Chapter 95: One Week

A week before the results, the anxiety comes back.

Not all at once.

Not like before, when it filled every available space and left no room for anything else.

This is quieter, more persistent.

It settles somewhere under everything I do, like a low-frequency sound I can’t quite hear but can’t ignore either.

I notice it when I wake up.

Not immediately, not in that first disoriented moment between sleep and consciousness, but a few seconds after, when my brain catches up and remembers.

One week.

Seven days.

I lie there for a while, staring at the ceiling, trying to figure out if I feel different.

I don’t.

Which is the problem.

Because I should feel done with it by now. The submission is over, the designs are out of my hands, there’s nothing left to revise or fix or improve.

There’s nothing left to do.

And somehow that makes it worse.

I get out of bed anyway.

Routine helps.

Or at least, that’s what I tell myself.

***

I try to sketch.

It used to be automatic, the way my hand would move without hesitation, lines forming before I consciously decided what I was drawing.

Now I hesitate just for a second.

Long enough to think.

*Is this line right?*

It’s a meaningless question, this isn’t for anything, there’s no standard it needs to meet.

I draw it anyway.

Then I erase it, redraw it, adjust the angle, stare at it longer than necessary.

It’s fine.

It was fine the first time.

I know that.

But the thought still lingers, persistent and unnecessary.

*It could be better.*

I flip the page and start something else.

A staircase this time. Clean lines, simple geometry.

Halfway through, I stop.

Not because anything is wrong, but because I’m thinking about the competition again.

About the version I submitted, about whether the proportions were slightly off, about whether the material choice in section three was too conservative.

About whether—

I close the sketchbook.

Set it aside.

This is pointless.

There’s nothing I can change now.

Thinking about it like this doesn’t do anything except make me feel like I missed something.

And I don’t even know *what* I might have missed.

***

I try reading.

That lasts maybe ten minutes.

I get through a page, then realize I haven’t absorbed any of it.

Go back.

Read it again.

Same result.

The words register individually, but they don’t connect into anything meaningful.

My brain keeps drifting back to the same place.

*What if it wasn’t enough?*

I close the book, set it down on the bedside table, stare at it for a moment like it’s personally responsible for this.

It isn’t.

Nothing is.

That’s the frustrating part.

There’s no problem to solve here.

Just waiting.

***

By midday, I’ve already run out of distractions.

The estate is too quiet.

Or maybe I’m just noticing the quiet more.

I walk without really deciding where I’m going.

Down one corridor, then another, past rooms I’ve been in before but don’t really *use.*

The place is large enough that I can keep moving without repeating the same path, but the novelty of that wore off weeks ago.

Now it just feels... excessive.

Too much space for one person with nothing to do.

I end up in the library again, not intentionally.

It just happens.

The door is already open, light spilling in from the tall windows along the far wall.

The shelves are exactly as they always are.

Perfectly organized.

I walk along one row, letting my fingers trail lightly across the spines.

I’m not really looking for anything specific.

Just... looking.

I pull out a book at random.

Flip it open, read a paragraph, close it again, put it back exactly where I found it.

It’s not the book.

It’s me.

I’m not actually trying to read.

I’m trying to *not think.*

Which, predictably, isn’t working.

The restlessness has settled in properly.

Not sharp enough to be panic, not overwhelming enough to be a spiral.

Just constant.

A steady pressure at the back of my mind.

I try to ignore it.

That doesn’t help.

I try to reason with it.

That helps even less.

*You did the work.*

*You checked everything.*

*You submitted something you were confident in.*

All of that is true.

Objectively.

But it doesn’t make the feeling go away.

Because the problem isn’t logic.

It’s the fact that I don’t know what’s going to happen.

And I hate not knowing.

***

I think about messaging someone.

Then don’t.

I don’t even know what I’d say.

*I’m waiting for competition results and it’s making me slightly unbearable to myself.*

That doesn’t feel like something that needs to be shared.

It’s not dramatic enough to justify it, not serious enough to require help.

Just... irritating.

Manageable.

I should be able to handle this on my own.

I always have before.

That thought sticks with me longer than it should.

I always have before.

Something about it feels off.

Not wrong, just incomplete.

I don’t follow that line of thinking any further.

I don’t want to examine it too closely.

***

Night comes slowly.

The estate gets quieter, or maybe I just notice the quiet more when it’s dark.

I change, get into bed, and lie on my back staring at the ceiling again.

Exactly like this morning, except now there’s a full day between then and now, and nothing has actually changed.

The anxiety is still there.

Still quiet, still persistent, still pointless.

One week.

I try to imagine how I’ll feel when the results come out.

Relieved, maybe, or disappointed, or nothing at all.

That last possibility sits strangely with me.

The idea that this thing I’ve spent months working toward could end with... nothing.

No reaction, no shift, just continuation.

I turn onto my side and close my eyes, open them again almost immediately.

Sleep doesn’t come easily.

Not tonight.

My brain won’t settle.

It keeps circling back.

Not to specific flaws, not to concrete mistakes, just to the idea that something might be wrong.

Something I didn’t catch, something I can’t fix now even if I knew what it was.

I exhale slowly.

Try to let it go.

It doesn’t go.

It just... fades slightly.

Enough that I can pretend it’s manageable.

Enough that I can lie here and wait for sleep to eventually take over.

Eventually, it does.

Not cleanly or peacefully.

But it’s enough.

Because thinking about this any longer won’t change anything.

And right now, that’s the part I need to accept.

Even if I don’t like it.