Jax's Little Obsession

Chapter 11

Maya’s Pov

By the second day, I notice people looking at me differently. Not the curious stares from before, but something sharper, something whispered behind hands as I walked past. It does not take long to figure out where it is coming from. Briar.

“She is telling everyone Jax bought your spot here,” Ava says, sliding into the seat next to me at lunch, her face tight with worry. “And that is not even the worst part.”

“What is the worst part?” I ask, already dreading the answer.

Ava hesitates, glancing around before lowering her voice. “She is saying you are sleeping with him. That the whole scholarship thing is just a cover story so it does not look as obvious.”

My stomach twists, but I force my face to stay calm. “Let her say what she wants.”

“Maya, this is serious,” Ava says. “People believe her. She has been here since freshman year. She knows everyone, and everyone listens to her.”

“So what am I supposed to do?” I ask, my voice sharper than I mean it to be. “Chase after every person on this campus and explain my entire life story? I did nothing wrong. I am not going to beg people to believe me.”

Ava sighs, but she does not argue further, just squeezes my hand once before class starts.

Through the day, I feel the whispers following me like a shadow I cannot shake off. Girls stop talking when I walk past. Boys smirk in a way that makes my skin crawl. By the time classes end, my jaw aches from clenching it so hard trying to hold my composure.

I spot Jax near the engineering building, talking with a couple of professors, looking completely unbothered by any of it. Something inside me snaps.

“Can we talk?” I ask, my voice tight as I approach him.

He glances at me, immediately catching the anger simmering beneath my expression. “Of course,” he says, excusing himself from the conversation and following me a few steps away, out of earshot.

“You have heard the rumors,” I say, not bothering to soften it. “Everyone has heard the rumors. Briar is telling the entire campus that you bought my way in here, that I am sleeping with you to keep my spot. And you are just standing there, talking to professors like nothing is happening.”

“I have heard,” he confirms calmly.

“That is it?” My voice rises, drawing a few curious glances from students passing by. “You have heard, and you are doing nothing about it?”

“What exactly do you want me to do, Maya?” he asks, his voice steady despite the frustration building in mine.

“I do not know, something! You could tell people the truth. You could shut Briar down with one sentence. Everyone listens to you. One word from you and this would all stop.”

“And then what?” he asks, stepping closer, his eyes holding mine steadily. “The next time someone challenges you, you come running to me again? And the time after that? If I fight every battle for you, you will never learn how to survive in this world on your own.”

“So this is a lesson to you,” I say bitterly, crossing my arms. “Watching me get humiliated in front of an entire campus is just some kind of exercise for my personal growth.”

“That is not what I said.”

“It is basically what you said,” I snap. “You know what I think? I think you are enjoying this. I think you like watching me struggle because it amuses you, the same way everything about me amuses you.”

Something shifts in his expression, the calm mask slipping just slightly to reveal something sharper underneath. “You think I enjoy watching you struggle?” he asks, his voice quieter now, more intense.

“That is what it looks like from where I am standing.”

He steps even closer, close enough that I have to tilt my head up to keep looking at him. “I do not enjoy watching you struggle, Maya,” he says, his voice low. “I enjoy watching you win.”

The words catch me completely off guard, stealing the anger right out of my chest for a moment. I stare at him, searching his face for any sign that he is just saying this to calm me down, but his eyes are steady, serious, completely unlike the teasing expression he usually wears.

“What?” I manage to say.

“You solved that engineering problem in front of the entire class without blinking,” he says. “You stood up to Dakota without needing me to defend you. You handled my family at dinner better than most people twice your age could have managed. Every single time someone underestimates you, you prove them wrong within minutes. That is not something I need to fix for you. That is something I get to watch happen.”

My heart is pounding so hard I am sure he can hear it in the silence stretching between us. “This is different,” I say quietly, though my voice does not sound nearly as certain as I want it to. “Briar has half the campus believing lies about me. This is not something I can just outsmart with a math problem.”

“No,” he agrees. “But it is something you can outlast. Rumors only have power if you let them shake you. The moment people see they cannot rattle you, they lose interest.”

I want to argue further, but something about the steady way he is looking at me makes the fight drain slowly out of my chest. Maybe he is right. Maybe fighting every battle for me really would just prove Briar’s point, that I cannot survive here without him constantly rescuing me.

“Fine,” I say finally, my voice quieter now. “I will handle it myself.”

“I know you will,” he says, and there is something in his voice that sounds almost like pride, warm and unexpected. “You always do.”

I turn to walk away, still frustrated, still uncertain, but something about his words settles differently in my chest than the anger did. I enjoy watching you win. The sentence repeats itself in my mind the entire walk back to my dorm, refusing to let me forget the way his eyes looked when he said it, like he actually meant every single word.