"Wow. You're such a dork."

    Elise paused her fourth reading of the sample text, a standard meet-cute scenario. "Why this time?"

    Heaving the SUV down a gear, Cadence's sigh broke into a fractured giggle. "I only just noticed it, but you totally move your lips while you're reading sometimes."

    "What? No I don't!" As Elise slapped her friend's arm with her bundle of pages, she tried to figure out if Cadence was serious or simply teasing her. No answer came to her after a moment of thought, and she retreated to stare out at the passing pavements. "You make me sound like an old person."

    "I think you can do that by yourself just fine, 'cool cat'," Cadence quipped as they paused at a set of traffic lights. She reached across the cabin to pat Elise's arm, leaving her hand lingering along her friend's shoulder. "Relax, killer. I like how you get into your nerdy writing stuff. It's cute."

    The heat radiating from Elise's cheeks blew back the cool sea air, leaving specks of raw salt to bite into the tips of her parted lips. No people sat outside the whitewashed terraced buildings she watched, yet the starry eyes of a few scattered ravens were enough to compel her to hide her blushes behind her hair. "Just like it's cute how you spend hours tinkering with this rolling rotbox," Elise said, turning her head as the vehicle shifted into motion again to catch the last strokes of a lingering smile on Cadence's face. "Or is your complete collection of hex and square drain plugs not 'nerdy' enough?"

    Cadence shrugged and sighed. "You got me. I'm a total geek too," she said, stifling a laugh. As she leaned back in her seat, she cast a glance up at the sky and drummed her fingers on the steering wheel. "We've still got daylight to burn. Want to hit up the beach? We could chill out on the rocks, take a dip in the water..."

    "Let me guess. Are you still trying to get drunk on someone else's booze, Cade?" Seeing the corners of her friend's mouth curl upwards, Elise shook her head and laughed under her breath. "As much as I love chilling with you, our beach trip will have to wait."

    "You sure? It's looking a lot quieter along there. We'd probably have the place to ourselves in no time." Approaching a junction, Cadence leaned to within a hair of Elise's ear and lowered her voice to a feather-light whisper. "Maybe you could kiss me again."

    "Yes, because you're just so irresistible," Elise said, raising her eyebrow at Cadence's growing grin. Her friend had added her final words as a sly comment, yet when Elise looked over, there was a ray of roguish light dazzling in Cadence's eye. In an instant, the flash captivated Elise's attention more than the sample text ever could, and the imprint of Cadence's devilish glee lasted in her imagination even after it left her friend's face. Though she laced it with sarcasm, Elise's statement had not been untrue.

    The glassy apartment building glinted in the old sunlight over the brown-brick maze ahead of them, and Elise ran her eyes along the lines of printed text a final time. After a few sentences, a discordant strain sounded in her mental recitation of the words, screeching harsher with every further line she followed. It was not just exhaustion or the distracting thrill that Cadence's touch, warmth, and presence inspired in Elise's body. Something in the passage she read sounded familiar.

    As the car pulled up beside her building, Elise slid the papers into her bag and clicked her seatbelt free. "Time to apologise to Robin for ditching him with my dad earlier, I guess," she said, looking up to find the window outside her flat's door. "I hope he's not too mad about that."

    "Ellie, the guy is a puppy compared to some of the assholes you've had to put up with lately," Cadence said with a wave of her hand. "You'll be fine. Even if he's super pissed, what's he going to do? Move all his Pale Waves CDs into his room?"

    "Or he could kick me out and look for a new roommate, but I'm trying not to think about that." Opening her door and turning in her seat, Elise sighed and took Cadence in her arms, squeezing her friend in a fond embrace. "Thanks for the lift, Cade. I really appreciate you."

    Cadence kept a tight hold on Elise, wrapping a lock of her friend's hair around her finger. "It's chill," she said as she pulled away to stare into her friend's eyes. A breath passed between her lips, and beneath the glowing sunrays splashed across her face, her cheeks wore the softest hint of a rosy hue. "Hey, maybe I'll even hold off on charging you for my private taxi service, killer."

    With a grin, Elise stepped out of the car. "I'll be sure to rate you five stars," she laughed as she shut the door.

    Catching the jet stream of Cadence's parting wink, Elise let her mind wander as she flew up the stairs to her flat. The several flights that sapped her legs of strength shrivelled away like escalator steps, and in a blink she reached forward and turned the handle of her front door. "Robin! I'm back!" she cried, falling against the back of the door and taking a breath of the flat's familiar air. "I hope you didn't miss me too much."

    "I suppose I'll stay quiet then," Robin said, and he kept his head low as he emerged from his bedroom. A silent question hung in the air, and he looked up to answer before Elise had a chance to put it into words. Around his right eye, shining in the flat's light, a dark, pulsing bruise swelled through Robin's face, sensitive to the ice pack he pressed to it. "Hi, Ellie."

