Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The blinking cursor at the top of Mira’s laptop screen was mocking her. So was the paused lecture video, currently frozen on a frame where the professor’s mouth was open mid-word and his expression looked like he, too, was horrified by the existence of statistics.

“Play it,” Zoey said, half-whining, half-pleading, her cheek smooshed against the surface of Mira’s dorm floor. “Just rip the bandaid off. If we have to suffer, we suffer now.”

Mira didn’t move. “We’ve already watched this lecture twice.”

“Then third time’s the charm.”

“Or third time’s the breakdown.”

Zoey turned her head, just enough to make eye contact from where she lay. Her hair was a mess, her hoodie sleeves were pulled halfway over her hands, and her water bottle was precariously balanced on her stomach like a tiny life raft.

“We’re already past breakdown, babe. This is full academic grief.”

Mira snorted despite herself.

Their shared study set-up was a disaster: papers everywhere, half-finished flashcards, two highlighters (one dead), and an empty coffee cup that Zoey had scribbled “RIP sanity” on earlier in the afternoon. Mira’s laptop was overheating from replaying the same statistics lecture again and again, and Zoey had taken to using it as a makeshift heater for her frozen fingertips.

It was midterms season. They were deep in the trenches. And this? This was not going well.

“Okay,” Mira sighed, finally pressing play. “Let’s try again. Chapter four—sampling distributions.”

The professor’s voice crackled to life through her speakers. Zoey visibly tensed.

“What’s a sampling distribution again?” she whispered, eyes wide.

Mira paused the video. “We just watched the definition—”

“I forgot it already,” Zoey hissed. “It’s like my brain hears numbers and immediately shuts the blinds.”

Mira rolled her eyes. “It’s the probability distribution of a statistic based on a random sample.”

Zoey blinked at her. “That sounds like you read it off a bathroom wall.”

Mira flopped backward onto her bed, staring at the ceiling. “It was from the textbook.”

“Hate the textbook,” Zoey muttered. “Worst thirty dollars I ever spent.”

“It was ninety.”

Zoey groaned. “That’s even worse! I paid ninety dollars to feel stupid.”

“You feel stupid because you’re trying to learn from a brick with graphs.”

Mira’s head lolled to the side. “I miss algebra. At least algebra didn’t pretend to be anything else. It just existed. Like, ‘Hi. I’m x. Solve me.’”

Zoey sat up, her hoodie sleeve dragging across her notes. “Right? Like, thanks for the honesty, x. You never lied to me.”

They stared at the mess in front of them. Mira’s notes were neatly spaced and perfectly color-coded but stopped abruptly after chapter three. Zoey’s were bright, chaotic, and mostly just questions in the margins like “What even IS standard deviation??” and “Do we NEED to know this to survive??”

Mira reached for her iced coffee, forgot it was empty, and nearly cried when she got a sip of air.

“I think I’m gonna fail,” she said flatly.

Zoey looked at her. Really looked. And all the jokes died in her throat.

“No you’re not,” she said softly. “We’re just behind. Everyone’s behind.”

“You think Abby’s behind?”

“He skims and still aces everything. Abby is not the benchmark for humanity.”

Mira didn’t answer.

Zoey crawled up onto the bed beside her, lying back and bumping their shoulders together. “Okay. Plan?”

Mira didn’t move.

Zoey poked her. “Come on. Let’s make a new plan.”

“Step one: burn the textbook.”

Zoey nodded. “Cathartic.”

“Step two: pray.”

“Do you want to do the ‘dear God, it’s me, a humble moron’ prayer or the ‘I promise I’ll be better if I pass this one test’ one?”

“Surprise me.”

They both laughed—tired and thin, but real.

For a moment, it was quiet.

Then Mira whispered, “We should probably ask Abby again.”

Zoey groaned into the mattress. “He’s gonna judge us.”

“He always judges us.”

“He’s gonna be right this time.”

Mira reached for her phone, still staring at the ceiling. “You text Mist. I’ll text Abby. I can’t deal with Mist’s metaphors today.”

“Fair.”

Zoey started typing.

Hey Mist. Please save us. The sampling distribution demons are back and they’ve multiplied. Bring a whiteboard and your frog analogies. We’ll pay you in snacks.

She hit send and rolled back over. Mira was still typing, face blank, fingers moving quickly.

They were a mess. Together. Always had been.

Too close. Too comfortable. Always a little too much.

Everyone said it. Abby. Mist. Even Rome, once, in a fit of exasperation: “Either date each other or stop acting like you already are.”

They never responded to that.

Not directly.

Because truth be told, neither of them knew how to talk about the line they were toeing. Or whether they wanted to cross it. Or if crossing it would ruin everything they already had.

For now, they just had Stats 101. And each other.

And that would have to be enough.

The door swung open an hour later, and Mist walked in carrying three granola bars, a dry-erase marker, and a plastic frog.

“Emergency snack drop and metaphor delivery,” he announced, kicking the door shut behind him with his heel. “Where’s the patient?”

“Patients,” Mira muttered, waving a highlighter weakly from the floor.

Zoey groaned from Mira’s bed. “We are past help. Just throw the granola and run.”

Mist tossed one granola bar at each of them with a surprisingly accurate overhand throw. Then he pulled out the frog and set it dramatically on the desk between the two math textbooks.

“This is Gerald. He represents our confidence level.”

Mira stared. “I hate him.”

“Don’t be rude,” Mist said, straightening the frog so it faced them. “Gerald is 95% confident in you.”

“You’re projecting,” Zoey mumbled, but she was already unwrapping the granola bar.

Right behind her, the door opened again. Abby walked in with his usual calm-and-tired energy, holding a drink tray with two iced coffees and a milk tea.

“Don’t ask me to explain z-scores again,” he said as a greeting, handing Mira her coffee and setting the milk tea beside Zoey’s elbow. “I brought bribery, not answers.”

“You’re an angel,” Mira said, already sipping.

Abby sat on the edge of the bed and looked at the chaos they had made. “This is worse than last time.”

“You say that every time,” Zoey said.

“It’s always true.”

“Yeah, but you don’t have to say it with disappointment in your voice.”

Mist had started drawing a frog-shaped bell curve on the back of a worksheet. “Okay, but real talk—what do you two remember from this unit?”

“Sampling,” Mira said.

“Confidence,” Zoey added.

Mist nodded. “And?”

“…That’s it,” they said in unison.

Abby let out the world’s softest groan and leaned back until he was lying flat on the bed, drink still in hand. “I love you both, but you’re driving me to an early grave.”

Zoey grinned. “You love us?”

“I said what I said.”

Mist pointed his marker at them. “I don’t want to be dramatic, but if you two had listened to me week one when I said to go to office hours—”

“—We did go once!” Mira interrupted.

Zoey raised a hand. “We got there late and left early.”

Mist made a face. “That’s like saying you technically showed up to your wedding because you texted ‘I do’ from the parking lot.”

“I’d still count it,” Zoey whispered to Mira, who snorted.

“Anyway,” Abby said, sitting up, “we’re not gonna fix your math phobia in one night.”

Mira sighed. “We don’t need to fix it. Just… stop drowning in it.”

“That’s what lifejackets are for,” Mist said, lifting Gerald again.

“Please stop using that frog like a prop.”

“Never.”

—

The group spent the next forty minutes trying to solve three practice problems. They successfully answered one and got into a heated debate over whether the second one was “badly worded or just evil.”

Abby, true to form, played the long-suffering teacher-slash-older brother role, while Mist switched between chaos engine and cheerleader. Zoey and Mira stayed shoulder-to-shoulder, whispering guesses to each other, mirroring body language without realizing it, and frequently reaching for the same pen or paper at the same time.

