The Heiress Club

Chapter 3: Roommate Three

Jasper Rochester is the kind of guy who everyone has an opinion on.

According to Nandika, "He's like ... really cute."

According to Mikhail, "His dad's a shareholder in my dad's company."

According to Cahyono, "Not just Mikhail's dad's company, basically everyone's company. His dad is really rich, even by rich people standards."

According to Manon, "My mom wanted me to marry him because his mom's a duchess in England."

According to Cyra, "He's the de facto leader of our friend group."

According to Seung-jun, "He's also scary. The kind of motherfucker you don't want to piss off. Valentina, how did you do that already?"

"It's not my fault!" I defend. Seung-jun, Manon and I are sitting in the entrance hall to Manners. "He's the one who crashed into me both times. I think he was mad that I was beating him at football."

Seung-jun cackles, tossing down a card. "Skip."

We're playing Uno right now. I have homework which I should be doing, but I just can't miss out on a golden opportunity like this to socialise. I toss down one of my cards (Manon was skipped).

"Even if it is his fault, you're supposed to just go along with whatever Jasper wants," Manon says.

"That's bullshit."

"I assure you, it is very much true," Seung-jun says. "Do you know how good his lawyers are? He's definitely also got some ties with the mafia too. You can't be that rich and not get to know a couple less-than-legal entrepreneurs. He's the oldest of old money. People like him are basically untouchable."

"Are you his friend or something?"

Seung-jun looks at me like I'm dumb. "Yes? Was that not obvious?"

"No."

"Well I am his friend. Not as close as he is with Teddy—Teddy's basically his right-hand-man, but I'm pretty close."

"So if we fought, you'd take his side."

Seung-jun raises his hands in a quick display of innocence. "Hell no."

"So you'd take my side?"

"No, I'd run bets on who's going to come out on top and eat popcorn," Seung-jun says in a blasé tone.

I stare at him, unimpressed. I should've known. "We can see all your cards," I point out.

Seung-jun looks at his hand in shock, quickly throwing down all his cards on the table. Manon giggles. "I resign!" Seung-jun exclaims dramatically. "Uno is a terrible game! We should play poker instead."

"I don't know how to play poker," Manon says.

Seung-jun flops sideways onto the couch, mimicking melting into a puddle of water like a wicked witch. Manon and I laugh. He sits upright again. "There's a tenth-year scholarship who's great at poker games. She's a darling. Go learn from her."

Scholarship students are rare but not entirely nonexistent. I know two in our grade, both of whom are veritable geniuses, and that's about it. They seem nice enough. They have a hefty amount of respect, to be sure, but it's just a little hard to hang out around them. It's probably hard for them to hang out around us too. It's just different lifestyles. When you fly to Malta on the weekends and your entire closet is Ralph Lauren, it's hard for scholarships to relate.

Seeing that we've all but lost interest in the game, Manon begins to clean up the cards. I stand up, stretching luxuriously. It's the end of our second day of school, I've just pissed off the guy who basically runs the school, and I still have no idea who my other roommate is. Things are basically going great.