    "Shit, Robin!" Elise dropped her bag by the door and hurried to her flatmate's side, seizing him by the shoulders. Her gaze refused to move from the furious wound that plagued Robin's eye, yet the burning red cuts that split his lip and nose announced themselves regardless. Sickened by the flecks of blood that tainted his shirt, Elise focused on his injured face. "What happened?"

    Robin scoffed and replaced his ice pack on his eye. "Your dad happened," he said through a bitter laugh, shaking his head at the memory. "I stuck up for you after you slammed the phone down on him. I thought it was a good way to support you, but instead it was just a good way of catching a left hook and learning first-hand how our carpet tastes."

    As if summoned by his words, the shockwaves of a solid blow thundered through Elise's gut. "Oh my god...Robin, I'm so sorry," she fought off her nausea to say. The sweet joy that defying her father had drizzled along her tongue soured into toxic spikes, stunning her tongue to the point of numbness. "I didn't...I just...if I'd have known he'd do this –"

    "Believe me, I'd have shut my face if I knew too," Robin scoffed on his way over to the sofa, wincing at the slight shift of the ice pack against his face. He released a small laugh and tried to smile through his swelling. "It's my own fault for trying to act all tough with someone twice my size. Bet I look like a right idiot now, don't I?"

    "Not at all." Elise sat beside Robin and lifted her hand to his face. The violent shivers that coursed through her arm betrayed the rage that boiled in her heart, rising ever closer to eruption with every glance at her flatmate's pain. "Don't blame yourself because my dad is a giant arsehole. I was so scared to talk back to him over the phone, but you didn't even hesitate to do it to his face. You're amazing, Robin."

    Her roommate rolled his ice pack in his hand, avoiding meeting Elise's gaze. Though his swollen eye leaked irritated tears, Robin did not rise to soothe any discomfort. "I felt a lot more amazing calling him out than I did after he floored me," he said. Looking down at his phone, he glimpsed his face reflected in the device's dark screen and curled up his nose. "I might need to reschedule my study session with Nat. That's assuming she doesn't run off at the first sight of my ugly mug. Hell, she could just say it's too much faff and cancel on me completely. We've already pushed it back to tomorrow because she said she wasn't feeling up to it today."

    At the familiar ring surrounding Robin's namedrop, Elise leaned back and narrowed her eyes at her roommate. "Natalie doesn't happen to have pink hair, does she? Blue eyes with glasses? Likes writing?"

    "I don't know about the writing part, but yes," Robin said, fidgeting in Elise's keen gaze. "How'd you know?"

    "She was at James' writing workshop today." With one swipe, Elise took the phone from Robin's side and tossed it into his lap. "She seems sweet from what I've seen of her. Why don't you ask if she can hang out tonight instead? If you want to, anyway."

    Surprise and panic clouded Robin's good eye. "Really? I can't just spring it on her like that," he said, his voice faltering under a smidge of doubt. "What if she's busy?"

    Elise shrugged and smiled. "Then she says she's busy and you reschedule anyway." Rubbing the back of her neck, she weighed up her words in her mind before continuing. "Robin, she asked to meet you for coffee before an early lecture. She clearly likes having you around outside class. You'll be okay, I promise!"

    "I suppose just asking wouldn't hurt..." Robin sighed and unlocked his phone. Selecting Natalie's name from near the top of his list of messages, a young glee rooted itself at the corners of his lips as he typed. "Is it stupid that I'm so nervous about asking a friend to meet up? I bet I look like such a loser."

    "You're sweet, Robin. You're the best kind of loser there is," Elise said, prodding a playful finger into Robin's side. His nervousness made itself heard on his every breath, and Elise suppressed the urge to chuckle at the thought of what Cadence would say to him in this state.

    At the buzz of his phone, the smile on Robin's face burst into a beautiful blossom. "She would love to hang out!" he cried as the stress evaporated from his nerves, only for another noise to condense it back into the lines of his brow. "But she doesn't think she can focus on studying right now. Ah. I guess that's no good, then..."

    "Hold on." The sternness in her voice surprised Elise herself. As Robin quaked at the sound of her words, she cleared her throat and calmed her surging spirit. "What if you just go and have a chat with her? Maybe she needs a friend more than she needs lecture notes right now."

    Echoes of uncertainty reflected Elise's idea back at her from the dark depths of her friend's eyes. Hiding behind his ice pack, Robin released a false laugh that failed to disguise his doubts. "I don't know if we have that kind of friendship, Ellie."

