My Romance Life System-Chapter 68: Warm Up

We ended up eating outside on one of the benches that nobody ever used, which was a nice change of pace from the controlled chaos of the cafeteria. The whole walk over, my brain was stuck on a single, ridiculous loop, replaying the moment in the classroom where she’d called me hot, which was a word I was pretty sure had never been used in the same sentence as my name before.

I wanted to ask her about it, to just casually bring it up and see if she was messing with me, but every time I opened my mouth to try, the words just got stuck somewhere between my brain and my tongue.

’Just let it go, you idiot,’ I thought, watching her unwrap the sandwich she’d brought from home. ’She was just teasing. It’s not that deep.’

"You’re doing that scrunchy eyebrow thing again," she said, her voice pulling me out of my head. She took a bite of her sandwich and looked at me, a little smile on her lips.

"Is this about your secret agent stuff with Jake? Are you planning a hostile takeover of the student council?"

"Something like that," I said, deciding to just roll with it because it was a thousand times easier than explaining the actual, mortifying truth. "Phase Three involves replacing all the water fountain water with soda. It’s a bold move, but I think we can pull it off."

She laughed, "I’ll support your coup, but only if you make it cherry soda."

"It’s a deal."

We ate in a comfortable quiet for a few minutes, which was something I was still getting used to, this idea that silence didn’t always have to be awkward.

"So, what about you?" I asked, trying to steer the conversation somewhere completely new. "If you weren’t stuck here, in this school, what would you be doing?"

She paused, her sandwich halfway to her mouth, and got this far-away look in her eyes that I’d never seen before. "I don’t know," she said, her voice a little softer than usual. "I’ve never really thought about it."

"Come on," I pressed gently. "There has to be something. If you could just snap your fingers and be anywhere, doing anything, what would it be?"

She was quiet for a long moment, just staring out at the field in front of us. "I think," she started, her voice barely a whisper, "I’d want to work at a flower shop."

I just blinked at her, because that was the absolute last thing I would have ever guessed. ’A flower shop? Not a fashion designer, or a model, or whatever her old friends were probably into?’

"Seriously?" I asked. "Like, with the aprons and the little watering cans?"

She looked over at me, a little blush on her cheeks, like she was embarrassed to admit it. "Yeah," she said, a shy smile on her face. "It just seems... nice and quiet. You’re surrounded by pretty things all day, and you just help people pick out flowers to make other people happy. It’s simple."

I just looked at her, at the way her whole face softened when she talked about it, something in my chest felt... warm.

It was like getting a peek behind a curtain I didn’t even know was there, seeing this entirely different version of her that had nothing to do with school or popularity or any of that other crap.

"That’s not what I expected you to say," I admitted. freewebnσvel.cøm

"What, you thought I wanted to be a professional mean girl or something?" she teased, her usual playful energy coming back.

"No, I just... I don’t know. It’s just really... you."

Her smile faltered for a second, and she looked down at her sandwich. "Yeah, well. It’s not exactly a career path my parents would be thrilled about." She sighed. "They have this whole plan, you know? Good university, a business degree, a ’respectable’ job. A flower shop isn’t exactly part of their five-year plan for me."

"It’s your life, not theirs," I said, and the words came out with more confidence than I expected.

She looked at me, her eyes a little wide. "It’s not that simple, Kofi."

"Maybe it should be," I said with a shrug. "I think you’d be good at it."

Her blush deepened, and she gave me this quick, bright smile that made my stomach do a flip. "Thanks," she said quietly. "So what about you? What’s your big, secret dream? Let me guess, professional manga critic?"

"Nah, I’m going to be a sword-maker. A legendary blacksmith who forges epic weapons for clueless heroes."

She stared at me for a second, then just burst out laughing. "You are such a nerd," she said, shaking her head. "But you know what? I can totally see it."

Her laughter faded, and she looked down at the half-eaten sandwich in her hands, her earlier brightness dimming into something more thoughtful, more shadowed.

"You know, for a while there, I think I actually forgot what it felt like to have a real conversation," she said, her voice so quiet I had to lean in a little to catch it. "With Selma and Becky, it was always a performance, every single word was calculated to maintain some kind of image."

’Here we go,’ I thought, recognizing the shift in her tone. This was her opening up, really opening up, and my only job was just to listen.

"It was all about who was dating who, which parties were the best to be seen at, and what filters to use on our pictures so we looked happy, even when we weren’t. I was with them all the time, surrounded by people, but I have never felt more alone in my entire life."

She took a shaky breath, picking at the crust of her sandwich without really seeing it. "I hated it. I hated the person I had to be to keep them as friends, and I hated myself even more for being too scared to just walk away."

The honesty of it was a bit overwhelming, a confession that you just don’t hear outside of a therapist’s office or a late-night talk with your closest friend.

"And the guys," she let out a dry, humorless laugh. "God, they were the worst part. Every single one of them was just a different version of Tyler, guys who looked at me like I was a prize to be won, not a person to get to know. And I just went along with it, because that’s what my friends told me I was supposed to do."

I just watched her, letting the silence sit between us, not wanting to break the spell with some empty platitude.

"Being with you," she finally looked up, her eyes meeting mine with a frightening intensity, "it’s like I can finally breathe. I don’t have to perform. I can talk about stupid things, my dumb dream of opening a flower shop, and you don’t look at me like I’m crazy. You just look at me like I’m... me."

"That’s because you are you," The words felt simple and true. "And that person is way more interesting than the one you were pretending to be."

Her eyes went a little watery, and she gave me a small, fragile smile that felt more real than any of the bright, perfect ones she used to wear. "Thanks, Kofi. For seeing that."

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