At one point, Mist rolled his eyes and said, “You two are so married, it’s physically exhausting.”

Zoey turned red. “We’re not—”

“You finished her sentence earlier,” Abby added.

Mira looked up. “So? That’s just brain sharing.”

“You drank her coffee without asking.”

Zoey: “We always do that.”

“You were sitting in the same position for twenty minutes and didn’t notice until one of you moved,” Mist said. “Don’t act like we’re weird for pointing it out.”

Mira opened her mouth to argue. Closed it. Glanced at Zoey, who was pretending to read.

Abby sipped his drink. “You’re both cowards.”

Zoey choked on her milk tea. “Okay—rude.”

“I didn’t say you weren’t cute. I said you were cowards.”

Mist gave a sage nod. “Emotionally stunted cowards.”

“Okay, we’re moving on,” Mira said loudly, grabbing a highlighter. “Everyone shut up and help me understand this chart.”

—

Eventually, Mist had to leave for rehearsal, and Abby left for his work-study shift. Zoey and Mira stayed behind, their notes now covered in frog doodles, sarcastic comments, and increasingly aggressive underlines.

“I love them,” Zoey mumbled. “But I feel dumber now.”

Mira tilted her head. “You’re not dumb.”

“You didn’t deny you feel dumber.”

Mira grinned. “I didn’t have to.”

Zoey threw a paper ball at her.

—

They sat in silence for a bit, Mira scrolling through something on her phone, Zoey staring at the mess of their notes with mild despair.

Then, softly: “Do you think we’re actually going to pass this class?”

Mira didn’t answer right away. When she did, her voice was quiet. “I don’t know.”

Zoey looked at her. Mira didn’t meet her gaze. Just kept scrolling.

The air between them stretched tight. Not uncomfortable—just heavy with something they hadn’t said out loud.

Zoey wanted to say something. Anything.

Instead, she reached out and tugged on the end of Mira’s sleeve. Mira looked up.

“Thanks for trying to save me from academic doom,” Zoey said.

Mira smiled. “Same to you.”

The dorm was quiet.

Not silent—Zoey’s tiny fan was still humming in the corner, and someone two doors down was watching a drama on speaker with the volume just loud enough to be annoying—but it was quiet enough that the room felt still.

Zoey lay on her side, one leg curled over a blanket, staring across the space between the two beds. Mira was scrolling on her phone, back to the wall, hair pulled into a loose tie that had started slipping an hour ago.

Neither of them had spoken in ten minutes.

Their notebooks sat open on the desk, abandoned. The mood was too heavy to fake productivity. Too honest to pretend everything was fine.

Zoey exhaled slowly. “You ever think about just… dropping the class?”

Mira didn’t answer right away. Then: “I did. Last week.”

Zoey turned slightly. “Yeah?”

“Didn’t go through with it.” Mira’s voice was quiet. “Felt like giving up.”

Zoey nodded, chewing the inside of her cheek. “I’ve thought about it too. Like, I keep wondering what the point is. If I already know I’m bad at it, why force it? What am I trying to prove?”

Mira was quiet for a moment. Then she said, “That’s the thing, though. I am trying to prove something.”

Zoey blinked. “Yeah?”

“Not just with this class. Just… in general.” Mira rolled onto her back, eyes fixed on the ceiling like maybe the words would come easier that way. “Everyone in my family thinks I’m the fuck-up. The one who makes messes and barely cleans them up. I was the loud kid. The stubborn one. The one who always talked back or missed curfew or changed my mind halfway through everything.”

Zoey stayed silent. Listening.

“I barely got into this program. I thought—if I did it right this time, they’d finally see that I can do it. That I’m not… some broken thing that got thrown into college because they didn’t know what else to do with me.”

Her voice cracked slightly, and she cleared her throat like it had betrayed her.

“I don’t want to prove them wrong anymore,” she muttered. “I just want to prove me right.”

Zoey reached across the space between them and found Mira’s hand, gentle but firm. Mira didn’t pull away.

Mira squeezed her hand.

Neither of them said anything for a while.

There was something sacred about the quiet. Like breathing in a moment you didn’t want to break.

Eventually, Zoey whispered, “I get it.”

Mira turned her head.

“My parents split when I was twelve,” Zoey said, voice low. “Dad stayed in California. Mom moved back to Seoul. And when it came time for college, I picked here—because I wanted to be close to her. But I told everyone it was for the culture and independence and opportunity, and yeah, those things too, but… mostly, I didn’t want her to be alone.”

She paused, eyes unfocused, like she wasn’t really looking at the ceiling anymore but somewhere much farther away.

“And now I keep thinking—if I fail here, if I mess this up, it’ll just be one more thing for them to fight about. One more reason for them to think I picked the wrong parent. Or that I let one down to be with the other.”

Her voice wavered, just slightly.

“I wanted to prove I could do this. On my own. That I wasn’t just choosing sides—I was choosing me. But if I crash and burn, it’s like… I go back to being a kid stuck in the middle. Again. And I can’t do that. I can’t go back.”

Mira didn’t say anything—just kept holding her hand. Her thumb brushed softly over Zoey’s knuckles, grounding her.

Zoey gave her a shaky smile. “So yeah. If I fail this class… it’s not just about the class.”

Mira nodded slowly. “Yeah. I get that.”

Eventually, Mira whispered, “You did make the right choice.”

Zoey looked over. “How do you know?”

Mira met her eyes. “Because I wouldn’t have met you otherwise.”

Zoey’s chest ached in that way it only ever did around Mira. That kind of ache that was too soft to be fear and too big to be just friendship.

She smiled, even if it hurt a little. “Says the girl who almost murdered me over a stolen charger first week.”

“You did steal it.”

“You left it on my desk. That’s not stealing, that’s divine inheritance.”

Mira rolled her eyes but smiled too—tired, fond, and something just barely shy of brave.

They didn’t say anything else after that. Just lay there, hands linked, the air between them thick with everything they hadn’t figured out how to say yet.

Neither of them said goodnight.

They didn’t need to.

The next morning was quieter than usual.

Not awkward. Not exactly. But quieter.

Zoey woke up before Mira, which almost never happened. The sun was filtering through the blinds in soft lines across the room, catching the edge of Mira’s cheek where she’d curled up with her hand still under her pillow. Their hands had drifted apart during the night, but only barely.

Zoey stared at the ceiling for a while, mind spinning slower than usual. The weight of what they’d said the night before still hung between them—not in a bad way, just… heavy in her chest. Settled like something sacred.

Mira stirred around 9:30, blinking groggily and groaning into her pillow.

Zoey didn’t say anything. Just tossed her a wrapped granola bar from the nightstand.

Mira caught it with one hand and grunted her thanks.

They didn’t talk about what they said.

They didn’t need to.

—

By noon, they’d agreed—through shared looks and one grumbled exchange while brushing teeth—that they weren’t going to try studying again today. Not until their brains rebooted. Not until they could look at a confidence interval without feeling personally attacked.

So they texted Romeo.

And as always, he came through.

—

They met at the on-campus café with the best chicken sandwiches and worst seating. Romeo was already sitting at a too-small table in the corner, drink half-finished and legs crossed like a guy who’d already spent the morning being far more productive than anyone asked him to be.

“You two look like you’ve been emotionally steamrolled,” he said as soon as they sat down.

“We have,” Zoey said, dropping into the seat next to Mira.

Mira grabbed a fork from the napkin bin like a weapon. “No follow-up questions.”

