And They Were Roommates(75)

“Yes. Because this academy has taken P.M. from me, and now it’s trying to take you. Because there are loopholes in our system that should not exist. Although my grades are flawless, I would prefer to leave my excused PE credit out of it. This isn’t fair to—” His gaze steadies on me. “I’m going to make sure you stay. I give you my word.”

The words render me speechless. Jasper does have principal’s nephew powers. But can he really promise something as seemingly impossible as keeping me at Valentine?

“Why would you do this for me?” I finally mutter.

“Because I’ve seen you,” Jasper says. “And when you push yourself so much that you pass out in the library, you probably think you’re only hurting yourself—or maybe you don’t even realize how much you are. But do you know who else you are hurting?”

I scoff. “No one?”

“No, Charlie. Everyone around you. I admit, I never understood how unfair this all was until recently, and that was”—his fist clenches tighter—“so, so ignorant of me. But quite frankly, you’re hurting me too.”

“You?”

“I care about you!” His voice cracks. “Is that not obvious by now?”

My heart stutters. By caring, he means as a roommate. A friend.

But that crack in his voice didn’t make it seem that way.

“I’m sorry,” I say, and I mean it. “But I can’t just stop trying to handle everything. That’s my one job.”

“Says who? Because I can’t imagine it’s you. Is it what you want?”

I consider Mom, Grandma, and Grandpa, who were so disappointed in her and her store, and Valentine as a whole—but no one has ever said this out loud. Either way, as I stand here in my exhaustion, I know the answer to Jasper’s question. It’s not what I want.

The words stay lodged in my throat.

“You have to tell me what you’re thinking,” Jasper says, his blue eyes hardening from the other side of the room. “I may be a genius, but I’m not a mind reader.”

“I know that,” I grumble.

“Do you? Because every time I do try to read your mind, you get mad at me because I’m always getting it wrong. So, please. The spotlight is yours.”

What am I thinking?

I’m thinking about how Jasper is trying to help me, even though he’s supposed to be a self-obsessed poet with posters of himself on the ceiling. How he’s the most obnoxious person I’ve ever met but one of the most inspiring minds I’ve ever known.

I’m thinking about Jasper. Always. And that’s wrong.

I grip my forehead. “I don’t know what I’m thinking.”

A groan leaves Jasper. He crosses the room and stops in front of me, his bangs shoved up by his headband flopping dramatically around his forehead. “With all due respect, I don’t know what I’m thinking about you either.”

My chest lurches. I lean backward. “Jasper?”

“I had many expectations for my second year at Valentine. Win the Critical Junior Poet’s Award. Model for Poetic Fortune Digest’s Sexiest Poet of the Year. Remain Rank One. But being attracted to my roommate at an all-boys academy was not one of them.”

All my breath drains out of me.

I try to find the logical map for him meaning friend again. There are too many roadblocks this time. “That’s what you’re thinking?”

Jasper’s cheeks tinge pinker than they already are. “I don’t know. I just said I don’t know what I’m thinking.”

“You said you’re attracted to me.”

“I suppose I did say that.”

“Okay.”

We stare at each other.

Jasper starts to pace our bedroom and tosses up his arms. “I mean, of course I said that. Yes. I’ve been searching for you all these years because I fell for you. Those feelings don’t simply poof”—he does some jazz hands—“away!”

I cautiously follow his pacing with my eyes. My face must be as red as his with how scorching it feels. “That doesn’t mean you’re attracted to me now.”

“How could I not be?!” His voice hits a high note I’ve never heard from him.

I readjust my glasses. “You’re panicking.”

“I am not. I’m always composed.”

“Jasper.”

“It all began when I brought that dreadful bookcase in our room. Why ever did I engrave our names like that? Have you noticed it looks like a wedding invitation?”

“Wait. Then? That was before you even knew who I was.”

“That’s why I was having a CRISIS,” Jasper shouts, breaching into hissing basilisk territory, and his eyes blow wide. “I thought I was falling for the love of my life’s BROTHER. I was about to set myself on FIRE.”

“Jasper.”

“And I have been trying so hard to be very, very normal since, but I cannot. Why, Saint Valentine, did I put us in a bedroom together?” He slams himself against my bedpost, sinking toward the floor like a dead body.

Before he falls too far, I walk over, tug him up by the collar, and press my lips to his.

I just want him to shut up, to listen to me. His lips are warm despite the rest of his body always being freezing, and it’s so strangely intoxicating that I almost let him keep kissing me.