks. The shame crashed over me in a massive wave. I sat down and stared at the wood grain of my desk for the rest of the period. I wanted the floor to open and swallow me whole.

Ryder Steinmann sat in the very back row. He wore a dark hoodie pulled low over his eyes. His arms rested crossed over his broad chest. I assumed he slept. I assumed the chaotic billionaire heir ignored the boring freshman presentations.

He did not sleep.

He heard every single word. He watched the humiliation burn my face. He logged the title of the book into his memory, and he kept it

there for four years.

I looked at the worn green cloth in my lap. I turned the book to inspect the spine in the dim stairwell light. I checked the publisher mark stamped into the bottom corner.

My heart hammered a frantic rhythm against my ribs.

This was not a used paperback from a local thrift store. This was a 1943 first-edition printing.

The realization hit me with staggering force. Billionaires solved problems with their wallets. If Ryder wanted to impress a girl, he possessed the bank account to buy a diamond necklace in five minutes. He possessed the resources to order a designer watch from a catalog and have an assistant wrap it.

He chose a different path. A pristine 1943 first edition required a hunt. It required time. He searched through rare bookstores. He contacted antique dealers. He spent months tracking down a specific, rare piece of my past. He spent his time and his energy to secure a physical representation of my freshman-year vulnerability.

He bought the book to tell me he saw me. He bought the book to prove he witnessed my struggles and found them beautiful. The boys in the middle row mocked my background. The boy in the back row revered it.

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13:12 Fri, Jul 10

Chapter 126 The Boy Who Watched Me

My vision blurred. A hot tear slipped down my cheek. It landed on the dark green velvet ribbon resting on my skirt.

The gift stripped away the remaining mysteries. He orchestrated the chemistry lab collision. He orchestrated the entire arrangement. He needed an excuse to cross the room because he spent four years watching from the shadows.

I needed to open the cover.

I placed my hand on the pale green board. I lifted the heavy front cover. The spine offered a soft, protesting creak.

The front endpaper felt thick and uneven beneath my thumb. The yellowed page contained no printed text.

A single line of black ink stained the center of the blank page.

The handwriting lacked the elegant, practiced loops of Julian Hayes. It lacked the neat, balanced spacing of a secret admirer trying to impress me with poetry. The script possessed sharp, heavy slants. It looked jagged and rushed. I recognized the letters. It was the same messy handwriting that filled out our joint lab reports. It was the same script that scrawled harsh warnings on the chalkboard during

detention.

Ryder wrote in my book.

I wiped a second tear from my face. I focused my eyes on the black ink. I read the words.

To the girl who never looks my way.

The sentence struck the center of my chest. It felt like a physical blow. The air rushed out of my lungs, leaving me hollow and gasping in

the quiet stairwell.

I read the eight words again. To the girl who never looks my way.

The sentence rearranged my entire universe.

He claimed me in front of the entire science wing. He pinned a boy to the metal lockers and declared his territory. He brought me to the roof and offered me his sanctuary. He displayed a fierce, confident possession.

But this ink revealed the bleeding core of his heart.

He thought I never looked his way. He thought my focus remained entirely on my biology index cards and my medical degree. He assumed I viewed him as a chaotic blur in the background of my disciplined, working-class life. He thought his dark storm repelled me.

He bought the book to celebrate my birthday, but he branded it with his own profound insecurity.

The monster of Crestview Prep pined for me. He possessed a terrifying reputation. He commanded the hallways with sheer intimidation. Yet, when it came to me, he felt invisible. He believed he was unworthy of my direct attention. He believed he needed a complex arrangement and failing grades just to warrant a conversation.

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Chapter 126 The Boy Who Watched Me

The ache in my chest intensified. It spread through my ribs, burning with a fierce, consuming heat.

I loved him. I loved the boy who carved stars into a library bookshelf. I loved the boy who tracked down a 1943 first edition to honor a

humiliated fourteen-year-old girl. I loved the boy who hid his devotion behind a leather jacket and a scowl.

I caused the pain behind that handwritten sentence. I walked past him in the corridors for years. I kept my head down. I focused on the

survival of my scholarship. I never gave him a reason to believe I saw the good inside his chest.

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