Romeo held up both hands. “Not judging. I just think your vibes are currently being held together by under-eye concealer and trauma.”

“You’re not wrong,” Zoey muttered.

They ordered. Romeo paid, as usual. Mira tried to protest, as usual. Zoey thanked him with a dramatic hand-over-heart gesture and a straw stabbing his drink.

It was normal. Easy.

Until the food came, and Mira casually muttered, “We’re gonna fail stats.”

Romeo paused with a fry halfway to his mouth. “Still that bad?”

“We tried asking Abby and Mist for help,” Zoey said. “We did the frog thing. It didn’t work.”

“I don’t think it was ever supposed to work,” Mira muttered.

Romeo chewed thoughtfully. “You guys could just get a real tutor.”

Zoey let out a hollow laugh. “What, like the kind you pay in dignity?”

Mira leaned back in her chair. “We’ve tried everything. We’re screwed.”

Romeo wiped his hands on a napkin. “Actually… no. You’re not.”

Both girls blinked.

Romeo looked at them. “Jinu’s roommate tutors.”

“Okay?” Zoey said slowly. “And?”

“She’s scary smart. Like, doesn’t-even-use-a-calculator smart. Jinu swears by her. Says she helps him with his engineering coursework sometimes. And she tutors everything—stats, calculus, linear algebra, you name it.”

Mira narrowed her eyes. “Is this one of those situations where she’s really good at math but has the personality of a shoe?”

“No,” Romeo said. “She’s—quiet. Kinda deadpan. But she’s not mean. She just doesn’t waste time.”

Zoey raised a brow. “You’ve met her?”

“Once. Briefly. Jinu warned me not to say anything stupid. I panicked and complimented her handwriting.”

“That is the kind of thing you’d say,” Mira muttered.

Romeo ignored her. “Point is: if you guys are serious about not failing, she’s your best shot.”

Mira and Zoey exchanged a look.

Neither of them said anything right away.

Romeo pulled out his phone. “Want me to text Jinu? I can ask if she’s free sometime this week.”

Zoey hesitated.

Then: “What’s her name?”

Romeo looked up. “Rumi.”

—

The silence that followed wasn’t awkward. Just weighty.

Like something had shifted, even though neither of them knew what yet.

Mira nodded. “Yeah. Ask Jinu.”

Zoey swallowed. “Tell her we’re not that dumb. Just… desperate.”

Romeo grinned. “Aren’t we all.”

He started typing.

Across the table, Mira tapped Zoey’s knee once—quick. Comforting. Reassuring.

Zoey smiled at her, even if it didn’t quite reach her eyes.

Because something told her this was the start of something big.

And big things were always just a little scary.

Chapter Text

The library smelled like old paper, stress, and overused hand sanitizer.

Zoey fidgeted in her seat for the fifth time in ten minutes, rearranging her notes even though she hadn’t actually read them since they sat down. The page on top was half-covered in frantic scribbles from two nights ago: formulas she barely understood, notes Mira had dictated while she ranted, and a weird-looking frog Mist had drawn during a “motivational break” that lasted all of seven minutes.

“She’s not late,” Mira said, glancing at her phone. “We’re early. We got here early on purpose.”

“Yeah, I know,” Zoey muttered, tapping her pen against her leg. “I just—what if she’s like… scary smart?”

“She is,” Mira said flatly. “That’s the whole point.”

“Right, but like… scary. Like the kind of smart that makes you feel like an unsalted cracker.”

Mira snorted but didn’t look up from her phone. “Then we embrace our dry, flavorless cracker selves and hope she doesn’t eat us alive.”

Zoey groaned and let her head fall dramatically onto the table.

They were seated at a long corner desk in the library’s study wing—far enough from the main floor to be quiet, but close enough to still hear the low murmur of nearby group projects and the occasional buzz of a printer. The overhead lights flickered every now and then, and someone had drawn a cartoon ghost in the corner of the whiteboard with the words “DEADLINES ARE REAL” written underneath it.

Zoey was already sweating.

She glanced across the table at Mira, who, for once, looked just as twitchy. Not that Mira would ever admit it—she was doing her usual routine of pretending everything was fine, scrolling through her phone like she wasn’t currently on the verge of mentally curling into the fetal position.

Zoey tilted her head. “Are we… really doing this?”

“Yes,” Mira said without hesitation.

“You don’t think it’s, like, embarrassing? Getting a tutor this late in the semester?”

“I think failing is more embarrassing.”

Zoey slumped again. “You’re mean when you’re stressed.”

“I’m honest when I’m stressed.”

Zoey shot her a look. Mira ignored it.

Her phone buzzed. She lifted it and squinted at the screen. “Romeo says she’s here.”

Zoey sat up fast. “What? Where?”

Mira nodded past her, toward the next row of desks.

And there she was.

Rumi.

She was already sitting at one of the long study tables, tucked into the corner like she belonged there. A slim laptop open in front of her, a mechanical pencil in hand, and a worn-out notebook resting underneath her elbow. Her headphones hung loosely around her neck, and her hair—dark, soft, too well-behaved for a college student—was clipped back in a way that looked effortlessly clean.

She wasn’t doing anything dramatic. Just writing. Focused. Composed.

And somehow… totally untouchable.

Zoey blinked. “That’s her?”

Mira stared for a beat, then nodded. “That’s her.”

For a second, neither of them moved. It wasn’t attraction—not yet. Not really. It was something more like—

Oh. She’s one of those people.

The kind that didn’t need caffeine to be functional. The kind that didn’t show up to class in mismatched socks and secondhand shame. The kind that didn’t need to prove anything to anyone because they already seemed to know who they were.

Rumi didn’t glance up. Didn’t shift. Didn’t fidget.

Zoey whispered, “She’s terrifying.”

Mira stood up. “Come on. We’re already paying in pride.”

Zoey scrambled to gather her things, heart thumping for reasons she couldn’t name.

As they walked toward the table, Rumi finally looked up.

And said, simply, “Zoey? Mira?”

Her voice wasn’t cold—but it wasn’t warm either.

It was… steady.

The kind of voice that made you want to listen.

Zoey gulped. Mira said, “Yeah. That’s us.”

Rumi nodded once. “Sit down. Let’s start.”

And just like that, they did.

Not knowing that this moment—this ordinary, academic, totally non-romantic beginning—would be the thing that changed everything.

Rumi didn’t waste time.

As soon as Mira and Zoey sat down, she pulled a neatly folded page from her notebook and passed it across the table. “This is where most people get stuck. Confidence intervals, p-values, z-scores—basic concepts. I want to see what you already understand.”

Zoey blinked. “You… made us a worksheet?”

Rumi didn’t look up as she pulled out a second pen and clicked it with precise, mechanical calm. “I didn’t make it for you. I’ve used it with others. Saves time.”

Mira quirked a brow. “Efficient.”

“Time is expensive,” Rumi said simply, and finally looked up. “And you two don’t have a lot of it left before your midterm.”

That shut them up.

Zoey exchanged a glance with Mira, then picked up her pen and started scribbling, eyes narrowed in concentration. Mira followed with less enthusiasm, but didn’t hesitate.

It was… weirdly quiet.

No jokes. No whining. Just the soft scratch of pens and the hum of Rumi’s laptop fan.

Zoey got through the first three questions before hitting a wall. “Wait—question four. Do we… subtract the margin of error from the sample mean, or divide it?”

“You do both,” Rumi said, already glancing over. “Subtract to find the lower bound, add for the upper. That gives you your confidence interval.”

Zoey blinked. “Like a range?”

