Michael had stopped counting days.
Time was only useful when you needed distance from something — when you wanted separation, relief, an end point. He didn't. Distance implied loss. Endings implied failure.
What mattered now was sequence.
Cause and effect.
Alignment.
Correction.
Time, for Michael, had reorganised itself into something more precise. Not hours or weeks, but moments of relevance — points where something shifted, where a decision locked into place and began to ripple outward. He tracked those carefully. He always had.
He moved through campus without hesitation, footsteps steady, posture composed. To anyone watching, he looked like a student with somewhere to be — late for a class, perhaps, or heading toward a meeting. His bag hung comfortably at his side. His pace neither rushed nor idle.
That was the advantage.
People noticed agitation.
They noticed desperation.
They noticed grief.
They did not notice certainty.
Certainty didn't announce itself. It blended. It walked with purpose and kept its head level. Certainty didn't look like obsession — obsession was frantic, hungry, loud. Certainty was calm. It waited.
Michael had learned that during the suspension.
Learned it while sitting in rooms with counsellors who smiled too much and spoke too softly, as though volume might trigger violence. Learned it while listening to people speak about boundaries as if relationships were lines drawn by strangers instead of truths built over time. Learned it while administrators folded their hands and talked about moving forward without acknowledging what had been interrupted.
They had asked him to explain himself.
He had.
They simply hadn't understood.
Understanding required context.
And Michael had more context than anyone.
——
He saw her near the central walkway, exiting a building with a few classmates.
The moment registered instantly, clean and sharp, like a photograph snapping into focus. He adjusted his path without breaking stride, angling just enough to keep her within view without signalling intent.
She walked easily, stride unhurried, backpack slung over one shoulder like it had always been there.
That was the first thing that reassured him.
She hadn't changed.
People who truly moved on changed in visible ways — new habits, new stiffness, new avoidance. They walked differently, held their bodies like something had shifted out of alignment. They glanced more often over their shoulders. They hurried when they didn't need to.
Hidayah didn't do that.
She still moved like the world made sense to her.
Which meant it could be restored.
She laughed at something one of the girls said, head tilting back slightly, hair catching the light as it moved. The sound reached him faintly across the open space — light, unguarded.
Michael didn't feel pain.
Pain belonged to misunderstanding. Pain belonged to people who believed something had been taken from them.
What he felt was recognition.
That laugh, he thought. She does that when she's comfortable.
Comfort was not happiness. Happiness was loud, temporary, reactive. Comfort was deeper. Comfort was familiarity. It meant safety built on repetition. It meant the absence of vigilance.
It meant she was not guarding herself from the world — only from certain people.
That distinction was critical.
He followed at a distance that allowed him to observe without intruding. This wasn't pursuit. It was calibration.
You couldn't recalibrate something if you refused to look at it.
He watched how she interacted with the others — open, polite, engaged. She listened when they spoke. She responded easily. Her hands moved when she talked, expressive without being restless.
No signs of fear.
No tension in her shoulders.
No accelerated pace.
Good.
That meant no one had poisoned her against him.
Not completely.
They had tried to frame him as a problem. That had been the mistake.
Problems were things you solved by removal. By distance. By erasure.
Michael was not removable.
He had history.
History wasn't something you erased — it resurfaced. It asserted itself when conditions were right. It waited beneath the surface until people stopped pretending it didn't exist.
The man she was involved with now — Michael refused to learn his name properly. He'd heard it, of course. Heard it mentioned in passing, seen it in messages he wasn't supposed to have access to.
But names gave weight.
And this man didn't deserve weight.
Temporary fixtures always felt permanent while they lasted. That was how people fooled themselves — mistaking proximity for significance, convenience for depth.
Michael knew this because he had been one of those fixtures before.
And before him, there had been others. Minor ones. Distractions. People she leaned on briefly when she was uncertain, when she needed affirmation or novelty.
She always returned.
Michael believed in patterns.
