Chapter five : Rath

Four months ago
New day, new whatever the f**k the say. Ugh. I hate waking up. Honestly, I wonder if there's anyone who likes to get up for classes at f*****g eight.
I’m no early bird, and trust me, I don’t want the damn worm. Just let me sleep, jeez.
But nope. I gotta get up. We’ve got presentations at nine, and Taylor and I have been grinding on this project for weeks. It’s worth, like, 60% of our grade.
The third guy in our group though? A Mutual friend. Completely useless. Honestly, might as well just been the two of us. I don’t even know why we kept him in -- probably out of guilt or some twisted sense of fairness.
Still, I’m not exactly dreading the presentation. Not to brag, but these things come naturally to me. It’s like reciting a song I’ve known my whole life.

I force myself out of bed. Take a quick shower. Put on some decent clothes and make myself presentable. Grab a hasty toast in the name of breakfast, a latte and set on a walk from the dorms to lecture hall. Today feels good. I love the kind of validation presentations bring -- that buzz you get from people paying attention, from doing well, from being seen. It makes me feel a whole lot better about my otherwise miserable self.


Now, I'm not exactly the campus nerd. I happen to love the balance between things I enjoy and the career I'm chasing. Just because you’ve got a 4.3 GPA doesn’t mean you don’t wanna get wasted. I totally do. I study way less than most and still manage to score better -- which means I get to enjoy life without being glued to a textbook most of the time.

I shoot Taylor a text to meet me outside the lecture hall while I take a sip of my latte. Guess college life isn't all that bad. I've got people I care about. So that gets me through. And oh, of course the women. Girls basically throw themselves at me, including Elizabeth, the prettiest blonde in our class. Not that I care about that.

I've had girlfriends before, sure. But I just seem to have no interest whatsoever in the actual person I'm dating. Cause everything's same. They're all the same.

I reach the corridor outside the lecture hall where we’re supposed to present, and there’s Taylor, beaming and waving at me frantically near the door. God, Taylor’s so pure. So genuine. He’s like the little brother I never had. Sometimes I feel this fierce urge to shield him from all the stuff this world hides. He doesn’t need to know -- about the darkness, the cruelty, the cracks people cover up with smiles. I wish that he could just stay the same: innocent, naïve, untouched by all of it.

"Please tell me you didn't stay up all night before presentation day", Taylor says, studying me with a skeptical look like he already doesn't believe whatever I'm gonna say.
“I tried to,” I say, raising my hands a little, half-laughing. “But you know how it is… with my insomnia and all.” Yes I do in fact suffer from insomnia. And I can't sleep until after like at least 3 AM. Even though I'd tried to make myself presentable, I guess it just reflects in my f*****g eyes. The lack of sleep.
But that's not gonna stop me from giving one heck of a presentation now.

Guess who just nailed their presentations. Me and my Boy Taylor, duh. It went as smooth as it possibly could. The prof seemed pleased with our presentation. Honestly, we had a blast working on this project -- countless late nights huddled over bug-infested code, troubleshooting till our brains fried, which, let’s be real, often dissolved into rounds of excessive snacking and chaotic gaming. But hey, we pulled through.

Once we were done, though, I stopped paying much attention. I mean, come on, who really listens to the other groups’ presentations? We’re all just here for the formalities at this point.

“Next. Group ten,” the professor calls out, shuffling his papers, eyes glancing up. “Wait a minute. Why is there only one person in this group?”
A voice rises softly from the front. “Everyone else was already paired up, Mr. Wells, so I had to do the project alone.”

I glance up lazily, curious, just in time to see her stand. Dark raven hair, pitch-black eyes, skin the color of soft dusk -- but it’s the eyes that catch me off guard. They look… lifeless. Like her soul's color has faded.

“Alright then,” the professor says, waving her forward, “the stage is all yours, Miss Reed.”
Behind me, I hear Elizabeth’s low snicker. “What kind of loser do you have to be to end up doing a group project all by yourself?”
I don’t turn around, but something flickers in me. A mix of irritation… and curiosity.

I can’t help but watch her.
She stands at the front, giving the presentation for what’s honestly a brilliant project -- and she did it all on her own. But what grabs my attention isn’t the content or the code. It’s the way her fingers fidget by her sides, absentmindedly picking at the skin near her nails. Small, repetitive motions, almost like she’s trying to peel herself away piece by piece. She’s anxious. But her face? Her voice? Smooth. Calm. Confident.
Interesting.

If she were just some loser no one wanted to work with, you’d expect her to stumble through the presentation. That’s usually the type -- useless, unreliable, not someone who’d pull off something like this. But her delivery is sharp, polished. She’s smart. Capable.

If I had to bet, I’d say no one even knew she was in this class. Hell, I’ve never seen her before today either. And I know people. That tells me she’s not someone overlooked because she’s weak or slow. No, she’s deliberately invisible.

Hmm, I muse, a smirk tugging at the corner of my mouth. Who the f**k is this girl?