Suhana sat cross-legged on the cold floor between two tall metal shelves in the university library basement, her laptop balanced on her knees. The paper on postcolonial literature was due at nine in the morning and she had already wasted most of the evening scrolling through half-relevant journals. The main reading halls above had emptied hours ago. Only the emergency lights glowed faintly along the ceiling ducts. She had told herself she would leave by eleven. It was now past midnight.

The overhead fluorescents clicked off one bank at a time. The sudden darkness made her jump. She closed the laptop and stood, brushing dust from her jeans. The staircase door at the far end of the stacks was still unlocked when she had come down. She walked toward it, phone flashlight cutting a thin beam through the gloom.