GO ON YOUR KNEES, ALPHA.

Diya's POV

“Diya!”

“DIYA!”

The second time my name hit the air, it hit differently like a slap.

My head jerked up so fast I nearly bit my tongue. The textbook I’d been using as a pillow slid sideways, and I grabbed it before it could crash to the floor.

Mrs. Smith was standing at the front of the class, staring directly at me.

And she was not happy.

I scrambled to my feet. Or I tried to but my legs had other ideas. My knees buckled slightly before I caught myself on the edge of my desk, blinking hard against the thick fog sitting behind my eyes. The classroom swam back into focus slowly, fluorescent lights, white boards, twenty-something faces all turned in my direction with varying degrees of amusement.

I wanted the floor to open and swallow me up.

“Get up, Diya. Will you get up from that chair!” Mrs. Smith’s voice bounced off every wall. “Right now!!”

Somewhere to my left, I heard whispering and then a poorly stifled laugh.

Mrs. Smith’s eyes cut sideways like a blade.

The laughing stopped.

“What,” she said, walking toward me slowly, “is wrong with you, girl? Did you not sleep last night?”

I opened my mouth but nothing came out.

“Don’t just stand there looking stupid,” she said, and her voice had dropped now, almost gentle beneath the frustration. “You are the brightest student in this class. Do you understand me? The brightest. And I have watched you for the past two weeks drag yourself through these halls like your own shadow is too heavy to carry.”

She stopped in front of me. Up close, her eyes behind those glasses weren’t angry.

They were worried.

“You failed the test I gave,” she said quietly. “Diya Osei failed my test. This has never happened. Not once since you came into this school.”

I looked down at the desk. My throat was tight.

“This is so unlike you.”

She reached up and adjusted her glasses one more time. Then she pointed at the door.

“Leave my class now and go straight to the school clinic and let them check you over. It could be that you need vitamins or iron, I don’t know and I’m not a doctor.” Her voice firmed. “But I will not stand here and watch my brightest student fall asleep and fail her destiny. Go. Now.”

I gathered my bag and walked out with my eyes forward, feeling the stares follow me all the way to the door.

“Well,” Nurse Jane said as she came back to her office with the test results.

And something about the way she said that one word made the bottom fall out of my stomach.

“You’re pregnant.”

The clock on the wall kept ticking.

I heard it louder now. Each second landing like a hammer.

Tick.

Tick.

Tick.

The room didn’t spin. I almost wished it would, at least then I’d have something physical to hold onto, some bodily excuse for the way the world had just tilted completely off its axis. Instead everything stayed exactly as it was.

The fluorescent light humming above me. The antiseptic smell. The paper in Nurse Jane’s hand.

“Pregnant,” I repeated. The word felt foreign in my mouth.

“That’s what I said.” Nurse Jane set the paper down on the desk between us. She leaned back in her chair and folded her arms, and the look on her face, I will never forget for as long as I live.

Contempt.

Pure, unbothered contempt.

“You know,” she said, “I see girls like you come through here every year. Girls who were handed an opportunity, a scholarship, a seat at this academy, a real chance to change their lives and what do they do with it?”

I said nothing.

“They spread their legs,” she said. Just like that, like she was commenting on the weather. “That’s what they do. Instead of focusing on their studies, on building something for themselves, they chase after alphas who will never take them seriously and end up right here. In my office. With a positive test.”

My hands were shaking. I pressed them flat against my thighs so she wouldn’t see.

“You’re a low-life omega on a scholarship,” she continued. “You were given an opportunity most girls in your position would kill for. And this is what you did with it. Do you even know who the father is?”

The question hit me like a bucket of cold water.

“Do you?” she repeated. “Or were there too many to be sure?”

“Get out of my office,” Nurse Jane said, rising from her chair. “I’m contacting the administration. Behavior like this is grounds for review of your scholarship. The Alpha will hear about this, I assure you.” She pointed at the door. “Shame on you. Shame on you.”

I stood up without even feeling or thinking.

The hallway was bright and ordinary and full of students moving between classes.

I stood in the middle of it with a result slip in my hand and absolutely no idea what to do next.

I knew who the father was.

That was the part that made it so much worse.

The memory came before I could stop it. The one that had been living rent-free behind my ribcage ever since the night of the party.

I remembered the laughter.

A group of them crowded in the hallway outside the lounge, loud and drunk and not even bothering to lower their voices. And Pete in the middle of them, grinning that easy golden grin of his, the one I had once thought was just for me.

“She was too easy, honestly,” he’d said. “I didn't even have to do much to get in between her legs, I don’t even know why we made a bet about it in the first place, I had her from day one.”

More laughter and they began to shake his hands and look at him in awe as if he's done something exceptional.

“The scholarship omega,” someone else said. “Classic.”

“Wow, do you think we can have a go at her too?” Another said.

“Hey, I won. I’m the master here.” Pete’s voice, bright with victory. “Pay up.”

It took a while before it registered that I was the center of gossip and I had been a bet.

Three weeks ago I had walked out of that party without letting anyone see me cry, and I had told myself that was the end of it.

I was done, I was moving forward. I was Diya Osei and I did not let people like Pete Leadsilver write the ending of my story.

“DIYA!”

I turned around to my best friend.

Shantel was running toward me down the hallway, her locs flying, bag swinging wildly off one shoulder, dodging students with zero apology. She skidded to a stop in front of me, slightly breathless, her eyes scanning my face with the sharp attention of someone who had known me since our first week here.

“Heard Mrs. Smith sent you to the clinic,” she said. “What happened? What’s wrong? Are you sick?” Then her eyes dropped to the paper in my hand. “What is that?”

Before I could answer, she’d already snatched it.

I watched her read it.

“O M G.” Shantel’s voice dropped to a whisper. “No. No no no no no.” She looked up at me. “Diya.”

My eyes were burning. I would not cry in this hallway.

“We need to tell him,” Shantel said immediately. The paper crumpled slightly in her grip. “Diya, we need to find that fuckface right now. He did this, he is going to be responsible for this, I don’t care who his father is ....”

“Shantel.”

“No, I’m serious, where is he? Where is that spoiled, proud, useless ....”

“Shantel.” Louder this time.

She stopped.

I took the paper back from her carefully. I folded it once and tucked it into my bag.

“I’ll handle it,” I said.

“Diya.…”

“I’ll handle it.”

Shantel looked at me for a long moment. Then she grabbed my hand and squeezed it once, hard, and said nothing else.

I walked to the far end of the hallway where the window seat was empty. I sat down. I took out my phone.

I opened my messages and found his name.

Pete Leadsilver.

I typed slowly.

We need to talk. It’s urgent. Meet me today.

I stared at the message for three seconds.

Then I pressed send.

The little tick appeared. Then it turned blue, and it was delivered.

I put my phone face-down on my knee and looked out the window at the Lead Claw Academy grounds, green and golden and completely indifferent to the fact that my entire life had just cracked down the middle.

Three dots appeared on the screen.

Pete was typing.