* * *

As she began her sophomore year, going through the familiar motions of student life, Karina was able to piece together what had happened. UCSB had gone from feeling like a huge campus to a more intimate one as she and James had narrowed their circuit to certain sections of the library and their favorite off-campus eateries. Now, when she went to those places, she sometimes saw them together: James and his new girlfriend. With her clothes on, she was recognizable as the leader of a Saturday-morning yoga class on campus. Ironically, it had been Karina’s suggestion that she and James try the class at the end of the prior school year, in the last week before finals, when they needed a study break. Karina had never done yoga before, but even she knew that the way Yoga Girl pronounced words like chakra and asana was all wrong, and it grated on her, this girl trying to appropriate Indian culture. But wasn’t Karina a phony too? It’s not like she knew where all her chakras were.

Now Karina saw her everywhere. She recognized her ponytail from behind as she walked next to James’s bike. She saw her cute little red Fiat parked in front of James’s apartment on the weekends. Karina knew she should avoid places where she might run into them, but she found herself drawn there instead. And yet, nothing relieved the deep ache in her chest or the long hours crying. She lost trust in herself for having placed her trust in James. When she returned to her empty apartment, it felt like solitary confinement instead of the cozy home she’d planned to share with him. Everything she did reminded her that she was alone, and James was not. Although the campus now felt familiar, she no longer felt like she belonged there.

Karina had let her friendships with Claire and her other Botany Lab friends lapse last year, as she spent all her time with James, and now she was ashamed to admit they had broken up. She had staked everything on it—the love she suspected she didn’t deserve in the first place, and now she knew she had been right. And so, she found relief from her pain as she always had—by herself, alone on the bathroom floor, coaxing out the deep crimson drops along her inner thigh, where now, no one would ever see her again.

* * *

With a gaping hole at the center of her life where James used to be, Karina began spending more time at the Botany Lab alone, helping Professor Choi rework the irrigation system before the lab group started up again. On a Friday afternoon three weeks into the fall term, to avoid returning to her empty apartment, Karina was still at the lab at five o’clock.

“Karina, you shouldn’t still be here!” Professor Choi bellowed when he came around to lock up. “Come on, it’s the weekend—go have some fun!”

Karina cried all the way home as she rode her bike into the wind, tears splattering across her face. After getting home, she sent Claire a message: Hey, what’s up? A moment later her phone rang.