A small flush rose under Yuna’s collar. She picked up her water again with the very deliberate motion of a woman who had said more than she’d intended to and was now committing to the bit anyway.

She cleared her throat and said, "I am a completionist."

"Four hundred."

"Yes."

"Professor Sakamoto—"

"Yuna." She emphasized again.

"—you read four hundred Chapters of my emotionally-stunted cultivation novel. With the love interest who has two hair colors. And the made-up monetary system."

"I have a long commute on the train."

"Damnation."

She gave me a small, slightly defiant smile and ate her sandwich.

I leaned back in the plastic chair and let myself just look at her for a second, the auburn hair coming loose from the bun, the glasses sliding the smallest bit down her nose, the faint pink still high on her cheek where she had embarrassed herself by being a fan and refused to back down from it.

’She read four hundred Chapters. The strict professor with the unreadable face read four hundred Chapters of a hermit’s first novel on her train commute. I am going to be insufferable about this for at least a week. Filing it. Possibly Chapter three of the new one, slightly disguised.’

"The new one’s better," I said.

"Mm?"

"My new novel. The current one. It’s better. I’m not just saying it, it’s actually—" I gestured vaguely at the air. "Something is working differently this time. I’m a few Chapters into it and it’s the best thing I’ve ever written. By a margin."

"That is a very bold thing to say about a novel few Chapters in." She said.

"I’m telling you. When it’s published properly, you read it. It’s going to blow your mind."

She tilted her head, smiling. "Confident."

"Earned confidence."

"Mm. We will see."

"You’ll see."

"What is it about?" She asked with genuine curiosity.

I opened my mouth.

Closed it.

’A self-deprecating shut-in who finds out he can world-hop and accidentally collects a small number of women who could each individually kill him. Including, by the way, his mom’s best friend, his ex-professor, and a hacker who calls him Lukas instead of master. You read four hundred Chapters of cultivation, Yuna, but I’m not sure you’re ready for this one.’

"It’s a portal fantasy," I said, disclosing a part of it. "With economic arbitrage."

"...Lukas."

"What?"

She repeated, "You wrote a portal fantasy with an economic arbitrage plot. Specifically. As your follow-up novel. With me as a footnote in your final essay."

"I did not write it because of you—"

"Mm-hm." She smiled.

"—I wrote it because I find currency markets interesting."

"Of course you do."

"Yuna."

"I’m just listening, Lukas."

I gave up and laughed, and she laughed back, and somewhere behind us the three undergrads had given up on pretending to eat and were now openly observing the strict professor laughing at a sandwich table with a man none of them recognized.

We sat there for another half hour.

The conversation wound out the way good ones do, no particular destination, looping through her family in Osaka and my failed beard experiment and the time she’d had a student try to bribe her with a bottle of sake to change a C-plus to a B-minus.

I made her laugh twice more. She made me laugh four times, which I noted as the day’s first proper exchange-of-equals with a woman I had previously only thought of as an authority figure.

When we finally got up, she handed me her phone with the contacts app open.

I took it.

Put my number in.

Handed it back.

"I’ll text you," she said, slinging her bag back over her shoulder. "When the new one is out. Don’t make me wait too long."

"You’ll be the first to know."

"Mm. Good." She paused at the door, the afternoon light catching her glasses. "It was good to see you, Lukas. The new you. And the old you, who is still in there somewhere under the shoulders."

"...Damnation, professor."

"Yuna."

"Yuna."

She gave me a small wave and walked off across the green, folders against her chest, hair coming loose from the bun, exactly the same shape as the woman who had once handed me back a graded essay with a single circled comment that read more confidence in your own voice, please.

I stood in the cafeteria doorway and watched her go for a second.

’Filed. All of it. Including the four hundred Chapters, especially the four hundred Chapters.’

Then my phone buzzed.

Lia: Daddy. East lawn. Come find me.

I went.

...

The east lawn was the small grassy quad behind the business school, the one with the picnic tables nobody used because they were always slightly sticky.

Lia was sitting on top of one of them, feet on the bench, talking to three other girls in a small cluster.

She saw me coming from across the lawn and her whole posture changed.

The change was subtle but I caught it because I had been specifically studying her body language. The shoulders dropped half an inch. The chin lifted. The smile she’d been giving her friends switched register from bored-friendly to something else, and that something else was a problem for my heart rate.

She did not, however, get up. She watched me walk to her instead.

I stopped in front of the table.

The three friends turned to look at me with the synchronized swivel of girls who had been pre-briefed.

"Hey, sugar daddy," Lia said, and one of her friends made an audible hngk noise.

"Hey." I leaned on the picnic table next to her foot, casual, looked her up and down once, slow, in a way I knew she would feel. "How was class?"

"It was a class."

"Mm." I tipped my head toward her sneakers. "You change shoes?"

"For you, yeah."

"Liar."

"...Maybe." she looked away.

"Lia."

"What?"

I whispered softly, "That uniform is doing things to me again."

Her face went pink in approximately one second. The three friends made a sound that was not, technically, words, but was somewhere between a gasp and a small collective scream.

Lia mumbled, "Daddy—" 𝗳𝚛𝚎𝚎𝘄𝕖𝕓𝕟𝕠𝚟𝚎𝕝.𝗰𝕠𝐦

"What?"

She looked down and muttered, "You can’t say that in front of them—"

"You introduced me as sugar daddy."

"That was for me—"

The shortest of her friends, dark curly hair, a small troublemaker face, leaned forward with both hands flat on the table. "Lia. Lia. Lia. Introduce us."

"No."

"Lia, that is rude—"

She glared at them, "He is mine—"

"Lia he is right here, you cannot say mine about a person—"

"Watch me—"

The tallest friend, ponytail, looked me dead in the eye and said, very evenly, "Hi. I’m Mei. Are you single."

"He is not—" Lia hissed.

"I am asking him, not you—"

"Daddy, tell her—"

"I’m not single," I said, smiling.

Mei sighed and sat back down. "Damn."

"Can we at least taste him?" said the third one, who I had not yet been introduced to and now never would be.

"Priya, no—"

"Lia, we just want a small bite—"

"Get away from him—"

Lia hopped off the picnic table, grabbed my wrist with surprising strength for a girl who had been doing a sleepy-soft voice on the phone an hour ago, and physically dragged me three steps before remembering she was supposed to be cool.

She turned over her shoulder, "I am leaving."

"Bye, Lia~"

"With my boyfriend—"

"Bye, Lia’s boyfriend—"

"He is a very good boyfriend—"

"We can see that, Lia—"

"Goodbye."

"Bye, Lia’s handsome boyfriend, come back any time—"

"Bring snacks—"