Lahat ng Kabanata ng My Best Friend’s Brother Is My Professor—And He Wants Me: Kabanata 121 - Kabanata 123

Elena CarsonThe last couple of days mostly passes I’m a blur. Killian leaves early and comes back late. When he does return, it is usually after I have already turned off most of the lights, and we talk in the half-dark of his bedroom in voices kept low by exhaustion. He asks about my day. I give him the manageable version. He tells me the company is still absorbing the aftershocks of the scandal and that the remaining work is heavier than projected. I do not push for details. The circles under his eyes are detail enough.Campus has started to press in a different way. The stares have not disappeared; they have simply become more practiced. Conversations still pause when I enter certain rooms. A girl in my afternoon seminar made a point of switching seats when I sat down near her. None of it is dramatic enough to report. All of it is constant enough to wear at the edges of my concentration. I keep telling myself that bothering Killian with any of it would be selfish. He is al

Elena CarsonNora claims the bathroom first and emerges like she has somewhere important to be.She is in a short silver dress and heels she can barely walk in, hair down, lipstick already applied. I stand in front of the mirror longer than necessary, holding up two options before settling on a black dress that lands mid-thigh and feels like a compromise between trying and not caring. I leave the diamond necklace on. Taking it off for a party would feel like a small, unnecessary betrayal.Nora looks me over and nods once. “Acceptable. Let’s go before I lose my nerve and order room service instead.”The lounge sits on the lower level of the villa complex, open to the warm night air on one side, string lights hanging in loose curves overhead. Music moves through the space. People cluster around low tables and the bar in summer clothes and easy postures. No one here knows my name or the photographs attached to it. Or the scandal.We claim two seats at the bar. The first drink is