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Controlled Variables

Nora

I’m not the kind of girl who gets flustered.

Not by midterms. Not by my advisor’s sudden obsession with oxytocin data models. And definitely not by dumb-hot hockey players who can’t keep their grades up.

Except Dean Carter isn’t dumb.

Or loud. Or late.

He’s early—already in the tutoring center, long legs stretched out under the table, flipping through a battered biomechanics textbook with that same silent focus that’s made me look twice in every shared class since sophomore year.

I clear my throat as I step inside. “You’re early.”

Dean looks up slowly. “You’re surprised.”

“A little,” I admit, dropping my bag in the chair across from him. “Most guys in your position show up late and pretend they forgot.”

“I don’t pretend,” he says, then adds with a shrug, “Not about this, anyway.”

I work on tugging my notebook from my bag. It takes more effort than it should.

“Plus.” His mouth quirks. Barely. “Academic probation will do that to a guy.”

I sit down across from him, my laptop thunking softly onto the table. “You’re not on probation. Just flagged. Big difference.”

“I stand corrected.” He holds my gaze.

I open my laptop and pretend to concentrate on the tutoring dashboard.

Dean’s only here because he missed too many biomechanics deadlines and the athletic academic support office flagged him. My advisor thought pairing him with someone who had “zero tolerance for bullshit” would scare him straight. Lucky me.

“You and Daphne still good?” I ask.

His brow lifts slightly. “You always start a tutoring session with personal questions?”

I clear my throat, sharper than I mean to, as if I can cough the words back down. “You’re dating one of my closest friends. I think I’m allowed a temperature check.”

“Right.” He leans back in the chair, the corners of his mouth turning down slightly. “Yeah. We’re fine.”

The same way a house is fine right before the roof caves in.

I click open the tutoring portal. It’s not my business. Whatever’s unraveling between them has nothing to do with me. Except it is confusing. They used to be so solid, and Daphne’s been sparse on details.

They’ve been the it-couple since last year. The kind of couple you build your assumptions around. The kind you don’t expect to fall

apart.He passes me his latest graded quiz without me having to ask. I scroll through it, scanning the formulas until one detail makes me pause. “You wrote ‘moment arm’ instead of ‘center of pressure.’ Twice.” I glance up.

“I know.”

“You’re usually better with mechanical analogs.”

“I got distracted.”

I pause. “By what?”

Dean’s eyes stay locked on mine. He doesn’t answer. Doesn’t smirk. Just looks. Steady. Intense.

Suddenly, I’m too warm. The tutoring center is quiet, half-lit by the soft flicker of fluorescent bulbs, and I’m acutely aware of how small this room is. How big he is. How sharp his jaw looks when he clenches it.

I shouldn’t notice.

I don’t want to notice.

“Let’s just focus,” I say, my throat tighter than it should be.

He nods once. “You’re the boss.”

It’s meant to be harmless. Light. Maybe even a little sarcastic.

But the way he says it?

It lingers.

My mind flashes to a conversation I overheard last week.

I hadn’t been eavesdropping.

Not intentionally.

It’s just that when you hear a name you recognize in a public café, and you’re seated ten feet away with a clear line of sight to their table… your brain kind of auto-tunes in.

I had been in the corner of The Grind for two hours, highlighting my neurochem notes, when I heard it—Dean’s name, from two girls I vaguely recognized from the biology department.

The taller one leaned forward, voice low but perfectly audible in the afternoon lull. “I’m telling you, Dean Carter is just… intense in bed. Like, too much. Always giving orders, always in charge.”

Her friend giggled. “That sounds hot, though.”

The first girl hesitated. Then said something I didn’t catch.

“Did you actually hook up with him?” her friend asked, eyes wide.

“God, no. Megan from my microbio lab did, before he started dating Daphne. Said it was the best and most intimidating sex of her life.” She lowered her voice further. “And I swear to God, she said he’s not just big—he’s, how is that supposed to fit big.”

