Page 120 of Unloved

“No!” I round on him. “You need to listen. We are broken up. We are done, for good.”

“Because you’re sleeping with Fredderic?” He laughs. “Truly, RoRo. That’s pathetic, even for you.”

“Matt is a better person than you have a chance of ever being,” I snap. “But, for the record, this”—I gesture between us—“has nothing to do with him. Freddy is myfriend. That’s something you never were to me. I should have done this a long time ago.”

I take a settling breath, trying to press a calm I don’t feel into every limb.

“This was inappropriate at the least, and an abuse of power at the most. I’ve let too much slide, and maybe that was naive of me, but I am reporting this to Tinley.”

“Tinley won’t take your side on this. I’m her cohort lead.”

It’s upsettingly true—something I’ve tried not to be annoyed or hurt with in the past. Trying to convince myself that she wasn’t favoring the boys of our group over me—trying not to take it personally.

“Maybe Tinley won’t,” I say. “But I’m betting the dean will. Especially if I accompany that with proof that you’ve ignored a student’s accommodations form.”

His nostrils flare at the threat. “Fredderic tell you that?” He laughs, and a chill works down my spine. “He’s a fucking liar and an idiot. Tryit, Ro. I guarantee I’ve got more support in our entire department than you can wrangle together.”

I want to argue more, but I can feel the threat, the way he’s breaking pieces of me down to sink his claws back into me.

But I won’t let that happen. He won’t get the reaction out of me that he so desperately wants.

“Leave me alone. Leave Matt alone—just stop. Or I am going to get our department involved. I don’t care anymore, Tyler.”

Leaving his house had been the easiest thing I’d done concerning Tyler. I wanted to go to Freddy immediately, but he’d been unreachable.

And I was still so raw from the energy that standing up to Tyler took, still am, nearly twenty-four hours later, after spending the night studying and perfecting my research proposal—my original one, before Tyler tried to redirect me.

It’d been years since I pulled an all-nighter, but after the situation with Tyler and the inability to calm my mind of what-ifs concerning Matt, I decided being productive was my best outcome. My phone died somewhere in the middle of the day, and I hadn’t had the energy to leave yet, so I just… disconnected.

I used the hours after finishing the proposal to journal, like I’d done when I was in high school. After my dad’s stroke, our family therapist had suggested it, and it helped. But I stopped when I moved to Waterfell and got busy, stopped taking care of myself or putting myself first.

And then I read the books Freddy got for me—on the bookstore trip that felt like a core memory, melded into what makes me,me.

To be loved is to be seen.

An old adage, but also a quote from the shy wallflower character of my favorite romance, when she gains her strength and becomes the heroine of her own story.

Isn’t that what Matt was doing? Seeing me?

I try not to think about it too much, because if there’s anything tutoring Freddy has showed me, it’s his extreme emotional intelligence.

That, tied with his desperation to please and keep everyone around him happy.

The sun set at four and the winds are getting brutal as I climb the steps to Millay and swipe my card, pulling the door hard against the breeze. Climbing the stairs instead of using the elevator that is definitely not up to code leaves a damp sweat on the back of my neck and an embarrassing heave of my breath before I get to—

“Freddy?”

Matt Fredderic is at my dorm room door, head tilted back with his eyes closed.

He’s too big for this ridiculously ancient, small hallway—all six foot three of him stretched out lazily across the floor, making me wonder if anyone’s accidentally kicked him while hopping over his long legs. His hoodie is scrunched up around his shoulders, almost like he’s turned it into a makeshift pillow; his golden hair is messy, backpack held like a teddy bear in his lap.

“Matt?” I say.

He jerks, eyelashes fluttering. He’s so beautiful he looks like a Disney prince in some gender-bent version ofSleeping Beauty.

“Ro,” he breathes with a smile. “You’re here.”

You’re here, in that gentle, happy tone that makes me feel wanted and needed.

---