The lecture hall smelled like hot paper and sour ambition.
And cheap cologne.
Ryan sat stiff in the middle row, pen tapping against his spiral notebook like a broken metronome. His notes were a mess of half-finished sentences and aggressive slashes through entire paragraphs.
That f*****g cologne.
It was stuck in his nostrils. On his skin. Buried in his hoodie. Some generic brand the guy last night had marinated himself in—like pheromones made in a gas station bathroom.
Ryan had showered. Twice.
Still there.
Still clinging.
Like a ghost with too much hair product and no sense of personal space.
⸻
Professor Langley was droning on about tort reform. Something about liability caps and moral hazard. Ryan wasn’t listening. Not really.
He just wanted to go back in time and never answer