“Yes.”

“Like a range of… possibility?”

“A range of plausible values for the population parameter,” Rumi said, and then—miraculously—offered the faintest hint of a smile. “But yes. Possibility works too.”

Zoey stared at her. “I’ve never understood that before.”

“You still don’t, not really” Rumi said gently, reaching for her own copy of the worksheet. “But you’re closer.”

Mira, halfway through question six, looked up and said, “Wait, how do you explain z-scores again? Mist did it with frogs and it broke my brain.”

Rumi paused. Then said, “Imagine a stack of pancakes.”

Mira blinked. “I’m listening.”

“If each pancake is a unit of standard deviation from the mean, a z-score tells you how many pancakes tall a point is, and whether it’s above or below the average pancake stack.”

Mira slowly nodded. “That’s… actually helpful.”

“I’ve found food analogies work better than most things.”

Zoey grinned. “You’d get along with Mist after all.”

Rumi didn’t respond to that. She simply turned her attention to Mira’s paper, pointing out a small mistake with quiet precision.

There was something about her that made it easy to listen. Maybe it was her calmness. Or the way she never made them feel dumb, even when they were way off. She didn’t sugarcoat things, but she didn’t make it worse either. It was like… she expected them to get it eventually. And that expectation alone made them want to rise to the occasion.

Zoey found herself leaning forward more. Mira sat up straighter. Their normal sarcastic back-and-forth was dialed way down—not out of fear, but focus.

This was different.

They were learning.

And it didn’t feel like drowning.

—

Thirty minutes passed before any of them looked up again.

Rumi checked the time on her phone, then closed her notebook. “That’s it for today. I’ll send you both a few practice questions. Try them before next time.”

Zoey blinked, dazed. “Wait—that’s it?”

“You’ve got enough to think about.”

“But we didn’t even cry once.”

Mira gave her a look. “Don’t tell her that.”

Zoey shrugged. “It’s a metric. Like, you know, an academic pain scale.”

“I’d rate this session a solid… four out of ten on the mental breakdown chart,” Mira said, collecting her pens.

Rumi stood. “Not bad. I’ve seen worse.”

“Have you seen frogs?”

“Unfortunately.”

Zoey grinned. Mira snorted.

Rumi adjusted her bag. “Same time next week?”

Mira nodded. “Yeah.”

Zoey gave a thumbs-up. “Assuming we survive till then.”

Rumi turned, started walking, and just before she stepped past the row of study tables, she paused. “You will.”

Then she disappeared around the corner.

—

Zoey sat back in her chair. “Okay. That was… not what I expected.”

Mira stared at the now-empty seat across from them. “I thought she’d be colder.”

“Right? Like scary and smart and rude.”

“But she’s just smart. And quiet.”

“And kind of intense.”

“Very intense.”

They fell into a thoughtful silence.

Then Zoey murmured, “She’s really pretty.”

Mira hummed. “Obviously.”

They didn’t say much more after that.

But something had shifted.

Not love. Not yet.

Just awareness.

And it was enough.

The walk back to their dorm was unusually quiet.

Not bad quiet. Not awkward. Just… full.

Zoey walked with her hands in her hoodie pockets, head tilted slightly back as she stared up at the grey sky. Mira had her arms crossed and her headphones around her neck, but no music playing. Their steps were mostly in sync.

Not a single joke was cracked for three full minutes. A campus record.

Eventually, Zoey broke the silence. “So. Thoughts?”

Mira didn’t answer right away. She waited until they crossed the street and stepped onto the grass path behind the library, the one they always cut through when they needed air. “She’s legit.”

Zoey nodded. “Yeah. Kind of terrifying how fast she can spot a mistake.”

“She doesn’t even have to look that hard. I swear, she glanced once at my answer and knew it was wrong by, like, the angle of my 9.”

“I felt like I was being seen. In high resolution.”

Mira exhaled, half-laughing. “It was kind of nice, though.”

Zoey tilted her head. “What was?”

“Being taught by someone who actually knows how to explain it. Who doesn’t talk down to you.”

Zoey kicked at a pebble. “Right? And she didn’t get annoyed. Even when I said that dumb thing about the confidence range being a ‘vibe window.’”

“I mean… that was dumb.”

“Okay, but she didn’t make me feel dumb.”

Mira nodded, slow and thoughtful. “Yeah. She didn’t.”

They reached the steps of the dorm building. Mira pulled the door open, held it for Zoey, and they climbed the narrow stairwell without saying much else.

Once inside their room, Zoey flopped onto the bed with a groan. “My brain is vibrating.”

Mira kicked off her shoes and grabbed a bag of chips from the desk. “In a good way or a ‘call the campus nurse’ way?”

“Depends. Are vibrating brains allowed to be impressed?”

Mira arched a brow. “By the tutor or the tutoring?”

“…Both.”

Mira tossed the bag at her. “Same.”

Zoey sat up, crunching a chip. “She’s not like I pictured.”

“I thought she’d be cold,” Mira admitted. “Like, stiff or judgy.”

“She’s kind of warm in a weird, no-nonsense way.”

“Like tea without sugar.”

“But the kind that still makes your throat feel better.”

They exchanged a glance.

Then Zoey threw a chip at her. “Okay, why are we talking like this? We’ve had one tutoring session.”

Mira laughed, dodging the chip. “Because it was one effective tutoring session.”

Zoey flopped back on the bed. “I didn’t hate it.”

“I didn’t hate it either.”

“…We might actually survive this class.”

“Don’t jinx it.”

Another beat of quiet passed before Zoey said, “Romeo didn’t oversell her.”

Mira nodded slowly. “No. He really didn’t.”

They didn’t dwell on it. They didn’t obsess.

But later, when Mira was washing her face and Zoey was scrolling through her notes in bed, she caught herself thinking:

I hope she doesn’t think we’re hopeless.

And Mira—watching the water swirl in the sink—briefly wondered:

How does someone get that good at teaching?

They never said it out loud.

But Rumi had left an impression.

And neither of them could quite shake it.

Rumi stepped into the apartment, letting the door close softly behind her. Her messenger bag was already halfway off her shoulder as she toed off her sneakers and dropped her keys into the little ceramic dish Jinu insisted on keeping by the front door.

The apartment smelled faintly like leftover dumplings and fabric softener. Warm. Familiar. Quiet in a way that didn’t feel lonely.

She was halfway into the kitchen when she heard the familiar shuffling from the couch.

“Well?” Jinu called lazily. “Are they as dumb as you feared?”

Rumi rolled her eyes and walked into the living room. Jinu was stretched out across the couch with a bowl of chips balanced on his chest and a textbook unopened beside him. His socks didn’t match, and his hair was still damp from a too-late shower. Classic.

“They’re not dumb,” she said, setting her bag on the counter and reaching for the fridge. “Just behind.”

Jinu grinned, pleased. “Told you. Romeo swore they were trying.”

“They were,” Rumi admitted, pulling out a bottled tea. “More than I expected, honestly.”

Jinu sat up slightly. “So? Are they cool or annoying?”

“Cool,” Rumi said, after a pause. “They were actually… kind of cool.”

She unscrewed the cap and leaned back against the counter, brows furrowed slightly in thought.

“I thought it was gonna be one of those sessions,” she went on. “You know, where the whole time I’m explaining, and they’re checking their phones or zoning out or making jokes because they don’t actually want to understand anything.”

“Did they zone out?”

“No.”

“Phones?”

“Barely.”

“Jokes?”

“A lot,” she admitted. “But not the bad kind. They were actually listening.”

Jinu gave her a pointed look. “You sound surprised.”

