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Chapter 60 — “It Didn’t Mean Anything”

Author: Pauline Maxwell
last update Petsa ng paglalathala: 2026-02-10 14:38:26

The silence stretched too long.

It pressed into Ruby’s chest, heavy and wrong, until the warmth of the kiss faded and reality rushed back in—sharp, unforgiving.

Kai stepped back first.

That alone should have warned her.

He ran a hand over his face, breathing unevenly, eyes unfocused like he’d woken up somewhere he didn’t recognize.

“This—” he started, then stopped.

Ruby waited. She didn’t reach for him. She didn’t soften. She just watched.

He laughed once, short and brittle. “This was a mistake
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  • The Guy Who Lives Next Door    Chapter 72

    Kai turns the volume up.It’s instinct—muscle memory from years of being watched, admired, followed. If something slips from his grip, he tightens the show. Makes it brighter. Louder. Impossible to ignore.His laugh carries down the hallway before he does.He shows up late to first period, door swinging open like an entrance cue. Someone snickers. Someone else straightens. A few heads turn automatically, trained to react.Kai grins, unapologetic, flashing that effortless charm that used to bend rooms around him.“Sorry,” he says lightly, not sorry at all. “Traffic.”There’s no traffic on campus.The teacher sighs but lets it go. They always do.Kai slides into his seat—leans back, sprawls a little wider than necessary. His gaze flicks, just once, toward Ruby.She doesn’t look up.Not even a glance.The grin stays on his face. It cracks on the inside.By lunchtime, the performance escalates.Kai drops into a chair too hard. Tosses his jacket across the table like a flag. Tells a story

  • The Guy Who Lives Next Door    Chapter 71

    Ruby’s decision doesn’t arrive with fireworks.No confrontation. No tears. No dramatic exit.It comes quietly—on a Monday morning when she pauses outside the classroom door and chooses a different seat.Not the one near the window where Kai usually leans back with his chair tilted too far.Not the row where their knees once brushed, where his presence felt unavoidable.She takes a seat closer to the front. Alone.It’s small. Invisible. Devastating.Kai notices immediately.He always notices when something shifts in a room—when attention bends away from him, when a rhythm changes. He glances up, already expecting to catch Ruby’s eyes the way he always does.He doesn’t.She’s looking at the board. Focused. Calm. As if he isn’t there at all.His mouth curves into a lazy smile anyway. A reflex. A mask.Doesn’t matter, he tells himself. She’s just in a mood.The class starts. The air hums.Ruby doesn’t look back once.She changes her routes that week.Not dramatically—just enough.She leav

  • The Guy Who Lives Next Door    Ch. 70 — What He Stands to Lose

    The school courtyard had changed. Not physically—same stone benches, same banners fluttering lazily in the afternoon air—but something in the energy had shifted. Conversations didn’t hush the way they used to when Kai Kingston passed. Heads didn’t automatically turn. For the first time, the world wasn’t rearranging itself around him. Ruby stood near the steps of the main building, sunlight catching in her hair. She was laughing—not the careful kind, not the brittle politeness she’d learned to wear early on, but real laughter. Easy. Unafraid. People were listening to her. A junior asked her something about the debate committee. A teacher paused to compliment her presentation from earlier that day. Someone thanked her for speaking up last week, for saying what everyone else had been too scared to say. Respect looked good on her. Theo stood beside her—not looming, not staking a claim. Just there. Solid. When Ruby spoke, he listened. When someone interrupted, he didn’t step in unle

