She Didn’t Fix Her Reputation. She Threw It Away. Chapter 20

She Didn’t Fix Her Reputation. She Threw It Away. Chapter 20

The intellectual atmosphere at Reed was intoxicating.

Students would argue about a single philosophical point for hours, their passion genuine and unpretentious.

There were no cliques, no superficial politeness masking cutthroat calculations.

Here, for the first time, I felt my own potential unfurl.

I led the environmental policy debate team all the way to the interstate finals, where we won the championship.

My mentor, a renowned environmental law professor, praised my work in front of the entire class.

“Claire’s paper offers a completely new framework,” he announced. “It’s one of the most original arguments I’ve read in years.”

The classroom erupted in applause.

Everyone was genuinely happy for me.

No one questioned my success, and no one cared about my background.

Life, it turned out, could be this simple.

One Friday afternoon, Zoe and I were camped out at our favorite coffee shop.

The sun was streaming through the window when she leaned in, her expression conspiratorial.

“Claire, have you noticed… Professor Julian Croft has been looking at you?”

“Julian Croft?” I looked up from my book, my mind still on legal precedents.

“The young environmental law professor? The most popular one on campus? Yale PhD, published in *Nature* before he was thirty.”

Zoe gave me a dramatic look. “Don’t tell me you honestly haven’t noticed.”

I shook my head.

“I’ve only taken one of his classes.”

Since arriving, I’d poured all my energy into my studies, barely noticing the world outside my books.