Her friend nearly choked on her coffee. “Maybe that’s why he’s so quiet. Man’s got enough going on.”

They dissolved into giggles, and I forced myself back to my notes, my face burning. I hadn’t meant to hear it. I certainly hadn’t meant to file it away in my brain where it would inevitably resurface at the most inappropriate moments.

But now it’s there, sandwiched between biostatistics formulas and my grocery list, and no matter how hard I try, I can’t unhear it.

I take a breath and pull myself back to center. Focus, Nora. People like me—girls who come from nothing, who can’t afford mistakes, who claw their way into the room—we don’t get to slip. We don’t get second chances. So I make plans. I follow them. I measure everything: tasks, variables, time spent on each goal.

Because if I control all the variables, nothing can fall apart. I’m here to graduate at the top of my class, secure a funded slot in the university’s neurobehavioral research lab, and get into a Tier 1 grad program. That’s it. That’s the plan. Whatever’s going on between Dean and Daphne? That’s noise.

I review the assignment structure and flag the sections where his logic faltered.

He listens. Doesn’t argue. His brow furrows in a way that tells me he’s really thinking—not just pretending to care until the session ends.

He’s sharp. I’ve always known that. He understands systems, patterns, bodies in motion. What he doesn’t grasp is people. Or maybe he just doesn’t try.

When we finish the review, I sit back. “You’re capable of more than this.”

Dean meets my eyes, and something about his expression changes. It’s subtle, like a muscle twitch. “You sure?”

I frown. “That wasn’t a compliment.”

“I know.”

But it wasn’t really a question either.

There’s a silence. Not awkward—just weighted. Like neither of us wants to break it first.

I check the time. “We’re done.”

Dean nods and starts packing his notebook. “Same time next week?”

I hesitate. “Yeah.”

He stands, slow and deliberate, slinging his bag over one shoulder. For a moment, I think he’s going to say something else. But he doesn’t.

He just looks at me one last time, then walks out.

And I sit there for a full thirty seconds, staring at the empty chair across from me like it might explain the pressure behind my ribs.

By the time I reach the dining hall that evening, the snow has turned slushy and unpleasant. My fingers sting from the cold as I scan my student ID, stepping into a rush of warmth and noise that smells faintly of overcooked pizza and burnt cheese.

Sadie’s already at our usual table near the back—bright pink hoodie, knees up in the chair like she owns the place. She’s talking with her hands, animatedly. Across from her is Daphne, polished and poised, sipping from a straw.

I grab a salad and a bowl of soup I probably won’t finish and slide into the empty seat next to Sadie.

“You’re late,” she says without looking up from her phone.

“Had tutoring.”

“With who?” Daphne asks, polite and casual.

I take a sip of lukewarm broth. “Dean.”

Both of them react.

Sadie raises an eyebrow. “As in… Daphne’s Dean?”

Daphne waves a manicured hand like she’s brushing this off. “I don’t even know if he’s my Dean anymore.”

I glance up. That’s new.

Daphne lets out a long, slow exhale. “He’s just been weird lately. Distant. And not in his usual broody way. I don’t know—he’s off.”

“Off how?” Sadie asks, tearing her bread into tiny pieces. “Like cold? Or like… blackout rage-y?”

Daphne snorts. “Dean doesn’t rage. He just retreats into that wall of silence and stares at you like he’s disappointed in you on a cellular level.”

I glance down at my soup and stir it for something to do.

“He’s just so intense,” Daphne says, setting her fork down.

That gets Sadie’s attention. She perks up. “Oh, god. What’s that even like?”

Daphne leans back in her seat, a slight crinkle in her brow. “Let’s just say he’s got a thing for control. Super bossy. Even in the bedroom. Especially in the bedroom.” She says it like it’s a flaw. Like he asked her to hand over her social security number, not her underwear.

I don’t say anything. My throat’s dry, and I reach for my water.

“I mean, the thing is,” she continues, stabbing at her pasta, “we’ve been off for a while. You know how it is.”

