Chapter 3 - Jackson
It’s entirely unfair how hot Professor Kendall looks in those damn suit vests. After about the eightieth time I caught myself staring at him and having that thought, I realized something.
I have a crush on my professor.
I’ve never been attracted to another man, so when I started to realize that’s what was happening whenever I was around Professor Kendall, I can admit it came as a shock. I tried to deny it at first, tried to rationalize it as admiration instead.
But after the eighty-first time, I couldn’t deny it anymore.
Which, I suppose, makes me bisexual.
I’ve been replaying that realization on a loop for the last few weeks, half expecting it to feel strange. But it hasn’t. It just feels true. Unfamiliar, sure, but grounding. Like something that was always there waiting for me to notice.
In a small town where the overwhelming majority of the population tends to be a bunch of homophobic pricks, I wish I could keep denying it.
But I can’t. I can’t even hate myself for it or have some kind of existential crisis over it because, for some reason, it just makes sense.
Lusting over a man was a lot easier to accept than I thought it’d be.
It probably has something to do with the way Professor Kendall looks when he’s teaching, confident and composed.
Hands tucked in his pockets, sleeves rolled up just enough to show the veins in his forearms. He wears those vests like armor—tailored, crisp, and precise—while the rest of us shuffle into class half-awake and crumpled.
Or how every time he and I end up in a conversation during one of his lectures, it’s as if everyone else in the classroom fades away and it becomes just the two of us.
Or that a simple nod or comment of approval from him makes me all warm and fuzzy inside.
I’ve been in his class for a month now, and I’ve never felt as engaged or motivated as I am in his classroom. I’ve always been a good student, but I want to be an even better one for him.
Of course, I don’t plan on actually doing anything about it. Not only is he my professor, but I have a girlfriend.
Speaking of Molly…
I’ve been debating with myself for the past week on if I should tell her I’m bisexual.
I don’t have any plans on acting on that part of it either.
It’s not like I want to experiment while I’m in a committed relationship.
But I also don’t want to keep something like this from her and wait until after we’ve graduated and gotten married and have kids before she finds out. That wouldn’t be fair to her.
I like to believe I’m as good of a boyfriend as I am a student.
But I still have a crush on someone else, so maybe that’s not true.
The least I can do is be halfway honest with my girlfriend.
I decided to try to ease the blow of the news by making dinner tonight. It’s Saturday, and I went grocery shopping earlier this afternoon while Molly was out with one of her girlfriends. I’ve been in the kitchen for the past hour making her favorite—chicken piccata with pasta and spinach.
The apartment smells like garlic and lemon butter. I’m sweating under the bright fluorescent kitchen light, trying to time everything just right. The pan hisses as I add the last squeeze of lemon.
I want everything to be perfect. I don’t want her to remember this conversation as a fight.
I want her to remember that I tried.
The door to the apartment opens, and Molly appears from around the corner on the other side of the bar just as I’m finishing up the food.
“Something smells good,” she says as she sets a couple of shopping bags down on the table in our small dining room. She flips her long, blonde hair over her shoulder as she turns toward me with a smile. “What are you cooking, babe?”
“Your favorite. Chicken piccata.”
I’m feeling pretty proud of myself for about two seconds before her smile turns amused and she says, “That’s not my favorite.”
I freeze with a piece of chicken in the air halfway to her plate.
Fuck.
That’s right. Her favorite is eggplant parmesan.
Getting off to a great start, Jackson.
“I’m sorry. I completely spaced,” I tell her as I finish plating the food. “I guess I’ve just had too much on my mind.”
“It’s okay.” She pushes her bags to the edge of the table before taking a seat. “I like chicken piccata too. You’re a great cook no matter what you’re making.”
I let out a tiny breath and manage a small smile. “Thanks.”
If she can be understanding about this, hopefully she can be just as understanding about what I have to tell her.
As I bring our plates to the table, my stomach twists into knots, full of nerves that have nothing to do with the meal. Maybe I should wait until we’ve eaten. Maybe I should wait until tomorrow.
Maybe I should just—
No.
It’ll only get worse the longer I drag it out.
I take the seat across from her, the table between us feeling like a barricade.
“Molly, there’s something I wanted to tell you.”
Her fork pauses midair. “Okay,” she says slowly, cautiously. “What’s up?”
Taking a breath, I stare down at the food on my plate. It looks and smells delicious, but I suddenly have no appetite, the aroma instead making my stomach turn again.
“It’s nothing bad. Or…I don’t think it is. It’s just something I’ve been figuring out.”
“You’re making me nervous.”
