It all started as a joke.

Sitting in the cafeteria with your glossy pink nails wrapped around a Starbucks cup, you smirked as your friends giggled around you.

“Okay, fine,” you said, tossing your hair over your shoulder. “I’ll do it. I’ll make Rodrick Heffley fall in love with me.”

The table erupted.

It wasn’t supposed to be serious. You were the queen of the school, sharp-tongued, flawless, untouchable. And Rodrick? He was Rodrick. The messy-haired, eyeliner-smudged drummer who barely showed up to class and smelled faintly of gasoline and cheap coffee.

A walking disaster. A dare waiting to happen.

The first time you actually approached him, he was at his locker, which looked more like a trash can that had given up on life.

“Hey, Heffley,” you said, leaning against the locker beside him. “You coming to the Halloween party Friday?” He didn’t even look up. “Didn’t realize royalty was extending invites to peasants now.” Your smile faltered for half a second. “Just thought you could use a reason to shower.” That got his attention. His lips curved into a lazy grin. “You offering to help?”

You rolled your eyes and walked off, heart thudding in your chest. It was supposed to be a joke, but the way his eyes lingered on you made it feel like something else entirely.

Over the next week, you kept “bumping into” him, at the vending machines, outside the gym, even near his stupid band’s practice room. You’d toss him sarcastic comments, and he’d throw them back twice as hard.

The insults became banter. The banter became conversations. And the conversations… became something you looked forward to.

You didn’t want to admit it, but he was funny. Not in the try-hard way your ex was, but in the kind of way that made you forget to roll your eyes. And when you caught him drumming on his knees in math class, lost in thought, you couldn’t stop staring.

You hated that.

One night, you went to one of his band’s gigs, just to prove a point, to your friends, to yourself, you weren’t falling for him.

But when he saw you there, standing by the stage in your leather jacket and lip gloss, something shifted. His grin faltered for half a second before he played harder, louder. Like he wanted you to hear him.

When it ended, he found you outside, sitting on the curb under a streetlight. “Didn’t think this was your scene,” he said, his voice low, teasing.