By the time the campus security officer arrived, Tessa Cole was on the concrete, and everyone was blaming Maya Bennett.
The truth was, Maya had been swallowing their cruelty for months.
She sat alone at a metal picnic table behind Westbridge Community College, her phone beside a half-eaten turkey sandwich and a paper cup of lemonade. The April wind kept lifting the corner of her notebook, so she placed one hand over it while she read the same message for the third time.
"Your financial aid review is still pending."
Maya closed her eyes.
That message meant she might lose her apartment by the end of the month. It meant another week of pretending everything was fine when her checking account had forty-three dollars in it. It meant she could not afford one more problem.
Behind her, three girls laughed near the vending machines.
Maya did not turn around. She already knew who they were.
Tessa Cole always laughed first. She had bright red hair, a denim vest, and a way of making every insult sound like a joke. Beside her stood Nia Brooks, whose long purple braids reached the middle of her back. Paige Miller followed them in a green hoodie, smiling whenever Tessa decided someone else should feel small.
They had chosen Maya three weeks earlier.
Maya still did not know why.
Maybe it was because she worked mornings at a grocery store and came to class in the same brown hoodie. Maybe it was because she never joined their parties or pretended to care about their online drama. Or maybe Tessa simply noticed that Maya ate lunch alone and decided that made her an easy target.
At first, it was small.
Someone moved Maya's backpack into a trash can. Someone poured ketchup across her homework. Someone wrote "desperate" on the whiteboard before her presentation and laughed when she stood in front of the room.
Maya reported none of it.
She told herself it would stop if she ignored them.
It did not stop.
Tessa's sneakers scraped across the concrete as she came toward the table. Nia and Paige followed, their laughter growing louder with every step.
Maya kept her eyes on her phone.
Tessa stopped directly in front of her.
"Move."
Maya looked up. "There are about twenty empty seats."
Tessa pointed at the tray. "I said move."
"This table seats six."
"I know how tables work."