She considers that. "Sometimes," she says. "Mostly it's just what needs doing."
"That's a very Lumi answer."
Her mouth shifts. "What would a very Alex answer be."
"I'd say it's exhausting," I say. "And then I'd do it anyway."
She studies me for a second — then laughs. Quiet, real, unguarded. The same thing that moved through her face a moment ago, back again and staying longer this time.
"You're not wrong," she says.
I lean back and take a breath.
"Can I ask you something," I say.
She waits.
"The staring. The whispers. People moving out of my way in the corridor before I'm close enough to be in their way." I look at my hands on the table. "Is that me. Is that what I do all the time or only when something's wrong."
Lumi is quiet for a moment.
"It's you," she says. "All the time. You don't have an off switch for it." She holds my gaze. "Most alphas learn to modulate. Tone it down in neutral situations, let it surface when they need it." A pause. "You never learned that. You were never taught."
"So I'm just—" I stop.
"Present," she says. "Fully. All the time. People feel it before they know what they're feeling." She tilts her head slightly. "Have you noticed it's worse in enclosed spaces."
I think about the corridor after mythology. The dining hall. The classroom where the girl stopped with her hand still on the door.
"Yes," I say.
"That will get easier," she says. "When you understand what you're doing. Right now you're broadcasting without meaning to."
I sit with that.
"My memory," I say. "The night Curtis died."
"I've been working on it."
"Here?"
She meets my eyes. "What you remember — documented properly, in front of the right person before the panel meets. That's what we're building toward."
"Tomlinson," I say.
She doesn't look away.
"He's good people. He’s not performing kindness," she says. "There's no angle."
We sit with that for a moment, the quiet settling again around us.
"How are you," she asks.
I think about the day. The clothes on the chair. The mirror. Eggs and Becky's wave. Tomlinson's voice and the poem I turned face-down. Lumi's laugh, unexpected and real. All of it held together without falling apart.
"Better than yesterday," I say.
She holds my gaze.
