Chapter 2: Orientation Day

The shrill beeps of his new alarm clock jolted Bharath awake.

He sat up in his bottom bunk, groggy, confused for a second about where he was. The room was quiet, save for the faint hum of Tyrel’s electric fan and the rustle of Jorge flipping pages above.

And then it hit him.

Today was Orientation Day.

His first real day as a student at Georgia Tech.

He swung his legs out of bed, feeling the cool linoleum floor beneath his bare feet, and reached for his towel and toothbrush. The sky outside was still painted in that faint blue that precedes sunrise. The dorm hallway smelled faintly of body spray, boiled eggs, and Pine-Sol.

The bathroom was just a few doors down.

He stepped inside, rubbing sleep from his eyes — and stopped.

Dead in his tracks.

There, standing just a few feet away under a stream of water, was a man.

A very naked man.

Showering. Casually. Completely exposed.

No curtain. No partition. Just a tiled row of open showers with no regard for modesty, shame, or basic human decency.

Bharath froze, toothbrush in mid-air.

The guy in the shower glanced at him once, nodded, and then went back to lathering shampoo into his hair like this was the most normal thing in the world.

Bharath backed away like he’d walked in on a crime scene.

Back in his room, he dropped his towel on the chair, breathing fast.

He stood there, soap in hand, heart pounding like he’d just escaped a battlefield.

“What happened?” Jorge asked from his bunk, his head poking over the edge.

“No curtains!” Bharath whispered, horrified. “Nothing! Everyone can see everything!”

Jorge gave him a sympathetic smile. “Yeah. I found out yesterday.”

“How did you—?”

“Just ... stared at the wall and prayed no one talked to me. You’ll get used to it.”

Tyrel, now awake and lazily stretching, yawned. “Man, y’all modesty dudes need to loosen up. This be college. Everybody got the same parts, bro.”

“I am not used to seeing others ... parts,” Bharath muttered.

Tyrel laughed. “You’ll learn.”

Ten minutes later, Bharath re-entered the bathroom like a soldier marching into enemy territory. He carried only the essentials: soap, towel, and shame.

He picked the furthest showerhead from the entrance, turned it on, and stepped under the spray as quickly as he could, eyes fixed squarely on the wall tiles.

The water was cold. His breath hitched. But nothing was worse than the exposure.

He soaped, rinsed, and dried off in record time — maybe ninety seconds total.

Back in the room, hair dripping, he collapsed onto the chair.

Jorge handed him a granola bar.

“You survived.”

“Barely.”

Tyrel was already dressed in his usual oversized jeans and Falcons jersey, grinning.

“Congrats, dawg. You just earned your first stripes in the college game.”

Bharath took a bite of the granola bar and made a vow to himself.

Never again after 7 a.m. Too many people. Next time, 5 a.m. or never.

People were still moving in.

Every hallway they passed on the way to the dining commons was cluttered with boxes, duffel bags, plastic bins, and families saying long, awkward goodbyes. Nervous mothers dabbed at eyes with handkerchiefs. Dads barked last-minute advice. Roommates half-ignored each other as they set up their territories.

And yet, for all the movement, one thing struck Bharath more than anything else.

It was almost all men.

Guys everywhere. Guys in Tech shirts. Guys in cargo shorts. Guys dragging mini-fridges. Guys with goatees. Guys with pimples. Loud guys, silent guys, sweaty guys, sleepy guys.

It was like someone had air-dropped a small army of nerds into the campus.

Occasionally, like a fleeting mirage, a girl would appear.

Usually surrounded by a ring of guys orbiting her like planets around a sun. Some helping with luggage. Some laughing too hard at her jokes. Some pretending not to look at her while very obviously looking at her.

Bharath whispered to Jorge, “I thought there would be ... more girls.”

Jorge shrugged. “It’s Tech.”

Tyrel laughed. “Welcome to the ratio, my man.”

