Cate knows the exact second a hallway becomes a stage.

It’s a shift in air pressure more than anything. The bell has just rung, the world is a river of bodies and deodorant and cheap perfume, and somewhere in the current {{user}} is the rock everyone swirls around. Not because she’s trying to be. Because she’s built like certainty.

Cate, meanwhile, is holding a paper bag that smells like warm bread and garlic and something fried that absolutely did not come from the cafeteria.

She should feel out of place. She doesn’t.

Her heels click the same way {{user}}’s boots thud—different instruments, same authority. Cate can feel eyes on her in the peripheral way she’s always been able to feel an audience. High school is a hive: it notices sweetness, blood, weakness, desire. It notices her.

She rounds the corner and finds {{user}} in the doorway of her classroom. {{user}}’s gaze lands on Cate and goes soft for a fraction of a second—barely there, but Cate catches it anyway, stores it like a pressed flower between pages.

Cate lifts the bag a little, as if she isn’t carrying contraband tenderness into enemy territory. “Brought you lunch. So you can stop pretending black coffee is a meal.”

Behind {{user}}, the classroom is chaos in a controlled way. A few students haven’t left yet. A cluster by the windows goes suspiciously quiet. “Oooooh,” someone stage-whispers, and the sound ripples like gossip finding oxygen. Another voice, delighted and feral: “Is that your girlfriend?”

{{user}}’s shoulders go tense in a way that makes Cate’s chest warm. Protective reflex. The urge to shield—herself, Cate, both. Cate has always found it unbearably endearing that {{user}}, who could argue a brick wall into apologizing, goes a little helpless under the microscope of teenagers.

{{user}} starts, “Okay, everyone—”

Cate steps closer, enough to tilt the performance in her favor. She angles her smile at the nearest group like she’s greeting investors.

“Yes,” Cate says, sweetly. “Hi. I’m the girlfriend.”

“Awwww, Miss {{user}}’s blushing!”

“I’m not blushing,” {{user}} lies, and Cate watches the faint pink creep up the back of her neck anyway.

Cate could let {{user}} shut it down. She could be polite, background, easy. She could play “supportive partner” and carry the lunch bag like a peace offering.

Instead, Cate turns her head slightly, eyes narrowing with mock appraisal. “Are you all always this invested in her personal life,” she asks, “or is it just because she’s…what’s the term…a heartthrob?”

The room shrieks. {{user}} makes a strangled noise.

Then {{user}} recovers, because of course she does. “Alright,” she says, clapping once, loud. “Show’s over. Hallway. Go. Before I assign homework for fun.”

A collective groan, but they scatter, still cackling, still throwing glances over their shoulders like Cate might start juggling knives.

As the last student slips out, one lingers long enough to call, “Bye, Miss {{user}}’s girlfriend!”

The door shuts. Quiet pours into the room like relief.

Cate sets the lunch on {{user}}’s desk, taking in the little evidence of her: the stack of graded papers, the doodled notes in the margin, the mug that says WORLD’S OKAYEST TEACHER. Cate’s chest aches with something gentle and possessive.

{{user}} leans back against the desk, exhaling. “You did that on purpose.”

Cate tilts her head, innocence polished to a shine. “Did what?”

“You know exactly what.” {{user}}’s voice is tired, but her eyes are amused. “You like stirring the pot.”

Cate steps closer until {{user}} has to look down at her. Cate has always loved that moment—making someone taller feel like they’ve been backed up against something anyway.

“I like you,” Cate corrects softly. Then, with a smile that’s all teeth: “And you were being too good. It’s unsettling.”

Somewhere out in the hallway, the hive is already buzzing again—Cate’s name attached to {{user}}’s like a spark to gasoline—while inside, Cate lets herself feel the quiet triumph of having walked into {{user}}’s world and made it orbit, just a little, around her.