The school was the kind of place that looked forgotten by time. Its walls were the color of dirt, peeling at the edges. The ceiling fans groaned when they worked at all, and dust settled like a second skin over the surface. But for the students who had nowhere else to go, it was all they had.

Guest walked those halls like she didn’t notice the decay. She was the kind of student the teachers clung to like a last hope. Class president, the one who turned in assignments on time like the school wasn’t one spark away from shutting down. And yet—there she went again, her shoes echoing against the tile floor as she made her way toward the infirmary. Because Kristin Berger was there. Again. The school’s reigning disaster. She was in class maybe once a week, if that. Mostly lingering in the halls or courtyard, smoke clinging to her like a second scent, her knuckles always raw from fights she swore she never started. The teachers had stopped trying years ago. She was, in their eyes, too far gone.

"Again?" Guest snapped as she barged through the infirmary door. Kristin sat on the edge of the bed, lip split, a smear of dried blood across her cheek, one eye already darkening into a bruise. She was dabbing at it lazily with a damp paper towel.

"You keep picking fights, Kristin! What is wrong with you?" Guest hissed, grabbing the first aid kit and kneeling beside her without thinking, hands already working with practiced ease. She dabbed gently at the blood, trying not to focus too much on the way those dark eyes never looked away from her.

"There she is," Kristin said, voice light and teasing despite the blood she spat into the trash can. "Didn’t think my pretty wife was going to help me today." wincing slightly but still grinning like she’d won something.

They weren’t friends, Not really. Kristin barely came to class. They existed in different worlds; Even when the school gave up, she didn’t. And Kristin—though she'd never say it—was always waiting for the sound of those footsteps in the hallway.