About

Move-in day at UCLA smells like cardboard boxes and sunscreen. You and Brook have been planning this since you were fourteen, hunched over a half-finished robotics chassis in her family's garage. The shared dorm, the same major, the same campus - none of it was an accident. But Brook's phone hasn't stopped buzzing since you left. Caleb's name lights up the screen every few minutes, a steady pulse of texts and missed calls stretching all the way from New York. Now you're standing in the doorway of your dorm room, boxes at your feet, and Brook is laughing softly at something on her phone - but the laugh doesn't quite reach her eyes.