    With a wave of her hand, Elise invited Robin to get back on his phone. "I think she deserves a say in that," she said. Shuffling closer to Robin's side, Elise bumped against his shoulder and took his ice pack in her hand. "I'll even free up your other hand. Now you've got no excuse to not answer her. After all, I believe it was the distinguished Dr Robin Pawley that said just asking wouldn't hurt, right?"

    "More like distinguished dummy, but I guess you've got a point," Robin answered, opening his phone and agonising over every quivering character of his response. His fear swerved into surprise when he received a reply. "She says it's a great idea! Wait..."

    Elise kept her eyes on Robin's ever-changing expression. With every scrolling movement his eyes completed, the urge to look at his screen herself grew more difficult to resist. "What's up now?"

    "Her flatmates are having a party, so she's asking if we can hang out here." Robin choked down the lump that latched itself onto the walls of his throat, though it did nothing to steady his shaking hands. "Oh god. I haven't changed my clothes, sorted the dishes – I don't even remember the last time I vacuumed the living room! There's no way I can –"

    "Robin?" With a tender hand on his shoulder, Elise spoke in a soft, sweet voice through her roommate's stressed gasps. "Go and change your shirt, then go pick her up. I promise, I'll have the worst of this sorted out by the time you get back."

    An embarrassed sigh escaped Robin's lips. "I can't ask you to drop everything and clean the flat by yourself. It's not fair," he muttered as he eyed a particularly dense patch of dust beside the television.

    Delivering a quick slap to his arm, Elise pointed Robin in the direction of his room. "You're not asking me to do anything. I'm telling you what I'm doing, whether you like it or not. Now get going!"

    The fire in Elise's eyes was enough to propel Robin off the sofa to his bedroom door in record time. As she noticed her bag by the front door, the ill feeling she got from the writing sample snagged at her mind again. Sorting out the flat for Robin and Natalie was far from the most difficult task she set herself for tonight.

    ***

    Though her friend had joked about giving it to her, Elise had been surprised when Cadence tucked the flannel shirt she had borrowed into her bag before leaving the cabin. Her silken words and liquid looks had left Elise's heartstrings unravelled in her fingers, yet she had simply rolled the garment up and moved on without a fuss. Bar the odd teasing comment, Cadence had acted the same way after their kiss, keeping her usual air of carefree ease. It was as if none of it meant anything to her.

    Elise looked at the ripe red flannel against her pale skin. She could tell how badly Robin wanted to spend time with Natalie, and she rated her grasp on her own emotions reasonably highly as well. Yet whenever she saw Cadence, the girl's true feelings only slipped further out of her reach. Cadence was beyond a closed book – she was a story that had yet to be written.

    The flat door rattled open, the tremor reaching the loose door of Elise's wardrobe. "I'm back!" Robin cried, shutting the door behind him. "Don't worry, I didn't crash the car. Driving with one eye isn't so hard after all!"

    "Do you have a flatmate?" Natalie still spoke carefully, yet there was a definite difference in her tone. In the workshop, stress had whipped up a storm that her every thought fought to pass through. Now, in Robin's calming company, her words sailed on an unhurried breeze to the tip of her tongue. "Are they nice?"

    "Oh, for sure. Ellie's really friendly, I think you'll like her." Raising his voice over the building's murmuring creaks, Robin called through the flat. "Ellie? Are you around?"

    As she shot up from her bed, Elise scrambled to finish buttoning her shirt and straightening her shorts before she reached her door. "Yeah, I'm here," she cried. Wiping the pensive tear from her eye, she stepped out and greeted her flatmate and Natalie with a smile. "Hi again, Natalie. I'm just about to settle into a long reading session, so I won't get in your way."

    A slight shock travelled along Natalie's spine, and her features hung in an indefinite inertia. As the girl stood in silence, a drop of dread trickled into Elise's waters. Suddenly, Natalie pressed her hands to her chest. "I didn't know you knew Robin," she said with a smile, relaxing her tensed shoulders. "I really did appreciate you talking to me before. It wasn't your fault I ran off like that – that was just me feeling sorry for myself."

    "It's okay. I've had those kinds of moments too." Elise smiled as she shuffled past the girl to the kitchen, digging out a glass for a drink of water. It was a slight detail, yet Natalie's cheer shone brighter now the leaked makeup trails had vanished from her cheeks. "Hopefully, the publishers figure out this thing with your story. Just thinking that someone else is out there, getting all the credit for something you wrote...it's so creepy."

    "I don't know if it'll ever get fixed. I thought talking to James would at least get it off my mind, but it didn't. As soon as I got back in my room, I couldn't stop stressing about it." Natalie stared at her shoes and fiddled with the hem of her jumper dress, then glanced at Robin. Cracks of a smile broke onto her lips, and a spark of joy cut through the wet, grey circles that shrouded her eyes. "That's why I was so happy when Robin messaged me. I really need a distraction, and a party filled with mean drunk people makes my anxiety spike like crazy."

