Chapter 2
An email landed in Aryan Carter's inbox at 8:04 a.m., cold and precise.
"Subject: Meeting Required - Professor Cowel."
He blinked at it through a mouthful of cereal. "Meeting," he muttered. "That's code for execution."
His roommate looked up from his laptop. "Execution for what?"
"Apparently for crimes against mathematics." Aryan jabbed the trackpad, reading aloud: Please meet me in my office at ten o'clock regarding your performance in the recent assessment.
"Performance," he said, rolling the word on his tongue. "So formal. I should take a bow."
"Maybe take a shower first," the roommate suggested.
"Already did. I like to be clean when facing doom."
By ten, he was crossing campus with a coffee in one hand and misplaced confidence in the other. The early sun gleamed off the old stone buildings; students hurried past, arms full of notebooks and anxiety. The air smelled faintly of coffee and chalk dust—the university's natural perfume.
Aryan's sneakers squeaked on the polished floor of the math department. He paused outside the departmental noticeboard where his latest failure still hung. The bright red F beside his name seemed to wink. He saluted it with the coffee cup. "Consistency, my friend."
The departmental secretary barely glanced up. "Professor Cowel asked for you. He's waiting."
"Story of my life," Aryan said, flashing a grin that fooled neither of them.
Cowel's office door was half-open. Morning light slanted through blinds, striping the bookshelves and the neat desk beyond them. The man himself sat behind it, sleeves rolled to the elbow, glasses catching the glare like warning lights.
"Come in, Mr Carter."
Aryan stepped inside, closing the door with exaggerated care. "Professor. I would've brought flowers, but the florist was out of apologies."
"Sit."
He dropped into the chair opposite, balancing his coffee on one knee. "Before we begin, just want to say I only cried for about five minutes after seeing that F."
"How resilient," Cowel said without looking up. "Do you know why you're here?"
"I assumed fan mail."
"Incorrect." Cowel slid a folder across the desk. The familiar red-scarred pages stared back at him.
"Ah, my masterpiece."
"Your failure," Cowel corrected. "And a deliberate one."
"Maybe I'm consistently unlucky."
"Unluckiness doesn't switch plus and minus signs in perfect symmetry." The professor folded his hands. "You're capable, Mr Carter. You simply prefer chaos to effort."
"That sounds poetic. You ever think about teaching literature?"
Cowel looked up, unamused. "This behaviour has consequences."
"I'm aware. Low grades, crushed dreams, global disappointment."
"Dismissal," Cowel said flatly. "That's the next step if this continues."
Aryan raised both hands. "You called me here just to fire me from education?"
"I called you here because I don't think you're incapable. I think you're avoiding work that would prove you aren't."
Aryan shrugged, aiming for lightness. "Trying's overrated."
"Then so is your degree."
The line landed like a dropped stone. Aryan glanced away, tracing the spine of a nearby book: Mathematical Logic and Its Discontents. Fitting.
"So what's the verdict?" he asked. "Expulsion with flair?"
"Not yet." Cowel's tone softened by half a degree. "I'm offering a final chance. Private tutoring. Twice a week. My office."
Aryan blinked. "You're serious."
"Completely."
"Tutoring? With you? That sounds like cruel and unusual punishment."
"Or an opportunity. It depends how you treat it."
He laughed, unsure whether to be flattered or terrified. "You must really enjoy pain."
"Professional obligation," Cowel replied. "You can decline, of course, and I'll begin the paperwork for removal. The choice is yours."
Aryan studied him. The man's expression was the same unreadable calm that ruled every lecture, but something behind the glasses hinted at stubborn belief—a professor still clinging to the idea that people could be fixed with enough equations.
"Why me?" Aryan asked quietly. "You've got a whole flock of eager geniuses begging for your attention."
"Because they don't need saving from themselves," Cowel said. "You do."
The clock on the wall ticked a few beats too loud. Aryan wanted to crack a joke, any joke, but for once humour deserted him. He sipped his coffee instead.
"So," he said finally, "twice a week, your office. Any chance you'll provide snacks?"
"I'll provide structure. You bring discipline."
"Sounds dreadful."
"It will be, if you continue like this."
Cowel opened a leather notebook, writing something quickly. "You'll begin next Tuesday at four. Don't be late again."
"Four o'clock," Aryan repeated. "What if I have prior commitments? Like, say, not wanting to be here?"
"Then you'll have all the free time expulsion affords."
"Touché."
Cowel closed the notebook with quiet finality. "That will be all."
Aryan didn't move immediately. He looked at the exam paper still lying between them, at the tidy red marks dissecting his laziness. Part of him wanted to grab it and tear it in half; another part wanted to defend every wrong answer like art.
Instead, he said, "You really think this'll work?"
"I think it's worth trying once before giving up on you."
The simple honesty of it caught him off guard. He covered it with sarcasm. "Careful, Professor. People might mistake that for faith in humanity."
"Don't test it further," Cowel said, but there was the faintest ghost of amusement at the edge of his mouth.
Aryan stood, slinging his backpack over one shoulder. "Guess I'll see you Tuesday, then. Try not to miss me too much."
"I'll survive," Cowel said.
"I wouldn't bet on it."
He left the office before the professor could reply.
The corridor outside was quiet except for the faint hum of fluorescent lights. Aryan's footsteps echoed, each one too loud in the narrow space. He reached the stairwell and paused, pulling the folded email from his pocket. Private tutoring, it read, neat and unforgiving. He smirked at the words but didn't tear the paper up.
On the ground floor, sunlight spilled through the tall windows, dust floating in lazy spirals. Students hurried past, laughing, arguing, alive with the kind of confidence he couldn't fake today. He walked slower, the words from the meeting looping in his head: Because you remind me of what happens when potential rots.
"Melodramatic," he muttered, kicking at a stray pen on the floor. "Still rude."
Outside, the air was sharper. He cut across the lawn toward the coffee stand, needing noise to drown the echo of his thoughts. A group of classmates waved him over.
"Carter! Heard Cowel called you in. What'd he do—hang you by your GPA?"
"Close," Aryan said, forcing a grin. "Sentenced to tutoring."
"Tutoring? With him? Man, rather you than me."
"Yeah," he said lightly, "I inspire charity."
They laughed, and he laughed with them, loud enough to sound convincing. When they turned back to their jokes, he slipped the meeting note deeper into his pocket and stared out across the campus.
The math building gleamed in the sunlight, windows catching glints of gold. He imagined Cowel still inside, back at his desk, already correcting someone else's logic. Maybe the man really believed this would change something.
"Private tutoring," Aryan said under his breath, tasting the words like a dare.
He took another sip of his cooling coffee, shrugged, and started walking again.