Chapter 3

Beckett actually followed through.

He'd text to see if I'd eaten. He'd show up where I was without making it obvious he'd looked for me. He started walking into rooms and checking my corner before he checked Del's.

Last time I'd spent a whole semester trying to figure out what he wanted, getting it wrong, apologizing. This time I already knew the answer — he wanted someone who didn't need him. So I gave him that. Showed up when it was useful, disappeared when it wasn't. Never asked for anything.

Slowly, people started treating us like we were actually together.

I played it carefully — small things, not obvious things. A coffee I'd grabbed from my shift left on his usual spot. A text about something minor, sent once, not followed up. When he leaned in close I'd go quiet and look away like I didn't know what to do with it.

He noticed. That was the point.

Del moved out of the dorm sometime in the weeks after the run. She didn't explain it, but I understood — Beckett had started paying attention to me in front of her, and having us in the same building wasn't working for her image anymore.

She still needed me for things. She just reframed it — not favors between friends, but program logistics, brand tasks, things that came with a title attached. Easier to say no to a friend. Harder to say no to the person who controls your access. I kept saying yes.

Every time I was in her space, I was paying attention.

The drunk night happened about six weeks after the run.

I was in my room late, protein powder mixed with hot water because I'd missed dinner covering one of her errands. I heard the door before it opened — she didn't knock.

Del was not sober.

"You think I don't see it?" She walked in, gesturing at nothing. "You drop a few pounds and you think you're someone else now. He's not going to take you home to his family, Wren."

She was still moving when she hit the cup. The whole thing went over, hot liquid catching her wrist on the way down.

She pulled back, hissing.

I looked at her wrist. Already red.

"You burned yourself. Go run it under cold water for ten minutes or it'll blister."

"I'm talking to—"

"Cold water first. Then we can talk."

She stared at me. Then she went to the bathroom.

She didn't come back out. On her way out of my building she said, loud enough for the hallway to hear, that I needed to watch what I was doing.

Del's version of what happened that night made the rounds quickly. Careless roommate, hot drink, a burn that could have been avoided. Beckett heard it. Everyone did.

Two weeks later Beckett came to find me.

He didn't ask. He said there was a thing at someone's place, that Del wanted to talk, that it would take twenty minutes. I went.

It was a back room at an off-campus house — frat adjacent, the kind of place where everyone knew everyone. Del's people. A row of shot glasses lined up on the table.

Del had her arms crossed, wrist still lightly wrapped.

"If you have any real respect for what I've done for you," she said, "you'll drink these. All of them. Say what happened."

Beckett picked one up. Held it out to me.

"It's just an apology. That's all she's asking. Don't make this bigger than it is."

I took it.

Last time I made it through the whole row. Said I was sorry, said whatever the room needed, and it still ended with me sick on the floor and Beckett telling someone to get me out. Del didn't even look at me on the way out. I wasn't worth the eye contact.

They weren't interested in what actually happened. They just wanted to see how far down I'd go.

I turned my wrist and poured it onto the carpet. Set the empty glass back on the table.

"I didn't do anything wrong." I picked up my jacket. "So I'm not apologizing."

Del stood.

Beckett reached out and caught my wrist. Not rough — certain.

"It's one thing. Why make it into this?"

I looked at him. Then I pulled my hand back.

"We're done," I said.

"I didn't agree to that."

"You don't have to."

I walked out.