MY PSYCHO AIPHA

The car smelled like fast-food fries that had given up on life three counties ago and the lavender air freshener her mom insisted “neutralized odors.”

It didn’t. It just made the fries smell like they were trying too hard.

Lila Gray sat with her knees pulled slightly inward, elbows tucked close, like she could make herself smaller and less noticeable to her own nerves. Her phone buzzed again in her palm.

MOM: Text me when you arrive.

MOM: Send a picture of your dorm.

MOM: Don’t forget to wipe surfaces.

MOM: And don’t leave your drink unattended. Even soda.

MOM: Call me.

Lila stared at the last one until the words blurred a little. She blinked hard and shoved the phone face-down onto her thigh as if that would stop it from existing.

Her dad drove with both hands on the wheel, shoulders tense, jaw doing that thing where it looked like he was chewing invisible gum. He hadn’t said much since they got off the highway and hit the two-lane road lined with dark pines that narrowed the sky.

It was late summer but the forest made the air feel cooler, like it didn’t care what the calendar said.

A wooden sign appeared, weathered but maintained:

WELCOME TO NORTHBRIDGE

HOME OF NORTHBRIDGE UNIVERSITY

PLEASE DRIVE SLOWLY—WILDLIFE CROSSING

Her dad slowed to a crawl like the sign had personally threatened him.

“See?” her mom said from the passenger seat, immediately triumphant. “Wildlife.”

Lila’s mom turned in her seat to look at her like she was delivering evidence in court. “This is what I meant. You have to be careful.”

“Of squirrels?” Lila muttered.

“Of everything.” Her mom reached back and patted Lila’s knee. Not comforting—more like checking the ripeness of fruit. “Do you have your pepper spray?”

“It’s in my bag.”

“Which bag?”

Lila breathed in through her nose. She could feel anxiety clustering behind her ribs like it was building a nest. “The backpack. The black one.”

“And your—”

“Mom,” Lila said, too fast. Then softer, because her dad’s knuckles whitened on the steering wheel. “I’m okay.”

Her mom’s mouth opened, then closed. She looked out the window at the trees. “I know. I just—” She stopped, then tried again, brisk. “I just worry.”

Lila didn’t say the obvious: You worry like it’s a hobby. Like you’ll win a trophy.

Instead she watched the town appear, tucked against the edge of the forest like it was trying not to be noticed. Coffee shops and bookstores and little brick buildings with hanging flower baskets. A diner with a neon sign that said EATS like it was a threat. Students wandered sidewalks in clusters, wearing campus shirts and carrying boxes and pillows and the kind of excitement that made Lila’s stomach twist.

Northbridge University rose beyond the town like it had been planted there on purpose: stone buildings, arched windows, lawns too green to be real, banners flapping from lampposts in the school colors.

At the entrance, volunteers in bright shirts waved cars forward while shouting directions over each other.

“Move-in is straight, unloading is left, parking is right—no, right—ma’am, you can’t stop here—sir, keep moving!”

Her dad rolled his window down. “Where do I—”

“Dorm name?” the volunteer yelled.

Her mom leaned out. “Briar Hall!”

The volunteer pointed so aggressively it looked like a personal vendetta. “Left lane, keep going, hazard lights on, unload fast!”

Lila’s phone buzzed again. She didn’t look. She kept her eyes on the campus ahead, on the towering trees framing the road, on the students laughing like they’d invented college.

Her dad found the left lane and crawled forward. Cars lined the curb. Parents argued with GPS. A mini-fridge went rolling by on a dolly with a freshman chasing it like it was a runaway pet.

“Hazard lights,” her mom reminded.

Her dad clicked them on with the resignation of a man turning on his own funeral music.

They pulled up in front of Briar Hall. The building was old brick with ivy climbing one side and windows that stared back like they were judging everyone’s life choices. A banner hung over the entrance: WELCOME CLASS OF 20—! The last digits were cut off by a fold.

Lila’s stomach did a slow, unpleasant flip.

“This is it,” her mom said, like they were arriving at a remote outpost.

“This is it,” her dad echoed, a little quieter.

Lila opened the car door and immediately got hit with the sounds: shouting, laughing, car doors slamming, wheels on pavement, someone playing music too loudly from a speaker that distorted the bass.

She stepped onto the curb and the world tilted slightly—not physically, but emotionally, like her brain was trying to process the fact that she had actually done it. She was here. She was leaving.

Her mom was already out, digging in the trunk, pointing. “Okay, you take the bedding, I’ll take the toiletries, your father can take the—”

“I can take the heavy stuff,” her dad said quickly, as if lifting boxes would keep him from feeling things.

Lila grabbed her backpack and a duffel. Her phone buzzed inside the backpack pocket. She could feel it like a heartbeat.

