Change For Me

12. you do you

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Jae's pov

"What do you mean?" I ask Roman about the conversation we had at my locker.

Today's gym unit is exercise. It includes consistent rotations of different workouts within a time period. Me, Conrad, and Roman are currently doing squats.

"I understand, she's very good looking." Roman struggles to finish the set.

"Ellie does look cute," I nod in agreement as we continue the rotation. We approach the next station of push ups. Claire and Lisa are struggling and Ellie waits for them to be done.

"I didn't say Ellie..." Roman teases in a sing-song voice. I stop momentarily and notice the smirk on his face. "Besides that, she's close with Eva and Taron now. They'll claw out your—"

"Our," Conrad corrects.

"Yes "our" throats if you do something wrong to her." When we realize Claire and Lisa are taking too long to finish, we decided to begin the push ups beside them.

"How the hell are you done?" I hear Lisa on my far left. She slumps down defeatedly on the floor.

"I can't even go half way," Claire slowly stands up and adjusts her gym shorts in front of us.

"I saw that," Roman hits my back when I go down for a rep. "Keep your eyes to yourself."

"Shut up," I finish the push ups easily, so do Conrad and Roman. The next station are jump ropes. "Why are you telling me to keep my eyes to myself? You have a girlfr—"

"She's not my girlfriend," Roman quickly interrupts. He seems offended by the way his humorless expression disappears. "Anyways, you should try dating sometime. Even if it's Ellie—"

"I don't date and if I were to ask her out, I'd feel bad." I say honestly. "I choose to fuck and leave. I don't do the whole dating thing you and Eva do." I point a finger in between him and Eva, who's across the gym from us.

"So you don't buy presents, or text them good night, or..." Roman lists off a few points.

"Again, I'm not like you with Eva." I roll my eyes, looking over at Conrad talking to Ellie.

"Conrad," I yell at them, forcing both of their attentions on me. I point to the crate full of jumping ropes, gesturing to the workout we need to finish.

"I've been waiting for 5 minutes! Move your asses," He yells back. Me and Roman exchange confused looks as he already has finished the section. We pick up the jumping ropes and begin on our sets without Conrad.

"You're good at it then," Roman continues as we jump in sync.

"At what?" I control my breathing.

"Are you serious?—I didn't know you only "fuck and leave"." Once we're done, he throws the rope in the crate. "I never thought you were that shitty." He catches up to Conrad. He leaves me behind to follow them and to think over what he said.

I'm not "that shitty". Many boys in our school have the same morals as me, but are more direct than I am.

I use girls for pleasure—I know that—but they use me too. They're openly honest with it. About the dating thing as well—why would they agree, when I've specifically made it clear to them that it's just sex? I obviously respect them and want them to feel comfortable of only hooking up. I've emphasized it many times before, but they still seem to not understand. After the sex and etc. they always expect something more—something I can't give to them—such as talking to me as if we're friends or more than it. I don't ask to be their friends in the first place.