Bharath frowned. “The what now?”

Tyrel clapped a hand on his shoulder like he was about to break terrible news. “At Tech? It’s like five guys for every girl. No joke. Sometimes six. Depends how many of the girls are actually real and not just mirages.”

Jorge raised his eyebrows. “You’re kidding.”

“Do I look like I’m playin’?” Tyrel gestured around them. “Look—guys in Tech shirts, guys with pocket protectors, guys who think Axe spray is a substitute for a shower. This ain’t a college. It’s a bachelor colony.”

Bharath nodded slowly, eyes scanning another all-male cluster helping unload a single girl’s car like worker ants. “So ... there are no girls here?”

Tyrel grinned. “Oh, they exist. But they’re rare. Like holograms. And if one’s halfway cute and breathes oxygen? Boom—she’s got three dudes carrying her laundry and five more offering to recompile her Java homework.”

Jorge snorted. “I thought this was just a first-day thing.”

“Nah,” Tyrel said with mock solemnity. “This is life at Tech, bro. You picked the nerd capital of the South.”

Bharath groaned. “I thought college in America was supposed to be ... fun.”

Tyrel pointed dramatically east, toward the nearby buildings past the edge of Smith dorm. “And that’s where salvation lies. Right across the tracks. Georgia State.”

Bharath blinked. “Wait. That close?”

“Practically next door,” Tyrel said. “From Smith? You can see their dorms. And unlike us, they actually got a normal ratio. Girls everywhere. Real majors too—psych, journalism, sociology. People who smile. People who’ve read a book that wasn’t a textbook.”

Jorge laughed. “So your plan is to invade?”

Tyrel smirked. “Already got missions planned. Operation Co-Ed Freedom. We hit their dining hall like cultural ambassadors. I charm ‘em, y’all play the strong silent type.”

“I don’t know...” Bharath began.

Tyrel threw an arm around Bharath’s shoulder. “We’ll get you a Georgia State girlfriend by midterms. Just gotta get you some better clothes, better cologne, and a little more swagger.”

“I already have cologne,” Bharath muttered. “It’s called Wild Stone.”

Tyrel raised an eyebrow. “Yeah, you’re definitely not wearing that around girls who can read.”

Tyrel gave them both a proud once-over. “We’re like a boy band with engineering minors.”

Bharath blinked. “Like ... the Backstreet Boys? The girls back home like that Nick guy.”

Jorge perked up. “Ooh—*NSYNC, bro. I call Justin.”

Tyrel reeled back like he’d just been slapped with a physics textbook. “Yo, yo, what? What did you just say?”

Bharath looked genuinely confused. “Backstreet Boys. They’re huge! I bought the cassette before I left Chennai.”

Jorge shrugged. “*NSYNC has better choreography.”

“Okay, okay, I’mma need y’all to stop right there,” Tyrel said, waving his hands like he was extinguishing a fire. “Never—and I mean never—say that crap in front of Georgia State girls. Y’all tryna be cute or tryna be celibate?”

Bharath tilted his head. “But they’re popular?”

“Popular with middle schoolers,” Tyrel snapped. “You trying to bag a date or run a babysitting service?”

Jorge leaned in, mock-whispering. “He’s just mad he can’t hit the high notes.”

Tyrel pointed at him. “Say one more word and I’m making you wear a ‘Team Lance’ shirt to the student mixer.”

Bharath chuckled, now genuinely enjoying the chaos. “Okay, okay. So what do we listen to, oh wise one?”

Tyrel straightened his cap. “Lauryn Hill. DMX. Maybe a little Aaliyah if you’re feeling smooth. But no boy bands, man. That’s a one-way ticket to Rejection Town.”

Jorge raised an eyebrow. “You made that up just now, didn’t you? That’s not a real place is it?”

Tyrel smirked. “You bet your ass I did. Now come on—time to fuel up. Game faces on.”

