"And remember, while it's important to hit the beats of your plot in good time, narration is more than just a tool to relay information to the reader."

    Fewer people sat around the workshop tables than the previous session Elise had attended, and the room's lighting dimmed to match. Though cloaked in more inky darkness than usual, James' lecturing figure defied the haze to capture his audience's attention as he strolled across the threadbare carpet in front of his empty desk. "Think of your narrator, whatever person you're writing in, as a guiding hand through the story's journey. Show your world and characters to your reader. Give them the details they need to invest in your plot," he said, pausing his step to scan his cohort's expectant faces. "Though not too many details. It'd be a shame to deprive your readers of the big twists they eat, sleep, and breathe, after all."

    Something in the air shifted enough to plunge Elise back into the earthy solidity of consciousness, and she rubbed away the dry itch that plagued her eyes. James' gaze cut through the shadows to rest on her, the realisation that he had caught her staring into space unleashing a fierce drought along her throat. It was not that James was a dull speaker in himself – it was that, without Cadence, everything lost its colour, its energy, its life.

    The chime of the corridor bell breached the classroom's walls, draining the soupy, scented air away. "Typical. Right as we get into the swing of things, the real world catches up with us," James said, clapping his hands to punctuate his disappointment. As if by his command, the rustling of papers and rattling of chairs filled the room, and the seminar leader had to raise his voice to be heard. "Don't forget, I'll be away when our next workshop comes around and I won't be checking emails. Those of you that left work with me last week, I'll be hanging around for a little while now so you can get it back and ask any questions – yes, Ellie, that includes you too. Don't think about sneaking away just yet."

    "Shit," Elise responded under her breath as she paused her patient crawl towards the door. Returning to her desk, she lifted Natalie's bag onto the table and watched the other students trickle out of the room. "I'm so not ready to see how badly he's ripped into my story. What was I thinking giving it to him in the first place?"

    "You were probably thinking it'll help you get better at writing, because it will," Natalie said, looking up at Elise with gentle kindness. "If it were me, you'd be cheering me on all the way to his desk right now. That's...not really my style, but I know James likes you, and he'd never give any feedback he didn't think you could take. You'll be okay, Ellie."

    With a flicker of her surprised eyes, Elise handed Natalie the rest of her belongings from the desk. "Gosh, Natalie. That's really sweet of you to say."

    Natalie hid her smile behind her hand. "I guess your influence is rubbing off on me," she said, her voice a delicate whisper through the gaps between her fingers. She rose from her seat and poked the back of Elise's arm, nudging her towards the front desk. "Now go! I'll wait for you outside."

    A cold sweat formed over Elise's lower back as the small group of students around James thinned, the wall of bodies eroding until its false safety abandoned her. "Ah, I see we've saved the best for last," her seminar leader said as he rose from his reclined position at the edge of his desk. "Sorry about calling you out like I did just now. Truth is, I was keen to have a chat with you. I've been doing some thinking, Ellie."

    "You have?" Struck by the deepening pit in her stomach, Elise tried to swallow down her discomfort only for the dryness in her mouth to thwart her. "About me?"

    "About your story, more precisely, but yes," James answered, withdrawing a small clutch of familiar papers from his satchel. Sparse red and green markup decorated the topmost sheet, yet even that slight glimpse of annotation drove a stake through Elise's core. "See, I was pretty impressed by the overall quality of your work. After a while, I realised that, while I could make the odd suggestion here or there in my spare time, this piece is just about ready for a closer, more sustained critical eye."

    After priming itself for a critical emotional blow, Elise's body froze in the wake of James' unabashed compliment. "Do you really think so?" she asked as she searched for a sign of deceit hidden in James' words. Unflinching sincerity polished off the finely drawn lines of her seminar leader's face, a fact that was more difficult to process than any lie. "I don't know...I wouldn't even know where to start with something like that."

    James smiled and adjusted his glasses, shifting them a fraction higher up the bridge of his nose. "Good thing you don't. That's what keeps me in a job, right?" he said with a smirk. Though the smile faded, a feathery cheer still blew through his words. "I'll just get to the point. I'm currently in talks with the editing team at the Orchard about running an article on Florence's work – a bit of a career appreciation piece, without wanting to make her out as some old relic."

    "That sounds like it'll be a nice surprise for her, especially after all the tough times she's been through lately," Elise answered, keen to ignore the question of her story that lingered over the exchange. "Though I'm not sure Florence puts a lot of weight in what others think about her. She certainly never cares about what I say."

    "She's not as insensitive as you think. Is she stubborn? Absolutely. She's like a slab of concrete, and that's entirely because she's proud of how much she's helped and inspired others. That's what makes her contract situation, and her publishers' obstinance, so bitter to swallow." A glassy sheen overtook James' eyes, and he stared into the lamplit corner as a faint, fond laugh left his lips. It was a departure from his usual superficial breeziness, yet the momentary show of emotion commanded Elise's attention with its raw depth. In a blink, the moment ended, and James wiped the mist from his eyes. "But, coming back to your story, if it's okay with you, I'd like to drop it into the conversation. Maybe I can see what they think about workshopping and featuring your work in the same issue."