  • The Guy Who Lives Next Door    Ch. 69 — Losing the Game

    Kai had always known the house was too big. It swallowed the sound. Even his footsteps felt temporary, like the floor didn’t bother remembering him once he passed. Tonight, the halls were lit brighter than usual—staff moving quietly, a dinner table set for people who weren’t hungry, for people who weren’t coming.He stood in the doorway of the study, jacket still on, tie loosened and forgotten. His father sat behind the desk, glasses perched low, absorbed in something that mattered more than a son. His mother lounged on the couch, scrolling through an event recap she hadn’t attended. They didn’t look up.“Sit,” his father said, eyes never leaving the papers.Kai didn’t.“I don’t want to talk about optics,” Kai said. His voice surprised him—steady, low, resolute. “I want to talk about us.”That earned a glance. Brief. Calculating.“We don’t have time for melodrama,” his mother said, eyes still on her phone. “If this is about the school—”“It’s not,” Kai cut in sharply. “It’s about you

  • The Guy Who Lives Next Door    Chapter 68 Brielle Overplays

    “Can we please stop talking about Kai?” she said. The post didn’t drop with a bang.It slid into the gossip app sometime between second period and lunch, quietly enough that Ruby didn’t even see it at first.She found out the way rumors always found her—through silence.Whispers that stopped when she turned her head.Phones lowered too quickly.Eyes flicking to her, then away.Not hostile.Not cruel.…Uncertain.Lila caught up to her outside the science wing, breathless. “Have you checked your phone?”Ruby shook her head. “Should I?”Lila hesitated. That was new. Usually Lila was fire-first, consequences later. “Brielle posted something.”Ruby exhaled slowly. She felt oddly calm about it. Maybe that was exhaustion. Maybe growth. Maybe she’d simply run out of fear.They sat on the low brick wall near the courtyard instead of rushing to class. Students passed them, some pretending not to stare, others not bothering.Lila turned her phone toward her.The post wasn’t long.That was Briell

  • The Guy Who Lives Next Door    Chapter 67 The Cost of Control

    The next morning Kai didn’t plan to lose control.That was the thing everyone always got wrong about him.He didn’t wake up wanting to explode. He didn’t stalk the halls looking for a target. Control had been stitched into him since childhood—tailored suits, measured words, the kind of silence that bent rooms to his will.But fear had a way of loosening seams.It started in chemistry.He hadn’t slept. Again. The house had been too quiet the night before—no parents, no voices, just the low hum of security systems and the echo of Ruby’s words looping in his head.You don’t lose people. You outgrow the version of them that lets you hurt them.He sat at his lab station, leg bouncing, jaw tight. The teacher droned on about reaction rates, but all Kai could hear was the whispering behind him.Not subtle. Not even careful.“…told you his name wouldn’t save him forever.”“…saw the security footage, right?”“…Kingston finally slipping.”His fingers curled around the edge of the desk.Then some

  • The Guy Who Lives Next Door    Chapter 65 — Cracks in the Crown

    Ruby didn't say a thing, she just smiled.The donor event was supposed to be untouchable.That was the word everyone used.Untouchable, like the Kingstons themselves.Ruby hadn’t planned on staying long. She was only there because the debate committee had been asked to help usher guests—smiles, pro

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  • The Guy Who Lives Next Door    Ch. 11 — Small Revenge

    Ruby didn’t mean to embarrass Kai.Not at first.She only wanted space — a little distance to breathe, to stop feeling like she was constantly pressed against a live wire whenever he looked at her. After seeing him in the hall, watching her and Lila like he had some unspoken claim, something stubbo

    last updateHuling Na-update : 2026-03-17

  • The Guy Who Lives Next Door    Ch. 10 — The Girl Who Helps Her

    Ruby didn’t leave the bathroom stall for a long time.She stayed there, knees pressed to her chest, listening for that silent person who had knocked. Nothing. No footsteps. No voice. Just the strange pressure of knowing someone had stood on the other side of the thin metal, breathing, waiting, then

    last updateHuling Na-update : 2026-03-17

  • The Guy Who Lives Next Door    Ch. 9 — Ruby’s First Breakdown

    Ruby waited until Kai was completely gone—until his footsteps faded, until the echo of his presence dissolved into the noisy hallways—before she let her body move again.Her hands shook. Her knees felt weak. Her lungs burned with the effort of holding everything in.She needed to hide.She needed a

    last updateHuling Na-update : 2026-03-17
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