Dares with the Boy Who Doesn't Care

Chapter Twenty-Six(Rose POV)

"Wow, you're so nice that must be why you have so many guys chasing after you."

"I do not!" I practically yell at Kyle, completely unconvinced and completely forgetting that we're in a library. "What would make you even say that." I whisper this time.

"It's true! You're all anyone in the locker room talks about. The girl everyone wants but no one can have. It's because you're always around those guys, and because you're kinda gorgeous." He says flipping a page in his notebook.

I look away, preparing to turn into a tomato because my body doesn't know how to react to compliments properly. It's weird. I consider myself the storybook definition of a nerd. Number 2 out of 189, I'm a teen who spends her weekends studying and doing homework, even other people's homework.

Yes, I've started doing my fellow classmates homework for them again. I can't decide if I'm more afraid of Mark finding out or of a student failing a class because of me.

Anyway, now Kyle is telling me that people actually like me. It's probably just because of my association with the guys, but even when I'm not with them I still receive stares from every possible direction. Before I could say it was because I was "the poor girl", but now there are even more people here who are probably in worse situations than I am, so that excuse is out the window. It can't be, am I popular? I could just be popular by association, because that's a thing apparently.

My knights made this possible for me. Though I still get cornered in the bathroom by students desperately in need of a five page research paper, everyone is being so much nicer towards me. Some a little too nice. The guy, whose name I've learned is Omar and who I distinctly remember as being the boy who tripped me in the hallway before giving my knights their title, he left a note in my locker. I don't know what it said because I was too scared to open it. I just left it there hoping that if I ignored it, it would go away. It's crazy because I don't even know what it says, I think I'm scared of the idea of confrontation, or confession. Even compliments leave me oddly uncomfortable.

Kyle looks up from his Literature book, staring directly into my eyes. "I rarely ever see you without at least one of them and I never see you talking to anyone else. In fact I'm surprised, that you're even talking to me right now, they hate me!"

I look down at the pile of books between us. I was happy to find out that I had a free period and immediately came to the library. I have to admit like every other time that I've been coming here it was because I was hoping to run into Jamie, again. However I ran into Kyle and now we're studying together. Even though this is only my second time running into him, I can already tell that it won't be the last. He's really great to be around and deserves a chance, I don't care what anyone else thinks.

"Do you know why they hate you so much?" Okay, I care a little bit, but it's just based on curiosity.

"Yeah, it's kinda stupid and childish but it's whatever I guess." He flips past a page that we haven't even read yet.

"Can you tell me?"

"It's so stupid I don't even like talking about it, but if you really want to know you can ask them. They're the ones holding the grudge, I have nothing against them."

It's good to know that the hate is one sided, I think it'll be easier to resolve that way. I usually like being around Noah, Cameron, Mark, Leo and Jamie but sometimes it can be really confusing. I still don't know why they don't like Kyle and now I don't know who to ask for the answers.

I sigh. "Okay, can you explain networking to me?"

•••

At lunch the guys are notably less ghost-like, compared to the other day, with the exception of Jamie. Noah claims the less vocal Jamie is the more likely he is to be upset about something, so I guess today and that day something had really pissed him off.