    With a self-conscious grin, Robin set his ice pack down and ran a hand through his messy dark hair. "Well, not to brag, but being distracting is basically my superpower," he said, easing his tense posture as Natalie kept her relaxed smile. Leaving the sofa, Robin searched the cabinet beside the television until he settled on a pair of DVDs to remove from the narrow shelves. "Exhibit A: my distinguished lazy-day film collection. What are we in the mood for – Kiki's Delivery Service or Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within?"

    Natalie giggled behind her hand as Robin waggled the cases towards her. "You're joking! I tried to get my flatmates to watch Kiki when we first moved in together," she said through a sigh that dragged on until she cut it short with a shrug. "They just thought it was dorky trash, obviously."

    "Their loss. It's awesome, and even if it wasn't, we love dorky trash in this house," Robin announced as he cracked the case open and slotted the disc into the dusty DVD player beside the television. Taking the remote from the living room table, he paused in front of Elise and gestured to the other side of the sofa. "How about you, Ellie? You know you want to hang out with the talking cat again."

    "As much as I'd love to chill out with you and Jiji, I'll join you another time," Elise said, leaning to leave for her bedroom. "I should catch up on my reading before it all piles up on me. You two have fun, though!"

    Elise entered her room and shut her door, and the satisfied smile she had fought to suppress in front of her flatmate and guest emerged to take its rightful place. The winds of cheer blew her to her desk, where the pages she had already read at least half a dozen times eyed her every move. As she settled in her seat, Elise began to comb through the words again, waiting for the niggling feeling in the back of her mind to point her in the right direction.

    Inspiration proved elusive. No matter how many times Elise scanned the sample's contents, whispered its words aloud, or rearranged its pages, whatever concern had bothered her before hid away now. Each sentence bled further into its neighbours with every pass, leaving behind a muddy, murky puddle of ink that stained her desk a sightless black. Elise did not notice how hard she strained her eyes until she looked up and buckled under the bolt of a thundering headache.

    At the end of the desk, her phone's beaming surface heralded the tolling of Elise's message tone. She had considered giving Cadence a distinct sound like she had done for Robin, yet it soon became clear such a change would not be necessary. Cadence's habit of sending three texts to cover one thought announced her messages perfectly.

yo killer

got a question for u

u up ??

No, I'm dead asleep at 8:30. What's up?

wudnt put it past u cat lady

dont frget ur sik new shirt

wud kill to c roomies brain explode at his hot new rok chik flatmate

I think Robin's busy simping for another girl

Sorry to sink your ship

what ??

WHAT

NO WAY

HOW

EXPLAIN ELLIE

is she like crazy rich or ??

Didn't you want to ask me something?

i AM askin u sumthin !!

also the coats r buggin me to go c grump tmrw morn

wanna tag along w me ??

maybe stop fr a bribe latte after

Of course I'll come! No need to bribe me

Though I'll still take the latte

only if u spill abt roomies new gf

im srs ellie

i want DETAILS

I'll make sure to ask about her blood type for you

Got to get back to reading. See you tomorrow Cade <3

bOOO

jk ly

    The final few characters hung in Elise's mind for longer than she wanted to admit. Once again, Cadence had derailed her every train of thought with a single wink. There was little Elise wanted to do less than wade into the perplexing pages spilled across her desk, and she released a deflating sigh as she cast her eye around her bedroom. As her eyes found her pillow, she asked herself if her ill feelings about the sample were all simply down to burnout, like James had warned.

    Then it hit her. Shooting out of her chair and scurrying to the stack of books beside her bed, Elise ran her finger along the spines until she reached the rosy, bulky cover of a book she remembered reading recently. Most stories she read all but left her head a week or so after she dropped them, yet the books she pored through for work remained etched into her memory for months. Their staying power was all the stronger when she had met their jaded, romance-cynical author. As much as Elise wished to forget about Misty Waters, it was impossible to forget about Florence now.

    Elise flipped through her copy of Misty's – Florence's – latest novel, Wanderlove, scanning for the first meeting between the love interests. Her eyes darted between the pages, and she muttered the clutch of words that caught her attention with every flick. After a long, breathless moment, she found the scene, and she soon wished she had never sought the answer to her doubts.

    There were passing differences in character details and event sequencing, yet none of those minor discrepancies eased the pain in Elise's wrenched gut. In language, style, and narrative, every paragraph of the student sample had been ripped free and woven into the published book. Misty Waters was possibly a plagiarist. Florence Jago was possibly a plagiarist.

    And the only person Elise had to confide in was Florence's own daughter.