The jab between my shoulder blades yanks me out of Mr. Collins's lecture so hard my pen skids across the page. Ink blooms in the margin like a bruise.
I don't turn.
Not this time. Not when I've spent the entire period wrestling my own mind back into my skull—pinning it to the present like it's a moth that keeps trying to fly into a candle.
Anchor. I give myself the inventory the Academy taught us when panic starts chewing through your bloodstream.
Chalk dust in the air.
Fluorescents trembling like they're tired of pretending.
Mr. Collins's coffee breath whenever he paces too close.
The scratch of someone's pencil.
My hoodie string knotted around my finger.
Here. Here. Here.
Another shove. Sharper. Right between my shoulder blades, like a finger pressing a bruise just to see if I'll flinch.
I close my eyes for half a second. Inhale. Count to three.
Then I twist just enough to glare.
The girl behind me isn't even pretending to be subtle. She's leaning forward, arm outstretched, holding a folded note like a tiny paper ultimatum. Her expression isn't giddy or conspiratorial—just determined. Jaw set. Eyes flick to the front, then back to me.
Like she's on a timer.
I shake my head once.
No.
She doesn't lower her hand.
"Take it," she says through clenched teeth, her bright, innocent smile never wavering. "Or I'll poke you until graduation."
I don't want attention.
I don't want trouble.
I don't want to be the story.
So I take the note in one smooth motion and slide it into the spine of my notebook, unopened, unseen.
A decision made in half a second.
A trap I don't recognize until it snaps shut.
Because the moment the paper leaves her fingers, her shoulders relax—like she's just completed a task. Like she's done what she was told. Like she can stop performing now that the handoff is complete.
Her gaze doesn't linger on me.
It flicks past me.
Toward the front.
Toward Mr. Collins.
And my stomach goes cold with the delayed understanding: this wasn't a note between students. This was a delivery.
Mr. Collins stops speaking mid-sentence.
He's no god, but the silence that fills the room is absolute—too clean, too sudden, like someone hit mute on the entire world.
"Ms. Meyler."
My stomach drops so fast I feel weightless. My pulse becomes a kick drum in my throat.
He doesn't yell. He doesn't rage. He just holds out his hand like this is a ritual he's performed a hundred times and never gotten tired of.
"Bring me the note."
The entire lecture hall is looking at me—a hundred invisible hands pinning me in place. The boy two rows down stops twirling his pen. The girl beside me inhales and holds it. Someone's gum snaps and then, mercifully, dies.
For a dizzy second, I consider pretending I don't have anything.
I could lie. Laugh it off. Claim it's mine—a grocery list, a reminder, a doodle.
But the note in my notebook feels like a live wire.
And my legs move before my brain catches up.
I stand.
The descent from my seat to the podium feels like walking down the aisle to my own execution. Every step echoes too loud. Every breath sounds borrowed. I'm suddenly aware of everything: the squeak of my sneakers on linoleum, my ponytail brushing my neck, the tiny bleach stain on my hoodie cuff, the way my hands want to curl into fists and I'm forcing them open like that's normal.
My cheeks burn. My ears burn.
Please don't let it be weird. Please let it be harmless. Please don't let it ruin me.
I place the folded paper in his hand.
Our fingers don't touch, but it still feels like a transfer of power.
He unfolds it too slowly—like a priest unraveling a sacred scroll—and the hum of embarrassment in my chest tightens into pressure.
He clears his throat, milking the moment.
"'Hello, Beautiful.'"
The room cracks open—laughter, whispers, a couple of exaggerated oooohs.
My breath stutters.
Of course it starts that way.
"It continues," he says, voice dripping theatrical cruelty, "'I was wondering if you're going to the Masquerade Ball. I know you'll pretend you're not interested—'"
He glances up at me over the paper, smirking like he's reading my diary out loud.
"'—but I'd love to take you.'"
More laughter.
David whistles, loud and obnoxious. Someone mutters, "Bold," and another voice snickers, "Shoot your shot, I guess."
Heat climbs my throat so fast I taste it. I want to disappear. I want to evaporate into chalk dust. I want to walk through the floor and live with the pipes where nobody can look at me.
But Mr. Collins isn't done.
"'You can leave your answer—Yes or No—in Lot 351. I'll be waiting by the black Chevy pickup… so I can surprise you later.'"
The laughter tips toward hysteria.
And that's the thing about public humiliation: it isn't just the people who hate you. It's the people who like you laughing too—laughing to prove they're not aligned with you, laughing to keep the spotlight from swiveling onto their faces next.
