“No.” Firmer this time. “I’m not telling her.”
The answer came hard enough that the couple at the next table glanced over again before returning to their shared study guide. I didn’t care. My whole body had locked around the idea before my brain even caught up.
“Why not?”
“Because she’ll fix it.”
Micah blinked. “Isn’t that the point of having people who love you?”
That question cut cleaner than I wanted it to. Love, in theory, was support. Safety. A place to go when the floor gave out. But love from someone like Lo was also momentum. She would not sit back and watch me drown if she thought she could throw a rope. She wouldn’t even ask first. She would just move.
“I don’t want it fixed.”
“You don’t want a job?”
“I don’t want a job handed to me.”
Micah tilted her head, considering. “Lo wouldn’t just hand you something,” she argued.
“She would,” I countered immediately. “Or she would make Ezra hand me something.”
I heard the bitterness dripping from my tongue and hated it. Not because Lo or Ezra had done anything to deserve it, but because even saying their names in this context made me feel tainted by association. Ezra Thomas, billionaire team owner. Clementine Atha, all effortless glamour and social reach and the kind of presence that bent rooms. People would see that link before they saw me. Maybe they already did.
“And that’s bad because…?”
“Because I didn’t earn it.”
Micah exhaled slowly, leaning back again, her chair creaking softly beneath her. The wood gave a faint protest under her shift in weight. “Bea,” she started, choosing her words carefully now, “you are one of the most qualified people in this entire graduating class.”
“That doesn’t matter if people think I got there because of who I know.”
Because perception mattered. In PR, in sports, in any room where power and narrative touched, perception was half the battle. Maybe more. I knew that better than most. It was practically the thesis statement of my entire paper sitting unfinished in front of me. Once a story attached itself to you, it took on a life of its own. The truth became secondary. Optics ruled.
“They already think that,” she pointed out bluntly.
That hit. I flinched before I could stop myself. It was tiny. Barely there. But Micah caught it because Micah caughteverything. A muscle moved in my cheek. My shoulders tensed. The truth of what she’d said slid under my skin and found every exposed nerve.
Micah’s expression softened immediately. “I didn’t mean?—”
“No, you’re right,” I cut in, forcing a small, humorless smile. “They do.”
Connected.
Lucky.
Spoiled.
The words lived in the back of my mind like a constant echo. They had for years, if I was honest. Not always out loud. Sometimes just in glances. In assumptions. In that subtle recalibration people did when they learned who I knew. It didn’t matter that Lo had earned her own life. That Ezra wasn’t even in my direct orbit. That my father’s money had never once written a paper or run an internship or sat me through brutal professors and impossible expectations. People loved an easy story, and nepotism was an easier story than discipline. Connections were easier to resent than competence.
I straightened slightly, pulling myself back together. “That’s exactly why I can’t go to her,” I continued. “If I do, then they’re right.”
“They’re not right.”
“They will be.”
Micah leaned forward again, her gaze locking onto mine. Her intensity sharpened in a way that was almost physical. She wasn’t going to let me retreat behind logic now. Not when she’d made it this far in. “Or,” she countered, “you’re making this harder than it needs to be because you think you have to do everything alone.”
I could feel the words before I answered them. Could feelthe way they found the exact center of the problem and pressed. Alone. The ugliest part of it was that I didn’t even know anymore whether I was protecting myself or punishing myself. Maybe both.