I was born to be the ultimate rule-follower. I followed rules so strictly that everyone, even my own mother, called me a rigid freak. In elementary school, the policy was: "No entry without a school uniform." One day, my mom lied and told me my uniform shirt got lost in the laundry. I stood outside the school gates for two days and two nights. I refused to walk inside until she bought me a new one. In middle school, my English teacher fainted in the middle of a lesson. I led the entire class in strictly adhering to the "0% head-raising rule during independent study." It took two hours before the principal did a routine sweep, found her, and called an ambulance. In high school, some kids in my class were doing acrobatics off their desks. The teacher filling in next door later screamed at me, asking why I didn't come get him. I calmly explained that school rules prohibited wandering the halls during class, and noise levels could not exceed 60 decibels. The principal was so furious he slapped his own leg. "You didn't think to call 911?! Even commuter students have cell phones!" I raised my hand respectfully. "But school rules state that commuter students are not allowed to use cell phones on campus." The principal's eyes rolled into the back of his head. He ended up getting severely reprimanded by the school board. On graduation day, the entire faculty wept tears of joy as they personally escorted me out the front doors. Then came college. My grandfather was critically ill, and I needed to request an emergency leave of absence to go home. Our academic advisor—a recently hired contractor—had just approved an elaborate vacation request for the class president. But when it was my turn, she lazily tossed my form back. "Denied." I asked sincerely, "Why?" Sarah, inspecting her freshly glued-on acrylic nails and sipping the boba tea the class president, Mark, had just bought her, shot me a sideways glare. "University policy explicitly states that leave requests must be submitted one week in advance with detailed justification. Otherwise, they are void." "You are requesting to leave campus today. The timeline doesn't align." She let out a mocking little laugh. "I mean, it's not entirely impossible to leave right now. A dead body could leave campus immediately." I nodded thoughtfully. If that was the rule, then I absolutely had to follow it. ... I walked over to the window and looked down. Third floor. Roughly thirty feet. Jumping from here would, at most, break my legs. It wouldn't kill me. My grandfather couldn't wait. I needed to find a spot with a 100% fatality rate. The other professors in the faculty office all covered their mouths, trying to hide their laughter. A female professor with glasses frowned in Sarah's direction. "Sarah, aren't you just intentionally making things difficult for the girl?" "What if she actually takes you seriously?" Sarah completely brushed it off. "It was obviously a joke. She managed to get into college, didn't she? Do you really think she's that stupid?" "Besides, administration is cracking down on absences lately. The last approved slot was taken. What am I supposed to do?" The AC unit outside the window buzzed loudly. I didn't catch the rest of their conversation. Mark, the class president, walked back into the office. "Hey Sarah, I need a massive favor!" Sarah’s demeanor instantly flipped. She beamed, her eyes crinkling with warmth. "Ugh, you little brat. I knew you didn't just buy me boba out of the goodness of your heart." "Spit it out, what do you need?!" "Hehe, you know me too well, Sarah!" Mark pulled out another leave request form, casually leaning against her arm with a charming smile. "My buddy Josh wants to tag along on the trip. A beautiful, kind-hearted advisor like you wouldn't say no, right?!" "Pfft, easy—" Sarah started to say, before abruptly stopping. "Ahem. Maya, do you still need something?" I turned back and looked earnestly at Sarah. "Advisor Sarah, were you telling the truth earlier?" Sarah assumed I was being sarcastic and her expression soured. "Of course it's the truth. Why would I lie to you?" "Okay," I nodded. "Since it is a university rule, I will comply." Even though I didn't understand the logic behind the rule. If the rule existed, it was valid. And I must obey it. As I walked out, I heard Sarah complaining to Mark: "Girls these days have absolutely zero self-respect. They'll make up any lie just to go spend the night with their boyfriends." "Guys are so much easier to deal with. At least they're honest!" I walked back into my dorm room. Chloe, the girl in the bed on my left, looked up from her video game. Seeing my empty hands, she frowned. "The advisor didn't approve it?" My expression remained perfectly flat. "No. She said I needed to submit it a week in advance." Emily, the hot-tempered girl across from me, immediately cursed. "That's fucking retarded." "How are you supposed to predict a family death a week in advance? Is she brain-damaged?!" Jessica, the girl in the bed opposite Chloe, patted my shoulder and sighed helplessly. "That's just how she is. Any guy in our class can get a pass to leave at 2 AM, but when it's a girl? Suddenly there are 'no slots