    "Wait, what?" Elise strained to say over the awestricken thumps of her heart. "A feature?"

    James nodded, waving the marked-up papers between them. "Admittedly, I can't give you any guarantees right now," he said with a pointed finger to indicate he had more to say. "But I can tell you that networking is an essential part of any artistic career. The backing of an established writer makes a big difference to magazine editors – not to brag, of course."

    The classroom door drifted open, and Natalie's face appeared in the crack. "Hey, Ellie. There's someone out here asking –"

    "Natalie!" A bubble of glee burst in Elise's chest at the sound of her friend's voice, splashing its delight over every dancing petal across her heart's meadow. Following a fizzing impulse, she led Natalie into the classroom and pulled her into a tight embrace. "Could you hear us from out there? I might be getting a feature in the Orchard soon. It's only a chance, and I feel kind of stupid for being so excited about it, but I really am!"

    Her friend's expression faltered, then rallied to recover a semblance of cheer. "That's amazing, Ellie! You should absolutely be happy about it. It's nice that your hard work is paying off," she said, her gaze turning downwards. "And in the Orchard too...I hope it goes better for you than it did for me."

    Taking the girl's hands between her own, Elise pressed pulses of affection into Natalie's palms. "Sorry, I didn't mean to bring it back up so suddenly," she whispered as she ignited a determined smile through the room's murky lighting. "I haven't forgotten about you at all. We'll head to ask for the security footage now and see if we can get any information out of it, okay?"

    "Nice to see that you two are getting along so well." James' voice broke through the tender peace that wrapped around the girls, sending the shards clattering to the floor. A hint of thorny severity had sewn itself into his tone, its depth matched by the lines furrowed through his brow. "I couldn't help overhearing something about 'security footage'. It might not be any of my business, but I wouldn't be doing my job as your teacher and supervisor if I wasn't a little nosy here and there. So, is there something wrong?"

    "It's nothing you don't already know about," Natalie uttered as she sank into Elise's protective hold. A subtle scent of vanilla-kissed coconut rolled in from the girl's wavy hair, and her voice threatened to disappear amid the hills and valleys of Elise's heather-hued jumper. "It probably won't even matter in the end. Everything's too messed up to fix properly."

    A cloud of dust spluttered from the carpet under Elise's skidding foot. "Don't say that! If it matters to you, then it matters full stop, whatever anybody else thinks," she said, prising Natalie from the safety of her chest to face James at her side. "Someone broke into Natalie's locker not long before her story was plagiarised. We're going to see if the cameras got anything to track down who it was."

    As he set Elise's sample writing on the desk, James sucked air through his teeth. "I see. It's noble of you to want to help your friend, Ellie, really..." he began with a deflating sigh. He rose from the desk and took a step towards the girls, his arms folded. "But I doubt you'll get the answers you're looking for. The security office don't even show anything to us faculty staff – believe me, I've rammed my head against that brick wall a few times. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news."

    "It's still worth a try," Elise countered, waving her arms in protest. "You're not expecting Natalie to just put up with it like everything's fine, are you? We have to be on her side about this!"

    "Yes, and we can be on her side by supporting her and doing what we can to ensure it doesn't happen again." The advancing stroke of James' words whistled past Elise's ear, their steel edge glinting in the darkness like the speck of light off his wristwatch's chain. "Helping your friends doesn't mean chasing every wild goose, Ellie. Sometimes the best course of action is simply being there, and listening instead of kicking up a fuss."

    Natalie tugged at the hem of her jumper dress. "Maybe he's right," she muttered as she shifted her weight between her slip-on boots. "It means the world to me that you want to help, Ellie, really, and I love having you on my side. But I think it'd be best if we just went back to yours to hang out instead."

    Soft shivers worked around the old university walls, the bricks chattering under the strain of the sweltering air. An urge to protest swelled in Elise's core, yet the steady unfurling of her friend's withdrawn stance was too rare a sight to upset. "Are you sure?" she eventually asked as she buried the bloody cries of her concern deep inside her chest.

    After a gasp of mild surprise, Natalie touched her hand to her chest and nodded. "Yeah, I'm sure," she answered, inspecting Elise's face for a visible reaction. "Is...that okay with you?"

    "If it's what you want, then it's what we'll do," Elise said with a tone of regret rolling through her words. "I just wish I could do more to get your story back. I know how much you loved it."

    "We all wish things had happened differently," James said as he paused the packing of his satchel. "But sooner or later, you have to make peace with the past. You've both got bright futures ahead of you if you work hard, and I have every faith you're more than capable of doing that. Speaking of futures, Ellie, while I hate to rush you into any big decisions..."

    The papers of Elise's sample poked out of the jumble of James' belongings, and a foreign warmth tingled along the tips of her nerves. "No, don't worry. I'm okay with you showing my story to the Orchard people," she said, her pulsing heartbeat muffling her words like they rang out underwater. "Is there anything else I need to do, or...?"

