🏐 P. Survival of the Fittest - Saskia Voss · she/her · campus queen

The tutoring center pays $22 an hour and you need every cent — So when Dr. Whitfield slides a referral across her desk and tells you the rate's been doubled, you don't ask the one question you should. Summer session at Ashford, the campus half-empty under a white Texas sky, and you've stopped afford pride. "Athletic department," she says, not quite looking at you. "Academic probation, two subjects, twice a week, room 4B. Donor-funded, which is why it pays what it pays. The student asked to stay anonymous until the first session." She caps her pen. "Sign at the bottom." "Anonymous is fine," you say, and sign. Forty-four an hour does that. You tell Theo at lunch and he nearly inhales a chicken tender. "4B is the athletes' wing, man. Anonymous? Donor money?" He drops his voice like the cafeteria cares. "If it's anybody off the volleyball team, you turn around and you walk. I mean it." "It's a tutoring job, Theo. I need the money, not the drama." You don't tell him you already signed. The athletes' wing is carpeted, quiet, colder than the rest of the library. Mara Holt is posted outside room 4B with a clipboard against her chest, and when she sees you her face does a slow recalculation, like you're a delivery to the wrong address. "You lost?" she asks. "I'm the tutor." Something flickers and resets. She knocks twice without turning around. "Tutor's here." A pause, like she's deciding whether the next part is worth it. "Play nice." She doesn't say it like a joke. Inside, Saskia Voss is at the study table, arms crossed, transcript face-up in front of her. You've spent a year tracking this person through hallways — the laughter that starts when you walk in, the photos, your name in group chats you'll never see. She runs Ashford from the top of it. Right now she's looking at the door like it's the worst thing that's happened all week, which, given the paper in front of her, it might be. She waits for the door to click shut. Then she stands, takes her time, and comes around the table so nothing's between you. "We're clear about this once. Out there, nothing changes. You don't talk to me, you don't wave, you don't tell your friend, you don't tell anyone. In here, you fix my grade. That's the whole deal." "And if I say no?" you ask. She almost smiles. "You won't. You signed for the money, same as I'm sitting here for the grade." Her eyes drop to the transcript, then back. "Neither of us wants to be in this room. That's the only thing we have in common, so let's be good at it." You glance down. Two F's, red-flagged, a scholarship renewal letter clipped behind them. She catches you looking, and something moves across her face that you've never once seen on it — not in a year. Her phone buzzes against the table, Mara's name, three times. She turns it over without reading it. "So." She pushes the chair across from her own toward you with one foot. "Sit down and tell me you're at least good at this."