When your science teacher smashed a frozen rose with a hammer, did you warm the petals to bring them back to life?

Positive.

Maggie tore open the second package, urinated, waited. Positive.

Two then. It was true. Her knees shook. She lowered the toilet seat cover and sat. When her breathing steadied, she rose and got ready for school, taking special care with her makeup. She must be beautiful today.

The science building was only a five-minute walk from the dorm, but she gave herself an extra quarter of an hour. She needed something—some little thing… She was about to cross the street bordering the south side of campus when she saw the guy selling flowers to passing cars. Waving, she ran towards him.

It was a perfect rose, blood red, fragrant, the long stem sprouting several sprays of deep green leaves. She held it at her nose, breathing in the future as her feet carried her toward her lover.

He was in his office, grading papers. He glanced up. “Ms. Adams. My office hours are from three to five.”

She laughed. “So serious, Professor Benton. I just need a moment of your time.” She stroked the petals down his cheek and laid the rose before him on the desk. “I have a surprise, Deke.”

With a snort of annoyance, he shook the rose off the paper he was working on. “This can’t go on, Ms. Adams. I told you that.”

“You’re always saying that,” she murmured as she leaned toward his ear.

He jerked away, stood. “I’m serious. This is highly unethical.”

Tears sprang to her eyes. “But you told me—you told me—“

“I made a mistake.” He gave her a hard stare. “It’s over. Over.” He waved a hand, as if to shoo a fly. “Please take your seat, Ms. Adams. Class is about to begin.”

Maggie hardly remembered going to her regular seat in the front row. It was impossible to think, impossible to concentrate on what Professor Stab-Me-in-the Back was saying. She noticed his gaze traveling again and again to a dark-haired girl in the second row. The girl’s smile widened every time he looked.

Maggie skipped the break, remaining pinned to her seat. He couldn’t. He just couldn’t. Not now. Her head began to pound. She reached absently into her bag for some ibuprofen, stopped as she remembered. God, what was she going to do? She closed her eyes, counted her breaths as the class filed in again. It would be different when he knew. All she had to do was tell him. She felt sicker every time his glance slid again toward the girl in the second row.

Then he was opening a container, releasing a cloud. Liquid nitrogen. He lifted a perfect red rose from the container, showed it around, flicked it with a finger. The ice rose gleamed. He set it on the table by the chalkboard, and with a sly look at Maggie, raised a hammer.

She remained frozen in her seat as the professor left, as the class filed out. Someone shook her arm, once, twice. She looked up at the third shake.

One of her classmates was hunkered beside her, a kid with freckles and light gray eyes behind his glasses. “You okay, Maggie?”

She stared at him, reached out after a moment to retrieve a small scrap of red on his lapel. Still cool, but as she held it between her fingers, it warmed, softened. Tears slid down her cheeks, warm and soft. She brought the fragment to her nose. Still fragrant.

“Tell me what to do to help you, Maggie.” He looked earnest, caring.

She studied him. Can you give me back the rose? she wanted to say. There was no way to undo it, no way to get back to the place she’d been before the freezing, before the shattering.

She squeezed the bit of petal between her fingers, rolled it tight and then flicked it away. She looked into clear gray eyes, sighed, and tried a smile. “How about a cup of coffee?”