His Cruel Friends Bullied Me, So The Star Quarterback Made Me His Fake Girlfriend

The bitter scent of over-roasted coffee beans was a smell Stacey had come to associate with survival. It clung to the air in The Daily Grind, a permanent fixture like the low hum of the espresso machine and the muffled chatter of students who were better at socializing than studying. She sat at her usual table, a small two-top tucked into a corner far from the door, a position chosen for its strategic advantage: minimal foot traffic and maximum anonymity.

Her world had shrunk to the glossy, nine-by-eleven-inch page of her anatomy textbook. The brachial plexus stared back at her, a terrifyingly complex web of nerves rendered in clinical shades of yellow and blue. Roots, trunks, divisions, cords, branches. The mnemonic she’d devised, Really Tired? Drink Coffee Black, circled in her head on a relentless loop. For anyone else, it was just a diagram. For Stacey, it was a map of the territory she had to conquer, a landscape of biological wiring that would determine her grade, her future, her entire life’s trajectory as dictated by a long line of decorated surgeons.

She leaned closer, the spine of the heavy book digging into the edge of the table. A strand of her plain brown hair fell across her face, and she impatiently tucked it behind her ear, her fingers smudged with graphite. Her own notebook lay open next to the text, its pages a testament to her obsessive precision. She had redrawn the plexus three times, her lines clean and exact, her labels printed in tiny, perfect block letters. Different colored pens delineated the five terminal branches—musculocutaneous, axillary, radial, median, ulnar. It wasn't just about memorization; it was about understanding the system so completely that she could visualize it in three dimensions, could imagine it pulsing beneath the skin of the person sitting three tables away, the one laughing too loudly into his phone.

The outside world was a distraction she couldn't afford. The pressure from her parents was a physical weight in her chest, a constant, low-grade ache. An A- wasn't acceptable. A B+ was a catastrophe. Anything less was unthinkable. So she shut it all out. The pop music filtering through the cafe's speakers, the scrape of chairs, the barista calling out names. It all became white noise, a blurry periphery around the sharp, clear focus of her work.

She wore her invisibility like armor. An oversized university sweatshirt, faded jeans, and a pair of functional, unflattering glasses. She kept her head down when she walked across campus, her gaze fixed on the pavement in front of her. It was easier that way. If no one saw her, no one could judge her. No one could find her lacking. Here, in the corner of the coffee shop, she wasn't the awkward girl who never knew what to say at mandatory dorm meetings; she was a future doctor, a scholar dissecting the very machinery of life.

Her pen hovered over the diagram of the axillary nerve. She mouthed the words silently, tracing its path with the tip of her finger. Deltoid, teres minor. Abduction of the arm at the shoulder. The knowledge settled into her brain, slotting neatly into place. A small, quiet thrill went through her—the pure, uncomplicated satisfaction of understanding. For a moment, the pressure receded. It was just her and the beautiful, logical complexity of the human body. She was safe here, hidden behind a fortress of textbooks and diagrams, completely oblivious to the bell that chimed above the coffee shop door.

The bubble of her concentration didn't just pop; it was obliterated. A wave of sound crashed through the coffee shop's quiet hum as the door swung open, admitting a wall of male bodies clad in varsity jackets. They moved as a unit, loud and entitled, their laughter booming in the small space and making the ceramic mugs on the shelves vibrate. The football team. Stacey didn't need to look up to know. Their presence sucked the air out of a room, replacing it with a thick, cloying arrogance.

She hunched her shoulders, trying to make herself smaller, her focus desperately scrabbling to find its hold again on the page. Axillary nerve, C5, C6. Innervates the deltoid. It was useless. The words blurred. The quiet sanctuary she had built in her corner was gone, bulldozed by their arrival.

"Hey, Mark, check this out," a voice cut through the noise, sharp and mocking.

Stacey’s blood went cold. She knew that voice. Mark, a wide-shouldered linebacker with a cruel smirk she’d seen directed at other students in the dining hall. She kept her eyes glued to her textbook, praying they were talking about something, anything, else.

Heavy footsteps approached her table, stopping right beside her. A large shadow fell over her book, eclipsing the diagram of the brachial plexus. She could smell him—a cloying mix of cheap deodorant and sweat.