Bharath looked skeptical. “And what exactly do we tell them we’re studying?”

“Lie,” Tyrel said immediately. “Say marketing. Or pre-law. Or poetry. Whatever. Just don’t say mechanical engineering unless you wanna talk about torque over candlelit pasta.”

Jorge burst out laughing again.

Bharath sighed as they entered the dining commons, the din of trays and the smell of eggs and floor polish hitting them at once.

College had officially begun.

The dining hall was bright, clinical, and smelled like a mixture of dish soap, syrup, and despair. It was bustling with students — trays clattering, chairs scraping, voices overlapping. Bharath followed Tyrel and Jorge to the hot food counter first.
And immediately regretted it.

Most of the trays looked like they’d been sitting there for hours. Bacon that glistened with too much grease. Sausages floating in orange pools of oil. Grayish eggs that looked like they had given up on life.

Tyrel, unfazed, scooped a pile of the eggs onto his plate like he was mining for gold. “Mmm. Protein, baby,” he said, grabbing two round, doughy-looking objects. “Biscuits. Southern-style, baby.”

He drowned them in a ladleful of some beige sludge the server called “gravy.”

Bharath tilted his head. “Wait. Biscuits?”

He leaned in and poked one gently with the end of his fork like it might react. “These are not biscuits. Where’s the sugar? The butter? The ... crunch?”

Tyrel looked at him like he’d just asked why cows don’t wear socks. “Bro, what? No, no, these ain’t sweet biscuits. These are the real deal. You put gravy on ‘em. Eat ‘em with sausage. Country-style.”

“Biscuits are supposed to be sweet!” Bharath hissed. “At home, they come in shiny wrappers. They’re crunchy. You dip them in tea!”

Jorge snorted. “I think he means cookies.”

Bharath turned to the server helplessly. “You call this a biscuit?”

The woman behind the counter, worn down by decades of incoming freshmen, just smiled. “You want one, sugar?”

“I want ... cereal,” Bharath muttered. “Just cereal. Please.”

He moved down the line with the wounded dignity of a man who had trusted the word biscuit and been betrayed.

Jorge wasn’t faring much better.

He eyed the meat tray skeptically, then pointed at the sausages. “What are these swimming in? Did someone cook them in engine oil?”

“Grease, honey,” the server said cheerfully, slapping three onto his tray. “That’s flavor!”

“Is there a no-grease option?” he asked.

“You want a salad?”

Jorge grimaced and shook his head. “I’ll just take toast. Maybe some fruit.”

The toast turned out to be slightly damp and inexplicably warm in the middle but cold on the edges. The fruit looked like it had been cut by someone holding a grudge against cantaloupe.

The cereal section was a rainbow explosion.

Bright plastic bins with plastic handles. Cartoons on the sides. Loops, flakes, squares, and tiny puffed balls in every unnatural color imaginable.

He filled a bowl with something that looked like neon-colored cardboard confetti and added a splash of milk.

Jorge chose something darker with raisins and frowned at the milk-to-cereal ratio.

They sat down at a long communal table near the window.

Tyrel was already halfway through his biscuit-and-gravy massacre, humming to himself.

Bharath took a spoonful of cereal.

Crunch.

Sweet.

Then too sweet.

Then ... oddly addictive.

But still, his tongue yearned for something warm. Something real. Idli. Pongal. A spoonful of spicy chutney. Filter coffee served in a steel tumbler with bubbles at the top.

This ... was not that.

He chewed quietly, trying not to grimace.

So this is breakfast now.

They sat down at a table near the window, where Tyrel was already halfway through one of his biscuit-mountain creations and humming a tune that sounded suspiciously like “No Scrubs.”

“This is a crime,” Bharath said, poking at the floating cornflakes that had somehow gone soggy between the counter and the table. “Why does the milk taste like ... metal?”

“It’s powdered milk,” Jorge said, biting into a piece of watermelon and immediately regretting it. “And the fruit is frozen. I think my tongue is stuck.”

