Coriolanus flexed his fingers around the stress ball.

It wasn't his, it was Sejanus'.

All students had been given it last term during a 'safety talk' as Coriolanus called them. Some long, drawn-out presentation about something boring and stupid. The last time it had been about mental health, and everyone had gotten a stress ball with their school's logo and the emergency after-hours number, just in case.

Coriolanus had immediately thrown his away.

He regretted it.

Though he wasn't ever stressed , it was a good way for his mind to think by giving his fingers something to focus on. He'd pretty quickly taken Sejanus' and pretended it was always his.

So far, Sejanus hadn't called him out on it.

He liked to think it was because he was a better liar compared to the situation being that Sejanjus just didn't care if he took it.

It squeezed between his fingers, going from palm to palm, heated by the movement.

His mind was an impossible tangle.

He pressed his feet against the back of his bed, lounging on his pillows, staring up at the ceiling above him.

He'd tried to write his thoughts down in his journal, which he wrote in for posterity, sure that one day when he was President of the United States, someone would want to know his schoolboy thoughts…how he became who he was, in a sense. But he'd done a cardinal sin in his page; torn out a page. He couldn't pen a coherent thought down and despite trying five times nothing seemed good enough.

That page was now ripped in his waste bin.

So he here was, trying to make sense of his night, to little success.

Whenever he thought he was making heads or tails of it, Lucy Gray would weave into his thoughts and shake them like someone dumping coins from their pockets. She was in his every thought, poking around uninvited, making snide comments about the way he mentally filed his memories.

The squeal of Sejanus' desk chair poked through his subconscious. He turned to see Sejanus eye level with him, looking at him with a narrowed gaze and a thoughtful tilt of his head.

"What?" Coriolanus asked, swinging his legs off the bed and raising his shoulders up, to get an inch of space above his eye-line.

"What happened tonight?"

"What do you mean?" Coriolanus blustered, huffing.

"I saw you rip a page from your diary-,"

"Journal," Coriolanus corrected with a hiss.

"Whatever. Your journal," Sejanus rolled his eyes, snorting, "You always write like you're composing your magnum opus; no mistakes."

Coriolanus shuddered to be so easily read by Sejanus. Lucy Gray really was bothering him tonight.

"You're somewhere in your mind. What happened?" Sejanus pressed.

"I just am discombobulated from eating bar food," Coriolanus lied, "It doesn't sit right with me."

Sejanus leaned back on his chair, giving Coriolanus a stupid smile. One he wanted to slap right off his face.

"I think you met someone," He said, fingers lacing behind his head, "Yep, sure of it, actually. Girl, boy, doesn't matter."

"You couldn't be more wrong," Coriolanus said flatly. But curiosity tugged, "Why do you think that?"

Sejanus wheeled away, infuriating, "Oh…" He scooted himself back to his own desk, "Reasons."

Coriolanus watched him with unmitigated fury. How dare he insinuate such things (even if they were the truth)?

"You're annoying, you know that?" Coriolanus bit out, with more anger than he'd usually give Sejanus, but he was just so infuriating!

"I know!" Sejanus replied cheekily, as though this was all just a game to him, "But I'm so right. I have an eidetic memory, did you know-"

Coriolanus didn't. He didn't give a shit about Sejanus.

"So you bet I'll spend all my time combing through everyone there to figure it out."

Coriolanus inhaled hard three times, trying to ease his fast-beating heart.

"Whatever," He muttered, rolling over on his side. Sejanus was bluffing, "Why do you even care?" He bit out.

"Because it has you hot and bothered and that's hilarious to me."

"I am not," Coriolanus spun around, eyes burning.

"You're grouching. Sulking even; Snows don't sulk. Who rejected the great Coriolanus Snow?"

"No one rejected me."

In fact, she was screaming my name.

"Sure they didn't."

"Do whatever you want, I don't care," Coriolanus finally relented, turning off the lights and crawling under the covers.

He quieted his mind with a final thought; if he absolutely couldn't get Lucy Gray out of his head, he was 100% sure that he must be invading her mind some way worse. It was impossible for him to imagine that she could go home and merely forget what had happened and it wasn't haunting her the same way it did him.

