Veronica
I stood at the front of the room, adjusting the lapel of my charcoal gray blazer. The air conditioning in the Business Management building was set to its usual freezing point, but the atmosphere inside Room 302 felt heavy with anticipation. Hawak ko ang aking laser pointer, scanning the sea of faces before me.
"Today, we dive into the complexities of Blue Ocean Strategy. How to create uncontested market space and make the competition irrelevant." I started, my voice modulated, professional, and commanding.
Habang nagsasalita ako, I couldn't help but notice the usual patterns. In the front rows, the overachievers were nodding like clockwork, their iPads ready. In the middle, the bored ones were trying to hide their phones behind their bags. But my eyes, almost against my own will, drifted toward the back.
There she was.
She was seated at the very last row, flanked by her two inseparable shadows, the flamboyant Caronan and the perpetually confused Mariano. Compared to the rest of the students who were trying too hard to look professional, she looked... effortless. She was wearing an oversized cream sweater and a pair of simple black-rimmed glasses that should have made her look plain, but instead, they framed her face in a way that highlighted the sharpness of her jawline.
"When we talk about Blue Ocean, we aren't just talking about innovation," I continued, pacing slowly across the platform. "We are talking about value innovation. Creating a leap in value for both buyers and the company."
I watched her. She was bent over her notebook, her hand moving in a steady, rhythmic motion. She wasn’t using a tablet like everyone else, she was using a physical pen. Old school. I like that. Bahagyang nakalaylay ang kaniyang buhok, obscuring part of her face, pero kapag gumagalaw siya para ayusin ang kaniyang salamin, doon lumilitaw ang kaniyang ganda.
She has that nerd aesthetic down to a T, but there's a raw, unpolished elegance to her. Her lips were pressed together in concentration, a tiny crease forming between her brows. It’s a look of pure intellectual focus. Most people would call her a wallflower, pero para sa akin, she was the most interesting person in this room.
My focus was momentarily fractured when she suddenly looked up.
She adjusted her glasses, and for a fleeting second, our eyes met.
I felt a sharp tug in my chest. Even from that distance, I could see the unique hue of her eyes. They weren't just dark, they had this haunting, smoky gray tint to them, like the sky just before a heavy downpour. Ang ganda ng hugis ng mga mata niya, almond-eyed and framed by thick, natural lashes that she probably didn't even realize she had.
I quickly looked away, focusing on a random student in the third row. "Any questions so far?"
Silence. Typical.
"No one? Then let's test your comprehension." I turned back towards the last row, my expression hardening into a mask of professional indifference. "You. Miss... in the back. The one in the cream sweater."
I saw her blink, and I saw her hand stop. She slowly lifted her head, her eyes meeting mine through those thick lenses. There was a flicker of something in her gaze, not exactly fear, but a guarded curiosity. She looked around as if checking if I was talking to someone else.
"Yes, you, Miss," I said, keeping my tone flat.
"Y-Yes, Miss?" she answered, her voice soft but steady. She stood up slowly, her movements graceful despite her obvious shyness.
"Since you’ve been so diligent with your notes, perhaps you can tell the class, based on our previous discussion on Porter’s Five Forces, how would you integrate those into a Blue Ocean framework? Is it even possible, or do they contradict each other?"