Tyrel looked up. “Y’all delicate little flowers better toughen up. This is what champions eat. Look at this biscuit. It’s basically a warm hug with lard.”

Jorge made a face. “I think my toast just sighed. Like, actually exhaled.”

Bharath sighed, chewing slowly. “In India, my mother made idli and sambar fresh every morning. With coconut chutney.”

Jorge nodded wistfully. “Back home, we had arepas with cheese and scrambled eggs. Real eggs. Happy eggs.”

Tyrel, mid-chew, waved his fork. “Y’all ain’t in Kansas anymore, Dorothy. This here’s Tech. If the homework don’t kill you, the breakfast will.”

Bharath put down his spoon. “You know, I thought the hardest part of coming to America would be culture shock or homesickness.”

“And?”

He stared down at his cereal. “Turns out it’s breakfast.”

They all went quiet for a moment. Then Jorge picked up one of Tyrel’s biscuits and slowly peeled it open. Steam rose from the middle like the gates of hell had been cracked open.

He blinked. “Okay, this might be good if it didn’t smell like boiled pepper spray.”

Tyrel grinned. “You just gotta drown it in gravy. Like so.” He poured another ladleful of the goopy sauce onto Jorge’s plate.

Jorge stared at it.

Bharath stared at it.

Even the biscuit seemed unsure about what it had become.

“I think I’ll fast until lunch,” Bharath said finally.

“Lunch is worse,” Tyrel said brightly.

After breakfast, the dining hall emptied out like the tide pulling back. Students streamed toward the auditorium, others lingered in pockets of nervous chatter and brochure-flipping. Bharath had just returned his tray when he spotted her again.

Ayesha.

Walking alone now, brushing a few strands of hair from her face, a folded campus map clutched in one hand. Her steps were unhurried. Her shoulders a little looser. No crowd around her this time.

Before he could overthink it, he walked faster to catch up.

“Hey,” he called, trying not to sound out of breath.

She turned, a light in her eyes. “Heyyy! Bharath-from-Chennai, right?”

His heart jumped. “Yeah. Good memory.”

“Hard to forget,” she said with a smile, slipping the map into her tote bag. “You settling in okay?”

“Trying to,” he said. “Breakfast was ... new.”

Ayesha wrinkled her nose. “That gravy looks like someone mixed flour with regret.”

He laughed — a surprised, warm sound — and felt the tension slide off his shoulders. Her rhythm was easy. Her voice, familiar. For a second, it felt like the start of something. A tether forming in mid-air.

“I’ve only been here two days and I already miss proper spice,” she said, animated. “Even the ‘hot sauce’ is just ... angry ketchup.”

“Exactly!” he said, grinning. “I didn’t expect—”

“God, who is yelling about ketchup?” a new voice cut in.

A girl walked up beside Ayesha, tall and unbothered, like the sidewalk belonged to her. Zara.

She was Indian, yes — but slick, polished, intimidating in a way that felt calculated. Her gold hoops swayed as she walked. Her crop top sparkled in the sun. She took one look at Bharath and visibly recoiled.

Ayesha turned. “Oh! Zara—this is Bharath. We met at the airport. He just got in from—”

“Let me guess,” Zara cut in, squinting at him like he was a badly dressed insect. “India. Obviously.”

She gave him a long, slow once-over. The kind of look meant to flatten.

“Fresh-off-the-boat much?”

Bharath blinked. “Sorry?”

“FOB, sweetie. Fresh Off the Boat. I mean—look at you.” She gestured at his polo shirt and scuffed sneakers. “Did your mummy pack your clothes too? Or just your lunch?”

Tyrel and Jorge, loitering nearby with trays in hand, froze mid-step. Tyrel’s smirk faded instantly.

Zara leaned in, eyes gleaming. “Let me guess. First time on a plane? First time out of the country? Still doing that little head-bobble thing every time someone talks?”

