The silence in the dorm room was a physical presence, thick and heavy as wet wool. For three days, it had suffocated Zaid. Bassam’s side of the room was a monument to his absence, bed perfectly made, desk eerily tidy. When he was there, he was a ghost, slipping in after dark and leaving so early, his headphones a permanent barrier. Zaid’s mumbled, “I’m sorry about what I said,” had dissolved into the stagnant air, unanswered.
The 300-dinar quest, “The Mentor,” now felt like a taunt. Bassam’s words were on a loop in his mind: “You’re using him… You’re just a clown.” He’d tried to sketch out “Project Bloom” with Khamis, but the ideas that once seemed brilliant now felt cheap and exploitative.
“We can call the first episode ‘The Wallflower,’” Khamis had said, tapping a pen against his story
