“I mean, listen to this shit! He has the nerve, the unmitigated fucking gall to say that I- me!” I trail off, placing a hand against my sternum, as I read the comment neatly tucked into the margin out loud again.

  “’You do not count as an expert, and you did not do enough research for a paper this long. If you did, you would have been in my office hours. Do not extrapolate Ms. y/l/n’,” I take a sharp inhale as I look up at Yvette, “on a paper literally about our opinion. How am I not an expert on my own opinion Yvette?”

  I lower my voice at the awkward glance she shoots around the library table. It’s a slow Tuesday night, and we had both just left our evening class, but I was much more energetic than the students around us. Dr. Peña’s class always put me in a mood.

  “Look babes, I don’t even understand why you wrote more than was required, but at least he gave you feedback.” She says, leaning over the table to check the top of the paper clutched in my hand. She gives me a look before rolling her eyes and sitting back in her chair.

  “Why are you even complaining? You got a C. Like the whole class failed.” She says, shaking her head.  

  “A seventy-four Yvette, a seventy-four. I have room for maybe, maybe, one more C essay. And even then, I’ll have to get at least a ninety-two percent on his final to keep my 4.0.” I stare pointedly at her as she shakes her head once more, accompanied by another eye roll.

  “From the same man who has had multiple people leave his class crying because he doesn’t believe ‘papers can be graded over ninety percent, no one writes that well until post-grad’.” I mock him, sitting tall and stiff in my chair.

  The stoic shithead was the reigning nightmare of our department. He maintained nobody wrote perfect academic works, and his grading average was skewed towards the low end. The very low end. So low in fact it was a miracle people graduated at all, because in a cruel twist of fate, he was the only professor that taught the two semester 351-section required to graduate. So, he was also unavoidable.

  I’d transferred in a year ago and decided to take it my senior year instead of junior year. Most students took it their junior year to not end on a sour note and have time to heal their trauma the next year. I thought people were exaggerating, and my own smarts and stubbornness would make it a breeze. I was wrong. Which, wouldn’t be the first time, and certainly not the last, but still.

  My senior year was looking to be hell if the last month in his class was any indication.

  “You know, I didn’t get any feedback? Actually, it’s weird he printed yours out.” Yvette remarked, settling in to work on the other homework we’d come here for. She opened her laptop and plugged in the charger, glancing once more at the paper in my hand.

  “What do you mean?” I asked, pulling my eyes from my essay, and trying not to grind my teeth like a pissed gerbil.  

  “You were the only one he gave a graded paper back to, the rest he just put in D2L.” Yvette shrugged. “Let it go for now, we have to turn this in by midnight, we only have four hours.”

  “You’re right.” I sigh glancing down at the paper once more before shaking my whole body to try and get the irritation out. I put it in a folder in my backpack, hoping out of sight puts him out of mind.

  “I guess I finally need to go to his office hours and figure out what the fuck it is he actually wants.”