A student in a volunteer shirt appeared beside them. “Hi! Welcome! Room number?”

Lila glanced at the paper clipped to her key packet. “Uh. 312.”

“Third floor!” the volunteer chirped. “Elevator is—just kidding, it’s broken. Stairs are that way.”

Lila stared. “It’s… broken?”

The volunteer smiled like that was an adorable personality trait of the building. “It’s historic.”

Lila’s dad made a sound that might have been a laugh if it hadn’t died halfway.

They moved inside, into a lobby that smelled like cleaning products and old carpet. The staircase was narrow and crowded with people hauling boxes like they were participating in an unpaid obstacle course.

Her mom took the lead, because of course she did, and Lila followed, counting steps as a distraction.

At the second-floor landing, someone coming down brushed past, and Lila caught a burst of scent—soap, sweat, something sharp like pine—and then the person was gone, moving too fast to place.

Her skin prickled.

She told herself it was just the heat. Just the crowd. Just the fact that her anxiety was doing its usual performance art.

Third floor.

Her dad stopped outside room 312, shifting the weight of a box. “Okay. This is… your room.”

Lila’s hand tightened on the key. The key felt too small for how big this moment was.

She opened the door.

The room was already half conquered.

One side of the small space was a riot of color: fairy lights draped like a net, posters taped crookedly, a fuzzy throw blanket tossed across a neatly made bed. A mini whiteboard on the wall had been decorated with doodles and a big bubble-lettered message:

WELCOME ROOMIE!!!

Beneath it, a girl stood on a desk chair, reaching up to secure another string of lights. She wore a black tank top and ripped jeans, her hair pulled into a messy bun that made it look like she’d fought it and lost. She held a roll of tape between her teeth like a pirate with a cigar.

She turned at the sound of the door, and her whole face lit up.

“OH MY GOD,” she said, dropping the tape into her palm and hopping down from the chair with the confidence of someone who had never once considered embarrassment as a factor in life. “You’re here! You’re real! Thank God, I was terrified they’d give me, like, a flute major.”

Lila blinked. “What’s wrong with flute majors?”

“They’re always either way too serene or secretly mean,” the girl said, as if this was science. She stuck out her hand. “I’m Harper Lane. Your roommate, your guide, your emotional support animal—”

Lila shook her hand, thrown off by Harper’s warmth like it was a sudden blast of sunlight. “Lila.”

Harper grinned. “Lila. Cute. Solid. Like a girl who can carry her own groceries.”

Lila glanced down at the duffel digging into her shoulder. “I can. Barely.”

Harper’s eyes flicked past her to Lila’s parents, and her grin snapped into polite mode. “Hi! Parents! I’m Harper. I promise I’m not a serial killer.”

Her mom gave Harper a tight smile that said I’m making a note of your face. “Hello, Harper. It’s nice to meet you.”

Harper nodded seriously. “Totally. Love meeting people who created my roommate. Iconic.”

Lila’s dad coughed like he was trying not to laugh.

Her mom immediately started scanning the room for problems like a security system. “Oh. You’ve already decorated.”

Harper clasped her hands. “Yes. Because if I don’t create an environment, I will dissociate.”

Lila set her bag down on her half of the room, which was currently empty except for a bare mattress and a desk that looked like it had survived three wars.

Harper leaned in, voice dropping conspiratorially as Lila’s parents started unpacking boxes. “Okay, first impressions. Your mom has ‘I will call the dean’ energy.”

Lila’s mouth twitched. “That’s accurate.”

“And your dad has ‘I will help you move a couch and then cry in the car’ energy.”

Lila’s mouth twitched again, but this time it felt like something tugged behind her eyes. “Also accurate.”

Harper softened, just a fraction. Then she brightened again like she refused to let sincerity last longer than two seconds. “Great! We’re going to get along. I can already tell because you have deadpan face. That’s my favorite kind of face.”

Lila pulled her phone out, because it was buzzing again and she couldn’t pretend she didn’t feel it. The lock screen was a stack of notifications.

MOM: Are you unpacked?

MOM: Call me.

Lila typed: I’m here. Roommate is nice. Busy unpacking.

Three dots appeared immediately. Her mom was a faster texter than any teenager deserved to be.

Lila shoved the phone into her pocket before the next wave of panic arrived in text form.

Harper’s eyes sparkled. “Okay. While your parents do the thing where they try to control entropy, let me give you the essential Northbridge survival guide.”

Lila raised an eyebrow. “Is this going to involve crime?”

“It might involve emotional crime,” Harper said, and waved a hand around like she was presenting a theme park. “Northbridge University: land of overpriced coffee, haunted dorm plumbing, and professors who think their syllabus is a sacred text.”

Her mom paused mid-fold of a towel. “Haunted?”

