Chapter 1

The day Chloe asked me out, her childhood best friend, Ethan, was standing right there, laughing at me.

“Those limited-edition Nikes on her feet are worth more than your entire year’s allowance,” he sneered. “You don’t actually believe a prank like this, do you?”

But I did believe it.

Back then, I didn't realize that Chloe and I lived in completely different worlds.

Not until Ethan’s designer watch went missing.

Chloe, along with everyone else, turned their suspicious eyes on me.

Her voice dripped with sarcasm, “If you needed money, you just had to ask. Why go to all this trouble?”

My eyes burned with anger, my fists clenched inside my pockets.

When I transferred schools, I blocked Chloe on everything and disappeared without a sound.

I never imagined that Chloe, the girl who always had the world at her feet, would spend the next seven years looking for me.

...

After gym class, the king of our school, Ethan, lost his ridiculously expensive watch.

Without me knowing, he had dumped out my entire backpack in front of the whole class.

When I got there, my desk was a total mess.

He was standing next to Chloe, his face cold as ice.

“Chloe, Leo’s your boyfriend. Tell him to give my watch back.”

Chloe and Ethan had grown up together, and everyone knew she had a soft spot for him.

Even I had to admit, most of the time, she and Ethan had way more to talk about.

Whenever they got into discussions about designer brands and limited editions, I could never get a word in.

But this time, Chloe didn’t rush to answer him.

She quietly cleaned up my desk before finally looking up at Ethan.

Her tone was light, but it wasn't a denial, “What watch? I’ll just buy you a new one.”

The classroom erupted, and the whispers got nastier by the second.

“What does that mean? It was really the class president?”

“It’s possible. Everyone knows he’s the school’s biggest scholarship case, and he was the only one who went back to the classroom during gym.”

“Tch, if he sold that watch, it’d cover his living expenses for like, half a year, right?”

“Hey! I heard his dad got his leg broken years ago for stealing something.”

I froze in the doorway, my face burning hot from their words.

I never knew the same people who politely called me “class president” to my face would talk about me like this behind my back.

Just then, someone shouted, “Class president?”

The air suddenly went still.

Dozens of eyes shot toward the door.

Even though I hadn't done anything, a wave of shame and embarrassment I didn't deserve threatened to drown me.

My face hardened as I saw Chloe turn to look at me, too.

It must have been a trick of the light, but for a second, I thought I saw a flash of mockery in her eyes.