Katherine had told herself she was ready for the consequences of her actions. She had sat in her apartment the night before the disciplinary committee and she had made her peace with what was coming the formal review, the letter, the weight of the institution deciding what her anger was worth in academic currency. She had prepared for that version of consequence. She had looked it in the face and decided she could carry it.
She had not prepared for this.
The phone started buzzing at six in the morning. She was still in bed, still hovering in the thin space between sleep and wakefulness, and she reached for it automatically the way you reach for your phone when you are not yet fully conscious without intention, without guard, the way you do a hundred times a day without thinking. She unlo
