DON’T STOP
“You look—”
“Don’t.” The word landed like a blade on the table. She stepped fully into the room, letting the door swing behind her, her chin lifted despite everything, despite the heat still radiating off her skin, despite the flyaways, despite arriving twenty minutes too late to a battle she’d already lost. “Where is the committee?”
“Gone.”
Her jaw flexed.
“The contract—”
“Signed.”
I watched it hit her. Watched her absorb it the way Daisy absorbed everything she refused to let break her — a single controlled breath, a slight stillness, a recalibration so fast most people would miss it.