The library is quiet in the way only a place full of serious people pretending not to be tired can be. Long tables. Tall shelves. The smell of old paper and binding glue that never really goes away. Sunlight spills in through high windows and lands in wide squares on the floor.

  Kai and I claim our usual table near the back. He stacks three books in front of himself with care, lining the edges up perfectly before opening the first one. I drop mine down less gently and let it thump.

  I stare at the cover for a moment.

  “You know,” I say, leaning back in my chair, “if books wanted to be read more, they would stop looking so judgmental.”

  Kai does not look up. “They are not judging you.”

  “They absolutely are,” I say. “That one especially.” I point at the thick volume near his elbow. “That book thinks I am stupid.”

  He turns a page. “That book doesn’t think at all.”

  “That is what it wants you to believe.”

  I crack it open anyway and scan the page. Dense text. Diagrams. Marginal notes from students who clearly cared more than I ever will.

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  I sigh and lean closer to Kai’s side of the table. “If I die under a pile of footnotes, tell my story.”

  He hums softly. That is the closest I get to encouragement.

  We study for a while after that. Real study. Notes scratched out. Pages turned. Kai reads faster than I do and remembers more on the first pass. I compensate by skimming and asking questions until it sticks.

  Eventually my attention drifts. It always does.

  I glance at the high windows and then back at Kai. An idea forms. A bad one.

  I clear my throat quietly and start to hum under my breath. Soft enough not to draw attention. Then I add words.

  “Oh little bird with feathers gray,

  You strut and peck and coo all day,

  You dream of skies so wide and free,

  But crumbs are dropped conveniently.”

  Kai freezes mid page.

  I grin and keep going, voice barely above a whisper.

  “You flap and hop with noble flair,

  A fearless king of market square,

  Oh pigeon bold, oh pigeon true,

  The world is wide,

  but bread is too.”

  He finally looks up at me.

  I smile wider.

  “It is a metaphor,” I say helpfully.

  “For what,” he asks.

  “For freedom,” I say. “And discipline. And crumbs.”

  “You are the pigeon,” I say. “Majestic. Focused. Deeply unbothered by my nonsense.”

  He stares at me for a long second. “I am not a pigeon.” Then his mouth twitches despite his best effort.

  “Stop,” he says quietly.

  I lean back, satisfied. “See. You understand art.”

  He shakes his head and goes back to reading, but his shoulders are a little looser now. His foot nudges mine under the table, light and deliberate, like punctuation.

  I open my book again and actually read this time, humming the tune softly in my head.

  Outside the windows, birds lift off from the Academy ledges in a sudden burst of motion.

  I decide not to tell Kai what kind they are.