“You have no idea.”
She laughs, “It’s seven dollars and ten cents.”
She runs my card, hands it back, and passes me the drink. I pull away before the smell of sugar and espresso can start reminding me of anything else.
The caffeine helps a little, enough that I decide to run errands. There’s a grocery store a few blocks from campus, small and half-dead inside, the kind of place that plays eighties music and smells faintly like old produce. I grab a basket and start tossing in the basics—ramen, sandwich stuff, bottled water, as well as a few frozen meals I’ll pretend count as dinner.
My dorm doesn’t have a real kitchen. Just a microwave, a mini fridge, and a portable burner I shouldn’t technically have but do, anyway. One pot. One pan. That’s it.
It’s not much, but it’s better than staying at my mom’s house pretending she’s an amazing parent. She wanted me to move in, but it was only so she could keep her judgmental eye on me. No thanks.
The dorms are tiny, loud, and smell like detergent and bad decisions, but it’s mine. No expectations. No rules I didn’t agree to.
I swipe my card at self-checkout, load the bags into the backseat, and sit there for a second, sipping my coffee. The world feels too normal, too bright, like it doesn’t know it’s missing something.
I tell myself again I’m fine. That I’m not thinking about her.
But the truth is, I still am.
And tomorrow, when the first day of fall semester starts, I’ll have to pretend like none of it ever happened.
Campus smells like new notebooks and a whorehouse of every perfume and cologne known to man. It’s loud and crowded, kids spilling out of every doorway, all laughing too hard like they don’t have real lives yet. I used to be loud, careless, easy—still was at boarding school. The popular bad boy with a grin that got me out of most trouble and into the rest of it.
But being back here? Different story. Nothing happens in this town without some gossiping bitch running to tell my mom. They all love knowing Talon Grant, the town bad boy, can still be dragged to his knees by his mother’s reputation.
If it weren’t for Minxy, I’d tell my mom and everyone of these bastards exactly where they could shove their waggling tongues.
My first class is Sociology. I don’t even remember signing up for it, but it fits the schedule, so whatever.
I push open the door a few minutes early, grab a seat near the front, and scroll through my phone while people filter in. Then I hear laughter. A low, smooth sound that hits me right in the gut.
I look up, and my pulse stumbles.
No way.
It’s her.
She’s laughing with another student—a tall girl in a baseball cap who’s trying way too hard to be funny. She laughs again, the sound soft but bright enough to punch straight through me. Her hair’s loose today, falling in waves that catch the morning light, and she’s smiling like she doesn’t have a single secret in the world.
It’s unreal seeing her like this. Normal clothes. No mask. No dim lighting or velvet walls. Just sunlight, coffee cups, and a notebook in her hand.
My heart stumbles, then starts racing for a completely different reason. She’s here. At my school. In my class.
The professor’s office door creaks open, and the room starts to quiet. She steps aside, smooth and composed. The girl she wastalking to mumbles something that makes her smile again, and she takes a seat in the front row, crossing her legs, pulling out a pen, the picture of casual focus.
I can’t stop staring.
Out of all the people in this town, all the schools, all the classrooms I could’ve walked into today… she’s here.
What are the odds?
The professor clears his throat from the front of the room, tapping a stack of papers against the desk. “Morning, everyone,” he says. “Before we get started, I want to introduce my teaching assistant. This is Penelope.”
She stands, and my stomach drops.
Penelope.
The name fits her too well—elegant, a little dangerous.