"Well, well, what do we have here?" Mark’s voice was right above her head. He leaned down, his face uncomfortably close. "It's the library ghost. Didn't know you were allowed out in the daylight."

A chorus of snickers erupted from his friends, who now crowded around her small table, hemming her in. She felt like an animal in a cage, surrounded by predators. Her heart hammered against her ribs, a frantic, trapped bird. She refused to look up, her knuckles white where she gripped her pen.

Mark tapped a thick finger on her textbook. "Human Anatomy. Heavy stuff. You planning on building your own boyfriend out of spare parts? Might be your only chance."

The laughter was louder this time, raw and ugly. Heat flooded Stacey’s face, a painful, prickling burn that spread down her neck and chest. She wanted to disappear. She wanted the floor to swallow her whole. Her careful armor of invisibility had been stripped away, leaving her raw and exposed under the harsh fluorescent lights.

"Look at these notes," another player said, leaning over Mark's shoulder to peer at her notebook. "Jesus, it's color-coded. What are you, some kind of robot?"

"Leave her alone," she whispered, the words barely audible, directed at the page in front of her. It was a mistake. Acknowledging them only fed the fire.

"What was that, sweetheart?" Mark drawled, leaning even closer. He reached out and flicked the corner of her glasses with his finger. The plastic frame jumped on her nose, and she flinched violently. "You say something? You gotta speak up. We can't hear you all the way up here in the real world."

The condescending 'sweetheart' was like a slap. Humiliation coiled in her stomach, hot and acidic. She could feel the eyes of everyone in the coffee shop on her. The barista was suddenly very busy wiping down a perfectly clean counter. The couple in the corner was staring intently into their empty cups. No one would help. No one ever did.

Mark straightened up, addressing his audience of teammates. "Nah, guys, she's busy. She's got important work to do. Right? All this studying… it's gonna make you real popular one day." He let the sentence hang in the air, dripping with sarcasm. "Real popular."

His friends howled with laughter. The sound was deafening, a physical force that pressed in on her from all sides. Her meticulously drawn diagrams, her neat handwriting, her hours of painstaking work—they had twisted it all into something pathetic and laughable. Her fortress had become her prison, and they were the gleeful wardens, rattling the bars for sport.

Tom stood by the counter, waiting for his black coffee, the noise of his teammates washing over him like background static. He’d followed them in out of habit, a post-practice ritual that was more about team cohesion than any real desire for caffeine. He heard Mark’s voice rise above the others, singling someone out. He glanced over, mildly curious, and saw the pack descending on a small corner table.

He didn't know the girl, but he recognized the type. He saw them all over campus, heads buried in books, moving between the library and the science buildings like ghosts. This one had brown hair and glasses and was trying to make herself invisible behind a textbook big enough to stop a bullet.

"It's the library ghost," Mark crowed, and Tom felt the first prickle of unease. It was Mark’s go-to move: find the quietest person in the room and put a spotlight on them. Tom usually tuned it out. It was just Mark being Mark. But today, something about the girl’s rigid posture, the way her shoulders hunched as if bracing for a physical blow, made it impossible to ignore.

He watched as his friends formed a wall of muscle and varsity blue around her, trapping her in her seat. The space felt smaller, hotter. Tom’s coffee was ready, but he didn’t move to get it. He leaned against the counter, his arms crossed over his chest, a spectator at an event he hadn't bought a ticket for.

"You planning on building your own boyfriend out of spare parts?"

The laughter that followed was jarring. Tom didn't join in. He saw the girl flinch. He saw the dark blush creep up the back of her neck. It wasn't funny. It was just mean. A voice in the back of his head, one that sounded suspiciously like his dad's, told him to step in. You're the captain. You're supposed to be the leader. But what would that even look like? Telling Mark to back off in front of everyone? Mark’s ego was as wide as his shoulders; a public challenge would turn this small-scale harassment into a full-blown confrontation. Tom needed Mark on Saturday. He needed him focused and loyal, not pissed off and looking to prove a point. So he stayed quiet, the guilt a bitter taste in his mouth that had nothing to do with the coffee.

Then Mark flicked her glasses.

Tom’s jaw tightened. A line had been crossed. Mocking someone's notes was one thing; putting your hands on them, even that lightly, was another. The girl recoiled, a sharp, jerky movement that spoke of pure fear. And in that moment, Tom felt a hot flash of anger. Not just at Mark for his casual cruelty, but at himself. For standing here. For doing nothing. For weighing team dynamics against basic human decency and finding decency lacking.