She'd seek him out; he was absolutely sure of it.

XXX

The day after, Sunday, Coriolanus chalked it up that she must be busy or sleeping off a mild hangover, or practicing with the band on the little free time she had.

On Monday, he told himself that she must be busy with school. It was hard for him to imagine that The Districts had much to offer in terms of academic difficulty, but he was giving her the benefit of the doubt.

By Tuesday, he was starting to get ticked off.

His social media pages weren't hard to find. Unlike some of his classmates who didn't care what potentially blackmail-ready photos they were tagged in, Coriolanus curated all his socials to be a perfect reflection of his persona. Something friendly, but daunting. Wealthy, but not flaunting. One could argue there was a creativity-driven storyline to his posts, and maybe Coriolanus wouldn't disagree. He knew how to give his followers just a whiff of his riches and legacy, even if he had not much to show about it. But he'd make it look like he sure as shit did.

Money screamed, wealth whispered.

He thought about that quote often as he put an expensive watch just out of view, rotated an expensive bottle to be visible behind him, or dropped a $100 bill carelessly on the ground like it was no better than a penny.

He wanted to give the illusion he didn't think much of his photos, that this was just how Coriolanus Snow lived his day-to-day life when the reality was he thought of it very much so.

He also was only active on a few select social media sites. To be too present was garish to him. He shuddered every time someone asked him to watch a TikTok or retweet their insipid thoughts on Twitter. No, Coriolanus stayed on just Facebook (mostly for his mother's sake, and college acceptance boards) and Instagram.

If he could have it his way, he wouldn't be on any of them.

Stupid, mind-numbing, idiot machines…that's what social media was.

He'd never admit it to anyone, but he did have a shell account for Reddit when the mood struck him to add a comment. But he never posted anything to link back to himself and would burn that handle in a moment if he thought it necessary.

But to be seen as normal was to have a stupid Instagram. If he couldn't compete with his friends with their wealth, at least he could with follower count and quality of mutuals. If he could hoard people with verified accounts that found it worth it to follow him…well, hate it as he might, he knew what the world's current currency was.

Still, he should be easy to find on Instagram, if Lucy Gray was to seek him out.

There were not any more Coriolanus Snows…he checked. Frequently. And, even if she wasn't sure how to spell his name (it wasn't easy, he could agree on that much), Festus Creed wasn't exactly a head-scratcher and anyone with enough determination could find him through any of his mindless idiots of friends.

So why hadn't she?

Why wasn't a follow request sitting in his inbox, with a pending message chat of Lucy Gray begging for a second round?

Maybe she doesn't have an Instagram?

It seemed crazy, but it was a more reasonable train of thought than the idea that she didn't take the time to find him.

It wasn't wild to think she didn't have a Facebook. Unless you were born in the 90s, you really only got one at the behest of a family…

…And if he recalled, she didn't have much family to speak of.

So, sure, that one he could buy.

But no Instagram?

On Wednesday, his curiosity won out and he searched for her, just to prove his own theory.

To his own frustration, she had one.

A very recently used one, at that. Not one that lay dormant for months on end, which could also be an acceptable reason for this delay.

All morning, he stared in confusion at the search bar, categorically unwilling to click on it and take the first dive.

Coriolanus Snow wasn't the chaser, he was chased by women!

His curiosity wore down as the day dwindled.

He blamed it on boredom. Academy classes were so dull he was driven to look at it. If he wasn't ever properly challenged, what did they expect him to do? Read ahead?

Hah! Coriolanus was already three chapters ahead of everyone.

So, slumped in the back of the classroom, ready to give a condescending and correct answer if any teacher called him out on not paying attention, Coriolanus hid his phone behind a book.

But they wouldn't imagine him to be partaking in such pedestrian things. Coriolanus never did anything wrong; they could excuse a momentarily teenage slip-up for just today.

Furtively, he put an AirPod into his left ear, brushing his curly hair in front of it to hide it.

Professor Demigloss was just starting to discuss the Revolutionary War, something Coriolanus excelled at and could probably lap any of his classmates when it came to testing. Something he could easily pull his focus back to if Demigloss decided to be dickish and call on him.

