Heartbreaker (Mileven AU)

step up in the game

"How did your little date go, then?"

Jane winced slightly and let out a deep sigh when she saw the sternness on Max's face. It was only a slight change, but she could see plainly that Max did not approve of her plan, and probably never would. As soon as she sat down under their tree and saw Max's quiet attitude, she knew that it was only a matter of time before she was given a lecture. 

Jane huffed. "I told you it wasn't a date or anything. His friends came too, and when I tried to hold his hand he almost ran out of the movie theater-"

"I told you that Mike isn't just some puppet that you can play with" Max rubbed her eyes and raised her eyebrows defensively, "Jane, it isn't fair on him to be your little experiment and it certainly isn't fair on his friends either!"

Jane cracked a small smirk. "You just care about Lucas, Maxine."

"I'm serious, Jane" Max nudged her, "What do you think is really going to come out of this? What are you getting out of it?"

She was quiet for a while, looking down at the blade of grass between her fingers. She pinched it slightly, watching it fall from her grasp and flutter down onto the ground. Jane laid down and looked up at the clouds forming, sighing gently. She thought back to all of the reasons that she contemplated before going through with it, seeing a flash of his evil smirk and cruel words through his mind, remembering every moment where people had walked away from her or whispered that she was approaching their group. 

"Proving Troy wrong, proving everybody wrong" she stated firmly. 

Max shook her head sadly and spoke up in a disappointed voice. "It just isn't the right way to go about it, Jane. I don't want everyone to get hurt and I definitely don't want you to get hurt. I-I heard about last night from Lucas, alright. Do you know what he was saying? He was telling me that you were such a genuine and cool person, someone who he could see the party hanging around with for a long time."

Jane swallowed back the guilt and closed her eyes. 

"He said that Mike was really beginning to like you, really like you..." Max breathed. 

She squeezed her eyes shut tighter. "I know you can't understand...you probably never will, Max. But this is something that I need to do for myself, and I-I know that it will be worth the consequences. I am sure that if you were in my position-"

Max scoffed but said nothing and Jane trailed off with a small sigh. Jane focused on pushing back the feeling of nausea climbing up her throat at the thought of Mike's face when he would find out what she had really been doing. How all of their conversations, all of the smiles she had thrown at him softly at had been for show, all a trick to get him to fall for her so that she could rub it in someone else's face. 

"What if you start to like him for real?" Max asked suddenly. 

Jane's voice was firm and quick. "I won't."

"But if you do..." Max insisted hesitantly. "What would happen then?"

"I won't" Jane repeated, hoping to believe it herself. 

...

Watching Mike's freckles move around as he spoke was something that intrigued Jane more than anything. It had become her favorite past time, learning that watching the small dots dance around on his cheeks was much more interesting than learning about Earth and Biology. She would snap out of her daze when Mike asked if she understood the topic, raising his eyebrows to make sure that she was paying attention. 

"Y-Yeah, yeah" she coughed, nodding along, "I get it."

Mike rolled his eyes, snapping the book shut. "You're lying. You haven't been paying attention to a single thing I have been saying, have you?"