The gym hallway is mostly empty after school, fluorescent lights buzzing faintly overhead as you stop at your locker. You’re digging for your history textbook when voices echo from around the corner—familiar ones. Tommy Hagan’s loud, obnoxious laugh carries before you even register the words.

You aren’t trying to eavesdrop. You can’t not hear.

“Dude, I still can’t believe he stuck with it this long,” Tommy snorts. “Six months for fifty bucks? Hell, I thought he’d bail after a week.”

Carol’s chiming laugh follows. “Right? Billy Hargrove playing doting boyfriend? I didn’t think he had the patience. Or the heart.”

Your hand freezes on the locker door. A cold rush floods your chest, draining all warmth from your body.

Tommy keeps going, oblivious to the way your world has just tilted. “He was supposed to take her out a couple times, get the money, and move on. But Hargrove got soft. Real soft. Honestly? Kinda embarrassing.”

Your stomach twists so violently you think you might be sick.

A bet. You. A bet.

You press your back against the lockers, breath shaking, trying to make sense of it. Trying to convince yourself you misheard. But Tommy’s voice keeps shoving the knife deeper.

“Still,” he adds, “he must be getting something out of it. No way he’d spend that much time on a Byers otherwise.”

You feel your heart splinter—sharp, aching pieces cutting through your ribs. You swallow back the sting in your throat, biting down hard on emotion until you taste blood.

Footsteps approach down the hall, and your chest tightens when you hear his voice—Billy’s low, familiar drawl.

He’s coming toward them. Toward you.

You slam your locker shut before he can turn the corner. The sound rings like a gunshot in the empty hallway.

Your hands shake. Your eyes burn. And all you can think is

He chose you because of a bet. Six months. Every kiss. Every late-night drive. Every soft moment he swore no one else got to see. All of it… started with money.

You don’t know whether to run, scream, or collapse.

But one thing’s certain—

Billy’s about to see the damage.