Lucy Gray's Instagram was a bombardment of the rainbow. Her posts were so…colorful, so saturated.

It made him want to barf.

His own was motley beige, with carefully curated splashes of red or dark, dusky blues. Respectable colors, muted, and exactly the right amount of focus given.

Lucy Gray had no such art when it came to hers.

Everything was unfiltered- uncollected and generally disorganized.

But he couldn't stop swiping through it; the most recent one was a selfie of herself on the stage of that stupid bar with her band.

Another great set with the Covey! Catch us next week; same place, same time.

Coriolanus seethed.

Nothing to hint at what had happened? No clever bylines or teasing entices to hint at a meeting with a tall, handsome stranger? It was as though he had just been a routine part of her night.

Angrily, Coriolanus continued his scrolling.

The rest of her posts were mostly about her music. They were so loud he had to frantically click his phone levels down when he tapped on the first reel, the sounds of her guitar blasting through his headphones.

In front of him, Florus turned, giving a strange look at Coriolanus. He saw the phone hidden behind his book and grinned like he'd just stumbled upon a bucket of gold.

Coriolanus glared until he turned back around.

It was just as mesmerizing to hear her voice the second time around. Something about the rawness of her performances here, mostly done in a small, cramped bedroom without a fancy microphone or the backing of her band, was even more inviting to Coriolanus. He drank in one song after another, clicking through, like she was a siren pulling him closer and closer and closer-

The bell rang for the end of class. Coriolanus nearly jumped out of his skin, clicking his phone closed and shoving it in the bottom of his bag.

Just as he was nearly out the door-

"Oh, Mr. Snow?"

Coriolanus forced a smile, turning to his professor.

"Yes, Professor Demigloss?" He asked in the nicest tone he could muster.

"I know what you were doing in the back of the class. You have a stellar record, and everyone deserves an 'off day', but I won't stand for it tomorrow."

Coriolanus felt the color drain out of his face.

He swallowed hard, "I don't know what you're talking about, sir?"

He couldn't admit what he'd done. Besides, any other teacher who heard that Coriolanus Snow was goofing off on his phone would think that their fellow teacher misunderstood.

Demigloss gave a mild chuckle and a half-smile, arranging papers at his desk.

"Of course, Snow," He agreed good-naturedly, as though Coriolanus was a child insisting he didn't take a cookie out of the jar despite crumbs on the edges of his lips, "Well, go on. You don't want to be late for gym."

But it didn't matter. In gym, Coriolanus faked a sprain. He liked being fit and competent in all manners so didn't have reason to skip out of his classes often, but he needed to do more research.

Sickle gave him an amused once-over before nodding toward the infirmary where Coriolanus went and gave a performance of a lifetime. The nurse gave him an ice pack and sent him to sit in one of the back rooms, where Coriolanus spent the next hour deep-diving into everything and anything about Lucy Gray.

By the time classes rang, signaling the end of the day, Coriolanus was no closer to untangling the enigma that was the girl he'd met, or closer to understanding why she wouldn't reach out to him. Not even a cursory 'hey, thanks for a great time'.

He skipped dinner, pulled deep into the mystery.

He went to the library. Not many kids spent time here, so it was perfect if you didn't want to be found. In this day and age, any research that could be done was simply done on computers, so the necessity for old, historical buildings wasn't like it was when his father was in school, but it was kept on campus for the long-standing significance.

Coriolanus settled himself into his study desk, the farthest place you could squirrel yourself, put his legs up, and continued scrolling.

There were hundreds of posts. She posted nearly every day, giving Coriolanus quite the library to explore. And she had more than that; YouTube, Tiktok, Tumblr for god sake! Coriolanus could swim in the social footprint that was Lucy Gray Baird for 100 years.

Someone should tell her to be more careful about that.

"Hey, stranger."

Coriolanus nearly dropped his phone at the unexpected greeting.

He snapped his head up to see Sejanus.

"What are you doing here?" He hissed, setting his phone face-down so there was no chance Sejanus could see what he was up to. To be caught gawking at her social media…well, he'd tell the entire school! The rumor that Coriolanus Snow was a lovesick fool would be in everyone's ears by tomorrow morning! And with a District student no less…

"You skipped dinner. After your terrible strain," Sejanus was grinning openly, "I wanted to make sure you hadn't fallen down a staircase and died."

