Cerita Pendek Male POV Romance & Novel Campus

After dinner, I did what I usually did and went to the front desk to pay. The poor signal held me up for a while, and by the time I finally sorted everything out, my girlfriend and my best friend were nowhere to be seen. I called them more than a dozen times before they finally picked up. "You took too long, so we left without you. We're at the LEGO-building studio on the first floor. Come over." It was during holiday, so the mall was even more crowded than usual. I waited through two rounds of the elevator, but both were packed, so I had no choice but to take the escalator. By the time I reached the studio, there was not a single seat left. Nicole and my best friend were sitting side by side, talking about going to Northbridge University together. They were already mapping out the next ten years of their lives together, from graduate school to their PhDs—a grand plan for the future I had never been able to insert myself into. They had both already been admitted through the early scholars program back in May. I, on the other hand, had failed to do well on my college entrance exam and was still considering retaking it so I could catch up with them. When Nicole saw me standing awkwardly at the entrance, she said with exasperation, "You're always so slow. Just wait outside for now." I stared at the two of them from behind. For some reason, I suddenly felt unbearably tired. I had spent far too long trying to keep up with Nicole. This time, I was done chasing her.

During my mother's prenatal testing, the doctor discovers that I, the baby she's carrying, have the XYY syndrome. Since Mom's health is frail, it will be hard for her to have another baby. My parents somberly decide to have me anyway. When I'm in elementary school, my nanny is playing with me when I accidentally break her arm by stepping on it. During middle school, a few thugs try to rob me on the street, only to end up in the hospital because of me. This one incident makes me famous. Word keeps spreading until I become known as a bully in school. No one dares to offend me at all. I've since graduated from college. During a class reunion with my college classmates, Zoey Johnson, my girlfriend of three years, brings Michael Greer, her male best friend, with her. When a game of Truth or Dare starts, Michael bluntly shares one of Zoey's secrets. "I know she has a mole on one of her nips." He looks smug about what he has just revealed. Everyone else has fallen silent. After glancing at Zoey, who's sitting beside Michael, I pull her off the couch and say, "Take your top off. Let's see if he's telling the truth."

Graduation season has arrived, and my girlfriend's childhood best friend, Daniel Whitmore, now a social media influencer, posts a video titled "The Friendship We Shared." It goes viral overnight. Everyone envies the four of them for staying close for ten years. Before long, people are even shipping Daniel and my girlfriend, Evelyn Hayes, swooning over their childhood-sweethearts story. What no one knows is that I film every second of that video. I even write the narration myself. The video is 20 minutes long, yet there isn't a single shot of me. Not even a mention of my name. I ask Evelyn why, but she barely seems to care. "You didn't join us until college. You can't really say you were part of our friendship." Later, I find a folder on Daniel's computer. Every clip featuring me has been removed and placed in that folder. It's named "An Outsider's Mistake". Then I see what Evelyn had written in their private group chat. "Make sure you delete everything. I don't want anything ruining the feeling that it's always been the four of us." I don't confront them about it. I simply revoke their permission to use any of the footage I've provided. If there's no place for me in their friendship, then they can stop using my camera to remember it.

I was easy to fool. I believed almost everything that people said. During the worst year of my life, a girl in the grade above me tricked me out of my entire living allowance. Juno Halloran split hers with me and helped me get by. She was the only person who had never lied to me. "It's not that you're dumb. Other people are just rotten," she told me. "Stop trusting them. Trust me instead." Then, 1 hour before I was supposed to walk into my grad school entrance exam, she texted me. [I was in a car accident. I'm at the hospital. Get here now.] I rushed to the hospital and found her and her best friend, Brent Ostrow, sitting in the convenience store downstairs, eating nachos. Brent laughed so hard he slapped his thigh. "See? I told you he'd fall for it. One text and he ditches his exam to come running." Juno held a chip to his mouth. "Fine, a bet is a bet. I'll take you to Starfall Park today." I stared at them in disbelief. Juno pulled out a napkin and wiped the sweat from my face. "You're about to graduate, and the world is a nasty place. Consider this lesson number one." My voice shook. "Today's my grad school exam!" Brent rolled his eyes. "Okay, okay, Cooper's about to cry. We'd better get him back before he flunks and blames us for it." When she saw my eyes reddening, Juno panicked too. She sped the entire way there and got me to the exam hall with only 1 minute to spare. I had barely breathed a sigh of relief when the proctor stopped me. "Excuse me, your admission ticket is fake. I need you to leave." I looked down at the paper in my hand. At some point, someone had switched out my admission ticket. In its place was a huge drawing of a pig's head with a message scrawled beside it. [Dumbass Cooper, I'm holding on to your ticket! Surprise!] Beneath that was another line. [Don't trip in the same spot twice. That's lesson number two.] It was Brent's handwriting. It was Juno's idea. I still could not tell truth from lies, but I could tell the difference between genuine care and fake concern. From that day forward, I never trusted anyone so easily again.