Bharath’s throat tightened. He opened his mouth. Closed it.

“I think it’s sweet,” Zara added with mock sincerity. “You’re like a walking Microsoft Helpdesk. All earnest and awkward. You’ll be very useful around finals week.”

He glanced at Ayesha.

Her face had changed — the light dimmed, her smile gone. She looked ... embarrassed. But not for him.

She didn’t say anything.

Didn’t correct her.

Didn’t move.

Zara kept going. “You should try not to talk so much. That accent? It’s giving tech support with no refund. Maybe stick to ... silent nodding?”

Jorge muttered, “Jesus Christ,” under his breath.

Tyrel took a step forward, jaw tight. “Yo, is she for real right now?”

Bharath didn’t hear them.

He was staring at Ayesha. Just her. One more chance for her to say something. To stop this.

But Ayesha just shifted her weight, looking off to the side.

Like she didn’t know him.

Zara looped her arm through Ayesha’s with a satisfied smirk. “Come on, babe. Let’s not be late. Some of us don’t need a compass to find the main quad.”

And Ayesha let herself be led. She didn’t resist. Didn’t say his name. She turned once, eyes flicking toward him — and then away just as quickly.

Gone.

Bharath stood there, frozen in the sunlight. A breeze lifted the edge of the campus map in his pocket, but he didn’t move.

The hurt didn’t hit him all at once. It seeped in — slow, numbing. Like ink bleeding through water.
He stared at the space Ayesha had just vacated, her absence louder than anything she’d said.
The noise around him resumed: conversations, footsteps, someone playing hacky sack on the lawn. But it all felt muffled. Distant.

Behind him, there was a long pause.

Then: “Damn,” Tyrel muttered. “That girl was cold.”

Bharath turned, startled. He hadn’t realized they’d followed him out of the hall.

Tyrel and Jorge stood a few feet away, no longer joking, no longer laughing. Jorge’s brow was furrowed, his arms crossed.

“Bro,” Jorge said quietly, “you good?”

Bharath tried to nod. “I’m ... fine.”

Tyrel stepped forward. “Look, man. I ain’t gonna lie — that girl’s a dime, but even baddies got limits. What she just did?” He shook his head. “That wasn’t confidence. That was straight-up cruelty.”

Bharath looked down, his voice low. “I didn’t expect her to ... stand up for me. But I didn’t think she’d just let it happen.”

“She didn’t just let it happen,” Jorge said. “She cosigned it. Walked off like you were a piece of trash for being from where you’re from.”

Bharath swallowed hard. His chest was tight, like something inside had cracked without breaking clean.

Tyrel clapped a hand gently on his back. “Forget her. You don’t need that kind of fake energy, man. You got us. And you got a whole campus to explore. Plenty of people here who’ll see you for you — not your accent or your visa stamp.”

Bharath managed a faint smile. “Thanks, guys.”

“Anytime,” Jorge said. “And listen, if I ever hear someone talk to you like that again, I’m throwing my cafeteria tray at their head.”

Tyrel snorted. “You say that like it’s a punishment. These trays are deadly.”

That drew a real laugh from Bharath — small, but genuine.

Just then, another voice joined in.

“What a bitch,” someone said bluntly.

They turned.

A tall, fair-skinned Indian guy with slightly messy hair and a vending machine soda in hand walked up, eyes sharp and full of mischief.

“Don’t mind her,” the guy said. “There’s a whole category of desi girls here who think being born in the U.S. makes them royalty. And anyone from back home is, like, provincial. Peasants. Software technicians. Whatever.”

Bharath blinked. “Uh ... thanks?”

The guy grinned and stuck out his hand. “Ravi. From Delhi. Cloudman Hall.”

Bharath shook it. “Bharath. Smith.”

“First year?”

“Yeah. CS.”

