CHAPTER 2: THE AWAKENING
205 Words
The cockroach skittered across Daniel’s trigonometry textbook at 3:17 AM—the witching hour of exhausted minds.
Its antennae trembled against the equation he’d solved seven times. *Still wrong.* He slammed the beaker down, trapping the insect in a glass prison. Round and round it ran, legs scraping against smooth walls, mirroring the frantic orbits of his thoughts.
*Like my brain. Chaotic. Undisciplined.*
Outside, the mango tree’s shadow fingered his window. Earlier that evening, he’d watched the security footage—seventy-three minutes of Evelyn Carter standing motionless beneath those branches, her uniform crisp in the moonlight while sweat glued his shirt to his back.
He uncapped a red pen.
**Rules for Excellence**
1. *4 AM wake-up* (theta wave optimization)
2. *Color-coded notes* (red for lethal formulas)
3. *No distractions* (not even her)
The cockroach stopped running. It raised its head as if listening to something beyond human hearing.
A *click* from the hallway.
Daniel froze. The school’s ancient pipes often groaned at night, but this was sharper—metallic. The sound of a locker door easing shut.
When he pressed his ear to the door, he caught it: the whisper of rubber soles on linoleum, retreating with surgical quiet.
And the faintest trace of jasmine.
- Writer