"Clearly I'm alive," Coriolanus said, trying to get him to leave, but he lingered.

"Brought you a dinner roll," Sejanus said, fishing a napkin from his backpack.

"There's no food in the library," Coriolanus said, but his stomach growled at the smell of it.

"Then come back to the mess hall with me. My dad did the chef a big favor a couple of years back; he's always willing to make me a midnight snack. I'm sure he could whip something up for you."

Coriolanus swallowed back his hunger, "I'm fine."

He didn't need handouts.

Sejanus slid into the study alcove next to him, "C'mon, take the roll, Coryo," He said in a babyish voice, moving it through the air like a plane.

Coriolanus, just to get him to stop, snatched it out of the air.

He was too good to eat it in the library and ruin the 150-year-old wood floor or ancient books.

He left with Sejanus into the darkened night, angrily tearing off a piece of the dinner roll.

"It's a bit hard," He said snidely.

"Well, yeah, it's like two hours old."

Coriolanus rolled his eyes and gnawed on it with as much disdain as he could muster, flicking open his phone. He walked two steps behind Sejanus so he couldn't see. Just as he was about to x-out of Lucy Gray's page, his eyes caught on the little gray widget at the top of the bar.

Following.

In his surprise at Sejanus' appearance, he'd accidentally clicked the 'follow' button.

He choked on his dinner roll.

"Slow down, sport!" Sejanus laughed, "We'll get food in a second."

But Coriolanus didn't hear him.

Ultimate shame and horror flooded his entire body.

He knew social faux pas. And he knew that this was just about the worst ever, only second to maybe accidentally liking a post from her feed from five years ago.

Frantically, he unfollowed her, praying that his near miss would get lost in a sea of notifications.

She seemed to be followed by enough, right? To have a near-constant stream of likes and comments that his little mistake would just be washed away to sea.

He felt numb as Sejanus led him to the dinner hall. He was in such a state of mortification that he let Sejanus sweet-talk the chef into making Coriolanus a home-made dish of pan baked mac and cheese, and he ate it without complaint.

If Sejanus noted the change, he was kind enough to not comment.

He was a better person than Coriolanus was, and he knew he was fucked because he was even thinking such things.

Coriolanus didn't remember much else from that night. The last thing he did recall, however, was locking his phone in his desk, sure that Lucy Gray Baird would be now surely waiting in his inbox with a totally untrue statement about how much he wanted her, and honestly, he'd been wanting to do an electronic cleanse anyway.

XXX

He didn't think about his phone all of Thursday.

Well, not true.

He thought a lot about all the comments Lucy Gray could be making on his Instagram as they spoke, like announcing the the whole world that they slept together. She could be mocking him. A laughing stock.

The only reason he was semi-sure that wasn't happening was because none of his classmates had said anything, and it wasn't like them to not jump on juicy gossip. Livia, in particular, snubbed, would have been feral to take him down.

Still.

Even a 'Hey, was that a mistake?' would be enough to send him into a spiral, and god, he just had too much on his plate to worry about something so dumb as high school romance!

It wasn't even romance, it was a stupid one-night stand.

He didn't really think of it on Friday either, not until Friday lunch.

"Coriolanus," Sejanus said, setting his lunch tray down, "Tigris wants to know if you're dead."

"Why the hell is she asking you?" Coriolanus scrunched his nose.

"Because you haven't answered any of her calls in two days."

"You didn't answer my question. Why is she asking you ?"

Sejanus didn't seem bothered by his prickly tone, "We exchanged numbers last year," He said, licking his soup spoon, "In case of emergency."

"What?" Coriolanus wanted to explode out, "Are you joking?"

"Chill, chill, man," Sejanus looked at him weirdly, "You have my parents' numbers in your phone in case something goes wrong."

Yeah, because you forcibly put them in there.

"Clearly, I'm fine."

"Okay," Sejanus snorted, "Can ya call her back, then?"

That would mean taking his phone out of his desk and that was not an option.