    James released a sigh of relief and shook his head. "No, that's it. I'm glad you agreed so quickly, though. This old man's nerves were wearing thin worrying about how to sell this opportunity to you!" he said through a laugh, wearing a vibrant smile that revealed just how inaccurate the moniker 'old man' was. "Now, you'd best get home and cosy before the traffic gets too bad. I'll be suitably jealous while I'm sat behind my mountain of paperwork, I assure you."

    "We'll keep you in our thoughts," Elise shot back, suppressing a giddy laugh until the classroom door shut behind her.

    As her friend joined her in the corridor, Natalie looped her arm around Elise's and walked down the corridor with her. "You know you're his favourite, right?" she asked with a knowing smile. She shrugged and flicked her head back towards the classroom. "Come on, Ellie. It's pretty obvious he's only going the extra mile because it's you."

    Elise rolled her eyes and snapped her gaze away from Natalie's face. "That's ridiculous. He said it himself, writing's all about networking." Her seminar leader's redeployed words rang hollow in light of the glazed look in James' eye as he thought of Florence's condition. "He's just using his connections to give his students an advantage. Nothing else."

    "Say whatever you want, but I don't see him sneaking anybody else's work directly to a magazine editor." A yawn heaved its way out of Natalie's lungs, and she let her head fall on Elise's shoulder. "Today's been so rough. I must look like the sulkiest, ugliest zombie right now."

    "Seems like we've got your Halloween costume figured out for this year," Elise quipped. Though delicate grey rings trailed around the circumference of Natalie's eyes, they swirled and sparkled like gentle waterfalls within the bower of her rosy hair. A gleeful gloss ran along her lips, its light matched by the fresh coat of pink polish that lined her fingernails. Slowing their joint pace to a gentle walk, Elise set her hand on Natalie's linked fingers. "Don't be silly. You look lovely, Natalie, like you always do. If he were here, I know Robin would say the same."

    Natalie tightened her hold on Elise's arm. "I don't know about that..."

    "You don't hear what he says when you're not around." With a wink, Elise leaned close to Natalie's ear and dropped her voice to a teasing whisper. "I bet he'd probably want to say more, actually."

    Covering her gasping mouth, Natalie's cheeks brightened to a pulsing crimson shade. "You mean he..." she began, then stopped as the flood of words lodged in her throat. "I had no idea. I thought he was just nice and friendly with everyone."

    The handful of other students that roamed the corridors glanced at the pair as Elise released a knowing chuckle, yet the attention did little to dampen her enthusiasm. "Oh, he is. But trust me, if you'd seen him when he first asked you to hang out, you'd know he's extra nice and friendly with you," she said, admiring the flushing posies that bloomed across her friend's face. "Do you like him too? Not to pry, that is. You don't have to answer."

    Slowly, surely, the lights that blinked in Natalie's dazzled eyes steadied to an even glow, and her next gentle breath brought the first strokes of a smile to her lips. "He's such a sweetheart, and I don't think I laughharder than I do when I'm hanging out with him. He's like a big, cuddly, dorky teddy bear," she said as she laughed to herself out of a mixture of embarrassment and relief. "And he is pretty cute when he smiles..."

    "Should I take all that as a yes?" Elise asked. As Natalie gave a shy nod, Elise pulled her closer and caught her in a tight, warm hug. "Then you should tell him that. I love Robin, and that's how I know that he'll never make the first move, no matter how badly he wants to. But once you give him that little nudge, he'll be the sweetest guy for you, I'm sure of it."

    A sudden push on Elise's arm parted the embrace, and Natalie fiddled with her jumper sleeves. "What if he's not interested? I don't want to scare him off. I know I'm...a lot to deal with sometimes, just like when you met me."

    With a raised eyebrow, Elise folded her arms and met Natalie's anxious eye. "And did you scare me off back then? No, and he's far nicer than I am," she said as she pushed open the double doors to the quad and invited her friend through. As Natalie hesitated, Elise sighed and reached out for the girl's hand. "Come on, this is Robin we're talking about here, Natalie. He's the loveliest guy I know. What's the worst that could happen?"

    "You're right, and I know you're right," Natalie said, taking Elise's offered hand and following her through the doorway. The fresh sea breeze danced between the quad's trees and twirled through her hair, and she looked up at the dim, late-afternoon sky with soft satisfaction. "First my story, now Robin – you're always helping me figure out what's best for me. You're like an angel on my shoulder, Ellie."

    "That's a sweet way of saying I'm a nosy bitch," Elise answered, the sound of Natalie's surprised laugh warming her heart against the cool, dark air. She moved to grab her phone from her bag, only for the flash of a familiar dusty blue hue to stop her in her tracks. By her side, Natalie looked over with an unspoken question between her parted lips, yet the shock that stormed through Elise's body did not let her look at her friend or the car that had caught her attention.

    All Elise could see was Cadence's face staring back at her across the car park.