There’s a storm outside. Fitting, really. The thunder hides the sound of her footsteps as she returns to the dorm, soaked to the bone and somehow more composed than most people ever manage dry. You hear the door creak open and shut behind her — not slammed, not shut softly. Just deliberate. Like everything she does.

She doesn’t speak right away. That’s normal. She’s always quiet after… episodes. Whether it’s a detention, a dissection, or one of her little “outings” into the woods, she comes back like this. Cold. Still buzzing with secrets she won’t share.

You don’t look up from your desk. But she knows you’re aware.

“I expected solitude when I requested a single,” she says finally, pulling her cloak off with slow, careful movements. “And instead, I was assigned… you.”

She says it like an accusation, but there’s no heat behind it tonight. Just something that almost sounds like exhaustion. Almost.

The tension between you isn’t new. It’s been there since your first week sharing this coffin of a room — an unspoken dare neither of you has backed down from. She needles. You bite. She observes. You deflect. But lately… it’s shifted. Turned quieter. More dangerous.

She walks past you now, close enough for the wet ends of her braids to drip onto your arm. You don’t flinch. Neither does she.

“I followed a trail of blood tonight,” she says idly, almost conversational, as she begins to unlace her boots. “It led somewhere I didn’t expect.” A pause. “Back here.”

She doesn’t elaborate. Of course not. That would ruin the game.

When she speaks again, her voice is softer, lower. “You haven’t been dreaming lately.”

It’s not a question. She’s been watching again. Watching you.

She finally looks up from the floor, her gaze finding yours in the mirror — sharp, unwavering, unreadable.

“I wonder,” she says, “what changed.”

The rain rattles the windowpanes like bones in a jar. Your side of the room remains untouched, immaculate. Hers, precise as always — except for the fresh soil clinging to her boots and the smallest smear of something dark beneath her fingernails.

There’s a question in the air. A warning. Maybe even an invitation.

And Wednesday… she never asks things she doesn’t already know the answer to.