The first thing Aria Sen noticed that morning was the blinking notification on her cracked Redmi screen.
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She rubbed her eyes, sat up cross-legged on the bed, and blinked again. This couldn't be real. She had posted that blog rant only last night, around 2 a.m., half-dead from coffee and Maggi.
"Influencers," she had typed angrily. "People who spend more time choosing filters than reading actual books. Perfect hair, perfect captions, perfect lies. Honestly, I'd rather read the back of a Parle-G packet."
It was supposed to be harmless—her little vent space that hardly anyone read. But the internet in India has no chill.
Now, scrolling through the replies, her stomach tightened.
> "Arre wah, finally someone spoke up."
"Full respect, yaar. You called out P.V."
"Obviously about Pooja Verma, who else?"
Aria groaned and flopped back on the pillow. She hadn't even mentioned the name. But of course everyone thought of her—the university's poster girl, the social media darling with half a million followers, the one whose face stared at you from fest posters and café ads.
Great. Just great.
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By the time she entered class, the gossip had already spread. Heads turned as she walked in, half-hidden in her oversized kurta and jhola bag. Some looked amused, others sympathetic. A few just smirked.
The lecture hall smelled of chai and dust, fans whirring overhead. Students filled the benches in little cliques. And right in the middle sat Pooja Verma.
Aria couldn't ignore her even if she wanted to.
Hair perfectly blow-dried, kajal sharp, outfit branded but casual enough to look "effortless." Pooja was laughing at something a boy said, nails tapping lightly on her phone. Even her laugh carried across the room, clear as a bell.
Aria's instinct screamed: Sit at the back. Blend in. Don't even look at her.
Too late.
Pooja's eyes lifted, sharp and unblinking. For one terrifying second, their gazes locked.
Aria quickly slid into a corner seat and buried her face in her notebook. Relax. She doesn't know it was you. She can't prove anything.
" Miss Sen."
The voice rang out smooth and sure.
Aria's pen froze mid-word.
"Aria Sen," Pooja repeated, lips curving into a smile that was sweet only on the surface. "I read your midnight blog post."
The class went silent. Even the ceiling fan seemed to be hesitated.
Aria looked up slowly. Pooja was watching her, head tilted, eyes glittering like glass.
"Tell me, yaar," Pooja continued, tone honeyed but sharp. "Was that supposed to be about me? Or do we have other plastic influencers hiding in the English department?"
A couple of boys chuckled nervously. Someone whispered, "Lag gayi."
Aria's face burned. Every nerve screamed at her to deny it. But something stubborn rose in her chest.
"Maybe," she said, voice steady, "it was about people who think likes are the same as talent."
The class gasped.
Pooja's smile didn't fade. She rose gracefully and walked over, heels clicking on the tiled floor. The air felt heavier with every step.
She stopped beside Aria's desk. Leaned slightly forward. Her perfume was expensive, the kind that lingered.
"You've got a sharp tongue," she said softly. "But it's dangerous, na? Hiding behind a screen."
Aria forced herself to meet her eyes. "At least I don't need filters to sound smart."
The silence that followed crackled with tension.
And then—Pooja laughed. A light, amused laugh that wasn't cruel, but wasn't warm either. The kind of laugh that said game on.
"This will be fun," she murmured, almost like a promise. Then, close enough that only Aria could hear, she whispered, "You'll regret every word, Sen."
With that, she turned and walked back to her seat, as if nothing had happened.
The professor entered. The lecture began. But Aria couldn't hear a thing. Her pulse was still hammering, her notebook filled with nonsense scribbles.
Around her, whispers buzzed, eyes darted, smirks spread.
And inside her head, one thought refused to go away.
This girl is going to ruin me.
What Aria didn't see was the flicker of excitement in Pooja Verma's eyes.
For the first time in weeks, the queen bee wasn't bored.
And that made her far more dangerous than anyone realised.
The murmurs in the lecture hall refused to die down. Aria could hear her own words being repeated in low voices—plastic smiles, manufactured lives, spotlight princess. The phrases that had come so easily at two in the morning were now weapons being swung around her, detached from her intent, exaggerated with every whisper.
Her pen tapped against the notebook, faster than she realised. She wasn't afraid, not exactly, but she was aware of how fragile her armour was. One careless word, one misplaced expression, and the whole class would devour it like hungry crows.
From the corner of her eye, she saw three girls clustered around a phone, giggling. One of them glanced at Pooja and quickly hid the screen. Aria didn't need to see it to know what they were sharing—a screenshot of her blog plastered with emojis, captions like savage queen and this is about HER, right?? circulating already.
Social media was ruthless in its speed. By the time the lecture ended, the entire Arts Faculty would know. By evening, probably half the campus.
Aria tried to steady her breathing. It doesn't matter. I stand by what I wrote. It wasn't personal. It was truth.
But her conviction wavered when she felt Pooja's gaze sweep across the room. Not glaring, just watching. It was worse than anger. Pooja Verma didn't need to raise her voice to dominate a space. She simply existed, and everyone else rearranged themselves around her presence.
Aria hated that. She hated how easily people followed glamour, how they bent towards the shine of perfectly styled hair and curated smiles. She hated even more that some part of her….. noticed.
When the professor finally began the lecture, droning on about post-colonial narratives, Aria couldn't focus. Every mention of "representation" and "voice" seemed to mock her. Her notebook filled with doodles instead of notes—sharp, jagged lines that cut across the page.