Even sympathy becomes self-defense.
Someone makes a kissy noise. Someone else says, "Damn, Collins, maybe I should take notes on that opener."
Mr. Collins pretends not to hear. He's basking.
He pins the note to the corkboard beside the syllabus and the Academic Integrity Policy like it's evidence. Like it's a warning. Like it's a little trophy he's earned for managing the classroom "culture."
"Let this serve as a reminder," he says, sweeping the room with his gaze. "If anyone passes another note, laughs, or interrupts my lecture, privileges—including the Masquerade—will be revoked."
Instant silence.
Not respect.
Fear.
He isn't just grading papers. He's curating shame. He's teaching us which kinds of attention are punishable and which kinds he gets to control.
I stand there one heartbeat too long, then turn and walk back up the aisle, eyes on the floor. If I see pity, amusement, or that smug I'm-glad-it's-not-me relief, I might actually shatter.
My fingers tremble when they touch my desk.
Humiliation burns hotter than the nightmares ever did.
At least in the crash dream, I die quickly.
Here, I sit and pretend everything's fine while my skull plays the scene on loop, the words Yes or No scraping inside my head like a nail.
The girl behind me leans forward, breath warm against my ear. "I'm so sorry," she whispers. "He saw it. I didn't—"
I raise a hand, palm out, without turning. "Please," I whisper. "Just…don't."
To her credit, she shuts up.
My phone buzzes once in my pocket. I slide it out under the desk and tilt it just enough to see.
CASSIE: you just spiked my migraine. what did you do
I stare at the words, throat tight.
There's no quick reply for Oh, nothing, just got auctioned off to a truck I've never met.
I don't answer.
Mr. Collins resumes the lecture like he hasn't just swung a social sledgehammer into my spine.
"…as we were discussing, ritual humiliations often function as a way of reinforcing group norms…"
Of course they do.
I sit through the rest of class in a numb haze. The slides blur. My pen lies useless on the desk.
When I finally look down, I realize I've drawn the door again in the corner of my notes—sigils curling around the frame, a tiny truck sketched at the bottom like a joke I don't remember starting.
When we're dismissed, the room erupts—chairs scraping, backpacks zipping, conversations igniting.
I don't wait for Shelby. I don't speak. I move.
Out the side door. Down the back stairwell. Out into the wind.
Straight to the lot.
Lot 351.
The gym wall shelters it from the main campus, turning it into a pocket of quiet that always feels a few degrees colder than everywhere else, even when the sun is out. Like the light doesn't like lingering here. Like the asphalt remembers too much.
And there it is.
A black Chevy pickup—polished to a mirror finish, like it was carved from midnight and arrogance. Older model, all hard lines and heavy metal. The kind of truck that says I can run you over and then tow you home.
My reflection warps in the paint—small, tense, eyes too wide. The wind snaps my hoodie against me, and the air tastes faintly metallic, the way it does right before lightning breaks the sky open.
I'm still shaking from the note, from the laughter, from the way a hundred people watched my humiliation and filed it away as entertainment.
I want control back.
I want to choose something—anything—before the world chooses for me.
I drop my bag by the front wheel and climb onto the hood.
The metal hums beneath my palms.
Not hot. Not cold.
Alive.
That wrong, subtle vibration I've felt in my dreams—like standing too close to a power line you can't see.
My pulse thunders in my ears.
I yank a white paint marker from the front pocket of my art bag—the one I use for mockups and costume boards.
Across the windshield, with quick, furious strokes, I write:
NO.
All caps. Thick. Jagged.
I add a little checkbox beside it—a dramatic, defiant, ridiculous flourish—and carve a vicious X through the square.
The marker tucks under the wiper blade like a signature.
Or a dare.
My breath catches.
For a tiny, bright second, I feel powerful.
For a heartbeat, it's like the prophecy is wrong and I'm not the one being chosen.
I'm the one choosing.
I slide off the hood, sneakers squeaking against the bumper, adrenaline singing loud enough to drown out the echo of laughter in my head.
Halfway across the lot, my victory stops dead.
I vandalized someone's truck.
A real person's.
Someone who might be furious. Someone bigger than me. Stronger than me. Someone who knows where I park and what classes I take and how easy it would be to make this worse.
Images flash: campus security. A formal complaint. Mom getting called at the hospital. The Academy headmistress pinching the bridge of her nose and saying, "Angela, do you have any idea what kind of attention this brings?"
I spin around, already moving back.
