The words sit there with quiet finality, and for a second, I don’t understand them. The calendar in my head scrambles. A month. I missed it by a month.
The hope that had been blooming in my chest folds in on itself and an ache unfurls low in my ribs. I press my fingertips to the glass where a phone number for “questions” is listed, as if contact alone could conjure a person who will make an exception because I’m here and want this more than anything.
The city answers with a horn blast and laughter in the distance, reminding me I’m just another person in this world. There won’t be any exceptions for me.
A gust of cool wind bites at my bare arms and I begin to pace the top landing of the steps. Anger and disappointment twine within me as my hands clench.
How did I not think to check this?
I memorized maps and safety routes, studied dorm layouts, planned how I’d keep my head down and still breathe for the first time in my life. Yet I didn’t check the most ordinary of things: business hours, deadlines, and how to apply before arriving.
My parents raised me to anticipate ambushes and betrayals, and somehow I tripped over office hours and applications.
Loneliness edges in, fine as a hairline crack, as my feet still and I look at the looming city. The campus is quiet in the way places get at night, even in a city that insists it never sleeps bustling around it.
Maybe I should go home.
The thought is a whisper as shame crawls up my throat to warm my cheeks. My gaze drops to the ring on my finger, the red stone a dark ember against my skin. It would be so easy. One breath, a thought, and I’d be back in the warm, bright halls that smell like cherry blossoms and where doors open because of my family's name.
I swallow the feeling of defeat.
“Next year,” I tell myself softly, a promise that doesn’t quite feel like resolve. “I’ll plan better. I’ll–”
A hinge creaks behind me.
Male voices spill through the night, low and irritated.
“He did it again,” one says, deep with a bite of disbelief. “Suddenly there’s no space left in the program we were already accepted to in May? Funny how that works as soon as we denied Uncle’s requests.”
“Yeah, well,” the other answers, just as deep but rougher around the edges, “he’s been mocking our interests since we were forced to live with him, so are we really surprised he used his connections this way? He’s never cared about our dreams the way Mom and Dad did.”
I don’t mean to eavesdrop, but their words fill the quiet around me, making it impossible to not hear. I turn to chime in about family expectations, but my eyes lock onto the open door behind them.
A thought strikes me as I watch it slowly begin to hiss closed: they were talking to someone in there, so I might still have a chance to plead my case tonight.
My breath catches in my throat as my heart hammers, watching this small window of opportunity disappear just beyond the men who haven’t even noticed me yet. They block the path entirely, standing there conversing, and I don’t have time to politely go around them.
It’s as if fate taunts me, daring me to prove I want this.
The men blocking me are broad shadows in the wash of lobby light behind them, but I don’t give them any further attention as instinct moves me. I dart forward, pushing between them. The space is narrow, and the hard lines of their bodies press against my shoulders and arms. Heat zips along my skin.
The door’s weight tries to pull from my fingertips that attempt desperately to wrap around it, but I catch it in time, my palm closing around the cold metal.
“Oh, thank goodness,” I breathe out in a rush.
A shadow slides in behind me, broad enough to cast his reflection above mine in the door. Heat presses in near my back and I swallow hard, holding his narrowed gaze in the glass.
“You always shove your way into places you don’t belong?” his deep voice asks, cutting through the sudden tension building between us.
My fingers tighten on the handle as I take a few breaths. I turn slowly, keeping my hand tightly on the handle, my pulse stumbling in my throat as I let myself actually take them in for the first time.
They’re both tall enough I have to tilt my head back to look at them this close-up. Their faces are filled with tight expressions that make me feel like I’ve made a grave mistake.
The taller one doesn’t move when I stare at him, he just stands there like a barricade. Six-three, maybe, with broad shoulders filling the space in a way that makes me feel incredibly small as he looms. He has a broad chest defined under the fitted black t-shirt stretched across it. Dark brown hair is cut short at the sides but tousled in a longer length on top.
He runs a hand through it quickly, his eyes never leaving mine. They’re a dark blue with lighter flecks catching from the light of the interior of the building behind me. The tight set of his square jaw catches my attention as he opens his mouth.
“Cat got your tongue?”
