All Chapters of My Accidental Boyfriend: Chapter 51 - Chapter 60

I couldn’t breathe.Jason’s words hung between us like smoke, filling the empty space at my locker until it felt suffocating.“…something I can’t lose.”His voice replayed in my head, raw and shaky in a way I wasn’t used to hearing from him. Jason Cole—the boy who never cracked, who laughed at rules, who could charm teachers and break hearts like it was second nature—looked at me like I was the only thing keeping him upright.And I didn’t know what to do with that.Because part of me wanted to lean in.And the other part wanted to run.“Jason…” My voice was barely a whisper.He didn’t move. Didn’t smirk. Didn’t throw some sarcastic comment like he usually would. His eyes stayed locked on mine, vulnerable and steady, and that scared me more than anything.I looked away first, pretending to shuffle books in my locker even though my hands were shaking.“You can’t say things like that,” I muttered.“Why not?” His voice was low, but firm.“Because…” I swallowed hard, searching for words. “

There are only so many times a girl can watch her best friend’s life turn into a soap opera before she either throws popcorn at the screen or storms on set to rewrite the script herself.Right now, I was leaning toward storming the set.Because seriously—what was happening with Lila, Jason, and Alex?Lila had been quiet all morning, her eyes puffy from crying even though she’d slapped on concealer thick enough to survive a hurricane. Jason had been walking around like a storm cloud with a smirk glued on top of it, which was terrifying in itself. And Alex? Alex had this unreadable, calm-but-not-calm energy that made me want to shake him and yell, Spit it out already, Romeo!And me? I was caught in the middle of this romantic apocalypse, trying not to scream.We sat at our usual table in the cafeteria, but it didn’t feel usual. Lila kept stabbing at her fries like they’d personally offended her. Jason sat across from her, leaning back with that fake-casual grin, watching her every move.

The thing about being the “popular guy”? Everyone thinks you’ve got it all figured out.The jokes. The confidence. The swagger.What they don’t realize is half the time, I’m just winging it.And when it came to Lila, I wasn’t just winging it—I was drowning.I watched her walk off with Alex after school, and something twisted in my gut. Not just jealousy—it was worse than that. It was this gnawing, restless ache, like I’d handed someone else the most important play in the game and was stuck on the sidelines.Alex, with his neat hair and neat life. Alex, who probably alphabetized his socks and knew exactly what to say to make Lila smile.I hated it.But more than that—I hated how much I cared.The guys noticed, of course. My friends never missed a chance to point out when I wasn’t acting like myself.“Yo, Cole,” Ryan called from across the parking lot. “You’re losing your touch, man. Your fake girlfriend’s hanging out with Boy Scout over there. You jealous?”I flipped him off. “Shut it.

I’d always thought of myself as patient.Steady. Dependable. The guy who doesn’t get rattled.But lately? Lila was testing every ounce of that patience.It started with the little things. She didn’t text back as quickly. She smiled at me, but the smile didn’t quite reach her eyes. She kept glancing over her shoulder in the hallways—toward him.Jason Cole.I told myself it was nothing. Jason was a storm—loud, messy, impossible to ignore. Lila wasn’t like that. Lila was sunlight. Warm. Steady.She didn’t need chaos. She needed someone who grounded her.Someone like me.At least, that’s what I’d always believed.I’d liked her for months before I said anything. We’d shared notes, inside jokes, quiet study sessions at the library. She was the one person I felt I could be myself around—not the guy who had to have perfect grades, not the reliable friend everyone dumped their problems on. Just me.When I finally worked up the courage to ask her to Homecoming, she’d smiled that smile, the real

“Everything.”That word had been bouncing around my skull all afternoon, like a song I couldn’t shut off. It echoed in Jason’s voice, low and serious, stripped of the usual arrogance he wore like armor.Everything.He didn’t even look like he regretted saying it. And I hated that part of me—the traitorous, ridiculous part—kept replaying the way his eyes had looked when he said it. Like he actually meant it.Which was insane. Because Jason Cole didn’t mean things like that. He meant jokes, and smirks, and dramatic entrances. Not words like “everything.”I pulled my hoodie tighter as I sat cross-legged on my bed, textbook open in front of me but completely useless. My notes blurred together, highlighter streaks looking more like an art project gone wrong than anything academic. I hadn’t even noticed that my pen had stopped moving ten minutes ago.Because Jason wouldn’t leave my head.“Ughhh.” I dropped the pen and buried my face in my hands.This was not supposed to happen. Fake dating