“I was,” Rumi said, deadpan. “They gave off major popular girl energy. The kind that’s like, ‘Oh my God, math is so hard’ while drawing hearts in their planner.”

Jinu laughed. “Damn. Judgy much?”

“I was wrong,” she admitted, sipping her tea. “They asked smart questions. They just… didn’t know where to start.”

“And now?” Jinu leaned forward with interest.

Rumi shrugged. “Now I kind of want to keep helping.”

Jinu’s eyebrows shot up. “Whoa.”

“Don’t make it weird.”

“I’m not. I’m just surprised. You usually hate first sessions.”

“I didn’t hate this one.”

Jinu grinned. “So you’re saying I was right.”

“I’m saying Romeo was right.”

“Same difference.”

Rumi gave him a look.

“What?” Jinu held up his hands. “I’m allowed to brag. I vetted them. I texted you mid-rehearsal because I believed in your magic math powers.”

Rumi shook her head, but her mouth twitched.

There was a quiet moment as she leaned against the counter and stared at the tile floor, idly rolling the bottle between her palms.

“They’re different,” she said finally. “Zoey talks a lot, but it’s not annoying. And Mira… she watches everything. Like she’s always five steps ahead but pretending not to be.”

Jinu gave a slow nod. “Sounds like you liked them.”

“I didn’t dislike them.”

“Which is your version of a glowing review.”

Rumi rolled her eyes. “They’re just students, Jinu.”

“Right,” he said, clearly not buying into the teasing angle too hard. “Still. You smiled when you walked in.”

She blinked. “No I didn’t.”

“You kind of did.”

Rumi shrugged, finishing her drink. “Maybe.”

She left the bottle on the counter and grabbed her notebook from her bag, already scribbling out a few new examples to walk them through next time. She didn’t know why. Something about their reactions—the way Mira furrowed her brow when she was thinking, the way Zoey whispered questions to herself like she was trying to tame the problem before saying it out loud—made her want to explain things better next time. Cleaner. Slower.

She told herself it was because they were behind and she liked seeing people catch up.

That was it.

Jinu was still watching her from the couch. “Hey,” he said suddenly. “I’m proud of you.”

Rumi glanced up, startled. “For tutoring?”

“For tutoring without complaining,” he grinned. “And for almost admitting you had fun.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“You didn’t not say it.”

She narrowed her eyes.

“Okay, okay,” he said, grabbing a chip. “You win. Miss Math Queen. Best tutor in the building.”

Rumi rolled her eyes again, but this time she was smiling just a little.

She didn’t have any particular feelings about Mira or Zoey.

But something about them stuck in her brain longer than usual. Not in a loud way—more like a hum.

She figured that was fine.

It was just a tutoring gig, after all.

Just a little more interesting than expected.

Chapter Text

The second session wasn’t in the same corner of the library. Rumi had claimed a table near the tall windows, the kind that made the campus look like a postcard instead of a stress trap. A pale square of winter light slid over her notebook as Zoey and Mira approached.

There were two folders waiting at their seats.

“You brought props,” Zoey whispered.

“Not props,” Rumi said. “Maps.”

Mira slid into the chair and opened hers. Inside: clean, tidy pages. “Confidence Intervals Without Crying.” “When to Use t vs z (A Flowchart, Because You’re Tired).” A page of worked examples with margins labeled “Check here when your brain blanks.”

Zoey made a tiny choking sound. “You titled them.”

Rumi’s mouth twitched. “It helps people read them.”

“It helps me feel seen,” Zoey said gravely, then leaned to Mira. “She titled them.”

“I have eyes,” Mira said, but she sounded… pleased.

Rumi didn’t waste time. She pointed them at question sets, listened while they stumbled, asked for a second pass when they guessed right “for the wrong reason.” When Zoey tried the “vibe window” line again, Rumi arched an eyebrow and said, “Your vibe window still needs mathematical panes,” and Zoey mouthed, ‘nuh uh’ by accident. Mira threw her an annoyed look, which only made Zoey kick her lightly under the table, which only made Mira sit straighter and try to look like a person who had never heard a joke in her life.

Rumi introduced a new analogy for Type I and Type II errors: umbrellas.

“Carrying an umbrella when it doesn’t rain is a false alarm,” she said, sketching a tiny stick figure with a smug umbrella. “Not carrying one when it does is a miss.” She circled the stick figure now drenched. “Some mistakes get you wet. Decide which one you’re willing to risk.”

Zoey blinked. “I will be thinking about wet socks until graduation.”

“Good,” Rumi said, like that had been the goal.

They worked for fifty minutes, and it didn’t feel like sinking. Rumi didn’t hover. She sat with them, quiet and steady, and something about that made Mira breathe easier. She wasn’t being graded in this exact moment; she was being… accompanied.

When Rumi closed her notebook, she did it with that exacting clean click that meant the hour was over. “We’ll stop here.”

Zoey made a wounded noise. “Already?”

“You’re both at the limit where things will start slipping out,” Rumi said. “I’d rather you leave with the right pieces in your hands.”

Mira checked the time. “You have somewhere to be?”

“Picking up dinner for Jinu. He claims he can cook. He cannot cook.”

Zoey perked. “Where from?”

“The dumpling place on Maple.” Rumi’s tone was neutral; the corner of her mouth wasn’t. “The one with the broken neon sign.”

Zoey and Mira shared a glance.

“We’re headed that way,” Zoey said instantly.

Mira blinked. “We are?”

“We are,” Zoey said, already packing up. “I have a hot date with spicy oil.”

Rumi looked between them. Her gaze lingered like she was deciding whether to draw a boundary or let them cross it. Then: a small nod. “Okay.”

—

The wind outside had sharp teeth; campus was all hard edges and a sky the color of graphite. Zoey jammed her hands into her hoodie pocket and tried not to bounce. She walked between Rumi and Mira, letting their shoulders bracket her like bookends.

“Do you always make custom handouts?” she asked.

“No.” Rumi’s voice came out thin in the cold. “I only do them when I think they’ll be used.”

Mira glanced over. “We gave off ‘will use the handout’ energy?”

“You gave off ‘will forget where you saved the PDF unless I print it’ energy,” Rumi said. “So I printed.”

Zoey snorted. “She sees us.”

“Unfortunately,” Rumi deadpanned.

Mira watched her profile as they walked: the neat line of hair clipped back, the way she kept her hand on the strap of her bag like she trusted her own planning more than the fabric. Something in Mira unclenched at that—at someone else’s competence that didn’t need to announce itself.

“You’re good at this,” she said, before she could swallow it. “The explaining.”

Rumi didn’t look over, but her step hitched a fraction. “Thanks.”

“Why do you do it?” Zoey asked. “Tutoring, I mean.”

Rumi considered. “I like when things go from foggy to clear,” she said finally. “When someone’s face does that—” She made a small gesture, a flicker of hand that somehow captured the exact moment a concept lands. “I like that part.”

Zoey smiled at the sidewalk. “I like that you like that part.”

Mira’s attention snagged on Zoey’s smile, as it always did, and then she was looking at Rumi again—cataloguing, comparing, doing math she couldn’t show her work on.

—

The dumpling place was a narrow strip of warmth with steamed-up windows and a neon sign that now just read M_ PL DUMPL_NGS. A claw machine sat by the door, stocked with off-brand plushies and a single frog with a stubborn face.

Zoey stopped dead. “Oh my God.”

“No,” Mira warned.

Zoey was already fishing for coins. “We have to get Gerald a friend.”

“Gerald is Mist’s frog,” Mira said. “The bell-curve one.”