Patterns weren't guesses. They were evidence repeated often enough to become truth.
And patterns, once established, repeated.
———
Hidayah
She didn't see him.
That wasn't the same as being unaware.
As she crossed the open space toward her next class, a faint pressure settled between her shoulder blades — not enough to alarm, not sharp enough to name. Just… density. Like air before rain. Like something occupying space behind her without touching.
She slowed half a step without realising it, her gaze flicking briefly across her surroundings.
Students passed in clusters. Conversations overlapped. Laughter rose and fell. A cyclist cut across the walkway, nearly colliding with a group of first-years.
Everything was normal.
Too normal to justify unease.
She kept walking.
The sensation didn't follow her into the building. It dissipated like a breath held too long, leaving nothing behind but the faint echo of its absence.
She dismissed it.
——
Michael
She didn't notice him.
Michael catalogued that calmly, the way one logged data without emotion.
Awareness would come later.
Awareness always came later.
Right now, what mattered was that she was functioning. Attending class. Studying. Laughing. Existing within routine instead of fracture.
She wasn't afraid.
Fear would have meant damage.
Damage would have meant someone else had interfered too deeply.
This — this was a pause.
A detour.
And detours could be corrected.
He adjusted his route again, moving away before instinct tempted him to stay longer. Discipline mattered. Proximity bred mistakes. Mistakes drew attention.
Instead, he relocated — another vantage point, another angle. He trusted the campus flow to carry him naturally elsewhere, confident that paths crossed when they were meant to.
They always had.
In the library, he stayed outside.
Glass was useful.
It separated observation from accusation. It allowed presence without implication. From the right angle, it reflected the world back at itself, turning watchers invisible.
Through the glass, he could see her seated at a table near the windows. Laptop open. Notes spread neatly beside her. Her posture was relaxed but attentive, one leg tucked slightly beneath the chair.
Her fingers moved quickly across the keyboard. She paused occasionally — to read, to think, to adjust the placement of her notes.
She looked focused.
That pleased him.
Focus meant stability. It meant continuity. It meant the world hadn't overwhelmed her, hadn't forced her into defence.
She hadn't been reshaped.
Michael's phone buzzed in his pocket.
He glanced down reflexively — his mother. A short message, practical, reminding him of dinner later. He silenced it without reading further.
Family didn't understand these things.
They saw outcomes, not causes. They believed resolution meant distance, that removing a person removed the problem. They mistook silence for healing.
Michael knew better.
Resolution meant alignment.
He watched as she shifted in her seat, brushing hair back behind her ear — an unconscious habit he recognised instantly.
You still do that when you're concentrating, he thought.
Some things didn't change because they were foundational.
That was proof.
——-
Hidayah
Hours later, packing up to leave, Hidayah paused.
The feeling returned.
Faint. Fleeting. Like a shadow slipping just out of view.
She straightened slowly, scanning the space around her without urgency. Students filtered past the glass walls. Reflections overlapped with reality, making it difficult to tell where one ended and the other began.
Nothing.
No one.
She exhaled, a small frown creasing her brow, and slung her bag over her shoulder.
Stop inventing things, she told herself.
The world didn't revolve around threats.
Not anymore.
——-
Michael
He stepped back before she exited.
Timing was everything.
He didn't want her associating the unease with his presence. That would come later — once familiarity reasserted itself, once recognition replaced discomfort.
Michael walked away, hands relaxed at his sides, mind already reorganising the day's observations.
She was well.
She was functioning.
She was protected — but not isolated.
That mattered.
Protection could be bypassed. Isolation could not.
There was still space.
And space, once identified, could be entered.
He wasn't angry.
He wasn't desperate.
He was certain.
Certainty was quiet. Certainty waited.
And when the moment came — when circumstances aligned, when interference weakened — he would speak.
Not to demand.
Not to confront.
But to remind.
Because people forgot things they were afraid to remember.
And Michael was very good at reminding.