Katie

"Thank you so much for everything Doctor Kat," I say, giving her a hug.

"Oh you're very welcome," she says, "I'm so proud of how quickly you improved Katie, rehabilitation can be really difficult."

She's right though, the past couple weeks have been rough. I was having a lot of difficulty with my left arm and leg after getting the casts off. Doctor Data was right about probably needing therapy afterwards.

Although I suppose therapy wasn't as rough as actually being in that wheelchair for two months. Getting around campus was a huge pain in the ass, luckily Lincoln helped me get around the entire time. I'm glad Doctor Kat is such a kind and supportive physical therapist too.

She walks me to the lobby. "Give me a call if you're having any problems," she says as I leave.

Lincoln is waiting for me in the lobby.

"Well, my last physical therapy appointment is finished, I feel good," I say with a smile.

He pulls me into a hug and kisses my forehead. "I'm really proud of you Katie."

"Will we be able to get back in time?" I ask as I check my phone, it's nearly half past three.

"Yeah I think so, Ray said they should be ready by 4," he says as we head to the car.

__________________

We walk into the club office. Ray, Stephanie, and the head of each department are there. They're sorting through a huge pile of slips of paper on the table into several cardboard boxes labeled with names.

"Hey pres," I say to Ray, "how's the counting going?"

He runs his hand tiredly through his hair. "We're pretty beat. I didn't expect so many club members to actually vote this year."

"I guess that explains why there are so many people in the common area," Lincoln says, peeking through the closed blinds.

I notice Elisha, our head of fundraising, has a couple bandages on her hands. "What happened to your hands?" I ask.

"Paper cuts from all the ballots," she says sheepishly, "why are all the department heads here anyways?"

Lincoln chuckles and pats her back, "There was a cheating incident a couple years ago. We do it like this now to ensure fairness."

"When I agreed to take over as treasurer I wasn't expecting this much manual labor," Stephanie says, rolling her eyes and laughing. I'm happy about how welcoming everyone was towards her.

Lincoln pulls up a chair and starts helping them count ballots. My name is on them so I'm not allowed to watch. I wasn't very confident about running, but everyone insisted, and I take a seat on the sofa instead. The new sofa - Lincoln had the old one thrown out as soon as possible after Ray became president, because of what he suspected had happened on it.

I look at Ray and Lincoln sadly. "I can't believe you guys are graduating in a month! ASA won't be the same without you," I pout.

Ray gives me a weak smile. "We're gonna miss it too," he says, "but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't relieved. Four whole years of this and I'm exhausted."

"Yeah, this year has probably shortened my lifespan by a couple years," Lincoln groans, "what a wild ride."

I laugh, "Fair enough, it was a pretty crazy year."

I yawn. I've been exhausted too. Going to class then physical therapy for over a month was stressful and tiring.

I decide to head downstairs to the Starbucks in this building, everyone in the office looks like they could use a caffeine pickup.

I take out my phone and double check the post.

"ASA will be announcing next year's board today at 5 pm in the common area! We will have a small social event afterwards."

After people found out about what had happened back in December, I haven't been able to show my face around the club members.

That was a rough week. Getting dozens of aggressive messages telling me to leave the club, Anna breaking up with me when people started harassing her too, Lincoln and Ray moving out of the apartment permanently, and Katie, Stephanie, and Tina leaving my life.

As I walk through the student union building, I spot a familiar figure. I quickly stop and hide behind a column by the wall. It's covered with obnoxiously bright flyers and posters. I slightly peek out from behind. Around twenty feet away, I see Katie walking towards the Starbucks nearby me. She's wearing a pink floral dress, and has a sort of happy bounce in her step.

I rotate where I'm standing behind the column as she gets closer so she won't see me. I haven't seen her in months, it's a new semester so I have no idea where her classes are, so there wasn't much use in looking for her on such a huge campus. She steps up to the counter and orders. She's speaking to the barista for an oddly long amount of time, Jesus how much coffee is she even ordering?

She steps to the other side of the counter and waits for her drinks. I really want to talk to her. Maybe I should order something so I have an excuse to stand over there. Just as I build up enough courage to head over, Lincoln shows up. They talk for a little bit before she slightly leans her back into him, and he places one of his hands on her waist. She says something to him and he laughs and kisses her temple.

They look so happy.

It's probably best if I leave.

__________________

I put on a cap tilted low on my forehead and head towards the back of the room, trying to draw as little attention to me as possible. It's not hard though, the room is packed and everyone's talking.

I see the door to the office open. A bunch of people come out and sit down on the sofas with everyone else, while Ray, Lincoln, Stephanie, and Katie stand at the front. I don't think I've seen them in person all together since December.

"Hey everyone, thanks for coming and voting," Ray says. "Votes have been tallied up and we're ready to announce next year's board."

"Before that though," Lincoln says, "we just wanted to say a big thank you for such a good year."

"As most of you know, we hit a rough patch halfway through the year," Katie cringes. "But I'm so proud of everyone for handling the changes in leadership so well, and everything we've done afterwards has gone so smoothly."

"I never intended to be president," Ray says sheepishly, "but I'm grateful for my team who was so supportive, and things turned out better than I could've ever imagined."

"And thank you for being so welcoming towards me as the new treasurer, I had a lot of fun meeting everyone," Stephanie says with a grin. "Now enough stalling, here's next year's board."

"Social media manager, Tiffany Smith."

People clap as Tiffany walks to the front.

"Secretary, Melanie Rodriguez"

She walks to the front and stands next to Tiffany.

"Treasurer, Joe Yin"

He walks to the front and stands next to them.

"President, Katie Sato."

The room erupts into cheers. Katie smiles shyly and Lincoln kisses her cheek. Everyone pulls her into hugs.

Her eyes roam the room and they suddenly lock on me, and we make eye contact. She gives me a look. The same look she gave me at the hospital. It's full of disappointment and pain. She subtly shakes her head at me.

I take that as my cue to leave and quickly slip out the back exit.

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Haven't heard from Jason in a while!

Thanks for reading!