"Environmental policy."
"Same thing." He picks his phone back up. "I'll order food. You want pad thai?"
"Get whatever you want."
"I always get whatever I want. That's my whole personality."
I grab my jacket, my keys, my wallet. At the door I look back. He's already burrowed into the pillows, his hair fanned across the one that smells most like me. The nest has grown since he built it. New blankets, a throw pillow he stole from his apartment, a candle on the nightstand that he swears "sets the vibe." His stuff mixed with mine, layered and tangled, the whole room smelling like both of us so thoroughly that I can't tell where he ends and I begin.
This is what we've built. Quietly, carefully, in stolen hours between his classes and my sections. I go to campus, I teach, I grade, I'm professional. I come home and he's here, or he shows up later with food and opinions, and the door closes and we're just us. No titles, no power dynamics. Just mates in a nest that smells right.
"Hurry back," he says, not looking up. "The nest gets cold without you."
I close the door behind me and drive to the department mixer already counting the minutes until I can come home. Which is a problem, because this is exactly the kind of thing I'm not supposed to feel about a student in my section.
The mixer is at Dr. Chester's house. Wine, cheese, the usual crowd of faculty pretending they don't have favorites among the grad students. I end up near the kitchen island talking carbon policy journal submissions with two professors who keep interrupting each other. Marcus from my cohort tells a joke I barely hear. I nod at the right moment, take a sip of wine, and check my phone under the counter.
A photo from Jude: the Thai food spread across the coffee table, two green curries, a message that saysgot extra rice because I love you and also because I'm starving.He's never said that before. The "I love you" buried in a text about rice, casual, like it's obvious, like it doesn't rearrange every molecule in my body.
I'm smiling at my phone like a fool when someone says my name.
"Calder."
Dr. Albright is standing next to me at the kitchen island. She's holding a glass of red wine and she's got that look, the one that makes grad students confess to plagiarism they didn't commit. She's mid-fifties, sharp, built the environmental policy program from the ground up. I respect her enormously. She also terrifies me.
"Dr. Albright. Good to see you."
"Enjoying the evening?"
"Always nice to catch up with the department."
She nods. Takes a sip of wine. Her eyes flick down to my phone, which I've already locked, but the gesture feels deliberate. Everything about Albright feels deliberate.
"I've been meaning to check in with you," she says. "Your section evaluations are strong this semester. Students seem engaged."
"Thank you. I've been—"
"You seem very invested in your Gen Ed students' progress." She pauses. The pause is the weapon. "Particularly Mr. Park. I hear he's been coming to your office hours quite regularly."
My whole body goes still.
"He came once," I say. My voice is steady, which is a miracle. "He had questions about his response paper."
"Of course." She smiles. It doesn't reach her eyes. "I only mention it because people notice these things, Calder. You have a promising career ahead of you. I'd hate to see anything complicate that."
She pats my arm, takes her wine, and walks over to chat with Dr. Chester. The whole exchange lasts maybe ninety seconds. It feels like being put through a shredder.
I leave twenty minutes later. I don't remember driving home. I don't remember parking, climbing the stairs, unlocking the door. I sit on the couch in my button-down and stare at the wall and replay those sentences on a loop.
People notice these things.
I'd hate to see anything complicate that.
The apartment smells like Jude. Like us. His mug is in the dish rack. His phone charger is plugged in by the bed. His shampoo is in my shower. And somewhere in this building, Dr. Albright's polite, surgical warning is still echoing in my skull, and I'm doing the math on how many things I'm about to lose.
My phone sits on the coffee table. I should call someone. My brother, my parents, one of my grad school friends. Someone who can think clearly, because right now my brain is stuck on Albright's smile and the phrasepeople noticeand the very specific image of losing my position, my references, my program, everything I've spent three years building.
And then the lock turns. The front door opens. Jude walks in carrying the Thai food, wearing my flannel, and the sight of himmakes my chest crack open and my stomach drop at the same time.
