Page 30 of Lethal in Pink

I don't know when it happened, but somewhere along the way, the space between us has stopped feeling like territory to defend.

So, I turn another page and he continues to stay.

And, maybe, I don't mind it too much.

Chapter ten

Amiyah

Icross the threshold of Law and Ethics at exactly 11:00 AM, coffee in hand, and stop dead.

It’s him.

The third row. Center aisle. Its fucking Jae—he’s already seated, one leg extended into the walkway, his casebook open on the fold-out desk in front of him, flipping pages with the casual authority of someone who didn’t just materialize in my academic existence like a particularly attractive curse.

I hate everything about this.

He’s now occupied three of my spaces already this week. It’s clear that it’s going to be a long fucking semester.

I take a deep breath, pretending not to notice him, and walk to my seat.

The chair groans when I sit, which feels personally targeted. I set my latte down on the desk with slightly more force than necessary. Coffee sloshes against the inside of the lid but doesn’t breach.

Small victories.

My tote bag yields its contents in the order I packed it this morning: planner first, then the pink binder, then the pen case. The planner opens to today’s date with a sound that is, to my ears, the auditory equivalent of a woman who has her shit together.

The planner opens to today's date. I smooth the page with my palm, straighten the edges of my notes, line up my pens.

Everything is neat.

Everything is where it should be.

It doesn’t even bother me that he’s in yet another one of my classes.

I am completely fine.

I am, in fact, the most fine person who has ever been fine in the history of fine. I am so fine that fine should consider retiring from the English language out of respect for how thoroughly I have mastered it.

Students filter in around me.

I do not turn around.

His breathing—I don’t even notice it. The shift of fabric when he adjusts in his seat. Nothing.

The professor walks in.

“Good morning,” he says.

A few people mumble it back.

“Today we’re discussing prosecutorial discretion and the ethics of outcome-based justification. I trust you’ve all read the Brady material.”

The room makes a sound that is not quite assent and not quite confession. It lives in the uncomfortable middle, the acoustic equivalent of thirty people simultaneously thinking oh shit.

I’ve read it.

Obviously.