Maybe I can wipe it off with my sleeve. Maybe it's still wet. Maybe I can backpedal so hard the universe pretends it didn't see.
But the truck is gone.
Not pulling out. Not reversing. Not peeling out with tires screaming.
Just—
gone.
No engine. No tires on pavement. No door slam. No taillights turning the corner.
The lot is empty.
Only my bag sits where I dropped it, strap twisted like it watched the whole thing and is trying not to judge me.
A tremor runs through me—not magic. Not prophecy.
Human.
Someone waited. Watched. Timed it.
Moved the truck before I could change my mind.
Not a truck. The truck.
Because there's no way something that big leaves without a sound.
Unless it doesn't move in any way I understand.
The air feels…thinner. The hairs on my arms lift as if a static charge crawled over my skin. My ears ring with a faint, high pressure whine—like a door closing somewhere too far away to hear properly, but close enough to feel in your teeth.
Wind snatches at my hoodie, tugging at the hem like it wants to see if there are words written under my skin yet. My mouth goes dry.
My phone buzzes in my hand.
I don't remember pulling it out, but suddenly it's there, lit up, vibrating like it's nervous.
Unknown Number: Nice handwriting. Wrong box.
My entire body goes cold.
Another message arrives before I can think.
Unknown: You don't have to be ready yet. But you will be.
My breath stops for a full second.
Then a third text:
Unknown: The Masquerade isn't just a dance, Aetheria. It's a door. And you've already opened it.
The world tilts.
A picture comes through.
Me—on the hood of the truck. Marker in hand. Hair whipping in the wind. Face set in fierce, furious concentration.
The angle is high, like it was taken from above—from a vantage point that doesn't exist in this lot. The resolution is crisp. No grain. No blur.
Timestamp: ten minutes after class.
Which means: Someone was close. Someone was watching. Someone wanted this.
They wanted me humiliated enough to react. Reckless enough to climb onto the truck. Angry enough to leave a mark.
They knew exactly when I'd get here. Exactly what I'd do. Exactly how long it would take for my shame to flip into defiance.
A test. A measure. A move.
My thumbs fly before I can overthink.
ME: Who is this?
The typing bubble appears. Vanishes. Appears again.
Finally—
Unknown: Call it…advance notice.
Another line follows immediately, like they don't want to give me time to recover.
Unknown: Cassiopeia is not the only one who sees.
My heart trips.
Cassiopeia. Not Cassie. Not Cassandra. Full-name power. Almost nobody uses it—and she hates when they do.
I swallow hard and type:
Me: How do you know Cassie?
The reply is instant.
Unknown: We know all the Seers on the board. Pieces, Aetheria. You'll understand soon.
The not-name slices straight through me.
Aetheria.
The air seems to thin again. For a second the lot flickers, and I'm not in Georgia anymore.
I'm back on the road. Back in the storm. Back staring at the door breathing in the middle of the highway. Ash falling like snow. A hooded man lifting his hand.
I blink hard.
The gym wall snaps back into place. The cracked asphalt. The distant shouts of students who have no idea the world is a game board.
My phone buzzes again. I flinch.
This time, it's Cassie.
Cassie: vision just dropped in my lap like a bowling ball are you in a parking lot?
I stare at the question.
Me: yes
Three dots. Vanish. Return.
Cassie: okay, don't freak out
Bad start.
Cassie: whatever you just did? something clicked like a lock like you just said "yes" to a question nobody asked out loud
My heart stutters.
Me: I said no
There's a longer pause this time. I can almost see her squinting at whatever she's seeing, reshuffling timelines like index cards.
Cassie: yeah about that sometimes "no" is the word that opens the right door
Wind curls around me, lifting the ends of my hair, smelling like rain and exhaust and something older underneath.
This should feel like pure mortification.
I was humiliated in class. I vandalized a stranger's truck. Tomorrow there'll be at least four versions of this story, and in half of them I'll be secretly in love with some mystery redneck in a Chevy.
It should feel like shame.
It doesn't.
It feels like fate tightening. Like something ancient smiling. Like a piece just moved on a board I didn't realize I was standing on.
The unknown number goes quiet.
But the feeling of being watched doesn't.
I pick up my bag with shaking hands and make myself walk back toward the heart of campus, one step and then another.
The wind follows, tugging at my hood like it doesn't quite want to let me go.
Behind me, Lot 351 sits empty.
But I can't shake the certainty that somewhere—just out of sight—a black truck is idling at the edge of the game, engine purring, waiting for its turn.