Outburst

Outburst

The campus was buzzing long before the first class even started.
Whispers clung to the hallways like humidity—heavy, sticky, impossible to ignore. People were clustered in small groups, phones out, eyes wide, waiting for something. Or maybe someone.
And then Michelle arrived.
She stormed through the main gate with the kind of energy that made people instinctively step aside. Her hair was unbrushed, her eyes red, her uniform wrinkled as if she hadn’t slept at all. One hand clutched her bag; the other protectively hovered over her barely showing stomach.
But what stood out wasn’t her appearance.
It was the fury simmering under her skin.
“WHERE IS SHE!?” she shouted, voice cracking through the courtyard.
Heads turned. Conversations stopped. Even the security guard froze.
Vienna and Jacob were at the benches nearby, both jolting to attention. Sue, who had been recording TikTok drafts with her friends, lowered her phone. Even professors who were on their way to class paused.
Because everyone knew who “she” meant.
Laura.
Michelle marched toward the Fine Arts building, breathing hard, the emotional dam inside her ready to burst. A few people tried to stop her—classmates, friends, even a professor—but she shoved past them with shaking arms.
Then she saw it.
Laura’s locker.
Her expression twisted.
“She took EVERYTHING from me!” Michelle screamed, slamming her palm against the metal door. “First Cole—then she ruins my life—AND NOW SHE GETS TO PRETEND LIKE SHE’S THE VICTIM?!”
Phones were raised. Someone gasped. Someone else whispered, “Is she okay?”
Michelle wasn’t. Not even close.
She spun around, addressing the growing crowd.
“Don’t act innocent!” she snapped at no one in particular, as if the entire world conspired against her. “Cole and I were supposed to fix things! He said he still cared—he said we could start over—but NO! Laura just had to show up—had to cry to him—had to make him feel responsible for her!”
Her chest heaved. Her voice wavered.
“She stole him. She stole my future. She stole EVERYTHING.”
Vienna exchanged a horrified glance with Jacob.
“Michelle, stop,” Jacob said, stepping forward cautiously. “This isn’t the way—”
She pointed at him, eyes blazing. “You don’t get to tell me what to do! YOU and your cousin are the reason Cole keeps running back to her! All of you kept choosing Laura over me!”
Jacob stiffened.
Michelle laughed, but it came out broken. “You think I don’t know what’s happening? Cole ignores my calls, stops checking on me, treats me like I’m nothing—because she’s always there!”
Her anger cracked into despair.
“He said he’d be there for me… for the baby…” Her voice trembled, thin as thread. “But now he won’t even look at me…”
There was a sharp silence.
Even the air felt scared to move.
Then—her mood snapped again.
“He’s MINE!” she yelled, gripping her head as tears streaked down her cheeks. “Laura can pretend all she wants, but I WON’T LET HER WIN!”
A professor stepped in, speaking gently. “Michelle… let’s go to the office. You’re distressed—”
Michelle jerked back. “NO! Not until I see her!”
She grabbed a paint can from a nearby display table—probably a student’s project—and hurled it at the hallway wall. The splatter exploded across the floor, splashing over lockers, tiles, even someone’s shoes.
Gasps. Screams. A few people backed away.
Michelle stared at the mess as if surprised she had made it.
Then she whispered, almost too softly:
“She took Cole from me… and I have nothing left…”
Her knees buckled. A professor caught her before she hit the ground, students parting in silence as faculty guided her away.
The courtyard remained frozen even long after she disappeared.
Vienna wrapped her arms around herself. Jacob ran a hand through his hair, muttering a curse.
And somewhere on the other side of the city—
Laura had no idea any of this was happening.
But the rumor storm was already forming.
And when it reached her…
it would hit like a tidal wave.

