Since her sister disappeared, four years ago, and with the memories of the attack of her uncle to her family; Tina, has changed, she has become shy, fearful, silent, instead of the bold, brave, kind, joyful she showed to be when child; she, unconsciously, protected herself with an armored shell of coldness and indifference; she doesn’t have girlfriends anymore, but she always ’watch’ the girls, wants to be close to them, she definitely send her lesbian vibes to them and sometimes received it from other lesbians; many had attempted to hook up with her, but she always discourage them and most the times ends being friends…, but yes… Tina is very deeply hidden in the closet, which makes her sad and even sullen sometimes.

In the meantime at MIT the professor in charge of the biology courses, Dr. Danika Palmer, has a series of conferences inside and outside the country, so, she can’t lecture all her classes, which she has already distributed among her graduate students; Maura Isles has been chosen to take care of the two and a half-months of teaching in Biology II. Maura is an excellent student and promising researcher, Danika thinks the young graduate student has potential to be a higher level researcher, and she was training her for that. Before Dr. Palmer leaves to her trips, a week previous to the beginning of classes a new student, moving from Texas A&M, her alma mater, entered to her office holding a letter from one of her professors; the student’s name is Christina Kennard, and the letter is from Dr. Malcom Smith, an old Danika’s flame, it was hard for Dr. Smith to phone-call to MIT, but an exceptional student as Miss Kennard deserved that and more; he did all he could to retain the student but Christina has to move one thousand eight hundred fifty four miles north east to continue her studies, and Smith wants to remain in the world around of that promising student and the best way is to connect her with Palmer’s people; the MIT professor was more than delighted when checking the new student’s grades and background; and of course, of talking with her old boyfriend.

After Dr. Palmer spoke with Miss Kennard, her expectations about her increased in an exponential way; then she called Maura, to tell her about the new student, and that afternoon Maura met Tina; when Kennard entered Maura’s station in the lab, the graduate student felt her gaydar’s gauge rose to a very high level, the girl in front of her, was thin but with very well proportioned figure, a little butchy in her clothes and manners but with very nice feminine features in her body, her attitude showed shyness, a little bit of social insecurity, but self-confidence in her academic knowledge, there was something in that girl, maybe a sad secret, or perhaps a hidden pain; whatever it was, it was making Maura feels more than a deep sympathy and the need for protecting her.