The immediate aftermath of the competition was a flurry of activity, but Mia knew her final task awaited. Back in Kris's temporary office, the silence felt heavy. She handed him her detailed report, her critique of the event, and his performance. He took it, his eyes scanning her neat handwriting.
"Well, Assistant," Kris said, breaking the silence, his voice a low rumble. "The week is over. The bet is settled. You've fulfilled your duties admirably." He looked up, his gaze locking onto hers. The usual challenge in his eyes was still there, but it was layered with something new, something deeper. "So. What now?"
Mia felt a sudden rush of emotion, a culmination of the week's bewildering interactions. "What now?" she repeated, her voice betraying the tremor in her hands. "I don't know, Kris. I honestly don't know. This week... It's been more than just a bet, hasn't it?" The lines between hatred and something else had blurred so much, she could barely tell where one began and the other ended.
Kris's gaze intensified, a rare vulnerability creeping into his expression. He ran a hand through his hair, a gesture Mia now recognized as a sign of his internal struggle. "No," he admitted, his voice barely above a whisper. "It hasn't. And... honestly, this event, this week, has been more stressful than anything I've handled alone before." He paused, his eyes flickering away for a second before meeting hers again, a raw honesty in their depths.
"My father... he has incredibly high expectations. Everything I do, every competition, every grade, it's all part of a path he's laid out. I've always managed, always delivered, but this... this was the first time I was solely responsible for something of this scale. No safety net, no senior oversight." He clenched his jaw. "And then Dean Harrison dropped it all on me last minute. It's one thing to meet my dad's expectations when I've had months to plan, but this past week... it felt like I was constantly walking a tightrope. The pressure to not just succeed, but to make it perfect... it was immense."
He looked at her, his usual impenetrable facade momentarily crumbled, revealing the raw anxiety beneath. "I never thought I could handle all this responsibility, not truly, not alone. And the club president's trust, on top of everything... it just added to it." He gestured vaguely at the now quiet auditorium. "How this turned out, how I turned out... it was a complete unknown until now. And it was incredibly stressful." He exhaled slowly, the weight of his admission hanging in the air between them.