Project Crisis
1087 Words
📖Chapter Twelve
Project Crisis
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The next day at the library,both Daniel and Amara had been working on the project
Then it suddenly went silent….Amara paused waiting for Daniel to continue talking…nothing
Amara knew something was wrong the moment Daniel stopped speaking.
He had been explaining the data comparison between their survey responses and the department archive statistics when his voice suddenly went quiet mid-sentence.
She looked up from her notebook.
“What happened?”
Daniel didn’t answer immediately.
He was staring at his laptop screen.
Too still.
“Daniel?”
He leaned forward slightly, scrolling again.
Then again.
Then once more.
“It’s not here.”
Her pen stopped moving.
“What do you mean it’s not here?”
“The fieldwork spreadsheet.”
Her stomach dropped instantly.
“What?”
“The updated one,” he said, already checking another folder. “The cleaned version.”
“No,” she said immediately. “You saved it yesterday.”
“I did.”
“Check again.”
“I am checking.”
He opened another file.
Then another.
Then another.
Silence stretched between them like something fragile and dangerous.
Finally, he leaned back slightly.
“It’s gone.”
For a few seconds, Amara didn’t breathe.
“That’s not possible.”
“I know.”
“That’s two weeks of work.”
“I know.”
“That’s the version Professor Okoye asked us to expand.”
“I know, Amara.”
She stood up before she even realized she was moving.
“No.”
Her voice sounded different now.
Quieter.
Strained.
“No, this cannot be happening.”
Daniel rubbed his forehead slowly.
“I think the drive corrupted when I transferred the backup.”
“You think?”
“I said I think.”
“That file had everything.”
“I know.”
“The survey coding.”
“I know.”
“The interview responses.”
“I know.”
“The field comparisons.”
“I know.”
Her chest tightened.
Her scholarship.
Her grade.
Her future.
Everything suddenly felt fragile again.
“What are we going to do?”
Daniel didn’t answer immediately.
Instead, he opened a fresh document.
“We redo it.”
She stared at him.
“Redo it?”
“Yes.”
“Daniel, that took two weeks.”
“Then we do two weeks’ work in one night.”
“That’s not realistic.”
“No,” he agreed calmly. “But it’s necessary.”
Amara looked at the clock on the library wall.
7:18 p.m.
The building would close late tonight.
But not late enough.
“This is my fault,” he said quietly.
She blinked.
“What?”
“I handled the backup transfer.”
“That doesn’t mean—”
“It does.”
“No,” she said firmly. “This is a group project.”
He looked at her then.
Really looked at her.
“You’re not angry?”
“I am stressed,” she corrected.
He almost smiled.
“That’s fair.”
She pulled her chair closer to the table again.
“Okay,” she said, opening her notebook. “Start from the survey summaries.”
“You’re staying?”
She looked up.
“Of course I’m staying.”
“It’s going to take hours.”
“I know.”
“It might not even be enough.”
“I know.”
Something in his expression softened again.
“Okay,” he said quietly.
They worked for nearly an hour before either of them spoke again.
Numbers.
Tables.
Responses.
Corrections.
Cross-checking.
Re-entering.
Rebuilding.
At some point, the library lights dimmed slightly as evening settled fully outside the windows.
Most students had already left.
The silence around them deepened.
“Take a break,” Daniel said finally.
“I’m fine.”
“You haven’t moved in forty minutes.”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re not.”
“I said I’m fine.”
“Amara.”
She stopped typing.
“What?”
“You’re tired.”
“So are you.”
“Yes.”
“So we keep working.”
He watched her for a moment.
Then he reached across the table and gently turned her laptop screen toward himself.
“Five minutes.”
She frowned.
“Daniel—”
“Five minutes.”
She leaned back reluctantly.
“This is still your fault,” she said.
“That’s fair.”
“And if we fail this project—”
“We won’t.”
“You cannot promise that.”
“I can promise we won’t stop trying.”
Something about the way he said it made her chest tighten again.
Not with fear this time.
With something else.
Something steadier.
Safer.
After a moment, she spoke again.
“Why didn’t you tell me earlier?”
“Tell you what?”
“That the file was gone.”
“I wanted to confirm first.”
“So you handled it alone.”
“I handled it quickly.”
“That’s not the same thing.”
He hesitated slightly.
Then said quietly,
“I didn’t want you to panic.”
Her expression softened before she could stop it.
“You thought I would panic?”
“Yes.”
“That’s rude.”
“That’s accurate.”
She almost laughed.
Almost.
Instead, she looked at him properly.
For the first time that night, not as her project partner.
Not as her academic rival.
Just as Daniel.
“You stayed calm,” she said quietly.
“I had to.”
“For me?”
“For the project.”
She raised one eyebrow.
He hesitated.
Then corrected himself.
“For both.”
The honesty in that answer surprised her more than anything else that had happened that evening.
Outside, the sky had gone completely dark.
Inside the library, only a few tables were still occupied now.
It suddenly felt like the world had narrowed down to just the two of them.
“You know,” she said softly, “most people would have blamed me.”
“For what?”
“For trusting you with the backup.”
Daniel stared at her.
Then shook his head once.
“I would never do that.”
She believed him immediately.
And that scared her a little.
“Okay,” she said finally, opening her laptop again. “Let’s finish this.”
He nodded.
And this time—
when their hands brushed accidentally while reaching for the same notebook—
neither of them pulled away immediately.
- Writer