“Same.” Ravi took a loud sip of soda. “Cool. We’ll suffer together.”

Jorge smirked. “Hey, another CS nerd! That’s my boy. We look out for each other, yeah?”

“You got it,” Ravi said, giving a little salute. “Anyone who survives orientation gravy and Zara deserves a medal.”

“You’re CS too? Argh ... looks like I’m going to be surrounded by nerds”, groaned Tyrel.

They found a low brick planter near the edge of the student center and sat side by side. Ravi popped his soda again and leaned back like he was preparing for a rant.

“Honestly,” he began, “this place is not what I expected.”

Bharath looked over. “Right? Same!”

“I thought American campus life would be like what they show in the movies — parties, concerts, smart women in glasses quoting poetry. But it’s mostly...” He gestured vaguely at a passing group of sweaty, shirtless engineering boys yelling about Dungeons & Dragons.

Bharath nodded. “And everyone eats ... cereal. For every meal.”

“No dahi-chawal. No masala. I asked someone where I could get samosas and they offered me ... spring rolls.”

They both paused.

Then started laughing.

It was easy laughter. Shared. Cathartic.

For the first time since arriving, Bharath didn’t feel like he was tiptoeing on cultural landmines. He didn’t have to explain himself. Or pretend to be impressed by sausage gravy.

“I even brought my own pickle jar,” Ravi confessed. “Wrapped it in socks so my suitcase wouldn’t smell.”

“I brought rasam powder,” Bharath grinned. “Customs made me open it. Thought it was some drug.”

They laughed again.

For the next half hour, they shared everything — bad food, baffling slang, the shock of public showers, confusing girls, and how no one seemed to understand cricket.

And slowly, Bharath began to feel a little lighter.

A little more like himself.

Not quite at home — but not entirely lost either.

“We’ll catch up later?” Ravi said, adjusting the strap of his backpack.

“Definitely,” Bharath replied.

“There’s an Indian Students’ Association meet tonight — student center, I think. Food, music, probably at least one guy trying too hard to impress everyone. You in?”

“Of course,” Bharath said without thinking. “Let’s go after orientation.”

“Done.” Ravi grinned and disappeared into a stream of freshmen heading toward the auditorium.

“There’s an Indian Students’ Association meet tonight — student center, I think. Food, music, probably at least one guy trying too hard to impress everyone. You in?”

“Of course,” Bharath said without thinking. “Let’s go after orientation.”

“Done.” Ravi grinned and vanished into the stream of freshmen heading toward the auditorium.

Bharath lingered for a moment near the steps.

The sun was fully up now, warm on his skin, sharpening the angles of the buildings and casting long shadows over the campus lawn. A light breeze stirred the trees, and somewhere nearby, someone was playing a guitar — lazy, open chords. The air felt alive, like something beginning.

And then — like gravity — his eyes found her again.

Ayesha.

She was sitting on a wide picnic blanket near the far end of the quad, surrounded by a semi-circle of students. A mix of people — well-dressed, confident, loud — the kind who already seemed to belong to each other. They were playing some kind of game. Charades, maybe. Ayesha was up now, running in place and flailing her arms dramatically like she was being attacked by invisible bees.

The crowd around her burst into laughter and applause.

She looked radiant. Comfortable. Already part of the world Bharath had just stepped into. He stood watching her, heart caught in his throat.

He hesitated, then walked toward them, rehearsing a line in his head.

Hey, I didn’t know you were out here.

Want to grab a drink after orientation?

Something casual. Friendly. Just enough to reopen the door.

As he crossed the lawn, Ayesha turned briefly to sip from a water bottle — and her eyes met his.

Just for a second.

Recognition. No warmth.

Then she turned back without a word, her expression unchanged.

Still, he kept walking.

“Hey,” he said softly as he reached the edge of the group.

A few people looked up. One or two gave him the polite, tight-lipped half-smile strangers reserve for harmless interruptions.

Ayesha didn’t say anything.

