In the halls of St. Jude’s Academy, two names rule the leaderboard: Jaden Sterling and April Mendoza.
Jaden is the school’s "Golden Boy." With a lethal smile, a billionaire inheritance, and a consistent #1 rank, he is the untouchable idol of every girl and the envy of every guy. April, however, is his polar opposite a scholarship student who balances three part-time jobs and a fierce determination to steal his crown. To her, Jaden is just an arrogant obstacle between her and a full-ride college tuition.
But April’s world flips when she catches the "perfect" Jaden Sterling in a back-alley PC cafe, wearing a hoodie and screaming at a computer screen. It turns out the school’s star student is actually the anonymous, chaotic pro-gamer "JD-Zero" a secret that would destroy his family’s polished reputation.
Desperate to keep his double life hidden, Jaden makes April an offer she can't refuse: He will intentionally sabotage his own grades to give her the #1 spot, but only if she acts as his "manager" and fake girlfriend to keep his parents and his fangirls off his trail.
Between high-stakes exams, secret gaming sessions, and a fake romance that starts feeling all too real, April realizes that Jaden Sterling isn't just the boy who has everything he’s the boy with everything to lose.

Monday arrived the way Mondays always did at St. Jude's Academy — with the particular cruelty of an institution that did not believe in grace periods. The golden gates opened at 7:30 AM precisely. The marble floors gleamed under the morning light. The bulletin board by the main entrance displayed the current rankings in fresh print, as if the world had not spent the weekend quietly falling apart.


Chapter 28 - Chapter 28: The Space Between