Shreya stood outside the computer lab on the second floor of the Science block at Lucknow University, phone in hand, refreshing her email for the third time in ten minutes. The deadline for the Environmental Studies assignment was midnight. Professor Mehra had been clear: no extensions, no excuses. The paper was worth thirty percent of the internal marks. Shreya had opened the Word document three days ago, typed her name and the title, then closed it. She had better things to do—late nights at the hostel common room, scrolling reels, letting boys buy her chai and then leaving them hard and frustrated when she decided she was bored.