CLAIRE ANDERSON
The coffee cup sits on my desk like a silent accusation, the paper surface still bearing the faint stain of this morning's disaster. I haven't touched it since I retrieved it from Xavier's office, and I don't plan to. Every time I look at it, I see his grey eyes, cold and unreadable, watching me like I'm nothing. I've shoved it to the corner of my desk, hidden behind my laptop, but I can still feel its presence, a constant reminder of everything I'm trying to forget.
The campus cafeteria is buzzing with the usual lunchtime chaos—students laughing, trays clattering, the distant hum of conversation that fills every corner of the building. I sit alone at a table near the window, picking at a sandwich I have no appetite for. My phone is face-down on the table, and I'm trying