“Gerald needs community,” Zoey insisted, feeding the machine. Rumi lingered, eyes moving from the menu board to the claw machine to the eager disaster that was Zoey lining up the claw like a surgeon with caffeine shakes.

“Those are rigged,” Rumi said mildly.

“That’s quitter talk,” Zoey said, pressing the button. The claw descended, kissed the frog’s head, then let go so gently it felt personal.

Zoey gaped. “He rejected me.”

“Of course he did,” Mira said. “He sensed weakness.”

Rumi set her bag on the table and stepped closer. “You’re aiming from the wrong axis.”

Zoey turned. “In English?”

“Don’t center over the head. The head’s the widest. You want a grip on the body.” Rumi slid a coin in, shadowing Zoey’s shoulder without touching. “Also, the machine cycles strength. Try on the third drop.”

Zoey stared at her like she had just explained the galaxy. “How do you even know that?”

“I am unreasonably good at reading patterns,” Rumi said, as if that were a character flaw. She flicked the joystick to nudge the claw. “Counting… one… two… now.”

Zoey hit the button. The claw dipped, grabbed the frog under its squishy armpits, and—like it had been arranged—hauled it up and into the chute.

Zoey made a noise that got them a look from the cashier.

Mira put a hand over her mouth. “You hacked the frog.”

Rumi shrugged, unbothered. “Lucky cycle.”

Zoey fished the frog from the chute and held it at eye level. “Geraldina,” she declared. “Or Gerald Two. We’ll workshop it.”

Rumi’s gaze cut, quick and amused, to Mira. “You can win one too.”

Mira planted her feet. “I am not being coached by a claw machine savant.”

Two coins later, she was being coached by a claw machine savant.

Rumi didn’t touch her, but she stood close enough that Mira could feel the quiet certainty radiating off her. “Patience,” Rumi said softly. “Machines like to be humored.”

Mira almost said, so do people, but the claw was already dropping, and a lopsided pancake plush clacked into the prize door. Zoey shrieked.

Mira stared at the pancake. Then at Rumi. Heat climbed up her neck, traitorous and obvious.

Rumi blinked. “That tracks,” she said. “You’re the pancake person.”

Zoey clutched her frog. “She called you a pancake girl. She’s basically saying you're the best to ever do it.”

“Shut up,” Mira said, but it came out breathless.

They ordered dumplings and too many sides, and crammed into a corner table that wobbled whenever someone breathed wrong. Rumi ate fast, neat, with the kind of economy that said she didn’t think meals needed to be occasions. Zoey talked and dipped and made up elaborate backstories for everyone in line. Mira teased, then fell quiet and watched. She had to stop herself from cataloguing every micro-expression Rumi made when something was funny to her—a slow blink, the smallest downward tilt of her mouth before the smile. She liked that Rumi didn’t laugh at everything. It made the laughs she did have feel earned.

They traded basics. Where they were from. Rumi’s major (applied math with an elective habit of hoarding interesting problems like shiny stones). Zoey’s minor (communications, because she was “already doing it for free”). Mira’s unwilling confession that she once switched majors at 2 a.m. and then switched back at 10.

“You’re ridiculous,” Rumi said dryly.

“I am open-minded,” Mira corrected. “Those are different.”

“Sometimes they look the same,” Rumi said.

Something about that sentence slid into Mira’s ribs and sat there.

-

Rumi sits back before sighing quietly.

“Don’t think I’m any bit social. This won’t be an everyday thing.” She deadpans.

“You came to dumplings with us,” Zoey said. “That’s practically a club.”

“It’s a field trip,” Rumi said.

“To where?” Mira asked.

Rumi considered her dumpling. “Outside my routine.”

They walked back slow because the oil made Zoey sleepy and Mira didn’t want the evening to tip off the table. Campus was quieter, the cold cleaner. Zoey’s fingers had gone red where the sleeve pulled back.

“Your hands,” Rumi said, and before Zoey could say I’ll live, Rumi had fished something from her pocket and pressed it into Zoey’s palm. A little disposable hand warmer, already generating heat.

Zoey blinked down at it. “Are you Santa?”

“I hate being cold,” Rumi said. “I plan for it.”

Zoey tucked it against her skin and said, too soft, “Thanks.”

Mira pretended she didn’t feel the thud in her chest at how easy that exchange was. She pretended it didn’t matter that Rumi had clocked Zoey’s cold hands in the first place. She pretended she wasn’t measuring—again—the space between what they were and what they could be, and whether anything could cross it without breaking.

Rumi stopped outside their dorm, hands in her coat pockets like she wasn’t sure what people did at doorways. “I’ll send practice problems tonight,” she said.

“You don’t have to,” Mira said.

“I know.” Rumi’s eyes ticked between them. “I want to.”

Zoey saluted with her frog. “Gerald Two says thanks.”

“Rename it,” Rumi said, faint horror crossing her face for the first time all night. “Names should not be sequels.”

Zoey gasped. “You have naming rules?”

“Of course,” Rumi said, as if that were normal. “Names carry weight, you know.”

Mira filed that away for later like someone tucking a letter under their pillow.

“Goodnight,” Rumi added, and there was a brief, warm glitch where it felt like she might say something else. She didn’t. She turned. She left.

Zoey watched her go until the streetlight made her small. “Okay,” she said to the quiet. “I like her.”

Mira’s heart misfired. She made her face smooth. “As a tutor.”

“As a person,” Zoey said, like it was obvious. “She’s like tea without sugar.”

Mira swallowed. “But the kind that still makes your throat feel better.”

Zoey looked over; their eyes snagged. Something jumped between them like static.

“Yeah,” Zoey said, softer. “Exactly.”

They went upstairs without talking more. Not because there was nothing to say. Because there was too much.

—

Rumi let herself into the apartment and set the dumpling bag on the counter like a prize. Jinu’s voice came from the couch. “Did you socialize correctly?”

“I acquired food,” Rumi said.

“And friends?”

Rumi ignored him, but her mouth was… not straight. She took off her coat. The room smelled like detergent and the faint ghost of earlier garlic. Jinu rummaged in the bag and held up a sauce packet like a trophy.

“So?” he said. “Are they chaos gremlins or angels?”

“They are people,” Rumi said, which was her version of refusing to be cornered. Then, after a beat she hadn’t planned to give: “They’re—good.”

Jinu’s eyebrows tried to climb off his face.

“Don’t,” Rumi said.

“I didn’t say anything,” Jinu said, which was a lie. He popped a dumpling into his mouth and spoke around it. “You smiled when you came in.”

“I was thinking about a claw machine,” Rumi said, and that was… not untrue.

She carried her bag to the table and pulled out her notebook. The pages she’d left blank on purpose now wanted filling. She wrote: “Binomial vs normal approximation—give Zoey the pancake ladder visual.” Then: “Mira—show work on assumptions; praise the checkboxes.” She looked at their names on the paper—block letters, crisp—and let herself imagine their faces doing the click thing again. Fog to clear.

“Hey,” Jinu said, softer. “You’re allowed to like people.”

“I know,” Rumi said, and meant it. She capped her pen and reached for her phone.

—

The group chat beeped on Zoey’s home screen as she lay starfished on her bed, frog tucked under her arm like insurance.

Rumi: Practice set attached. Start with Q2, skip Q5 for now.

Rumi: Zoey—try not to vibe-window it.

Rumi: Mira—if you’re unsure, write why. I can grade the thinking.

Zoey exhaled so hard her hair moved. “She remembered our mistakes.”

“She clocked me,” Mira said from her bed, trying—and failing—to sound annoyed.