I force myself to look up and meet her blue-eyed gaze. “I’m bisexual,” I blurt. “I only realized it recently. I just…I thought you should know. I didn’t want to feel like I was hiding it from you.”
Silence.
Her fork clinks softly as she sets it down. “Oh.”
The hum of the fridge fills the quiet. The sound of a car passing outside. The faint tick of my mom’s old wall clock. All of it feels painfully loud.
I wait, but she doesn’t say anything else for several long, tense seconds.
Finally, she lets out a shaky breath and forces a small smile that doesn’t quite reach her eyes. “Okay. Wow. Um…I mean, that’s…good that you’re being honest with yourself.”
I want to believe she sounds sincere because I never thought of her as homophobic. My best friend is gay, and she and Bodie have always gotten along well. We’ve both seen the shit he’s had to put up with from too many people in this town, and she’s always seemed supportive.
However, as her face scrunches with whatever thoughts are running through her mind, now I’m not so sure.
“But?” I prompt.
Her fingers start fidgeting with the edge of her napkin. “It’s just…I don’t know, Jackson. I could tell things have been kind of off lately, but I didn’t think it was because of…this.”
“It’s not,” I say quickly. “I mean, it’s not about anyone else or anything. I just didn’t want to keep it from you.”
Maybe I should have.
She bites her lip, looking anywhere but at me. “I just don’t know what that means for us. You say it’s not about anyone else, but someone had to have made you realize this, right?”
Okay, fair point.
“And if you like guys too, that’s kind of like double the competition.”
“Double the competition?” I repeat incredulously.
Okay, so maybe she’s not homophobic, but she might be biphobic. Or maybe I’m just being overly sensitive because all of this is so new.
But to me, it sounds like she just expects me to fall into bed with the first man who shows interest. We’ve been together long enough that she should fucking know me better than that.
“That’s not how it works,” I tell her, my voice starting to rise in volume with how agitated I’m getting.
“I know. I know,” she says, too fast, too defensive. “It’s just…I don’t want to spend the rest of our lives wondering if you’re checking out guys whenever we go out or if you’re going to realize one day that maybe you want something I can’t give you.”
“Molly—”
“Maybe we should take a break.” As she cuts me off, she finally looks up into my face, a sadness and a fear in her eyes. “Just so we can both figure things out.”
There’s no malice in her tone, but the damage has been done.
The realization hits me harder than her words. If she sincerely believes that I’d fuck up a year and a half long relationship just because I might be attracted to men and women, then she clearly never trusted me at all.
I always thought Molly was one of the good ones. However, as I stare at her across the table, her once pretty blue eyes are now filled with something ugly.
I’m seeing her in an entirely new light.
And it’s not flattering.
We’ve been together a fucking year and a half. And, sure, we both admitted moving in together last year was probably going a bit fast, but we were both desperate to get out of our parents’ houses. She wanted to live on her own, wanted more freedom. I just wanted to get away from my dad.
Now it looks like that’s exactly where I’ll be heading back to.
But I can’t even care right now. I don’t feel like fighting this anymore.
“Yeah,” I say as I push my chair back and stand. “That sounds like a great idea.”
She looks surprised, like maybe she expected me to argue. Her eyes follow me as I round the table. “Jackson, wait—”
But I’m already heading for the door. I grab my keys off the counter and pause just long enough to peer back at her. “I’ll be back for my stuff tomorrow.”
With a small nod, she frowns and says, “I’m sorry, Jackson.”
The words hang hollow in the air.
I’m surprised that the fact she doesn’t mean them doesn’t hurt.
I step out into the night, and the quiet hits me hard, but in a way that feels lighter, something similar to relief. Like the space I’ve been carving inside myself finally has room to breathe.
Streetlights blur in the sheen of mist on the pavement as I walk to my car, the air sharp and clean against my skin. The quiet stretches out around me, not empty but open.
For the first time, I don’t feel like I’m running from something. I don’t feel guilty for wanting to stay away instead of fixing things.
There hasn’t been anything to fix for a long time.
I slide into the driver’s seat and rest my hands on the steering wheel, my reflection caught faintly in the windshield. My own eyes look different somehow.
I think of Professor Kendall then, his calm voice, the way he leans against the edge of the podium when he talks about a line of poetry like it’s something sacred.
The thought shouldn’t bring comfort, but it does.
It reminds me that there’s still more to want, more to discover.
That this version of myself doesn’t have to apologize for existing.
As I start the engine, I realize that tonight might not just be the end of something.
Maybe it can be the beginning of something too.