I don’t. I’ve never dated someone long enough for it to be an “off and on” situation.

“Anyway,” she continues, her tone airy, “we’ve been talking about breaking up. Honestly, it’s probably time.”

Sadie blinks. “Wow. Okay. I did not see that coming.”

Daphne gets a faraway look in her eyes. “He’s not, like, abusive. It’s just his whole thing. Always giving orders. ‘Come here,’ ‘stay still,’ ‘don’t touch me yet’—like it’s some game he has to win.”

I swallow a too-big bite of lettuce, forgetting how to chew.

Sadie snorts. “Yeah, no thanks. That kind of thing screams ‘fragile masculinity’ to me.”

“He doesn’t just want sex. He wants surrender,” Daph says, stabbing a piece of melon with her fork.

I don’t say anything.

Because somewhere between stay still and come here , something shifts.

Not in a way I’d admit.

Not even in my own head.

But my chest turns warm and unsettled, and I hate how quickly my mind goes there—flashing back to how Dean looked at me today in the tutoring room, calm and still, like he already knew what I’d say before I said it. And now those words from the café are replaying in my head too— not just big—it’s like, how is that supposed to fit big —and I’m mortified by how much that thought affects me.

Daphne sighs. “Anyway, I just want something lighter, you know? Someone easy. Something fun.”

My fork pauses halfway to my mouth.

Sadie hums in agreement, pulling her phone back out. “Emotionally available and not a caveman. Is that too much to ask?”

Maybe not.

But maybe I don’t want easy.

Maybe I never have.

I push a crouton around in my salad bowl.

There’s a short lull in the conversation. Then Daphne glances at me. “What about you, Nora? Anything new?”

I lift a shoulder. “Same as always.”

Sadie doesn’t even look up from her phone. “Nora’s got her whole life planned through 2030.”

“2032,” I say, half smiling. “Assuming I get the fellowship.”

“What fellowship?” Daphne asks.

I take a sip of my tea, keeping my tone even. “There’s a research assistantship opening in the neurobehavioral lab. Funded slot. My advisor thinks I have a shot.”

Sadie finally looks up. “She has more than a shot. She’s already halfway in with her professor. Total brain crush situation.”

I shake my head. “He’s just old and overly invested in oxytocin regulation pathways.”

Daphne blinks. “Oxytocin, like… the love hormone?”

“Technically, yes,” I say. “But we’re more interested in the behavioral implications—attachment regulation, social bonding, risk patterns, that kind of thing.”

“Sounds sexy,” Sadie deadpans.

I don’t share the truth—that I love how brains make decisions before people even realize they’ve chosen anything. Understanding how fear influences choices makes me feel like I might survive my own someday.

Instead, I say, “It’s fine. Just research.”

But my mind keeps wandering.

Back to the way Daphne said it— he wants everything.

Back to the way Dean looked at me today.

And the annoying way my heart skipped.

The words shouldn’t matter. Their relationship is practically over. This whole situation—my tutoring him, our strange eye contact, the weird current humming beneath everything—doesn’t mean anything. Not even close.

Except now my head won’t quiet down.

Because the way Daphne said it—like it was a flaw—hits a nerve I’ve buried for years.

I’ve been called intense, too. Too ambitious. Too curious. Too “in my head” to enjoy the moment. I’ve been made to feel that wanting things—sex, closeness, real chemistry—was embarrassing.

Sophomore year, I dated someone who praised me for being “low maintenance”—as long as I didn’t ask for too much, or show too much, or want too much.

So I stopped asking.

I got quiet.

I decided maybe I wasn’t built for the messy, needy, thrilling kind of sex people whispered about in dorm rooms and Netflix dramas.

Maybe I was too logical for that. Too structured. Too safe.

But hearing that Dean wants that —that his problem was being too tuned in, too focused, too hungry for something deeper—sends a jolt of something hot and sharp through me.

Not fear.

Not revulsion.

Curiosity.

Because what if I’m not broken?

What if I just haven’t been with someone who actually wanted me that way?