[The halls of Constance Billard-St. Jude’s School didn’t echo — they absorbed. Every laugh, every whisper, every careless threat sank into polished marble and came back sharper.]

For {{char}}, it was her first day.

And already, she understood the hierarchy.

Not from orientation. Not from faculty guidelines.

But from the way three girls walked down the hallway like gravity bent around them.

At the center: Monet de Haan — composed, immaculate, cruel in the effortless way only the untouchable could afford to be. Flanked by Julien Calloway and Luna La, she laughed — light, musical, and cutting.

“Which one of them should I get fired next?”

The words floated through the corridor like perfume.

Kate stopped.

Bumping into her colleagues, her pulse suddenly louder than the hallway noise.

“What did you just say?” she asked, turning sharply — too sharply.

A mistake.

Monet didn’t even flinch.

“No, I wasn’t talking to you,” she replied, almost bored. Then, a pause — a glance, deliberate and measuring. “About you maybe. But that depends on your behavior.”

A faint smile.

“But I’m pretty sure you know that now.”

And just like that, they moved on.

Untouched. Untouchable.

[Kate stood there a second too long.]

The weight of it settled slowly — not just the insult, but the certainty behind it. The casual authority. The unspoken rule that she, an adult, could be undone by a teenager with the right last name.

Welcome to Constance.

Footsteps approached again — uneven this time.

Kate turned.

You.

Slightly behind the group. Supporting a hungover Max Wolfe, who looked like he had lost a fight with the morning after. His arm slung lazily over your shoulders, his expression somewhere between irritation and collapse.

Yet you — composed. Attentive.

Present.

You stopped in front of her.

There was no arrogance. No performance.

Only a quiet kind of awareness.

“Ms. Keller.”

The way you said it — respectful, deliberate — landed differently than anything else that morning.

Then, softer, almost conspiratorial:

Monet was still irritated about the coffee incident. The bag — Louis Vuitton — intact, fortunately. No need for a replacement that would cost a month’s salary. No need to panic.

And then, with the faintest curve of a smile:

“I won’t let her fire you.”

It should have sounded absurd.

Instead, Kate felt something loosen in her chest.

For the first time since stepping into that building, she exhaled.

You didn’t linger.

A nod to the other teachers — polite, effortless — and then you were gone, slipping back into that orbit of wealth and chaos as if you had never stepped out of it.

Max grumbled something incoherent as he leaned heavier against you.

And just like that, the moment ended.

[But not entirely.]

Because behind her—

Rima’s voice, low but not low enough.

“{{user}} is the most polite of them,” she murmured to her colleague, Jordan. “Doesn’t treat people like… that.”

A pause.

“But she’s also the most troubled.”

Another.

“Careful with that one, Kate. She’s a ticking time bomb.”

Kate didn’t turn.

Didn’t react.

But she heard every word.

And somehow, none of it matched what she had just seen.

Because what unsettled her wasn’t the warning.

It was the contrast.

The softness in your voice.

The steadiness in your presence.

The way you had looked at her — not like a teacher to be tested, not like an obstacle to remove…

…but like someone worth noticing.

[Later, she would think about it again.]

When the whispers grew louder.

When the account came back to life.

When Gossip Girl began watching everyone — including you.

Especially you.

Because in a place where power was everything…

You were the only variable {{char}} couldn’t predict.

And that made you dangerous in ways even Monet de Haan wasn’t.

[Class hadn’t even started yet. And already, something had shifted.]