Rain Wang's POV (Flashback)
It started with a laugh.
Sharp. Male. Cruel.
I remember the way it sliced through the lecture hall like a scalpel. Precise. Surgical. Designed to make me bleed.
"She brought a paper notebook. What is this, 2003?"
A few students chuckled. I felt my cheeks burn as I hugged the worn leather journal tighter to my chest. I couldn't afford the fancy tablet everyone else used. I couldn't even afford a hot lunch.
I sat at the end of the third row, too proud to sit in the back but too scared to sit in front. I kept my head down and wrote quietly, hoping the attention would slide off me.
It didn't.
Another voice—female this time. "Look at her hair. You think she gets stuck in the revolving doors on purpose just so people notice her?"
More laughter.
I told myself they were just bored. Just mean. Just rich.
But then I heard his voice.
Deeper. Calm. Lethal in how effortless it sounded.
Sebastian Ashford.
"She probably thinks the longer the hair, the longer the attention span," he said. "Shame about the brain, though."
Silence. Then a roar of laughter.
I stopped breathing.
My hand froze on the page. The pen wobbled. My vision blurred—but I refused to cry. Not in front of them.
"Seriously though," someone added, "why does she dress like she's in a historical drama? She look like she's auditioning for a period piece, not med school."
Another: "Maybe she thinks the professors will pity her."
I bit the inside of my cheek until I tasted metal.
I didn't turn around. I didn't say a word.I just stared at the page and wrote a single line over and over.
You are here to become a doctor. You are here to survive.
But that day, I didn't.
I left the class ten minutes early. Pretended to be sick. Locked myself in a fourth-floor girls' bathroom no one used and let myself collapse beside the sink. My heavy black hair had come undone during the walk and dragged behind me like a curse. I stared at it in the mirror.
I wanted to cut it all off.
I wanted to cut them all off.
But I couldn't.Because I was Rain Wang.Because I had no safety net.Because Ardenleigh wasn't a school to me—it was a lifeline.
And I had to stay.Even if they made it feel like drowning.