Page 2 of The Code of You

"This isn’t failure,” I said. "This is a draft. Literature is always a draft. We write and rewrite and rewrite again. Failing is part of it.”

My own words echoed in my ears like mockery. If failing was part of it, why was I so terrified of it? My fingers tightened around the armrest. She looked at me the way students sometimes do. Like I had answers. Like I knew how to live. If only she knew.

"Come to my office hours next week,” I said, putting on the professional smile I’d practiced in the mirror until it looked real. "Bring your conclusion. We’ll work on it. Together.”

She nodded, wiped her cheeks, and stood. "Thank you, Dr. Blake.”

She left. The door clicked shut. I counted to five, listening for her footsteps to fade. Then I let out the breath I’d been holding. My shoulders dropped. My hands uncurled, and I saw the red crescents my nails had pressed into my palms. My heart was beating too fast. I laid a hand on my chest, but that made it worse. I could feel it everywhere now—in my throat, in my temples, behind my eyes. The walls of books closed in. I tried to breathe, but the air wasn’t reaching where it needed to go. Not good enough. Not good enough. Not good enough.

I pressed my forehead against the edge of my desk. The wood was cool and hard and real. I focused on that. And then it was there, the thought that always came when I lost control. The thought of hands gripping my wrists, holding me down, forcing me to be still. I opened my eyes and pushed it away, to the place where I kept everything I couldn’t allow myself to think about. I breathed in and out, again and again. The trembling faded slowly, the way things do when they’re only retreating, not leaving.

I sat back up and smoothed my skirt. With hands that still weren’t quite steady, I pulled a stack of essays toward me. Forty of them. The third one had a coffee stain on the last page. I stared at it. The stain was from a mug, not a cup—the ring was too big for a cup. Who drinks coffee from a mug while printing an essay? At home, then, not in the library. But why hadn’t he printed it again? Had he run out of paper? Had he not cared? I touched the stain. It was dark. Strong coffee. Black, no milk. That didn’t fit the student whose name was on the cover page. He always had a latte in front of him during lectures.

I shook my head. It was just a coffee stain on an essay. It didn’t matter at all. I turned the page and forced myself to focus on the words. But whose coffee was it, if not his?

The church bell rang. Once. Twice. I didn’t flinch until the third strike. Shit. The meeting. I jumped up, grabbed my notes, stuffed them into my bag, and ran. My footsteps echoed through the vaulted hallways, bouncing off the stone walls. Damn, damn, damn.

The heavy wooden door to the courtyard crashed shut behind me. The autumn air hit my face. Henley hated tardiness. I checked my watch. Shit, I was fifteen minutes late.

The administration building loomed ahead of me. Red brick like so many buildings in Cambridge, crawling with ivy. In the distance, the Boston skyline glistened in the sunlight. I yanked the heavy entrance door open. Inside it smelled like floor wax and old files.

Henley was already waiting. Of course. And he was smiling. That was worse than any anger. "Dr. Blake.” His voice was lethally polite. "How lovely that you could join us.”

I stopped, catching my breath. "I’m sorry, I . . .”

"Come.” He turned and marched into his office. His face had taken on that color it got when budgets didn’t add up.

Inside, Jamie Kowalski studied me with something that looked a lot like pity.

"Sit down.” Henley gestured to the chair across from his desk.

I dropped into it.

"We have a problem,” Henley said. "Your position here is . . . at risk.” The words hung in the air like a verdict.

My stomach clenched. "At risk? What do you mean?”

Henley leaned back. His fingers drummed on the desk. "We need to cut costs. Eliminate positions.”

"Eliminate positions?” My throat tightened.

"There’s one way we could keep you on.” He avoided my eyes, like he already knew he was about to ask something unreasonable. "Going forward, you would need to take on two hundred students per semester.”

"Two hundred students?” My voice came out sharp. "I can barely give fifty students what they need.”

"Dr. Blake.” Henley raised a hand. "I admire your dedication to your students, but you’ll need to find a way if you want to keep your position.”

Jamie cleared his throat. "Pandora, maybe you could . . .” He stopped when I looked at him.

"What?” My voice cut through the air.

"Well.” Jamie ran his fingers over the keys of his laptop. "There’s a new option. An AI could support you in your work and take over the repetitive parts.”

Henley nodded eagerly. "Exactly! Dr. Kowalski has made a brilliant suggestion. With AI you could grade five times as many essays in a day. It can help you prepare your seminars too.”

Heat rose to my face. My hands curled into fists. "You want me to work with a machine?”

"It’s not an ordinary machine,” Jamie said quickly. "It’s an experimental AI from the Quantum Systems lab. It can recognize patterns that—”