We were both men, and the world expected us to compete.
In a university where excellence was currency and affection was a liability, we learned early how to hide—our feelings tucked between textbooks, our hands brushing only when no one was looking. To everyone else, we were academic equals, rivals chasing the same summit.
But in the quiet, we were boyfriends.
You used to lean against my shoulder during late-night study sessions, your voice low as you explained theories I pretended not to understand just to hear you longer. I memorized the way you smiled when you solved a problem, the way your eyes softened when you said my name like it belonged to you.
Until it didn't.
The announcement came without warning. One scholarship. One place. One future guaranteed.
Your name.
Applause filled the hall. Professors beamed. Students stared. I clapped because that was what love was supposed to do—celebrate, even when it shattered you.
You didn't look at me.
Later, we met in the library—the same table where we first kissed, hidden by shelves and silence. You stood taller than before, like victory had already reshaped you.
"I didn't mean for it to hurt you," you said.
I smiled. "You didn't mean for me to lose."
There it was. The truth we had been circling for months.
"I worked for this," you continued. "I can't give it up. Not for anyone."
Not even me.
I nodded, because losers don't argue with winners.
"You knew this might happen," you added gently.
Did I?
Or did I believe love would rewrite the rules?
I stepped closer, close enough to feel your warmth, close enough to remember what we were. "So tell me," I said quietly. "What am I to you now?"
Your silence answered first.
Then you spoke, carefully, like every word was being graded.
"I don't want to lose you," you said. "Maybe we can still be friends."
Friends.
A word sharp enough to cut.
I laughed, bitter and small. "You don't turn your boyfriend into a friend after you beat him."
Your jaw tightened. "This isn't a competition."
I looked at the rankings posted on the wall. At your name above mine.
"It always was."
For the first time, doubt flickered across your face. But doubt doesn't change outcomes.
"I love you," you said suddenly, desperate.
Love, offered after the victory.
I stepped back.
"If you loved me," I replied, "you would've asked what this would cost us."
You reached for my hand, and I let you touch me—one last time. Your grip trembled.
But you didn't let go of your future.
So I did.
I walked away first, because I refused to watch myself become smaller beside your success.
That night, alone, I finally understood the cruelty of it all: in academics, in ambition, even in love—someone stands crowned, and someone else is reduced to a footnote.
You won the scholarship.
You kept your pride.
You kept the world.
And I lost the boy I loved.
The winner took it all.
And I was left with the only question that mattered:
Was I ever your lover—
or just the rival you had to defeat?