He looked at his friends, really looked at them. He saw the eager, predatory grins, the way they fed off the girl’s humiliation. They weren't just a team; they were a pack. And right now, he was ashamed to be a part of it. The camaraderie he valued so highly suddenly felt cheap, built on the shared amusement of tormenting someone who couldn't fight back.

He should say something. Just walk over and say, "Alright, guys, that's enough. Let's go." Simple. Direct. The captain taking charge. But the words caught in his throat. The moment for easy intervention had passed. Now it would be a statement. It would be him choosing her, a total stranger, over them. Over his friends. The social calculus was too complicated, the potential fallout too messy.

So he remained silent, a coward in a quarterback's body. The laughter of his teammates echoed in the too-bright coffee shop, but for Tom, the loudest sound was his own inaction. The knot in his stomach tightened, a feeling of deep, profound disappointment in himself. He watched, helpless and complicit, as the last of her dignity was stripped away for a cheap laugh.

The final peal of laughter was the breaking point. It wasn't just sound; it was a physical blow that shattered the last of her composure. A switch flipped inside her head, from freeze to flight. She had to get out. Now.

Her movements were clumsy, frantic. With shaking hands, she shoved her massive anatomy textbook into her messenger bag. The corners caught on the fabric. Her fingers fumbled with the slick covers of her other books. She didn't look up. She couldn't bear to see their smug, triumphant faces. She just focused on the task, a desperate, singular goal of erasing herself from this space.

Tears pricked at the corners of her eyes, hot and sharp, blurring the edges of her vision. She blinked them back furiously, refusing to give them the satisfaction of seeing her cry. Her breath came in short, shallow gasps. She slammed her laptop shut, the click unnaturally loud in the sudden lull as the football players watched her frantic escape with amusement.

She grabbed for her stack of notebooks. Her favorite one, a thick, spiral-bound book filled with the meticulous, color-coded notes they had ridiculed, was on the bottom. Her fingers, slick with nervous sweat, failed to get a firm grip. As she shoved the pile into her bag, the notebook slipped free, sliding silently off the table. It landed with a soft thud on the worn carpet and skittered under the table, hidden from view. She didn't notice. Her mind was a roaring chaos of shame and adrenaline. All she registered was the need to be gone.

Slinging the heavy bag over her shoulder, she finally pushed her chair back. The legs scraped against the floor, a raw, grating sound that made her cringe. For a single, terrible second, she risked a glance up. Mark was watching her with a lazy, satisfied smirk. His friends flanked him, their expressions ranging from open mockery to bored indifference. And beyond them, leaning against the counter, was Tom. Their eyes met for a fraction of a second. She saw something flicker in his expression—not amusement, something else she couldn't decipher—but it didn't matter. He was one of them. He had stood there and watched. He had done nothing.

The look on his face was the final twist of the knife. Humiliation, sharp and absolute, burned through her. She tore her gaze away, turning and pushing through the small gap they'd left her. She half-walked, half-ran to the door, feeling their eyes on her back with every step. The cheerful chime of the bell as she burst out into the cool afternoon air sounded like a scream.

She didn't stop. She fled across the manicured lawn of the quad, her bag banging painfully against her hip. She ignored the students lounging on the grass, their curious glances sliding right off her. She was a raw nerve ending, exposed and screaming. She ducked behind the imposing brick facade of the chemistry building, finding a secluded alcove near a humming air conditioning unit that was mostly hidden by overgrown bushes.

Her back hit the rough brick wall and she slid down to the ground, the concrete cold and hard beneath her. The strength that had propelled her this far evaporated, leaving her limp and shaking. Here, in the relative privacy of the humming machinery and rustling leaves, the dam finally broke. A choked sob escaped her lips, then another. She wrapped her arms around her knees, pressing her forehead against her jeans as the tears she had refused to shed in the coffee shop came in a hot, silent, shuddering rush. Each gasp for air was a fresh wave of mortification. It wasn't just that they had mocked her; it was that they had seen her. They had looked right into the quiet, ordered world she had built to protect herself and declared it worthless. And no one, not a single person, had disagreed.

