Everything.
Everything.
I’ve seen Jackson as abright, passionate student, one with a craving to learn and an academic drive that reminds me of my own. I’ve seen him when he’s struggling too, angry at the world, testing boundaries and acting out because he’s learned just how unfair life can be.
The version of him I’ve seen this past week is the one I like the least.
He comes to class, and he’sthere. But that’s about it. Always on time, always prepared. He does his work and gets good grades, but there’s something hollow about it all now. Mechanical. As though he’s just going through the motions.
He’s quiet in class. He doesn’t offer answers or insight into any of the questions I pose like he did at the beginning of the semester. He doesn’t talk back or make smartass jokes like he did before that evening in my office. That spark that used to flicker in his eyes when he challenged me—when hedaredme to push him harder—is gone.
He barely looks in my direction.
And when he does…
It’s with narrowed eyes full of his own suspicions.
There’s a wall between us, one I know I put there, but he’sadded more to it, traces of doubt and accusations. In those rare moments I catch him watching me, it’s like he’s waiting for me to slip, trying to piece together a puzzle he’s trying too hard to solve.
It’s a strange kind of punishment, this silence and the suspicions. I tell myself I deserve it. After all, I’m the one who blurred the lines, who gave him reason to question who I really am and what I want from him.
On the other hand, it’s a small comfort that he seems to be so despondent only when he’s in my class, somehow turning the lecture hall itself cold. I’ve passed him a couple of times in the halls talking and laughing animatedly with his friend Bodie, the easy smile that no longer shows up in my classroom lighting up his face.
It’s a relief to see that version of him exists somewhere, even if it’s not around me.
As much as it hurts knowing I’m the reason for that, I know it’s for the best. It’s what I should’ve done from the start—kept a safe distance between us, maintained the line I crossed the moment I let him get too close. Because now I’ve done something I can’t take back.
I’ve tried to convince myself that I can fix it when the semester ends. But deep down, I’m not sure I believe that. I still have my reservations.
Fears.
Ican’tbe with Jackson while he’s still my student. But after that?
While Jackson is not Dylan, what if he leaves too? What if the same thing that happened five years ago happens all over again?
I haven’t wanted to take a risk like this in years, but with Jackson…
Idowant to take the risk. Even if it makes me selfish.
Even if it makes me the bad guy.
My house feels hollow tonight.Empty and silent. The kind of silence that doesn’t invite peace within the solitude but reminds you what you’re missing when you’re all alone.
I’ve been sitting in my study for over an hour, my laptop screen glowing with essays awaiting feedback and grades while the faint lamplight spills across the physical paper of Jackson’s essay on Gilgamesh. I’ve read through it several times since he turned it in, but there’s one part in particular that keeps coming back to me.
“Mortality is the one truth humans can’t bargain with. But it’s not death that destroys us; it’s the loss of meaning. When we lose that, we become empty versions of who we were. Mortality is inevitable, but morality is what decides what’s left of us.”
Those words have been haunting me all night, hitting hard right in the place I’ve been trying not to look too closely.
Morality decides what’s left of us.
What does that say about me?
There’s something raw in the way he wrote this paper, like he bled a little into every word. It’s the kind of writing that lingers, that makes you wonder what the author lost. That makes you reflect on whatyou’velost.
I lean back in my chair, my gaze drifting from Jackson’s essay to the framed photographs mixed in with the books on the shelves. Most of them are old, their colors soft and faded.
My parents’ smiles stare back, frozen in a time that feels impossibly distant. My mother’s laugh, my father’s arm wrapped around her shoulders. Me and my brother holding up the fish we caught after a day of fishing with our dad. My mom and my sister in the garden, the sun behind them too bright for the lens.
