The Boy Next Door Is My Nightmare

I've spent four years learning how to be invisible at Westbridge Academy, but apparently nobody told Chase Hendricks that invisible girls can still bleed.

It all started with the class rankings. Every semester, they posted them outside the Dean's office like we were racehorses at auction — names, GPAs, class standings displayed on a gleaming board that might as well have been a guillotine. I'd spent nineteen years being overlooked, underestimated, and written off by people who thought fat girls belonged in the back of every room they entered. But I'd learned something they hadn't: spite is an excellent motivator.

So when I saw my name at the top this morning, I let myself feel it for exactly four seconds.

GRADUATING CLASS RANKINGS — FALL SEMESTER

1. ZARA OWENS — 4.0 GPA

2. CHASE HENDRICKS — 3.98 GPA

Four seconds was al I got before Tyler Mace's voice came through the hallway like a serrated blade.

"Yo, Chase! You got beaten by the fat chick!"

The hallway didn't just go quiet, It went still. That particular kind of silence that happens right before a crowd decides whether they're witnessing entertainment or a funeral.

I should've walked away. I'd survived four years at this school by knowing when to disappear, when to let things roll off, when to be so small and so quiet that cruelty couldn't find a target. But my hand was still on my backpack strap and my name was still at the top of that board, and some stupid, reckless part of me thought maybe — just maybe — this one time would be different.

I turned around and saw Chase Hendricks stood fifteen feet away, surrounded by his usual orbit of teammates and hangers-on. Tall, sharp-jawed, dark hair falling just right like even gravity wanted to do him favors. He had the kind of face that made people stop mid-sentence, the kind of presence that bent rooms. Westbridge Academy's golden boy, Captain of the football team and the guy everyone wanted to be or be with.

And right now, he was staring at the rankings board like it had personally insulted his bloodline.

Tyler leaned against the lockers, grinning like he'd just won the lottery. "Damn, Hendricks. You've been going head-to-head with her all semester and she still smoked you. That's gotta sting."

Someone in the crowd snickered. Then someone else. The sound built like a wave gathering strength.

Chase's jaw tightened. He looked at the board. At Tyler. Then, finally, at me.

Our eyes met across the hallway, and I saw the exact moment he made his choice.

He smiled. Slow, easy, devastating. The kind of smile that had probably gotten him out of every inconvenient situation he'd ever faced.

"Well," he said, loud enough for everyone to hear, "I guess we know what happens when someone has nothing better to do than study."

The hallway erupted.

Laughter hit me like a physical blow — sharp, ugly, the kind that has teeth. Someone behind me muttered, "Probably the only thing she's good at." Another voice: "Can't get a boyfriend, might as well get a GPA."

Tyler was practically cackling. "Damn!! Chase, that's cold."

Chase shrugged, still smiling. "Just saying. Some of us have lives."

He said it casually. Like I wasn't even worth the effort of real cruelty. Like I was a joke that had already reached its punchline.

Then he turned and walked away, his friends trailing behind him like planets orbiting the sun, and I stood there with my throat tight and my hands shaking and my name still sitting at number one on a board that suddenly felt like the loneliest place in the world.

The crowd dispersed. The hallway swallowed the moment whole.

I made it to the bathroom before the tears came. I locked myself in the furthest stall, pressed my forehead against the cool metal door, and breathed through my nose until my hands stopped shaking.

I had kept my head down for four years and I'd been so careful, so quiet, so determined not to give anyone ammunition.

And the one time I let myself want something — the one time I let myself win — Chase Hendricks made sure I knew exactly what it cost.

I hated him, hated this school, hated that I had six more months of this and no escape route.

I pulled out my phone. Twelve messages in the group chat, all from Priya.

Priya: bestie I saw

Priya: are you okay

Priya: where are you

Priya: I swear to god if you're crying in the third-floor bathroom again, I won't take it easy on you.

Priya: I'm coming to find you

I typed back: I'm fine. I just needed some time alone.

Her reply was instant: You're a terrible liar and I love you. Coffee after school?

Can't. Babysitting job starts today.

Priya: THE MYSTERY JOB???

Priya: who is it?

I stared at the screen. My mother had been frustratingly vague about the details — just that it was nothing really.

"His name is Micah," Mom said, folding a dish towel with the kind of focus that meant she wasn't going to look at me. " I got you a job, he's six. His mother Karen,just went back to work full-time and their babysitter cancelled last minute. She asked if I have anybody interested, I told her you were available."

I set my fork down. "Tell me you're joking."

"You sat your ass right here two weeks ago complaining about needing a job to fix your laptop. Now I got you one. So stop complaining."

