The email I send Marcus is clinical. Surgical. I even use a formal greeting, which should tell him everything he needs to know about how badly I've miscalculated.

Dr. Reid,

Upon further analysis of my preliminary data, I've determined that continued personal interaction is compromising the integrity of my research. To maintain scientific validity, I need to implement strict distance protocols for the remainder of the study. I trust you understand the necessity of this decision.

Best,
Iris

I hit send at 3:15 AM and immediately want to vomit.

"Dr. Reid?" Sophie appears in my doorway, already dressed for her 8 AM class, which means she's been up for a while. She takes in my state—unwashed hair, yesterday's clothes, the laptop glowing like a second heartbeat in the dark—and her expression shifts into something that looks a lot like pity. "You didn't sleep again."

"I slept." I didn't. "I was working."

"On your thesis or on your self-sabotage? Because I'm seeing some overlap."

I close the laptop like it might bite me. "The experiment requires distance. It's scientifically sound."

"The experiment requires you to stop being a coward." Sophie sits on the edge of my bed without asking permission, which is very on-brand for her. She smells like coconut shampoo and morning coffee, like normalcy and health, and it makes me irrationally angry. "What happened, Iris? Like, actually happened? Because Marcus was fine yesterday. You were fine yesterday."

Fine is a generous word for whatever was happening between Marcus and me. Fine doesn't account for the way his hand found the small of my back in the library. Fine doesn't explain why I've memorized the exact shade of his eyes or the fact that I can identify him by scent alone—that intoxicating cedar and smoke that makes my brain short-circuit.

Fine is a lie, and Sophie knows it.

"I looked at my data," I say instead. The truth, technically. Just not the whole truth. "The biometric readings show significant physiological response to proximity with the subject. Increased cortisol, elevated heart rate, disrupted sleep patterns. It's contamination."

"Or it's called having feelings."

"Same thing, neurologically speaking."

Sophie makes a sound that's half-laugh, half-sob. "You're really going to do this. You're really going to kill this because you're scared."

"I'm not scared. I'm being rigorous."

"You're being a robot." She stands up, and I can feel her disappointment like a physical thing, pressing down on my chest. "Marcus is going to get that email and think he did something wrong. He's going to think you don't want him."

"He doesn't want me. He wants the novelty of someone who doesn't immediately fall apart when he smiles."

"Is that what you think this is?" Sophie's voice gets quiet, which is somehow worse than if she'd yelled. "Iris, that boy looks at you like you hung the moon. He doesn't look at anyone like that."

I don't respond because responding means admitting that I've noticed. That I've catalogued every instance of his attention like it's data, like I can somehow quantify why it matters so much that he remembers how I take my coffee or that he once moved my hair out of my face just to see my expression better. That's not love. That's observation. That's the careful attention someone pays to something they find interesting before they get bored and move on.

That's what everyone does eventually.

Sophie leaves for class, and I spend the next three hours refreshing my email like an addict waiting for a fix.

Marcus doesn't respond until 2 PM.

Okay. I understand. Let me know if you need anything else for the study.

That's it. Seven words. No signature. No attempt to negotiate or convince me otherwise. Just acceptance, which somehow feels worse than if he'd fought me on it.

The withdrawal is immediate and physical.

By Wednesday, I'm experiencing what I can only describe as a physiological cascade of symptoms: disrupted sleep (I've logged 4.2 hours per night), elevated cortisol (confirmed by saliva samples), decreased appetite (I've eaten approximately 1,200 calories per day), and a persistent ache behind my sternum that no amount of logical analysis can explain away.

This is what dopamine withdrawal looks like. This is what happens when you remove a stimulus that your brain has become dependent on.

It's not heartbreak. It's chemistry.

Except my body doesn't seem to understand the difference.

I see Marcus on Thursday in the dining hall, and I have to grip the edge of the salad bar to keep from walking over to him. He's sitting with his usual crowd, laughing at something someone's said, and he looks fine. Better than fine. He looks untouched by any of this, which is exactly what I wanted and exactly what breaks something in me that I can't repair with data.

He doesn't look at me once.

I tell myself this is good. This is proof of concept. Feelings fade without reinforcement. Remove the stimulus, and the response diminishes. Basic operant conditioning. I've just conducted the most painful experiment of my life, and the data is irrefutable.

It's also bullshit, and I know it.

By Friday, I'm barely functional. Sophie's stopped trying to talk to me about it, which is worse than the lectures. She just watches me with sad eyes and makes sure there's tea in the apartment and that I'm not actively dying. She's a better friend than I deserve.

That's when Ashford finds me in the library.

I'm in my usual corner, surrounded by journal articles and my laptop, trying to force myself to work on the analysis that's supposed to be my salvation. Instead, I'm staring at a blank document and thinking about Marcus's hands.