Harper smiled innocently. “Metaphorically.”

Lila’s dad leaned toward Lila and murmured, “I like her.”

Lila murmured back, “Of course you do.”

Harper lowered her voice again. “Okay, but actually, the important stuff: the dining hall’s breakfast is edible if you don’t look at it. There’s a coffee shop off campus called Witchlight—don’t go there unless you want to spend eight dollars on foam. The library is where dreams go to die.”

Lila nodded like she was taking notes.

“And,” Harper said, drawing the word out, “the biggest campus lore is… Caleb Raine.”

Lila paused with a stack of t-shirts in her hands. “Who?”

Harper’s expression turned reverent in the way people got about celebrities and disasters. “You don’t know who Caleb Raine is?”

“I’ve been here,” Lila said, glancing at her watch, “forty-five minutes.”

“Fair. Okay.” Harper climbed onto her bed like she was settling in to tell ghost stories. “Caleb Raine is the campus bad boy. Not the fun ‘oops I forgot your birthday’ bad boy. The kind where you hear his name and your organs file for a restraining order.”

Lila snorted despite herself. “Sounds dramatic.”

“It is dramatic,” Harper said. “He’s a junior. Nobody knows his major because he never talks to anyone except like… his little group of scary friends.”

“Scary friends?”

Harper nodded hard. “Like, pretty scary. Pretty in general. Scary specifically.”

Lila tried to picture it. A guy with a reputation. Every campus had one. Usually it was a tall athlete who was mean to girls and drove too fast and thought being rude was charisma.

Harper continued, delighted to be holding the floor. “He’s allegedly had three fights on campus in one semester. One of them was in the student union. Rumor says he put a guy through a door.”

Her mom’s head snapped up. “Through a door?”

Harper’s smile turned angelic again. “Allegedly.”

“That’s—” Lila started, then stopped. She looked at Harper. “People just… say that?”

“They say a lot of things.” Harper shrugged. “But everyone agrees on one thing: don’t piss him off.”

Lila folded a shirt with unnecessary precision. “Okay. So he’s violent. Great.”

Harper leaned forward, eyes bright. “But here’s the weird part. Dogs freak out when he walks past.”

Lila paused again. “What does that mean?”

“Like, bark like they’ve seen the devil,” Harper said. “My cousin is a sophomore and she swears her emotional support corgi tried to bite his ankle.”

Lila stared. “Maybe he just doesn’t like dogs.”

“No,” Harper said, shaking her head like Lila was missing the point. “It’s not like ‘ooh he hates puppies.’ It’s like… animals can tell something’s off.”

Lila’s stomach tightened for no logical reason. She didn’t like that. She didn’t like the way the hairs on her arms lifted like they were responding to a change in temperature.

She forced a laugh. “Or animals can tell he’s a jerk.”

Harper pointed. “That is also possible. And honestly, I respect a dog with standards.”

Lila’s mom pressed her lips together. “If there’s a student who’s violent, the university should—”

“Mom,” Lila said quickly, and Harper’s eyes flashed with amusement. Lila kept her voice light. “It’s probably exaggerated.”

Her mom’s gaze stayed sharp. “You need to be careful.”

“I’m always careful,” Lila lied.

Her dad shoved a box under Lila’s bed like he was trying to do something useful with his feelings. “Is there a campus safety number? We should program it into your phone.”

Lila’s throat tightened. “Dad.”

He looked up, eyes too bright. “Just—so you have it.”

Harper watched, suddenly quieter. Then she cleared her throat and hopped off the bed. “Okay! Enough murder talk. Let’s do something fun. Like… orientation tour. Or stalking the dining hall.”

Lila’s mom looked relieved to have a plan. “Yes, we should see where her classes will be.”

Lila wanted to say I don’t even know my classes yet, but she didn’t have the energy to fight the tide. She tied her hair back, grabbed her key card, and followed her parents and Harper out into the hallway.

The tour group was already gathering outside Briar Hall, led by a cheerful upperclassman with a megaphone and the kind of smile that suggested she didn’t believe in negativity.

“Welcome, new students!” she shouted. “I’m Maddy, your orientation leader. If you get lost, follow the sound of my voice or the smell of fear!”

Harper leaned into Lila’s ear. “That’s you. You smell like fear.”

“I smell like deodorant,” Lila whispered back.

“Fear deodorant.”

They joined the cluster of freshmen. Parents hovered like anxious satellites, taking pictures of everything: the dorm sign, the brick wall, the ground. Someone was filming their kid walking in a straight line like it was historic footage.

The tour started across the quad. Northbridge’s main lawn was expansive and manicured, with stone paths cutting through like veins. Students lounged on blankets, tossing frisbees, pretending not to be stressed.

