Page 55 of Chasing Mr. Prefect

“It’s not about you being good or whatever,” he said and I closed my eyes as I listened. “It comes with the territory, youknow. Caring for you. Or caring for somebody else. Cutting them some slack, giving them space to learn. Watching them become what they wanted to be.

Everyone just needs a chance and some time to get their shit together. A lot of people don’t get that. They’d rather spend time judging others than learning from them. You want to know what I learned from you?”

“Cutting classes?” I offered.

“Hey, that was one time,” he countered, referring to that day he did not show up to classes all day for that Makati interview. “I learned that there were a lot of things more important than academics.”

“Wow, that’s heavy,” I teased. “What could be more important to you than academics, Mr. Prefect?”

“Family. Standing up for oneself. Fighting back when the situation calls for it.”

“I’m always up for a good fight, thank you,” I answered.

“Sabi ko when the situation calls for it,” he countered, nudging me with his elbow. “Man, that side of you was scary. You were tough and you never let others win, and sometimes, bwisit na bwisit ako sa tigas ng ulo mo.”

“So I take it you’re not scared or bwisit anymore?”

“Not quite. Uy, alam mo, Katniss reminded me a lot of you when I watchedThe Hunger Gamesthe other day.”

“Yeah? You think I’d make a good tribute?” I said, moving away from his shoulder to look at him.

He closed his eyes in exasperation. “See? It’s so you. You avoid stuff. You can spin anything into a joke without reading the room and you’ve gotten so used to it that you’ve become unaware that you’re hurting people.”

“Where did that one come from? Are we still talking aboutThe Hunger Gameshere?” I demanded.

“There you go.” he said, scratching his nose and avoiding my eyes. “See? Manhid.”

I stared at him for a while, unable to comprehend a thing.

“Matulog ka na nga. We’re supposed to attend mass tomorrow morning,” he said, standing up suddenly.

I followed suit and punched his arm hard.

“Aray, Lavinia!” he complained.

“‘Tanginang ‘to,” I barked. “What did I do to you? Why are you telling me these things and then tell me to sleep?”

“Do you have any idea how difficult it is,” he snapped, gritting his teeth as he rubbed the spot on his shoulder that I hit, “whenever you speak to me like this and you—” He stopped midway through his sentence, looking at a loss for words. Cholo then groaned at the heavens and turned his back on me, throwing his hands in the air.

“But I don’t understand!” I answered. “What’s difficult?”

“Of course, you don’t. You never listened, otherwise you would have figured it out.”

“Figured out what?” I asked, frustrated now. My heart was doing these flips inside my ribcage and again, I could not think straight. “Do you want me to push you off this roof?”

“No need,” he snapped but his voice was now a mere whisper. “It’s already killing me that everyone else can see I’m in love with you and you can’t.”

CHAPTER 23

Excuse me, what?

What Cholo said hit me like a sledgehammer. The atmosphere turned all tense. His tone was a tad accusatory and I turned on defensive mode. “How on earth was I going to figure that out when you kept telling me I was a piece of work that needed fixing?” I said indignantly.

“Not these past few weeks! I did want you to grow up a little when I met you. You were snarky, angry, and all sorts of difficult. But here we are and joke’s on me for ending up liking every single bit of it.”

“But I did just that,” I answered. “Right? I changed. You guys could trust me now. You’re listening to me and it’s like my opinion on things actually matter. You wouldn’t have done that if I didn’t fix myself.”

I did not know what to do with what he told me. I wanted to be offended but there were some parts of what he said that made me want to melt.