"Tell him I'm okay."

"Dude, just call your cousin," Sejanus poked him with the end of his fork, softly, "I'm not your messenger."

At least he didn't want to spend undue time texting Tigris.

Small miracle.

Coriolanus was stubborn, though.

So, after lunch, he hiked himself all the way to the Old Hall, a building that was basically left in the 80s when it was built. Not needed for the current students, so left as an outhouse for kids to smoke and cause all sorts of trouble. Coriolanus didn't have any reason to frequent here…but he knew there was a payphone still on the grounds.

He fished out some quarters, rang Tigris' number, and came to a voicemail.

"Dammit, Tigris, it's me. When this number comes up again, pick up the phone!" He growled and waited three minutes, and rang again.

"Whose phone are you calling from?" Tigris asked, foregoing a greeting.

"A payphone-,"

"What? Why?"

"It doesn't matter," Coriolanus waved away her question, "Ta-da, I'm alive."

"Yeah, Sejanus told me."

Coriolanus curled the cord around his finger, "I can't believe you have his number."

"He thought it was a good idea to exchange them, and he was right. God, Coriolanus, I thought you…you…I don't know!" They didn't say it, but kids burned out of The Academy often, usually in violent and self-destructive ways.

"I'm better than that," He said, offended that she would think him so weak of will.

"Okay," She gave a long sigh, "Are you going home this weekend?" She asked, and Coriolanus could hear the wince behind her voice.

"Yeah," He shrugged. Better than hanging out with Sejanus here, "I'll see you?"

"Well…."

"C'mon, you make it bearable!" Coriolanus whined, "It's your own father's party, Tig."

"Do you think I want to watch Dad get drunk and hit on every waitress? Really, hard pass, Coryo." Tigris winced, "Come to New York with me. I'll take you around!"

She was desperate.

"Uncle Bacchus will be furious if you skip," Coriolanus said, knowing how much his father and uncle put into the idea of 'family', even if it was often misguided.

"I don't care, honestly," Tigris said shortly, "He's not paying a dime of my school. He would have disowned me if he could to begin with, but I got the scholarship."

"Don't make this harder than it has to be," Coriolanus begged. Without Tigris there, his uncle would ask Coriolanus all weekend why she was gone, as though Coriolanus was her keeper. Somehow, because he was the only male descendant, it was his responsibility to keep his wild cousin in line. And one day to keep his sister quiet and submissive too, if need be. 'Not to make a mockery of the Snow name', his Uncle Bacchus would say.

You mean, not like you both already did?

So he was the 'Tiger Wrangler', as Tigris said jokingly- like it was funny (it wasn't). And, like he was ever able to make her do something she didn't want.

"Tigris, if you're not there, I swear to god…" He exhaled in frustration.

"Sorry, Coryo," Tigris said apologetically, "You know, just with my classes and my job and-,"

"I met someone," He blurted.

The silence of the phone booth felt like a thousand anvils on his shoulders.

Fuck; why the hell did you say that?

The line was static for a second.

"Wh…aaat?" Tigris echoed, and he could just imagine her, eyes wide and excited.

"But you'll have to come home to hear about it," The words fell out of his mouth, a wickedly smart tactic zapping through him faster than his brain could think. He winced, knowing that this was possibly the only thing he could do to coax her back for the party.

"Oh, oh! That's all you had to say!" Tigris was overeager. It was cringe-worthy. But if anyone had to know, well, Tigris was the best.

Tigris felt safe to 'tell'. She didn't talk to any Academy kids anymore and her only allegiance was to her younger cousins. Plus, she always had good advice, so…

"It's nothing," He mumbled, and not even true. Well, not true in the way she was taking it. He'd met Lucy Gray, that was surely the truth. But he wasn't…they weren't…it wasn't romantic, not like Tigris hoped.

Oh well, a little white lie to get her home - get Uncle Baccus off his back - was well worth it.

"Coryo, I knew this day would come. I can't wait to find out who got through to you," She said, voice all dreamy and romantic.

He winced at her words.

"She must be something special."

"Yeah…" Coriolanus couldn't even muster a lie, mystified at his own admission, "I guess she is."