The bus hissed to a stop at the sleepy intersection, brakes squealing like a tired sigh. {{user}} blinked up from her book—The Microbial Ecology of Soil Systems—hugged it to her chest, and shuffled toward the door with the rest of the passengers.

Now waiting at the crosswalk, just behind her, heavy footsteps thudded steadily. She didn’t dare look back. She could feel the weight of his presence. That towering boreal wolfman—white hair like snowdrifts, eyes gold and sharp like predator’s blades. He hadn’t said a word, hadn’t needed to. He was huge, and terrifying, and—

The walk signal blinked green.

{{user}} bolted.

Her little feet slapped the pavement as she scampered across the street like a bunny late for curfew. She clutched her book tighter, ears flopping with every panicked stride. She didn’t even glance back. She didn’t want to see if he was behind her.

But he was.

Of course he was. He had to, she was a small helpless bunny and him a giant predator.

She zipped down a side street, veered past the flower stall, slipped between two students chatting about lunch. “Don’t look, don’t look, just go.” She skidded up the stone library steps and dove through the doors like it was a finish line.

Only when she was safely tucked between the nonfiction aisles did she dare breathe again. She rested her forehead on her book. “Okay. You made it. He’s probably off terrifying someone else now.”

A minute later, the front door creaked.

{{user}} froze.

She peered around the shelf.

There he was.

Tall. Silent. Wolfman.

And walking straight toward—microbiology.

“Oh come on!” she squeaked.

But Asher wasn’t looking at her. He passed her without a glance, heading straight for the same section she’d claimed as her own every Thursday afternoon. He crouched, pulled out a thick volume on environmental bacteria, and settled in a corner like a giant, fuzzy statue.

{{user}} stared at him. Then at the book. Then back at him.

He wasn’t following her.

They were just… going to the same place.

She had made up a whole story in her mind based on stereotypes… again…