left,' or the 'reason isn't valid,' or 'denied.'" "It's just our luck we got stuck with a 'pick-me' advisor." I set my textbooks down on my desk and offered them a small smile. "You can't blame the advisor. She has to follow university rules too. I understand." "Plus, she already told me the authorized method to leave campus without violating protocol." The three of them exchanged confused glances but didn't press further. They assumed I had found someone to cover my classes. I walked out the door. I turned and headed straight for the eight-story science building. The railing on the rooftop was old and severely rusted. It wobbled precariously. My mom sent me a text: [When are you getting here? Your grandfather doesn't have much time.] I replied: [Almost there.] After sending the message. I took a photo from the edge of the roof, looking straight down, and sent it to my advisor. [If I jump, I can leave campus.] It's called documenting the process. Sarah replied almost instantly: [Yep, exactly.] I felt relieved. The railing was a bit high, so it took some effort to climb over. Then, I spread my arms wide. And jumped. Chapter 2: Attending Class with Injuries But I didn't die. I just shattered a massive portion of my skeletal structure. When I fell, I happened to crash directly into a massive industrial dumpster outside the building, terrifying a group of students walking to class. In less than two minutes, half the university administration was on the scene. As I slowly regained consciousness, I heard the dorm mother crying and explaining to someone: "Everyone else was heading to class, but she just kept climbing toward the roof." "I was screaming at her from the courtyard, but it was like she couldn't even hear me." "She just kept muttering something about 'university rules' and 'compliance.'" "If the university hadn't just planted those massive oak trees last month, which broke her fall... she'd be gone." "Dean, did this poor girl suffer some kind of psychological break?" The Dean of Students stood with his hands behind his back, glaring at Sarah. His voice was heavy. "Maya's roommates stated that right before she jumped, she came to you to request an emergency leave, and you denied it." "What was the reason for her request?" Advisor Sarah sounded deeply irritated. "She claimed she needed to go home for a funeral." "But our class president informed me that Maya had actually gotten into a fight with her boyfriend and was just making up an excuse to go move in with him." "Furthermore, her request form was formatted incorrectly, so denying it was entirely within protocol." "Students these days are just way too fragile. Overreacting and jumping off buildings over trivial inconveniences, causing endless headaches for the university." Mark quickly backed her up. "I can testify to that. Maya barely ever talks to guys in our class, and her phone lock screen is literally a picture of her boyfriend." "I was in the office at the time too. She was definitely acting unhinged." I twitched my fingers. But that lock screen... was a picture of the only student from my rural county to ever score a perfect on the SATs. My dad instituted a rule that he was to be my absolute role model, and therefore, every single device background had to be a picture of him. The Dean violently slammed his hand against a nearby desk. "Did I or did I not explicitly tell you that we had a special-needs student enrolling this year, and that you needed to pay exceptionally close attention to her?!" "Did you even bother to read Maya's file?! She suffers from a severe cognitive-linguistic processing disorder! She interprets rules absolutely literally!" "Regardless of the context, the fact is she jumped off a building! If something like this happens again, consider yourself fired!" "I've managed to keep a lid on this for now. Do not notify her parents yet. You fix this." Sarah lowered her head, accepting the reprimand. But internally, she was entirely unconvinced. After the Dean left. Sarah complained to another professor who was also stationed in the hospital room. "Girls these days are so manipulative." "If she actually had a cognitive processing disorder, how is she actively maintaining a romantic relationship like a normal person?" "I honestly prefer dealing with guys. No hidden agendas, no dramatic sensitivity. So much easier." That professor happened to be the woman with glasses from the office that day. Hearing this, she looked hesitant. "Did she... did she jump because you told her that a dead body could leave campus immediately?" Sarah's expression stiffened for a fraction of a second, before quickly returning to normal. "When did I ever say that? Professor Evans, you must be misremembering." "And even if I did, a dead body can leave campus immediately. I wasn't wrong." The room fell silent. Sarah quickly tried to justify herself. "Who on earth would actually kill themselves just to get off campus?" She glanced down at me, still lying with my eyes closed, and rolled her eyes. "If she really follows rules that strictly..." "I should have told her that without an approved doctor's note, she isn't allowed to miss class. Look at her, she's sleeping perfectly