Chapter 2

The moment she received my message, my mom called right away.

"Alex, why did you suddenly move out of Aunt Sarah's house? Is something wrong?"

Hearing the tension in her voice, my nose stung, and I felt incredibly wronged.

My aunt, Sarah, was my mom's only sister.

Mom had always been incredibly generous to her.

When Aunt Sarah mentioned Uncle Michael had lost his job, Mom immediately pulled some strings and arranged a well-paid, low-stress position for him.

Knowing Aunt Sarah struggled commuting on her scooter, Mom, without a second thought, bought her a brand-new Mercedes-Benz.

Even the house Aunt Sarah's family lived in now was paid for by my mom.

I didn't want to worry my mom, nor did I want to ruin the relationship between the sisters, so I just vaguely said that living at school would give me more time to study.

After hanging up, I returned to school.

The moment I reached the dorm room the teacher had assigned me, I heard my roommate, Jake, speak up with a snide, mocking tone.

"Well, well, well, isn't it the freeloading vampire who always pigs out on meat? Did someone finally kick you out?"

Jake was Blake's little minion.

He'd always subtly targeted me before, but I hadn't thought much of it.

Now, it seemed it was all connected to Blake.

Jake's shrill voice instantly drew students from other dorm rooms.

In a flash, everyone started pointing fingers and whispering about me.

"No wonder he didn't live at school, he was mooching off his aunt's family!"

"How disgusting, the freeloading vampire on the trending list is in our class. How embarrassing!"

"Some people are just poor and pretentious. If you're living under someone else's roof, why can't you just act like a grateful guest? Why fight with your hosts over food?"

Amidst the chorus of mockery, Blake rushed over from his aunt's house, looking displeased.

"Cousin, why are you so sensitive? People just said a few truthful things online, is that really enough to make you throw a fit and run away?"

"You've been mooching off us for so long, and now you pull this stunt. Are you deliberately trying to make everyone think our family bullied you?"

I looked at his condescending face and suddenly found it all a bit laughable.

"You think I'm taking advantage of you by staying at your house?"

Blake snorted, raising an eyebrow.

"Isn't it obvious?"

"Do you know how expensive things are these days?"

"Do you know how much money your free room and board for the past few months has cost my family?"

As he finished, Jake immediately chimed in.

"That's just shameless! Everyone in our class knows how well-off Blake's family is. He kindly took you in, and not only are you ungrateful, but you're also audacious enough to act like you're royalty?"

"I think you're just taking advantage of Blake's good nature, riding roughshod over him and bullying him!"

It was truly absurd.

Before I moved into Aunt Sarah's house, Blake was just an unremarkable background character at school.

His monthly allowance of barely a hundred bucks meant he couldn't even afford to join class outings.

But ever since his family started getting my mom's fifteen thousand dollars a month, the boy who once couldn't afford a decent shirt now flaunted designer clothes and flashy jewelry every day.

With money in his pocket, he immediately became active in class, frequently treating his classmates to lavish spending sprees with his massive allowance.

Seeing him spend money without batting an eye, everyone naturally assumed Blake was a generous scion of a wealthy family.

And I, always low-key, slowly became the "cheapskate," "freeloading relative" everyone gossiped about.

I looked at Blake, and firmly reminded him.

"I advise you to go home and ask your mom, clearly, whether or not I'm truly living there for free!"