“Maybe you’re just bored.”
I remember looking down into my soup and shaking my head.
“No. Bored’s not right.”
Leo tipped his glass toward me.
“Then what is?”
I looked at the fire.
At their place.
At the kind of warmth that comes from a life that actually fits.
And I said it.
“Empty.”
The word had landed and stayed there.
It stays now too.
Not because Stanford fixed it.
Not because seeing Stella magically turned me into some romantic idiot who thinks the universe writes in neon.
But because all of it together says the same thing.
Harvard was never wrong.
It just wasn’t alive.
Stanford is.
And Stella standing there when I walked in?
That wasn’t coincidence.
That was the universe looking me straight in the face and saying:
Try freezing this time.
I lean my head back against the seat and close my eyes.
The transfer was already the right move before I saw her.
Seeing her there?
That just made it impossible to lie to myself about it anymore.
Boston feels smaller when I land. My old dorm room looks temporary now. I pack slower this time.
Clothes.
Shoes.
Old game wristbands.