fine..." In the afternoon, Sarah got annoyed with waiting and left. But her words began playing on an endless, looping track inside my brain. My entire body felt like it was on fire. My legs, bound in heavy plaster casts, began to uncontrollably shift toward the edge of the bed. I had an intro to philosophy seminar this afternoon. Without an approved doctor's note, I was not allowed to miss class. Chapter 3: The Lame Run Riiiiiiing— The exact second the final tone of the class bell echoed. I pushed the door open. Enduring the horrified, monster-like stares of every single student in the room, I dragged my shattered, mangled leg and limped my way to the seat next to my roommate. The philosophy professor, an elderly man with white hair, literally dropped his dry-erase marker. He took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes in utter disbelief. "Maya? You... you're severely injured! Why are you in class?!" I tilted my head slightly. Sitting perfectly upright, acting as if I couldn't feel a shred of agony. "Professor, I do not possess an approved medical exemption form. University policy dictates that unexcused absences result in a deduction of academic credits." Fresh blood was seeping through the thick layers of bandages wrapped around my leg and foot, pooling darkly. My leg was bent at an unnatural, grotesque angle. And yet, my facial expression remained entirely, terrifyingly serious. Chloe swallowed hard, shrinking away from me in sheer terror. "M... Maya. You fell from the eighth floor. You just woke up. Do you not feel any pain?!" Students all around the room began pulling out their phones to record me. "Holy shit, is she Superman? She jumped off the eighth floor this morning and she's in seminar this afternoon." "Is attendance for this class seriously mandatory under penalty of death? Blink twice if you're being held hostage!" "I heard her boyfriend is forcing her to get an abortion. Did the trauma literally break her brain?" Emily wasn't just confused; she was actively panicking. "How did you even get here?!" "The campus clinic said you have a comminuted fracture in your right leg! They said you couldn't be out of bed for at least three months!" Wave after wave of excruciating, blinding pain surged through my body. I answered honestly: "I walked." A guy sitting in the back row burst into hysterical laughter. "Are you telling me you walked a mile and a half from the campus clinic to the humanities building, and then climbed five flights of stairs?!" "Who are you trying to kid? Is this a medical miracle?!" I turned my head. "I'm not kidding you. I really did walk." The whispering behind me grew louder and more vicious. "She's definitely faking the severity to force the advisor to give her an excused absence." "Seriously, if she actually wanted to die, she wouldn't have picked a spot directly over trees and a dumpster. Hitting the pavement would have been much faster." More and more people began nodding in agreement with that logic. "Advisor Sarah has the worst luck. Getting stuck with a toxic psycho like her." "Manipulative bitch. No wonder her boyfriend dumped her. Someone like this should just be expelled!" My head throbbed with blinding agony. It felt like thousands of needles were being driven directly into my skull. Jessica couldn't handle it anymore. She violently slammed her hands on the desk. "Will you all shut the fuck up?!" "Maya did not jump off a building over a guy!" Another guy, who was notoriously friendly with Sarah, sneered. "The screenshots are already all over the group chats. It's not exactly a secret." "You roommates are all covering for her, and now you're trying to deny it? Don't you think it looks a little pathetic?" Jessica's face flushed crimson with rage, desperate to expose the truth. But the advisor had privately threatened them. If they spoke out of turn, they faced academic suspension. The elderly professor slammed his hand against his podium. "Class has begun! Silence!" I don't know if the adrenaline was wearing off, or if the painkillers had completely failed. The agonizing pressure in my skull intensified a million times over. The pain in my lower half became so unbearable that I bit completely through my tongue just to suppress a scream. And then, my vision went completely black. With a heavy crash, I collapsed face-first onto the desk. Sarah, conducting a routine hall sweep, pushed the classroom door open. She scanned the room. Not immediately spotting me, she let out a quiet sigh of relief. But just as she turned to leave, her eyes swept over the most populated row in the classroom. She barked sharply: "Do some students in this room lack basic respect for their professors? The lecture is ongoing, and you are sleeping at your desk?!" She pointed a rigid finger with absolute, pinpoint accuracy directly at me. "Yes, I am talking to the student in the third row from the back, sleeping on the desk." The elderly professor immediately tried to interject and explain. But Sarah preemptively cut him off: "Stand up. Go to the track and run three laps." Chapter 4: Plunge into the Lake My chaotic, drifting consciousness was violently dragged back to reality. My physical body was