"Iris." Ashford materializes like he's been summoned, all silver hair and expensive cologne, and suddenly my small corner of the library feels much smaller. "I've been meaning to catch you. How's the research progressing?"

I straighten up, pulling my professional face into place. "Fine. On schedule."

"You look exhausted." He sits down across from me without asking, and I have to force myself not to lean back. "Everything alright?"

The question is casual, but there's something underneath it. Something that feels like fishing. I'm usually good at detecting manipulation—I've had a lifetime of practice—but I'm running on fumes and heartbreak, which apparently disables my threat-detection system.

"Just the usual thesis stress," I say. "Long nights."

"The subject's been distracting you."

It's not a question, and the way he says it—like he knows something I don't—makes my skin prickle. I don't respond, which is apparently confirmation enough.

Ashford leans forward, and his scent wraps around me: expensive cologne mixed with whiskey and old leather, the smell of authority and privilege. It's nothing like the cedar and smoke that makes me lose my mind. It's nothing like anything I want, but he's here, and he's paying attention, and my loneliness is so loud I'm not sure I can hear anything else.

"Marcus Reid is not the kind of person you should be involving yourself with," he says quietly. "He has a reputation for... collecting women. Using them to boost his ego and then discarding them when they start to matter."

My stomach twists. "I'm aware of his history."

"Are you? Because from where I'm sitting, it looks like you've already started to matter to him, and he's already starting to pull away." Ashford's eyes are sympathetic, which is somehow worse than if they were cruel. "I've seen this pattern before, Iris. Brilliant girls like you, so focused on logic and data that you don't see what's happening until it's too late."

"He's not—" I stop myself. What was I going to say? That he's not like that? That he's different? I have no evidence of that. I have one kiss and six weeks of data that proves nothing except that my body has been hijacked by neurochemistry.

"You deserve someone who appreciates your mind," Ashford continues, and he reaches across the table to adjust a stack of my papers, his hand lingering close to mine. "Someone who understands the kind of work you're doing. Someone who won't distract you from your potential."

His hand is still there, and I could move mine. I should move mine. But I'm so tired of being alone, and he's offering something that feels dangerously close to care, even if it tastes like manipulation when I examine it too closely.

I don't move.

"I think you're right," I hear myself say. "About the distance. It was the right call."

Ashford smiles, and it's the smile of someone who just won something. "I know it is. You're too brilliant to waste on someone like that. Too important."

He leaves a few minutes later, after making sure I know his office door is always open if I need to talk. The gesture feels like a trap I've already sprung.

The weekend is a study in degradation.

I tell myself I'm not checking Marcus's Instagram, but I am. I tell myself I don't care that he posted a photo from last night—him and his friends at some party, everyone laughing, him looking like he's already moved on. I tell myself that this is what I wanted.

Sophie finds me at 11 PM, staring at the photo on my phone, and she doesn't say anything. She just sits next to me and takes the phone out of my hands and sets it on the nightstand.

"He's hurting too," she says quietly. "I know you can't see that right now, but he is."

"He looks fine."

"People who are fine don't post party photos at midnight on a Saturday. People who are fine don't text me asking if you're okay." She pauses. "People who are fine don't look like someone kicked them in the gut every time they see you across campus."

I want to ask what he said. I want to know if he mentioned me. I want to know if he's suffering the way I'm suffering, and that desire is so pathetic and desperate that I hate myself for it.

"It's better this way," I say instead.

Sophie doesn't argue. She just turns off the light and lies down next to me like I'm someone who needs to be watched so I don't do something stupid.

Monday morning, Ashford asks me to come to his office during my usual advising time.

I should have seen it coming. Looking back, it's obvious. The careful cultivation, the positioning as my protector, the subtle way he's been inserting himself into the space Marcus left behind. But I'm operating on a deficit of sleep and emotional regulation, so when he closes his office door and suggests we "discuss the direction of your research" over coffee from his personal machine, I just sit down.

His office is exactly what I expected: all dark wood and leather, smelling like old money and the kind of power that comes from knowing you'll never be held accountable. There's a photo on his desk of him with some famous psychologist I vaguely recognize, both of them smiling like they've just discovered something important.

Ashford hands me a mug and sits on the edge of his desk, close enough that I have to look up to meet his eyes. "I've been thinking about your thesis," he says. "About the methodology."

"What about it?"

"It's solid, but I think you're missing something." He takes a sip of his coffee, and I notice he's wearing a new watch. Diamond face. Probably costs more than my tuition. "Your hypothesis assumes that attachment forms primarily through physical proximity and biochemical response. But what you're not accounting for is the role of intellectual compatibility. Of genuine understanding."

