Brianna finished her last class of the day, excited but exhausted by her arrival on campus a week earlier. The students seemed friendly, the administrators were open-minded, and the faculty treated her as an equal. Woodland was everything she"d hoped it could be, but it was Friday and time to take a break from academic life. She was anxious for news from Malachi"s fake coffee date with her mother that afternoon. Once she finally got hold of him, all he"d learned was that Molly had talked about relocating from somewhere else many years earlier. When Brianna called her mother, she never even mentioned the coffee date—the woman would hide things until the day she died.
Brianna left the classroom, crossed the entrance to the library, and began the trek home. She scrolled through her playlist,
