Malia~
The classroom always smelled faintly of floor polish and the lingering bite of dry-erase markers, the kind that left a ghost of blue or red across the whiteboard no matter how much the teacher scrubbed. Today the air felt thick, like I couldn’t pull a full breath. Maybe it was just me. Maybe it was the way I’d barely slept, my brain replaying last night in dizzy loops.
When I had finally slept, my dream was a repeat of that day, Maverick and my closeness, how if Mum hadn’t barged in, we would have gone the whole way.
I forced myself to sit straighter than usual, books stacked in neat piles on my desk, highlighter capped and waiting. I kept my eyes fixed on the board as if I were hanging on to every number the teacher wrote. Focus, Malia. This was school. My safe place. It had to