—-

Night fell heavy over the city—thicker than usual, like the darkness itself was holding its breath.
Edward stepped out of his office building, loosening his tie, rubbing the stress off his temples. He had just finished a tense meeting with investors and was already crafting excuses to Emily in his head.
But the moment he reached his car, he stopped.
A piece of paper was tucked under the windshield wiper.
Not the usual parking ticket.
Not a flyer.
White. Folded once. Edges shaking slightly in the breeze.
He pulled it out.
The handwriting was jagged. Uneven.
Desperate.
“You don’t get to leave me.
You don’t get to pretend I don’t exist.
I’m carrying your child.
You will pay attention to me.”
Edward’s stomach twisted.
He looked around the nearly empty parking lot.
Nothing.
Just shadows from the lampposts and the hum of engines far away.
He crumpled the note and shoved it into his coat pocket, scanning the area again with a cold sweat sliding down his spine.
He didn’t know she was watching.
Up on the rooftop of the adjacent building—half-hidden behind the concrete ledge—Michelle crouched with trembling hands.
Her hoodie swallowed her figure, her breath coming out uneven, fogging the night air. Her eyes were swollen from crying, but underneath… there was something sharper. Brighter. Dangerous.
She whispered to herself, voice hoarse:
“He thinks he can ghost me? Pretend I’m some joke? Leave me alone with this baby and my whole life falling apart?”
She clutched her stomach, not protectively—
but possessively.
“No. No, he doesn’t get to do that anymore.”
Her phone lit up.
No new messages.
Nothing from Edward.
Nothing from Cole.
Nothing from anyone.
Michelle wiped her tears with the back of her hand, then pulled out a second note—already written, already folded.
“Don’t make me come inside your house.
Talk to me. NOW.”
Edward’s house wasn’t quiet that night.
At 2:17 AM, he woke up to a soft thud on his front porch.
Then another.
Then another.
Like someone was throwing pebbles, deliberately, rhythmically.
He got out of bed, annoyed, thinking it was kids messing around. But when he opened the front door—
A small stack of folded papers lay scattered across the tiles.
His heart dropped.
He bent down, hands shaking as he unfolded them.
“I see you.”
“Why are you ignoring me?”
“We’re in this together whether you like it or not.”
“If you leave me again I WILL TELL EVERYTHING.”
One of them had a smudged fingerprint.
A hint of red nail polish.
Michelle.
His breath hitched.
He looked up and saw movement—just a blur—fading into the bushes across the street.
He slammed the door shut, locked every bolt, pulled the curtains tight.
For the first time in a long time…
Edward felt fear.
Meanwhile, in her cramped dorm room, Michelle huddled on the floor, surrounded by scribbled drafts and torn papers. Her knees were tucked into her chest, and her fingers tapped compulsively against her thighs.
“He has to talk to me,” she whispered. “He has to. He said he’d take care of me. He promised.”
Her face twisted.
“Laura stole Cole… Emily stole everything… but Edward is mine. He CHOSE me first. He gave me this life. He doesn’t get to leave.”
She picked up her pen—dark ink staining her fingertips—and began writing again.
This one was different.
Sharper.
Colder.
“You ignored me again.
Do you want Emily to know EVERYTHING you made me do?”
She smiled through her tears, a trembling, broken little smile.
“Now he’ll listen.”

\-

Michelle didn’t sleep that night.
Not because she couldn’t—
but because the silence was too loud.
Her dorm room was dim, lit only by the weak glow of her desk lamp, painting long, warped shadows across the walls. The air felt thick, suffocating, as if every breath had to fight its way out of her lungs.
She sat on the floor, knees pulled close, one hand gripping her stomach, the other trembling around a pen she refused to put down. Her hair was messy, strands sticking to her damp cheeks from dried tears.
It wasn’t madness.
Not yet.
But the pressure was there—pressing, pulsing, whispering.
The kind that crawls under the skin
and refuses to leave.
She whispered, voice cracking:
“Why won’t he answer…? Why won’t anyone answer?”
Her phone lay face-up on the floor.
Screen cracked.
Battery at 7%.
No new notifications.
Not from Edward.
Not from Cole.
Not even from her so-called friends who vanished the moment her scandal broke.
She inhaled sharply, a choked little sound escaping her chest. For a moment—just a moment—her vision blurred, as if reality itself was smearing at the edges.
But Michelle blinked hard.
She wouldn’t break.
She refused to.
The world could crush her, judge her, call her names, but she would not fall apart. Not now. Not when she had everything to lose. Not when she was carrying the one thing that tied Edward to her forever.
Her fingers tightened around the pen.
“I’m not crazy,” she whispered to the empty room.
“I’m not. I’m not.”
But the room didn’t answer.
It only echoed her breathing—rapid, shallow, uneven.
She suddenly grabbed the stack of notes she had written. Dozens. Some smeared with tears, some crossed out violently. She spread them around her like a circle, surrounding herself with her own words.
He can’t ignore me.
He won’t leave me.
I’m not alone. I’m not.
He promised.
He promised.
Her nails dug into her palms.
She wasn’t going insane.
She was being pushed
and pushed
and pushed.
By Edward.
By Emily’s coldness.
By Laura’s existence.
By the baby inside her reminding her every second that she couldn’t go back to how things were.
She stood slowly, breath shaky, and walked to the mirror. Her reflection stared back—eyes puffy, lips trembling, skin pale as paper.
She touched her cheek.
“I still look fine,” she whispered.
A small, humorless smile tugged at her lips.
“Pretty enough for him to come back.”
But the smile cracked.
Something inside her trembled, wavered.
Her voice dropped to a whisper.
“…right?”
The silence hit harder this time.
Heavier.
Louder.
Michelle closed her eyes… and suddenly the room felt like it was tilting. For a moment, she thought she might fall—might finally break—
—but she caught herself on the desk, breathing hard, shaking her head violently.
“No.”
Her voice was rough, edged with desperation.
“No. I’m not losing it. I’m not losing control.”
She lifted the latest note she wrote.
The one that felt like a threat wrapped in a plea.
She pressed it to her chest.
“He’ll read this. He’ll understand. He has to.”
Then she grabbed her hoodie, pulled it tight, and stepped into the hallway.
Her steps were slow, purposeful.
Every stride fueled by fear, love, obsession, and something darker she didn’t want to name.
Not madness.
Not insanity.
Just… a mind under siege.
And Michelle Sy wasn’t losing.
She was fighting.
Even if the battle was only against herself.