Maddy yelled fun facts. “On your left is Whitaker Hall, built in 1893, and rumored to be haunted by the ghost of a professor who never returned his books!”

Harper clapped sarcastically. “We love an academic villain.”

Lila tried to focus on the physical details—the way the sun hit the stone, the sound of sneakers on the path, the smell of cut grass—because if she let her mind wander, it would sprint straight into panic.

They passed the student union, where a fountain splashed quietly. Maddy pointed. “This is where most student organizations meet! And yes, sometimes campus security has to break up arguments about club budgets.”

A guy behind them muttered to his friend, “Not the only arguments. Remember the Caleb thing last year?”

Lila’s head turned before she could stop it, like her curiosity had teeth.

Harper’s eyes widened. She mouthed: Caleb.

The guy’s friend snorted. “Bro, don’t say his name like you’re summoning him.”

Another girl chimed in, half-laughing, half-serious. “Seriously, don’t. He’ll hear you.”

Lila leaned toward Harper, whispering, “Do people think he’s Voldemort?”

Harper whispered back, thrilled, “Basically. Hot Voldemort.”

They moved past the science building. A trio of students crossed the path ahead of them, laughing loudly, and a small dog on a leash trotted beside them—some kind of golden doodle, tail wagging.

The dog abruptly stopped.

Its ears flattened. Its head snapped toward the far side of the quad. It let out a sharp bark that startled everyone nearby.

“Oh my god,” the dog’s owner laughed nervously, tugging the leash. “Buddy, what—”

The dog barked again, more frantic, pulling backward like it wanted to get away from something. Its nails scraped against the stone path. The owner crouched, trying to soothe it. “Hey, hey—what’s wrong?”

Lila felt her skin prickle.

She hadn’t seen anything yet, but the reaction spread through the crowd in subtle ripples—people turning, glancing, heads angling toward the same invisible point like sunflowers following light.

Harper’s grip tightened around Lila’s forearm. Not enough to hurt. Enough to say look.

Lila’s gaze tracked across the quad.

And there he was.

He stood near the shadow of a tall oak, half a step away from the path like he didn’t need to belong to the flow of people. Taller than most of the students around him. Broad shoulders under a dark hoodie despite the warm day. His hair was dark, slightly messy, like he’d run his hands through it too many times out of frustration.

His face wasn’t pretty in the polished, poster-boy way.

It was… striking. Hard lines. A faint scar cutting through one eyebrow. Another thinner scar near his jaw, pale against tan skin. He looked like someone who’d been in fights and didn’t consider that unusual.

He wasn’t smiling.

Not even a little.

His posture radiated a tense stillness, like a held breath. Like a person one small shove away from snapping.

And then he looked up.

His eyes locked on Lila with unsettling precision—as if he’d been aware of her before she ever looked at him.

For a moment the world narrowed to the space between them.

Lila’s lungs forgot their job.

The dog barked again, high and panicked, straining so hard its harness shifted. The owner cursed under his breath and hauled the dog closer.

Around Lila, someone whispered, “That’s him.”

Someone else muttered, “Told you dogs hate him.”

Harper’s voice was right at Lila’s ear, barely audible. “Caleb Raine.”

Caleb didn’t react to the whispers. He didn’t react to the dog losing its mind.

He just stared at Lila like he was trying to solve a problem that had suddenly appeared in his life.

Lila forced herself to breathe. One breath. Two.

She lifted her chin, mostly because her body refused to do anything else that would look like fear. Her pulse pounded in her throat like a warning.

His gaze dropped—briefly—to her mouth, then back to her eyes.

Lila’s stomach flipped again, and this time it had nothing to do with anxiety about college.

What is wrong with me? she thought, but the thought didn’t settle, because his expression shifted—just slightly—into something darker. Something like irritation. Or surprise. Or both.

He took one step backward, deeper into the shade.

The dog barked like it was trying to rip reality in half.

Caleb’s eyes held Lila’s for one more second—long enough that it felt deliberate, like a mark pressed into memory—then he turned and walked away, cutting across the grass toward the far edge of campus where the trees thickened and the forest began.

He didn’t look back.

Lila realized her hands were clenched into fists at her sides.

Harper’s fingers loosened on her arm. “So,” Harper whispered, voice shaky with excitement. “Not a myth.”

Lila swallowed. Her mouth was dry. “No,” she managed, because the word was all she had.

Maddy’s voice blared through the megaphone again, cheerful and oblivious. “And over here is the campus health center—remember, mental health is health!”

Lila barely heard her.

She watched the spot where Caleb had disappeared, the tree line swallowing him like it had been waiting.

And somewhere deep in her chest, beneath the layered panic and the newness of everything, a small, sharp curiosity flickered—bright enough to be dangerous.

She turned back to the tour before anyone could read it on her face.