I understood that there would always be a girl easier to catch than I. Plenty of girls had been caught up in his gaze, and like moths to a flame, they flirted with him, desired him, had him, and then left him, all of them burned.

This is what kept me sane: the knowledge that I could be turned into damaged goods in the span of a few hours one night. It seemed rather low for me to stoop: to lower my standards from someone who would love me, and me only, to someone who would leave me for the next pair of knockers.

I watched him give a shoulder squeeze to a girl who seemed to have been teased by the crowd of wannabe girlfriends who all chorused with giggles as they made up with her. In no way would they dare to upset their prized King. The warning bell rang and he walked the girl to her class with his arm still draped over her shoulders. I’m glad my next class was in the other direction.

And yet as soon as he was out of my sight, I knew I wanted to be the owner of those shoulders.