Adam

The university basketball team was his religion, and its captain, Adam, its chief prophet. Girls threw themselves at him, boys aspired to be like him, professors turned a blind eye to minor absences. The only person who looked at him without a hint of admiration was Katie from the law department.

They only crossed paths in the student cafeteria, and every encounter ended the same way: Adam would loudly crack a joke about her perpetually disgruntled demeanor; Katie would pretend not to hear, but then inevitably write a scathing piece for the university newspaper about how athletes were overly forgiven. He considered her a bore, simply jealous of someone else's popularity. She considered him a boy who never grew up.

Everything changed after the winter exam. Adam, accustomed to getting away with everything, failed his history exam. Without a retake, he was suspended from the games. The dean, tired of the teachers' complaints, set a condition: retakes were only possible with a private tutor, and Ketty, the only one willing to work with the captain during the holidays, was assigned as his tutor.

The first lesson took place in the library, empty and quiet.