The coffee shop slowly emptied out. The boisterous, chaotic energy of Tom’s teammates had dissipated, leaving behind a hollow quiet and the lingering scent of burnt espresso. Tom remained at a small table near the window, his own coffee long since gone cold. He’d told the guys he’d catch up, that he needed to finish some reading. It was a weak lie, but they were too high on their own obnoxious energy to question it.

He couldn't shake the image of the girl—Stacey, he now knew her name was Stacey—fleeing the shop. He kept replaying the moment her eyes had met his. There was no anger in them, not yet. Just a raw, bottomless humiliation that he had helped inflict with his silence. The memory sat like a stone in his gut.

A barista with tired eyes began the closing routine, wiping down tables and sweeping the floor. Tom watched him work, his gaze drawn back to the corner where she had been sitting. The empty chair, pushed askew, looked accusatory. As the barista swept under the table, the bristles of the broom nudged something into the open. A thick, black spiral notebook.

The barista bent down, picked it up, and glanced at it without interest before turning toward the lost-and-found box behind the counter.

A sudden, sharp impulse shot through Tom. "Hey," he called out, his voice rougher than he intended. The barista looked over. "I think that's my friend's."

The lie came easily, a well-practiced social lubricant. The barista, clearly past the point of caring, just shrugged and handed it over. "Whatever, man. Just glad it's not my problem."

The notebook felt heavy in Tom’s hands, far heavier than it should. It was just paper and wire, but it was weighted with the afternoon's ugliness. He ran a thumb over the plain black cover before flipping it open.

He was met with a page of impossibly neat handwriting, the ink a crisp, dark blue. The heading read Cranial Nerves: Anatomy and Function. Below it, a series of diagrams were rendered with an artist’s precision, labeling the olfactory, optic, and oculomotor nerves. Every available space was filled with color-coded annotations and mnemonics written in a tiny, perfect script. This wasn’t just studying; it was a craft.

He remembered Mark’s idiotic joke about building a boyfriend from spare parts. The memory made his jaw clench. She wasn't playing with dolls; she was mapping the human brain. The sheer intelligence on the page was humbling. He was a smart guy—he had to be to manage his classes and memorize a playbook with hundreds of variations—but this was a different language altogether. It was the language of someone who was going to save lives one day, and they had treated her like she was dirt on their shoes. The shame from earlier twisted into something sharper, more acute. They hadn't just been cruel; they had been profoundly stupid.

He turned the page. The brachial plexus, a complex network of nerves, was drawn out like an intricate circuit board. He kept flipping, past detailed cross-sections of the heart and diagrams of cellular respiration. He didn't understand most of it, but he understood the effort. He understood the hours and the discipline it represented.

He turned back to the inside front cover, searching for a name. There, in the same small, careful script, he found it.

Stacey Miller
Bio-Chem Building, Room 312

Stacey. The name made her real. She wasn't the "library ghost" or some anonymous nerd. She was Stacey Miller, and she lived in the Bio-Chem dorm. And he had her notebook, a book that was clearly the product of countless hours of work.

He closed it, the spiral wire pressing into his palm. The easy path was clear: drop it at the front desk of her dorm. Anonymous. Clean. He wouldn't have to face her, wouldn't have to see the accusation in her eyes. It would be a simple, detached transaction. A problem solved with minimal effort.

But the image of her face flashed in his mind again. That final look before she turned and ran. It wasn’t just about returning her property. This was about the fact that he had stood there, a silent pillar of the group that had cornered her. His inaction had been a vote of approval. Leaving the notebook with a stranger at a desk felt like another form of cowardice, a way to wash his hands of it without ever getting them dirty.

He owed her an apology. Not a grand, public one, but a direct one. He had to look her in the eye and take responsibility for his part in it. The thought made his stomach tighten. She probably hated him. He wouldn't blame her if she slammed the door in his face or told him to get lost. He deserved it. But the alternative—doing nothing, again—was no longer an option.

He pushed his chair back and stood, leaving the cold coffee untouched. He tucked the notebook under his arm, the metal spiral digging into his ribs. It was a small, insistent discomfort, and it felt right. He walked to the door, the bell chiming softly as he stepped out into the evening air. The campus was quiet, the sky fading from orange to deep indigo. He knew her name. He knew where she lived. And for the first time all day, he knew exactly what he had to do.