The answer appeared instantly: — AZ-ray .

The next morning, Maria stood before her class. “According to ASHRAE Standard 55—” she began, hitting the word cleanly.

“Ash-ray?” she whispered. No, that sounded like a celebrity’s child. “Ash-ree?” Too close to “ashy.” “A-S-H-R-A-E?” Spelling it felt like defeat.

Her professor smiled. Someone in the back nodded.

In the fluorescent-lit silence of the university library’s engineering section, Maria stared at the acronym on her screen: .

She leaned back and laughed. All this time, she’d been avoiding the name of the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers in conversations, nodding vaguely when professors mentioned it. Once, she’d even said “Ash-rah-ee” in a study group and watched someone’s eye twitch.

Frustrated, she typed into the search bar: ashrae pronunciation .