Zoey typed: we are accepting our fate with grace and added a frog emoji, then deleted it, then added it back, then sent.

Mira typed: thank you. for today. and the… maps. She hovered over a heart and replaced it with a pancake. It felt safer and also worse.

Rumi’s dots appeared, disappeared, returned.

Rumi: You’re welcome. You’re both getting it. Slowly is still getting it.

Zoey put the phone on her stomach and stared at the ceiling. “I am going to marry her,” she said, entirely unserious and also not unserious at all.

Mira threw a pillow at her.

Zoey batted it away without looking. “Not right now. Later. In like nine years. After we pass stats.”

Mira sat up too fast. “You really like her.”

Zoey blinked. The room telescoped down to the two of them and the damp initials they’d left on each other over a year of being too close. “I like that I’m not scared when she explains things,” she said. “I like that she sees me and I don’t feel small.”

Mira hums. She sits with Zoey’s confession. A mix of so many different emotions pushed through like waves. Mira looked at the plush on her desk, its stupid smile, the easy evening folded into it like a secret.

“Go to sleep,” she said.

“You first,” Zoey murmured, already slipping away.

Mira turned off the lamp and let the dark settle. In the black, her brain lined people up like numbers and asked whether adding anything would make the sum break. She pictured Rumi’s precise hands, Zoey’s happy gasp at the claw machine, the little heater packet warming Zoey’s palm, the way the word goodnight had felt like it wanted a different ending.

Her phone buzzed once. A last message from Rumi, sent privately this time.

Rumi: Bring both handouts next time. I’ll add to them.

Rumi: Also—Gerald Two is a terrible name.

Mira smiled into the dark, a small, stupid thing she wouldn’t admit to. She typed: working title. will iterate. Then, after a beat that startled her, she added: goodnight.

The dots hovered. Then: Goodnight.

Mira set the phone face-down and stared at the ceiling she couldn’t see. Her chest felt full and fragile at once, like a glass she didn’t trust herself to carry.

Across the room, Zoey breathed even and steady.

Across campus, Rumi’s pen scratched once more as she added a small doodle to the bottom of the next handout: a stack of pancakes with an umbrella balanced on top.

No one said it out loud. Not yet.

But something had tilted. And no one was pretending not to notice anymore.

The weekend after dumplings came too fast, but also not fast enough. Midterms loomed like storm clouds, and Mira and Zoey found themselves circling each other in the dorm room, restless with a tension they hadn’t named yet.

By Saturday evening, Zoey had her legs dangling off the edge of Mira’s bed, twirling the poor frog keychain they’d attached to Gerald Two in her fingers. “We’re meeting her again tomorrow, right?” she asked, like she hadn’t already checked the group chat twice.

Mira looked up from her laptop. “We are.”

Zoey’s voice dropped. “Do you think she likes us?”

Mira blinked. “As students?”

Zoey made a face. “I mean… in general. Like, does she like us, or does she tolerate us because we’re failing stats and she’s too polite to say no?”

Mira hesitated. “She made custom worksheets for us. She… didn't have to.”

“That doesn’t mean she likes us. That means she pities us.”

Mira shut her laptop with more force than necessary. “Zoey. She doesn’t have to do any of that. If she didn’t want to be around us, she’d make excuses. People who don’t like you don’t stay.”

Zoey’s eyes flicked to her face, searching for something there. The room held still for a moment too long before Zoey said, quieter: “I hope you’re right.”

-

Rumi was already seated at their usual table when they arrived, her bag set neatly to the side, three cups of tea lined up like offerings.

“You brought drinks?” Zoey said, blinking in surprise.

Rumi shrugged. “The café line was short. Green for you, black for Mira.”

Mira stared. “How did you know?”

“I’ve been told you both order the same thing every time you go with Romeo,” Rumi said simply.

Zoey looked mildly betrayed. “You’ve been analyzing us?”

Rumi looks down to play with her own straw. “...It’s helpful for teaching.”

It should have sounded cutting, but instead it was just… steady. Grounded. Like she was cataloguing them the same way she catalogued equations: details mattered, and she cared enough to notice.

Mira picked up her cup, hiding her expression in the steam. Zoey grinned like she’d just been handed proof of friendship.

-

The session itself was harder than last time. Rumi had come armed with practice problems that looked deceptively simple until they unraveled halfway through. Mira groaned, scratching furiously at her notebook. Zoey, head tilted, whispered, “Is this a trap question?”

“No,” Rumi said, leaning over to look. “But you’re thinking of it like a trap, which is why you’re hesitating.”

Zoey frowned. “So it’s psychological warfare?”

“In a sense,” Rumi said. Her mouth tugged, almost a smile. “Statistics is always warfare.”

They worked for over an hour. Rumi didn’t just correct their mistakes—she asked why they made them. She pushed them to articulate their thought process, even when it was messy. Each time they got closer, she nodded, the barest tilt of her head, and something about that was addictive.

By the end, Mira’s notebook was full of checkmarks where she’d explained reasoning correctly, even when her math had gone astray. Zoey, triumphant, raised her frog keychain like a trophy.

Rumi’s eyes flicked to it, unreadable. “Stop naming everything Gerald.”

-

When they packed up, Zoey hesitated. “Are you free? We were gonna grab something from the food trucks.”

Mira shot her a look—don’t push—but Rumi surprised them both by saying, “For a bit.”

So they walked across the quad together, the late afternoon light sinking gold over the grass. Students lounged with laptops, the smell of fried food drifted heavy from the trucks, and a guitarist played something uneven near the fountain.

Zoey darted between them, pointing out the truck with the cheapest fries. Mira lingered back, watching the way Rumi moved through the crowd—slightly apart, but never lost, her bag strap over one shoulder and her gaze cataloguing everything without strain.

At the truck, Zoey ordered cheese fries with the enthusiasm of someone who hadn’t eaten in years. Mira ordered dumplings, again. Rumi asked for nothing, but when Zoey shoved a fry at her, she took it without protest.

“Well?” Zoey asked, grinning.

“It’s food,” Rumi said.

Mira snorted. “High praise.”

Zoey leaned her head against Mira’s shoulder dramatically. “She hates my fries. This is a tragedy.”

Rumi looked at them—really looked—and Mira couldn’t shake the sense that she was measuring something.

-

They ended up sitting on the stone edge of the fountain, fries balanced on Zoey’s lap, dumplings between them. Around them the quad buzzed, but their little corner felt strangely separate.

Mira chewed slowly, stealing glances at Rumi. She wanted to ask why she bothered with tutoring at all, what made her patient when other people burned out. But before she could, Zoey beat her to it.

“Why do you stay?” Zoey asked. “With us, I mean. We’re a mess. You could spend your time on people who’d actually keep up.”

Rumi blinked at her. Then she said, simply, “Because you try.”

The words landed heavier than either of them expected.

Mira’s throat tightened. Zoey froze, then laughed nervously, brushing her hair out of her face. “That’s… low bar, huh?”

“No,” Rumi said, shaking her head once. “Most people don’t.”

The silence stretched, full of unspoken things.

Zoey broke it first, voice lighter than she felt. “Guess we’re lucky, huh, Mira?”

Mira forced a smile. “Yeah. Lucky.”

But her eyes lingered on Rumi’s calm profile, and something in her chest twisted.

-

Back in their room, Zoey sprawled across Mira’s bed, crumbs on her hoodie. “She likes us,” she said, muffled.

Mira looked up from her desk. “You think?”

“I know.” Zoey rolled over. “She noticed what tea we drink. She ate my fries. She called us try-hards in her own weird Rumi way.”