screaming in resistance, but my brain absolutely refused to comply. I shot out of the classroom with the speed of an Olympic sprinter. I even collided with Sarah on the way out. She looked incredibly annoyed. "Who the hell was that? Zero manners." The elderly professor slapped his thigh in sheer panic. "That was Maya! I literally sent you a text message about her!" "Don't just stand there! Chase after her!" Sarah completely froze, turning to stone. A few of the guys who were close with her quickly tried to reassure her. "Sarah, that Maya girl is 100% faking it." "Exactly, she's just doing it for attention. Let her act crazy, don't let it stress you out!" But when their group finally arrived at the athletic fields. What they saw was me, dragging my mangled, grotesquely twisted leg, violently hopping and limping my way around the track. A crowd of dozens of students had formed a dense perimeter, holding their phones up to record. Sarah's heart instantly dropped into her stomach. The medical reports were still sitting in her bag. The severity of Maya's injuries was undeniable and entirely real. Did Maya... Did she really jump off a building just because of my joke? In the center of the crowd, the Dean of the College and the Head of Academics were wiping sweat from their foreheads, desperately trying to de-escalate the situation. "Maya, please, if you're upset, just talk to us. We will absolutely solve whatever problem you have." "Just tell us what you need. We'll do whatever it takes to help." I acted as if I couldn't hear a single word. I kept moving. With every agonizing step, fresh blood dripped onto the rubber track. "The advisor stated that sleeping during a lecture requires running three laps on the track. I am complying with university rules." The crowd erupted in absolute shock. "Is this advisor a psychopath? Forcing a student with a shattered leg to run laps?!" "It's not just a shattered leg! That's the girl from the women's dorm who jumped from the eighth floor this morning! She has multiple comminuted fractures across her entire body!" "Tsk, honestly she probably deserves it. Jumping off a building because she got knocked up? She's clearly insane." The Dean's face was blacker than coal. "Where is the advisor responsible for this student?! Get her over here immediately!" Sarah rushed forward, panicking. "Auntie, this has nothing to do with me!" The Dean glared at her, lowering her voice into a furious whisper: "Now that this has blown up into a massive spectacle, you better get out there and convince her to stop." "Otherwise, if she actually dies out here, even with me as your aunt, your career as an advisor is completely over!" "Yes, yes, absolutely!" Sarah agreed instantly. "Mark, come here and help me talk some sense into Maya!" Mark eagerly complied. "On it!" On the surface, Sarah looked careful and concerned, but internally, her mind was racing through a dozen different calculations. "Maya, have you told anyone exactly why you jumped off the building?" My phone was still tucked securely inside my jacket pocket. I hadn't sent a single text message to anyone since the incident. My throat was bubbling with blood. I couldn't speak. I could only shake my head. Sarah let out a massive sigh of relief. The corners of her eyes curved into a venomous, malicious smirk. "I see." "Do you still want to go home?" My dad told me that even if it killed me, I had to come home for the funeral. It was the family rule. I nodded. Sarah let out a heavy, exaggerated sigh. "Well, if you jump into the river right now, and die... you'll be able to go home." My neck instinctively snapped toward the large artificial lake situated just beyond the athletic fields. But my body continued to relentlessly limp along the curve of the track. Mark looked slightly concerned. "Sarah, isn't this going to cause a massive problem?" Sarah rolled her eyes. "What kind of problem?" "I absolutely refuse to believe that someone would actually kill themselves just to follow a rule. If people like that actually existed, they would have died a hundred times over by now." Sure enough, my footsteps didn't falter. I continued my grotesque, agonizing hopping around the track. Mark laughed. "Wow, you're right. She's totally faking it." Sarah scoffed dismissively. "Once she gets tired of running, she'll stop on her own." "Besides, the campus medics are already on standby right there." A few moments later, with a heavy thud, I collapsed onto the synthetic rubber track. The medical team instantly rushed forward and loaded me onto a stretcher. Seeing the crisis resolved, the crowd slowly began to disperse. Sarah rolled her eyes. "Let's go. It's too hot out here." Mark immediately sucked up to her. "You worked so hard today, Sarah. Let me buy you a boba. The usual order?" However. The reason I didn't jump into the lake earlier. Was because I hadn't finished my three laps. Now that the laps were completed, I was officially authorized to leave campus again. I abruptly sat up from the stretcher. And without a single second of hesitation, I threw myself over the retaining wall and plunged directly into the artificial lake.
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