The night tasted of metal and leftover fury when YN let herself into her apartment—one of those dull, quiet, too-clean places that felt like a holding cell between the woman she had been trained to be and the woman she did not yet dare to admit she was becoming, and as she locked the door behind her, the leftover scent of the classroom, chalk and old wood varnish and the faintest trace of that boy’s expensive cologne, still clung to her like something illicit, something she should have shrugged off long before she stepped out of the building, yet it stayed, persistent and disrespectful, just like the boy who wore it.

She tossed her bag onto the sofa with more force than necessary, ignoring the way her pulse still hadn’t settled, ignoring the way her mind kept replaying that stupid smirk Hunter had worn when he handed her back her pen—her pen.