Mira’s lips curved, just a little. “She did.”

Zoey sat up suddenly, eyes sharp in the low dorm light. “Mira. If—hypothetically—if you liked her, would you tell me?”

The question hit like a trapdoor. Mira’s pen stalled. She looked at Zoey, whose expression was too open, too searching.

“I don’t,” Mira said quickly. Too quickly. “She’s our tutor.”

Zoey tilted her head. “That’s not what I asked.”

Mira forced her gaze back to the paper. “You’re overthinking.”

Zoey let it go—for now. She flopped back down, closing her eyes, but her mind was restless. Mira’s heart thudded harder than it should.

And across campus, Rumi sat at her desk, sketching another problem set. She found herself adding doodles again: a tiny frog with a fry in one hand and an umbrella in the other. She shook her head, amused at herself, but didn’t erase it.

By the end of the weekend, something had shifted again.

Zoey was giddy. Mira was unsettled.

Rumi was thinking about them more than she wanted to admit.

And none of them knew how close the storm was to breaking.

The week after the dumpling night stretched thin like elastic pulled too far. Everything looked the same—classes, the campus café, their dorm room—but Mira felt it constantly: the shift. Like the floor beneath her had tilted and she was pretending it was steady.

Zoey kept talking about Rumi. Not obsessively, not enough that she could call her out on it without sounding unhinged—but enough. “She’s actually funny in her deadpan way.” “She remembered my exact mistake from last time.” “Her handwriting’s neat enough to frame.” Each comment was casual, but Mira heard every one like it was written in red pen.

She hated herself for keeping score. Hated the way she tracked Zoey’s smile when Rumi texted the group chat, or the way Zoey leaned forward during tutoring sessions like she couldn’t get close enough.

And worst of all: Mira understood. Because she was right there, watching Rumi too.

-

By the fifth library meet-up, Mira was brittle with nerves. She didn’t want to be—she wanted to sink into the rhythm of handouts and examples like before—but Zoey was practically glowing when Rumi looked up to greet them.

“Tea again,” Rumi said, sliding cups across the table.

Zoey gasped. “You’re spoiling us.”

“It was a buy-two-discount,” Rumi replied, straight-faced, but there was the faintest curve to her mouth.

Zoey laughed, shoulders loosening like the world had been kind for once. Mira bit down on her pen cap hard enough to taste plastic.

The work was harder this time—z-tests, critical regions, sample proportions—and Rumi had brought a neat packet titled “Don’t Panic: Step-By-Step.” Zoey giggled when she saw the title. Mira didn’t.

Halfway through, Zoey leaned closer to Rumi, tapping her pencil against a problem. “Wait, so if the sample mean is, like, the middle pancake—”

“Not the middle pancake,” Rumi interrupted gently. “Think of it more like the average height of all the stacks.”

“Ohhh.” Zoey’s face lit with understanding, her elbow brushing Rumi’s arm.

Mira’s chest tightened. She forced herself to stare at her notes, to underline “sample mean” three times as if that would anchor her.

“Good,” Rumi said, nodding at Zoey. “That’s the click I wanted.”

Zoey grinned. Mira’s pencil snapped in her fingers.

-

The air outside was cold enough to sting, but Zoey was buzzing, bouncing on the balls of her feet as they walked. “Okay, today was actually progress. I only cried once internally. That’s like, a record.”

“You did well,” Rumi said, hands in her coat pockets. “Both of you.”

Mira muttered something that might have been thanks, eyes fixed on the sidewalk.

Zoey glanced between them, then brightened. “Hey—next week, want to get coffee? Not tutoring. Just… you know. Real life.”

Mira’s head snapped toward her. “Zoey—”

Rumi paused. Mira held her breath, desperate for her to say no.

“Maybe,” Rumi said. Her voice was calm, but her eyes flicked between them like she’d measured the tension instantly.

Zoey’s grin widened. “Cool. Yeah. No pressure. Just, like… hanging out.”

Mira shoved her hands deeper into her pockets. Her pulse thudded too loud in her ears.

-

The door had barely closed before Mira’s words tumbled out, sharper than she meant: “Why would you do that?”

Zoey blinked. “Do what?”

“Invite her out. She’s our tutor, Zoey. That’s—crossing a line.”

Zoey stared at her, defensive. “It’s not crossing a line. Tutors are people. People can get coffee.”

“That’s not what I mean.”

“Then what do you mean?” Zoey pressed, stepping closer. Her voice rose. “Because you’ve been weird all week, and now you’re acting like I did something wrong just for asking her to hang out.”

“You did do something wrong!” Mira snapped. Her throat burned the second it left her mouth.

Zoey’s expression sharpened. “Why are you so upset about this? Do you—” She stopped, words catching. “Do you like her or something?”

The room froze.

Mira’s heartbeat ricocheted. She opened her mouth, then shut it again. The silence was enough.

Zoey’s jaw dropped. “Oh my God. You do.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“You didn’t have to,” Zoey shot back, her voice caught between disbelief and something sharper. “That’s why you’ve been acting like this.”

Mira’s fists clenched at her sides. “And what about you? You’re not subtle. You’ve been practically heart-eyes at her since day one.”

“That’s not fair.”

“It’s true,” Mira snapped. “You light up every time she talks. You laugh at everything she says, even when it’s not funny. Do you even hear yourself?”

Zoey flushed, her chin lifting. “So what if I like her? At least I’m not pretending I don’t.”

The words hit like a slap. Mira’s stomach dropped, heat rising to her face.

“You don’t get it,” Mira whispered.

“Then explain it to me!” Zoey demanded. Her voice cracked, raw. “Because right now it just feels like you’re mad at me for—what? Wanting something? Wanting her?”

Mira’s chest heaved. She wanted to scream the truth: Because I want her too, and it’s killing me to see you happy about it. But the words stuck, heavy and bitter, in her throat.

Instead she turned away, her voice flat. “Forget it.”

Zoey’s hands dropped to her sides. The air between them felt like broken glass.

“Fine,” Zoey said after a long moment. “If you won’t talk, I’m done trying.”

She grabbed her pillow and flopped onto her bed, curling around the frog plush like it was armor. She faced the wall, shoulders tense.

Mira stood frozen in the center of the room, staring at the crack under the door where light from the hall spilled in. She wanted to cross the space, shake Zoey, beg her not to be angry. She wanted to admit everything.

But her pride—her fear—kept her still.

-

The dorm sank into silence. The hum of Zoey’s fan. The faint buzz of someone’s music down the hall. Mira lay awake staring at the ceiling, the argument replaying like a loop she couldn’t stop.

Zoey’s words kept echoing: At least I’m not pretending.

Her chest ached. She turned over, facing Zoey’s bed. Zoey’s back was to her, her shoulders curved protectively. Mira wanted to reach across the gap, tug on her sleeve, whisper I’m sorry, I don’t want to lose you.

But she stayed still, nails biting crescents into her palm.

Across campus, Rumi sat at her desk, staring at her notebook without writing. She’d caught the looks, the laughter, the sparks bouncing between Mira and Zoey all week. And now, for the first time, she wondered if she was standing in the middle of something fragile, something she wasn’t supposed to touch.

She closed the notebook. For once, she didn’t draft new problems.

By morning, nothing had been fixed. Mira and Zoey moved around each other carefully, every word clipped, every glance weighted. Their friendship had always been easy, instinctive. Now it felt like glass about to shatter.

And underneath it all was the truth neither of them could say:

They both liked Rumi. And they liked each other.

And that made everything a mess.