Page 55 of One Day

“Good.” He leans down again, surprising me when he presses his lips to mine. It’s not like any of our others, it’s short and sweet. The type of kiss meant for couples parting ways, not friends strictly sleeping together. “I’ll see you later.”

“Yeah.” I nod my head when he walks towards the door, my eyes dropping to his ass and the way the denim hugs it.

“Stop checking out my ass, Sunny.”

My lips pull up when I lift my head to see his eyes on me. “Never.”

He shakes his head at me and steps outside, leaving me alone with my thoughts as they go back to the app. My gaze drops to her office hours again and then moves to the corner of my laptop screen where the time is displayed.

The worst that happens from asking is she says no.

I chew my bottom lip as I debate my options. I can either try and get this sorted out myself, hoping that by some grace, I get inspired for this project again, or I get to follow the lead buzzing beneath my skin. Either way, I have exactly forty minutes to get back to campus and to Professor Andrews’ office, to ask and hope she lets me.

“Door’s open!” Professor Andrews calls out a few short seconds after I knock. She looks up from her laptop when I step inside. “Sonya, what brings you by?”

“Is now an okay time? I wanted to talk about the project brief,” I ask, sliding my hand down to the doorknob.

When she nods her head to answer, I shut the door and sink down into one of the armchairs across from her desk, letting my bag slide down to my feet. “I don’t really know how I’m supposed to bring this up.”

Concern gets tangled together in her brows. “Did something happen?”

“No, no, but I am hoping that you’ll let me move forward with my idea. I know the whole point of this project is to create something for people to be able to explore the university teams, but I have a different direction in mind.”

“What direction would that be?”

Swallowing the nerves working their way up my throat, I sit a little taller and run my hands down my thighs. My fingers curl into the smallest part before my knee, squeezing tightly.

“I want to do an app focused on the athletes and helping organize their schedules. One of my best friends is on the team, and recently, there seem to be some hiccups in their current system. Troubled communication between the athletes and the coaching staff, an unorganized system for their meal plans with the team nutritionist,” I explain.

“I want to do something that would help organize that and make for a smoother line of communication between the athletes and their trainers. They already have so much on their plate between their team commitments and their academic responsibilities, stressing over if they’re where they’re supposed to be shouldn’t be something they need to worry about.”

She absorbs my words, and for a second, I think she likes the idea. Hope replaces the dread I felt coming here but drops out when she says, “You make a compelling case, Sonya, but unfortunately, that isn’t what the university is looking for.”

I nod my head. “Right,” I say, swallowing the lump in my throat. “I understand. I thought I would ask. It was a long shot, to begin with.”

A thick line of tension fills the air when she doesn’t say anything right away, and I feel like I want to curl in on myself. Putting myself out there has never been a problem, except when it comes to tech.

I want to be bold and prove myself more than anything, but my high school counselor basically told me I was fighting a losing battle. The tech industry isn’t kind to women, but it didn’t stop me. If anything, it puts a fire under my ass to prove him wrong because it frustrates me.

There shouldn’t be this line between genders, but there is, and I want nothing more than to be a force that breaks that line down. I want to make it easier for a younger generation of women, but every now and again, this doubt flutters in. It shouldn’t because this is just a bump in the road, and I know better than to think this is anything but a refusal because it goes beyond the project outline.

That is what it is, but my brain can’t seem to tell the difference.

“It’s not that I don’t think it’s a good idea, Sonya. It is, and I’m glad you came to me about it, but this opportunity is a huge one, and I think it would be a massive shame to let it slip through your fingers to do something else,” she explains, her fingers clasped together as she leans forward on her hands. “I think you are immensely intelligent. You have a fight in you that I don’t see a lot, and I want you to use that. I want you to prove yourself. Sometimes, we’re going to get put on projects we don’t like, but it doesn’t mean we don’t do them. I want you to do this project, and I want you to do it well. I genuinely believe you have a good shot at getting this spot. Don’t squander it now.”

Pressing my lips together in a thin line, I nod my head and try to smile. Her words are meant to be encouraging, and they are. Someone I have looked up to for years just told me they think I have the talent to get this huge opportunity, but it feels like I’ve been told to conform to a box I don’t fit into. I want to do something bigger for this project to show my ability to see a problem and solve it.

“Thank you, Professor Andrews. I’ll do that,” I say, grabbing my bag off the floor. “I appreciate you giving me some of your time.”

“Sonya,” she says when I stand, tilting her head to watch me. “Don’t let this put you down, okay? I know you’re going to come up with something incredible.”

I nod and head for the door, trying to stomp my disappointment down on my way, but all it does is set flames beneath my skin. I know I have something big at the tips of my fingers, and I’m not ready to just tuck it away. She never explicitly told me that I couldn’t do it, just that the opportunity would be out of my hands.

And that’s all the push I need.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

WALKER

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