Chapter 78 SIX SHEETS
POV: ANNABELLE — PART ONE
The exam paper landed on Annabelle’s desk like everything else at Thornfield: silent, already decided, as if her part in it never really mattered. Professor Torres moved through the classroom, dropping papers with the kind of calm you only get from doing something a thousand times before. Around her, students clicked their pens open. The legacy kids slid down in their seats, totally at ease, looking as if they never once doubted they belonged here.
Annabelle clenched her cheap blue pen and stared at the first question. She knew this stuff. She had spent four nights straight with her head buried in the textbook, working through derivatives at the library table while Whitney sat nearby, lost in her own world of color-coded timelines. Annabelle had learned all of this by grinding harder than anyone else she knew. The only way she ever made it work was by working more.
She started writing, her thoughts racing to keep up with her hand.
Halfway through the first page, something flickered at the edge of her vision. No sound. Just suddenly there.
She didn’t move her head, only her eyes, the way she’d practiced for years, always watching her surroundings without letting anyone notice. Her heart thudded, and she caught sight of it: tucked under the corner of her test paper, a folded white sheet.
Her pulse jumped. Cold. Electric.
She stared at the slip of paper, just sitting there, and counted a single slow second before touching it. She picked it up, kept it low, and read the message.
LOOK UNDER YOUR CHAIR.
Her mind ran through every scenario in a flash. Was this a prank? A test? She waited, then glanced beneath her seat.
There, taped to the bottom, was a thick white rectangle.
She reached under, fingers trembling for a moment, but then steady, the way her hands always got when something truly bad was happening. She peeled it free, unfolded it under the desk.
It was covered in formulas, theorems, all arranged by question number. And the handwriting—her handwriting. The slight left slant she’d never managed to fix, not even after years of trying.
But she hadn’t written this. She knew she hadn’t.
She stared at it, then flipped it face-down on her desk. She looked up at the front of the room, where Professor Torres was making his way back up the far aisle. He was slow, measured, like nothing surprised him.
Three rows ahead, Mia Chen’s whole body froze.
Then Torres crouched at Mia’s desk. He reached under her seat, pulled out another folded sheet, and laid it on her desk, quiet and deliberate, like he was setting down a sentence instead of a piece of paper.
Mia stammered. Grace Marshall protested. Rodriguez, then Park. Each time, the same thing. Torres never broke his rhythm or looked angry. He just worked his way through, one after another, as if this was all expected.
Each kid tried to defend themselves, their voices shaky, but the excuses all sounded the same: That isn’t mine. I didn’t put it there. Please, you have to believe me.
Professor Torres did not answer any of them. He just kept moving.
Annabelle’s turn came. His shadow stretched across her desk. She looked up and met his eyes.
He bent, reached under, and pulled out the sheet she had already found. He glanced at it for one long second. She watched his face, searching for any hint of surprise, but saw none—just confirmation, as if he already knew what he would find. He wasn’t searching for evidence. He was gathering it.
He finally looked at her.
“Miss Wilson.” His voice was quiet, almost gentle.
“I didn’t write that,” Annabelle said, her voice barely above a whisper.
His mouth curled into the faintest smile, not kind, not cruel. Just tired. He leaned in, so close she could feel his breath. “Of course you didn’t.” He said it like a fact, not a comfort. “No one ever does.”
Then his voice boomed for the whole class to hear.
“Six identical violations. Six scholarship students. That’s quite a pattern.”
The room hushed. Pens stopped moving.
Every single head turned. Annabelle could feel the legacy students staring, hungry for drama, eager to see someone pushed out of a space they had always believed she didn’t deserve.
“Collect your things,” Torres said. “Report to Dean Blackwood’s office as soon as the exam is over.”