He's looking at me like I'm supposed to understand what he's saying underneath the words, and I do. I understand perfectly.

"Ashford—"

"David," he corrects gently. "We're colleagues now, aren't we? Or at least, we will be soon."

There's something in his tone that makes my skin crawl, but he's still my advisor, and he still controls my academic future, so I don't move when he sets his coffee down and moves closer.

"I think you've been looking in the wrong direction," he says quietly. "Trying to understand love through the lens of someone who's incapable of genuine feeling. But what if you looked at it differently? What if you examined the capacity for connection with someone who could actually appreciate your brilliance?"

His hand is on my shoulder, and I should stand up. I should leave. Every survival instinct I have is screaming at me to get out of this office, away from this man and his careful manipulation.

But I'm lonely, and he's offering proximity, and my judgment is so compromised that I can't tell the difference between care and control anymore.

"I don't think—"

"You think too much," he says softly. "That's your problem, Iris. You rationalize everything away before you let yourself feel anything."

He's moving closer, and I can smell the whiskey on his breath now, and this is wrong, this is so wrong, but I'm frozen because if I move, if I acknowledge what's happening, then I have to admit that I've let someone else into my space while the person I actually want is gone.

My phone buzzes.

It's a text from Sophie: Where are you? We were supposed to get lunch.

The reminder of the real world, of someone who actually cares, snaps something back into focus. I stand up, and Ashford steps back like he's been expecting this.

"I need to go," I say.

"Of course." He's smiling that winning smile again. "But think about what I said, Iris. About what you really need. I think you'll find that I understand you better than anyone else."

I leave his office and don't look back.

The campus is bright and terrible in the afternoon sun, and I'm walking without direction when I see him.

Marcus is sitting on the lawn near the science building, reading something, and the sight of him hits me like a physical blow. He's wearing a gray t-shirt that makes his eyes look more green than gray, and he's got that little crease between his eyebrows that means he's concentrating, and I've missed him so much that it's actually difficult to breathe.

I should keep walking. That's what the data suggests. That's what my thesis requires.

But I'm so tired of doing what the data suggests.

He looks up like he feels me watching him, and for a second, we just stare at each other. There's a distance of maybe twenty feet, but it feels like an ocean. His expression shifts from surprise to something that looks a lot like hope, and then he's standing up, and I'm moving toward him, and the space between us is closing.

"Hi," he says when I'm close enough to hear him over the racing of my own heart.

"Hi."

"I got your email."

"I know."

"I've been respecting your boundary."

"I know."

He takes a step closer, and I can smell it now—that cedar and smoke that's become as necessary to me as oxygen. "I've been miserable."

"Good," I say, and then I'm kissing him, right there on the lawn with half the campus watching, and it tastes like relief and desperation and the kind of honesty I've been running from for six weeks.

When we break apart, he's smiling, and I'm crying, which is absolutely unacceptable, but I can't seem to stop.

"I'm sorry," I say. "I'm sorry, I was—"

"Scared," he finishes. "I know. I could tell."

"I pulled away because—"

"Because you were protecting yourself. I know that too." He reaches up and wipes a tear off my cheek with his thumb, and the gentleness of it nearly breaks me all over again. "I'm not going anywhere, Iris. Even when you push me away. Even when you convince yourself that this isn't real."

I want to believe him. I want to believe that love is more than dopamine and oxytocin, that it's something that survives distance and logic and fear.

But Ashford's words are still in my head, and Marcus's reputation is still a fact, and I'm still the daughter of a woman who loved someone so much she lost herself completely.

"I have to tell you something," I say.

But before I can, my phone buzzes again.

This time it's an email from the department. From Ashford.

Iris,

I'm concerned about the scientific validity of your research given your personal involvement with the subject. I'd like to discuss potentially reassigning you to a different advisor. My office. Tomorrow, 9 AM.

The email is copied to the department head and the graduate program director.

Marcus reads it over my shoulder, and I watch his expression darken.

"What the fuck?" he says quietly. "Is he—did something happen?"

I should tell him. I should tell him about the office, about the hand on my shoulder, about the way Ashford positioned himself as my protector while systematically isolating me from the one person who actually makes me feel less alone.

Instead, I'm thinking about my thesis. About my future. About the fact that Ashford still has power over my academic career, and Marcus is just someone I kissed on the lawn while my entire life was imploding.

"I need to go," I say, and I'm already backing away.

"Iris, wait—"

But I'm already running, and the distance between us is opening up again, and I'm not sure I know how to close it without destroying everything I've worked for.

Behind me, Marcus is calling my name.

Ahead of me, Ashford is waiting.

And I'm caught between them, terrified that choosing either one means losing myself completely.