"A job, Mom. Not a babysitting gig you signed me up for without asking."

I picked up my fork. "Fine."

"I told her you'd start tomorrow."

"Of course you did."

But then I'd said yes because my laptop was dying and I needed money for a replacement before college applications opened. I hadn't asked questions.

Now, staring at Priya's message, I felt something cold settle in my stomach.

I'll tell you later, I typed.

I didn't know how right I was to be afraid.

The address Mom gave me was in Maplewood Heights — the part of town where the houses had gates and the driveways could fit three cars. I stood on the front porch at six o'clock sharp, backpack slung over one shoulder, jaw set.

I could do this. It was just babysitting. Four hours, four nights a week. I'd survived worse.

I knocked.

The door swung open.

And my entire world tilted sideways.

Chase Hendricks stood in the doorway, barefoot, in a black t-shirt and grey sweatpants, hair damp like he'd just showered. For one horrible, suspended second, neither of us moved.

Then his expression shifted like a surprise flickering into something harder, colder, recognition without warmth.

"You're the babysitter?" he said and that sounds more like an accusation.

My mouth was too dry. "You've got to be kidding me."

"Trust me, I'm just as thrilled as you are." He stepped back, holding the door open but not looking at me. "Micah's upstairs. Try not to screw it up."

The dismissal was so casual, so cutting, that for a second I couldn't breathe.

He turned and walked into the house like I was nothing. Like I was furniture. Like I hadn't just spent the last eight hours with his words ringing in my ears.

I should've left. I should've turned around, walked straight home, and told my mother this job wasn't worth my sanity.

But I needed the money. And more than that — more than anything — I needed to prove that Chase Hendricks didn't get to take up every room I walked into.

So I stepped inside.

The house was beautiful in that effortless, old-money way. Hardwood floors. Family photos on the walls. The kind of warmth that came from people who'd never had to choose between paying rent and buying groceries.

Chase was already halfway up the stairs.

"Micah eats at six-thirty," he said without turning around, voice flat and commanding like he was giving orders to someone whose name he couldn't be bothered to remember. "Nothing with sugar after seven or he won't sleep. Mom left instructions in the kitchen. Don't touch anything you don't need to touch."

Something in me snapped.

"Excuse me?"

He stopped. Turned halfway, one hand on the banister, eyebrow raised.

I took three steps forward. Looked him dead in the eye.

"Let's get something straight," I said, voice low and steady and sharp as glass. "I don't care what happened today. I don't care that you're upset I beat you or that your fragile ego can't handle someone like me coming first. But in this house, you don't get to talk to me like I'm beneath you."

His eyes narrowed. "I—"

"I'm not finished." My heart was hammering but my voice didn't shake. "I'm here to do a job. I'm going to do it well. And you're going to treat me with basic human respect while I'm under this roof, or I walk out that door and you can explain to your mother why her 'lovely church friend's daughter' quit on day one."

The silence stretched and Chase stared at me like he'd never actually seen me before. Like I'd just materialized out of thin air instead of being the girl he'd humiliated six hours ago.

Then — and I still don't know what possessed him — his expression broke Just slightly. The cold mask slipped and something almost like shame flickered underneath.

"You're right," he said quietly.

I blinked. "What?"

"You're right." He exhaled, ran a hand through his damp hair. "That was—" He stopped. Started again. "I'm sorry. For today. For just now. That wasn't fair."

I didn't know what to do with that. People didn't apologize at Westbridge. Not real apologies. Not ones that sounded like they meant it.

Before I could respond, a small voice yelled from upstairs: "CHASE, IS SHE HERE YET?"

A door flew open and a tiny blur of motion came hurtling down the staircase — dark curls, gap-toothed grin, a superhero cape tied around his neck.

"You're Zara!" The kid crashed into my legs like a battering ram and looked up at me with eyes so bright I felt something in my chest crack wide open. "I'm Micah! I'm six! Do you like dinosaurs? I like dinosaurs. I have seventeen dinosaurs. Do you wanna see?"

He grabbed my hand without waiting for an answer.

I let him pull me toward the living room, still reeling, still trying to process the fact that Chase Hendricks had just apologized.

When I glanced back, Chase was still standing on the stairs, watching us. His expression was unguarded in a way I'd never seen at school — something soft and unprotected, like he'd forgotten to put his armor back on.

Our eyes met.

He looked away first. Disappeared upstairs without another word.

I stood there, hand-in-hand with a six-year-old who was already chattering about pterodactyls and how they weren't technically dinosaurs, and I felt the ground shift beneath me.

This was going to be a problem.

A huge, complicated, utterly unavoidable problem.