Wednesday morning, I wake up at 5 AM in Caleb's bed, but for once it's not anxiety driving me awake—it's determination. The packet from Mrs. Harrison sits on his desk like a challenge, and I've already completed a third of it, my handwriting getting progressively messier as the problems get harder.
I slide out carefully, not wanting to wake him. He looks younger when he sleeps, all his edges softened. I grab one of his hoodies and set up at his disaster of a kitchen table, clearing away empty beer cans and unopened mail to make space for my work.
By the time Hanna gets home from her night shift at 6:30, I'm deep in derivatives, hair in a messy bun held up with a pencil, surrounded by eraser shavings and covered in graphite smudges.
"You're up early," she observes, dropping her keys with exhausted precision.
"Trying to fix my grades. I have a week to prove I deserve a second chance."
Hanna pours two coffees, sets one by my elbow. "What happens if you can't fix them?"
"Then I don't graduate with my class. Don't go to college. Prove my father right that I'm throwing my life away." My voice cracks on the last part.
Hanna sits across from me, still in her bus driver uniform that smells like diesel and tired mornings. "You know what I did when I was nineteen? Got pregnant with Caleb. His dad promised he'd marry me, take care of us. Instead, he robbed a liquor store and went to prison."
She sips her coffee black, no sugar to soften anything. "Everyone said my life was over. Teen mom, no education, convicted felon's girlfriend. You know what I did?"
"What?"
"Got my GED. Learned to drive a bus. Raised my kid alone. It wasn't the life I planned, but it was mine." She stands, bones cracking. "Don't fix your grades for your father or even for college. Fix them because you want to prove to yourself you can. That's the only reason that matters."
At school, I approach each teacher like I'm preparing for battle, armed with humility and desperation.
Mr. Peterson in Chemistry: "I'll do every lab I missed. Stay after school. Clean equipment. Reorganize your entire supply closet."
He looks at me over his glasses. "That's six labs, Miss Harper."
"I know. I'll do them perfectly."
He agrees to let me make up two exams.
Mrs. Coleman in AP Literature: "I'll rewrite every essay. Do an extra research paper on any topic you choose."
She purses her lips. "Your paper on Gatsby was particularly disappointing."
"I know. I was writing what I thought you wanted to hear instead of what I actually thought."
She gives me a chance at partial credit.
Mr. Rodriguez in Spanish: "I'll tutor beginning students. Create study guides for the whole class. Record pronunciation guides."
He's impressed enough to offer a full makeup exam.
By lunch, I'm exhausted but nowhere near done. I find Mia in the library, in our old spot by the windows. She looks up from her perfectly organized notes, expression guarded.
"What do you want?"
"To apologize. And to ask for help." I sit down uninvited, my bag hitting the floor with a thud. "I lied to you. I chose a boy over our friendship. I became someone neither of us recognizes. I'm sorry."
Mia's quiet for so long I count my heartbeats. Twenty-seven.
"You scared me, Evie. That video, the failing grades, choosing him over everything—"
"I know. I scared myself too." I pull out my calculus packet, pages already soft from handling. "I'm trying to fix things. Not going back to who I was, but becoming who I'm supposed to be. And I need help with these integrals. You're still the only person who explains them in a way that makes sense."
Mia looks at the packet, at my desperate notes in the margins, the places where I've erased so many times I've worn through the paper.
"You're really trying?"
"Really trying. Not for my dad or Yale. For me."
She pulls the packet closer. "Your approach to problem seventeen is all wrong. You're overthinking it."
For the next hour, we work together. It's almost like before except it's not, because I don't panic when I get one wrong, and Mia doesn't pretend everything's perfect between us. It's honest, messy, real.
"I'm proud of you," she says quietly as we pack up. "For choosing yourself finally."
After school, I literally run between classrooms.
Mrs. Harrison's room: practice problems on the board until my hand cramps and chalk dust coats my lungs.
Mr. Peterson's lab: redoing failed experiments, getting the right results this time, understanding why heat makes reactions faster instead of just memorizing it.
Mrs. Coleman's classroom: rewriting my essay on The Scarlet Letter with a new understanding of what it means to wear your shame publicly, to transform it into something else.
By 7 PM, I'm stumbling with exhaustion when Caleb finds me in the empty chemistry lab, still trying to balance equations.
"Hanna said you left at 6 this morning. Have you eaten?"
"I had coffee. And I think a granola bar?" I can't actually remember.
He pulls me up from the lab stool. "Come on. You're done for today."
"But I still have—"
"Evie." His voice is firm but gentle. "You can't fix everything in three days. You'll burn out."
He drives me to a diner that serves breakfast all day, makes me eat actual food while I explain each teacher's requirements, drawing diagrams on napkins.
"That's insane," he says. "They're basically making you do a whole semester's work in a week."
"It's what I deserve. I threw it all away."
"No, you chose something different. That's not the same as throwing it away." He reaches across the sticky table, takes my hand. "I'm proud of you, you know. Not for the grades, but for fighting for what you want instead of what someone else decided for you."
Thursday morning continues the same pattern. Wake at 5, work until school, beg teachers for chances, study with Mia, stay until the janitors kick me out. But something's different—other students notice. Not mockingly, but with something like respect.
"Heard you're basically living in Peterson's lab," Connor says. "That's hardcore."
Even Stacy seems impressed. "You're really doing all this while living with Caleb? How do you concentrate with him around?" There's only a little venom in it.
Thursday afternoon, I hand Mrs. Harrison the completed packet. Every problem worked, most of them twice to be sure. The pages are soft as fabric from erasing and reworking.
Mrs. Harrison flips through slowly, checking my work with a red pen that doesn't mark anything.
"This is comprehensive work, Miss Harper. You've shown real understanding, not just memorization."
"Does this mean I can retake the test?"
"Monday morning, 7 AM. Don't be late."
I almost cry with relief right there in front of everyone.
That afternoon, I'm in the library making flash cards when I remember—Caleb's game is tomorrow. The one Marcus invited me to. My first time being a girlfriend at a sporting event, cheering for my boyfriend. The normalcy of it feels surreal.
The intercom crackles: "Evelyn Harper to the main office."
My stomach drops. Has my father come? Called the school? Threatened legal action?
But when I get there, it's Mrs. Patterson, the guidance counselor, and she's actually smiling.
"I've been talking to your teachers," she says. "They're all impressed with your effort this week. Mrs. Harrison says you've basically retaught yourself calculus. Mr. Peterson called your makeup lab work 'inspired.'"
She leans forward. "Yale might be gone, Evie, but there are other schools. State universities with strong programs. Community colleges that transfer to four-year schools. This isn't over unless you let it be."
Walking back to the library, I realize I feel lighter than I have in years. Not because I'm fixing my grades, but because I'm choosing to fix them. Not for anyone else's dream, but for whatever my own might turn out to be.
I text Caleb: Pick me up at 4? Want to actually get ready for your game tomorrow.
His response is immediate: Already planning to drag you out. You need rest.
Then another: Proud of you, tutor.
I smile at my phone like an idiot. Maybe I can have both—the grades and the boy. Maybe that was always allowed.
I just had to stop asking permission.