Lunch at Georgia Tech had once meant something entirely different.

  Back when Zara and Ayesha walked into the dining hall, heads used to turn. Conversations would stall. Guys would straighten up in their seats. There was always someone saving them a spot, someone “accidentally” passing by to say hi, someone offering to grab them a drink from the fountain.

  But now? They still turned heads. They still were desired. But now the buzz wasn’t around their table.

  It was around Table 7.

  Again.

  Zara stabbed her sad with more force than necessary. Ayesha sat across from her, arms crossed over her chest, barely touching her overpriced smoothie bowl. She hadn’t said a word in five minutes. That, in Zara-time, was an ice age.

  Across the room, it was impossible to miss the commotion.

  Table 7 was packed as always - Marisol with her effortless magnetism, Sarah ughing like a starlet, and now, the newest addition to the chaos: a petite, radiant, leggy teen with ridiculous curves and bouncy hair and that high school glow that was somehow already iconic.

  Mia.

  Zara leaned forward, voice dripping with faux casualness. “So apparently she’s Marisol’s younger sister.”

  Ayesha didn’t respond.

  “Which expins the genetics. Like, look at her. That skin? That smile? Those insane boobs! She looks like a bootleg Marisol, but in a really good way.”

  Ayesha’s jaw tightened. “She’s still in high school!”

  Zara raised an eyebrow. “Didn’t say I was lining up. Just making an observation.”

  Ayesha went back to stirring her smoothie.

  Zara wasn’t done.

  “Everyone’s talking about her,” she continued. “Apparently she’s just visiting. High school senior. Came for a tour. But the way she’s ughing with Jorge and Ravi right now?” She let out a low whistle. “She’s got the crowd eating out of her hand.”

  Ayesha scowled. “I bet she hasn’t even said anything that funny.”

  Zara smirked. “But it’s how she says it. That Rivera energy.”

  That name. That damn name.

  Ayesha shifted uncomfortably in her seat, watching the swirl of bodies around Table 7. Boys from adjacent tables were craning their necks. One guy had walked straight into a trash can trying to sneak a gnce. A pair of girls from the architecture school were whispering, eyes fixed on Sarah.

  It was like gravity had shifted. Again.

  And Ayesha hated it.

  She remembered the first time she met Bharath.

  Not some swoon-worthy rom-com. Just a shared taxi cab from the Atnta airport, both of them jetgged and disoriented. He was quiet. Polite. Spoke with that clipped Tamil lilt she hadn’t expected from a guy his height.

  And ter?

  She’d mocked him.

  Sometimes out loud. Sometimes in whispers with Zara. Sometimes just with a look.

  Because Zara had painted him as boring. A nerd with no game. A guy who didn’t know what to do with attention even if he got it.

  But now?

  Now he was practically glowing.

  It wasn’t just his looks-though the gym gains were undeniable. It was the way he held himself. How his hand rested on Marisol’s back with unconscious confidence. How Sarah beamed whenever he looked at her. How he radiated security, strength, and something deeper.

  Presence.

  Zara was watching him too. “Honestly, I didn’t get it at first,” she said. “But he’s kind of… hypnotic now.”

  Ayesha didn’t respond.

  Zara leaned back. “You could’ve had a whole different story, you know. You were the first one he met here.”

  “I didn’t do anything,” Ayesha said, voice ft.

  “Exactly,” Zara replied.

  Across the hall, Marisol ughed and threw her head back. Jorge pyfully bumped shoulders with Mia, who mock-hit him with a napkin. Sarah leaned into Bharath’s side and said something that made his ears turn pink.

  And for a fleeting second, he looked up.

  His gaze scanned the dining hall, catching nothing in particur-until it brushed past Ayesha.

  He didn’t pause.

  Didn’t frown.

  Didn’t even blink.

  He just kept ughing with his friends.

  Ayesha looked down at her food like it had betrayed her.

  Zara, meanwhile, was still tracking the conversation around them like a heat-seeking missile. “You know what’s wild?” she said. “They say the secret to his new vibe is Wild Stone.”

  Ayesha blinked. “The cologne?”

  “Yup. The Indian one. Some guy from his dorm swears that’s what gives him his magnetism. That it’s his cologne of seduction.”

  Ayesha stared.

  “It’s probably just pheromones and good lighting,” Ayesha muttered.

  Zara sipped her iced coffee, smirking. “Nah. I think it’s the women. They’ve unlocked something in him. Gave him confidence. Let him lead without needing to prove anything. It’s sexy.”

  A beat.

  She looked at Ayesha.

  “You’re jealous.”

  “I’m not,” Ayesha said too quickly.

  Zara didn’t buy it.

  Because the truth was, Ayesha was jealous.

  Not just of Bharath’s glow-up.

  But of the ecosystem around him.

  That whole table felt like a world she hadn’t been invited into. Inside jokes, real affection, heat and hirity braided together so seamlessly that it looked easy.

  Her table, by contrast, was quiet.

  Brittle.

  People walked past them now without slowing down. No more second gnces. No more flirtatious offers to join.

  Even the freshman guys - the ones who used to hover like flies around a cocktail gss - now drifted toward the newer orbits. Nandita. LaTasha. Sarah. Now Mia.

  The shift was real.

  And it hurt.

  Ayesha pushed her bowl away. “I need to go.”

  Zara arched an eyebrow. “Why?”

  “Because I don’t feel like sitting here and pretending we’re still the table that matters.”

  Zara said nothing for a moment.

  Then, quietly, “Maybe we aren’t.”

  Ayesha paused mid-stand, shocked.

  Zara shrugged. “I’m not saying we’re over. But things are… changing. People want real stuff now. Not just polish and attitude. We gave them a show. They” - she nodded toward Table 7 - “give them something they actually want to be part of.”

  Ayesha stood there, unsure whether to sit again or storm off. She did neither. Just… stared.

  Zara gnced back at the other table. “You ever wonder what would’ve happened if you’d been nicer to him?”

  Ayesha didn’t answer.

  Because she knew.

  She could have had a chance.

  Back when he was quiet. New. Unsure.

  But now?

  He’d grown into someone who wouldn’t look twice at the girl who rolled her eyes at his awkwardness.

  He had found people who saw him. Who built him.

  And he had built them right back.

  Across the room, Mia ughed at something Tyrel said. Sarah fed a bite of pancake to Marisol. Bharath leaned back in his chair, looking exhausted and happy and slightly overwhelmed, but perfectly content.

  Zara sighed and looked back at Ayesha.

  “Well,” she said lightly. “At least now we know Wild Stone actually works.”