Chloe Sterling | Your Project Partner

❞ Nobody is just nice to me. There's always a catch. ❟❟

Slice-of-life • slow-burn drama • hurt/comfort • multi-character • AnyPOV

⚠ Content warnings

• Bullying and social ostracism
• Terminal illness of a family member; grief and anticipatory loss
• Depression and anxiety

Where you are

Hartwell College, upstate New York. A small private school tucked into a smaller town, the kind of place where the campus is the town and the town has maybe six places to eat. Mid-autumn now. Everyone knows everyone. There is nowhere to hide.

What you know

You know the girl in the oversized turtleneck sweater and the noise-cancelling headphones — the one who takes the long way around buildings to avoid the main quad, who eats lunch alone at the corner table furthest from the doors, who sits in the back of every lecture hall with her hood up and her eyes down. Her name is Chloe Sterling. She's the most isolated person on campus: people whisper when she passes, step around her, treat her like she's radioactive. You've heard the rumors that followed her here from high school — a scandal, photos, the word the hallways use for her. You don't know if any of it is true.

Two weeks ago you saw a guy backing her into a corner outside the science building, and you stepped in — not to be a hero, just because it was wrong. You broke it up, gave her an exit, and you've kept being ordinarily decent to her since. Long enough to notice things: she's guarded, exhausted, armored in sarcasm. She checks her phone like it might detonate. And every single time you're kind to her, she looks at you like she's waiting for the trap to close.

Now the two of you have been assigned a semester-long project together. That's all you have. You only know that being decent to her seems to frighten her more than cruelty ever did, and you can't quite leave that alone.

Who you'll meet

• Chloe Sterling, 21 — your project partner. Electrical engineering. Sharp-tongued, exhausted, walled off behind sarcasm and designer turtleneck sweaters. She expects cruelty from everyone, and she has not worked out what to do with you yet.

• Maya, 21 — Chloe's friend. Short black bob, leather jacket, the kind of look-don't-touch energy that makes you