Zara, lounging beside her in a pink halter top and mirrored sunglasses, turned with the precision of someone who lived to turn dramatically.

“Oh wow,” she said. “It’s you again.”

Bharath blinked. “I just saw Ayesha and thought—”

Zara laughed. Not a real laugh — a dagger dressed in glitter. “You thought what? That she was waiting for you? Sitting here hoping you’d come rescue her from her popularity?”

The people nearby chuckled, unsure, watching.

“I just—” Bharath started.

“Oh my God,” Zara interrupted. “He’s like a lost puppy that followed you from breakfast. Do you feed him, or does he just keep showing up on his own?”

A few more snickers. A guy in sunglasses murmured, “Damn...”

Bharath’s ears burned. He looked at Ayesha.

She wasn’t laughing.

But she wasn’t stopping it either.

She leaned back on one arm, her face unreadable behind her large sunglasses. Her silence was louder than any insult.

Zara pressed on. “Sweetie, we’re kind of in the middle of something. Orientation, remember? You can’t just walk up to every girl who makes eye contact and assume it’s destiny.”

Bharath tried to swallow. “I didn’t—”

“Don’t worry,” she added sweetly. “It’s cute, in a desperate kind of way. Like, try-hard energy. You should bottle that. Sell it at the Desperate Dudes Store.”

That broke the group. Laughter rippled through the blanket. Someone clapped.

Ayesha’s mouth curved slightly — not quite a smile, but not quite guilt either. A flicker of amusement, maybe. Maybe relief that Zara was handling it so she didn’t have to.

And that — that was worse than anything.

Bharath didn’t say another word.

He just nodded once, woodenly, turned, and walked away.

Behind him, he heard Zara mutter, “These FOB guys, I swear ... Think every girl in America is a Bollywood heroine waiting for a backup dancer.”

And Ayesha’s low laugh in response.

That one sound — casual, soft, unthinking — broke something.

Bharath kept walking.

He didn’t know where. Just away. Away from the heat on his neck, the eyes that had watched, the laughter still ringing in his ears.

His map crinkled in his back pocket.

He shoved his hands into his jeans, head low, footsteps quickening until the noise behind him disappeared.

He didn’t cry.

But his chest felt hollow. His stomach twisted.

Whatever lightness he had found with Ravi, whatever warmth he’d felt in Ayesha’s eyes hours ago — it was gone now. Not stolen. Not lost.

Given up. By her. Willingly.

He wasn’t part of her story.

Smith Hall was quieter now. Most of the first-years were still off pretending to care about orientation or wandering campus in dazed herds, clutching maps like they were navigating the Amazon.

Bharath pushed open the door to Room 202 and walked into ... chaos.

Jorge was sitting cross-legged on his bunk like a monk preparing for spiritual battle, eyes closed, bobbing his head to a rhythm pulsing through his bulky headphones. A portable CD player sat beside him like a holy relic.

Tyrel, shirtless (again), was slouched dramatically against the windowsill, chewing gum like it had personally insulted him. His arms were crossed. His jaw was set.

“What did I say, man?” Tyrel said, louder than necessary. “It’s just noise.”

Jorge whipped off his headphones, scandalized. “It’s rhythm, pendejo. It’s heat. Reggaetón is life.”

Tyrel gestured broadly like he was dismissing a mosquito. “Nah, man. That ain’t life. That’s just someone banging on pots and yelling over it in Spanish.”

“You don’t even speak Spanish!”

“You don’t need to speak Spanish to know when something sounds like a blender trying to sing!”

Bharath froze in the doorway, still wearing his backpack. “Is ... is this a fight?”

“It’s a debate,” Jorge snapped.

“It’s an intervention,” Tyrel corrected.

“About music,” Jorge added, as if that explained everything.

Tyrel pointed a dramatic finger at the CD player. “This fool tried to say reggaetón is better than Tupac.”