26.
···
By the time I found parking, I had already convinced myself three separate times that I was going to be late.
I wasn't.
I was twenty minutes early.
Still, I checked the time again before shutting my car off, staring at the numbers on the dashboard as if they might suddenly change.
8:40.
My first class started at nine.
I exhaled and leaned back against the seat.
"Okay."
The word sounded ridiculous in the empty car.
My bag sat upright in the passenger seat, packed since last night with considerably more supplies than any one person could reasonably need for a single class.
The planner I'd spent too much time picking out was tucked inside beside two notebooks, a folder, my laptop and an entire pouch of pens and highlighters that had seemed completely necessary in the store.
Today, it all felt a little excessive.
I reached for my phone instead.
There hadn't been anything else from Rodney since his message last week. I didn't go back to the house within the given time frame and was expecting more threats, but he finally took the hint.
I'd spent enough time thinking about what he meant by come home that I'd eventually stopped trying to decide. Whatever Rodney wanted from me wasn't changing where I needed to be this morning.
I opened Grant's messages.
I stared at it for half a second before adding another.
His response came before I'd even finished putting my phone into my bag.
Another bubble appeared beneath it.
I smiled.
I slipped my phone into my bag before I could find another reason to sit there.
Outside, campus was already busy. Students moved along the sidewalks in small groups, some walking quickly enough that I assumed they actually were late, others standing around with coffees and laptops tucked beneath their arms.
I fell into the flow of everyone heading toward the buildings, adjusting the strap of my bag higher onto my shoulder.
It had been years since I'd walked onto a campus because I belonged there.
I'd attended enough universities as First Lady to know what it felt like to arrive at one. I'd given speeches, sat through panels, toured buildings and smiled beside administrators while students watched from behind whatever security perimeter had been created for me.
This was different.
There wasn't a podium waiting for me.
Nobody had sent me talking points.
I wasn't here because Rodney's schedule said I should be.
I was here because I'd applied.
Because Georgetown had looked at my application and decided I deserved a seat.
Remembering that helped until I walked into the building and realized I was going to be okay.
Eventually, I found the classroom. A few people were already inside when I stepped through the door. Conversations carried quietly across the room while students settled in, laptops opening and coffee cups finding whatever small amount of desk space wasn't already occupied by books.
I hesitated near the entrance.
I chose a seat several rows from the front, close enough that I could see without looking overeager, but far enough back that I wouldn't be directly underneath the professor's nose.
Perfect.
I sat down and started unpacking.
Laptop.
Notebook.
One pen.
Then another because the first one suddenly didn't feel right.
I slipped the scrunchie from my hair and wrapped it around my wrist before smoothing my hair down around my shoulders. More students filtered in as nine approached, filling the seats around me until the scattered conversations blended into one steady hum.
A few people recognized me.
I could tell.
There was a particular kind of double take people did when they knew my face but hadn't expected to see it in front of them. Most were polite enough to look away afterward. One woman two rows ahead whispered something to the man beside her before both of them glanced back.
I pretended not to notice.
I'd gotten good at that.
At exactly nine, the woman I'd been waiting to see walked into the room.
Professor Camille Platek.
I straightened without meaning to.
She looked almost exactly like the faculty photograph I'd found online, only younger somehow. Her locs were pulled away from her face, and a pair of glasses rested low on her nose as she set a leather bag beside the podium.
I'd looked her up almost immediately after receiving my schedule.
Professor Platek had spent years working in civil rights litigation before entering academia, and I'd gone down an embarrassing rabbit hole reading about her cases and published work.
Finding out that one of my first professors would be a Black woman with the kind of career I'd only recently allowed myself to imagine having had made me even more excited about starting.
She didn't waste much time settling in.
"Good morning."
The conversations around me quieted.
"I'm Professor Platek. Welcome to Constitutional Law."
She introduced herself briefly before explaining what she expected from us. The class wouldn't be about memorizing cases and repeating holdings back to her. She expected us to understand how law developed, who benefited from it, who didn't and what happened when legal principles met actual people.
I liked her immediately.
Which made what happened next considerably more uncomfortable.
Professor Platek glanced down at the roster on her desk.
"This is an interesting cohort."
A few people shifted around me.
"You'll be learning alongside people from different academic backgrounds, different parts of the country and, undoubtedly, very different political perspectives."
Her gaze traveled across the room as she spoke.
Then stopped on me.
"And apparently, this year, our cohort will be accompanied by the First Lady of the United States."
The room changed. The sudden awareness of several heads turning in my direction at once.
My stomach tightened.
Professor Platek's expression hadn't changed, but there was something about the way she'd said First Lady that I couldn't quite place.
Not admiration.
Certainly not excitement.
Maybe nothing.
Maybe I was already searching for something that wasn't there.
I gave the room a small smile and lifted my hand in an awkward half-wave.
"Hi."
A couple people smiled.
Someone near the front gave me a polite nod.
Most simply looked.
Professor Platek moved on.
"Regardless of whatever positions, titles or experiences brought any of you into this room, once you're here, you're students. I expect the same preparation from every person sitting in front of me."
Her eyes passed over me once more.
"The same standards apply to everyone."
My smile disappeared.
I wasn't sure whether that was supposed to reassure me.
I told myself it did.
Professor Platek began walking us through the structure of the course, and I tried to focus on what she was saying. I opened the syllabus on my laptop and started making notes.
For a while, it worked.
Then Professor Platek shifted from the mechanics of the class into why constitutional law mattered in the first place.
"The Constitution doesn't exist separately from politics," she explained.
"And despite what you'll sometimes hear, neither does constitutional interpretation. Judges are human. Legislators are human. Presidents are human. Every institution we're going to discuss this semester is made up of people carrying their own ideologies, interests and biases."
Someone near the front raised their hand.
Professor Platek nodded toward him.
"So how much are we going to be discussing current politics? Because it seems impossible not to."
"It is impossible not to," she said. "But there's a difference between analyzing government action and turning my classroom into a social media debate. If you make an argument in here, you're going to support it."
I followed most of the conversation carefully, listening as people began testing how comfortable they were speaking in front of one another.
Then race entered the conversation.
It wasn't abrupt. We were already discussing how constitutional protections could exist on paper while producing different realities depending on who was interpreting and enforcing them.
A student across the aisle spoke next.
"I think part of the problem is pretending institutions are neutral just because they're institutions."
Professor Platek nodded for her to continue.
The woman shifted in her seat.
"You can have laws that supposedly protect everybody and still put incompetent people in positions of power who openly say racist things, support policies that disproportionately hurt minorities and then hide behind the legitimacy of their office."
Something tightened in my stomach.
I knew where this was going before she ever looked at me.
"And what makes it worse," she continued, "is when people from the communities being affected stand beside them and help legitimize it."
There it was.
Her eyes flicked toward me.
Only briefly.
Long enough.
The room seemed to notice at the same time I did.
The woman beside me shifted slightly in her seat.
My fingers found the scrunchie around my wrist.
I pulled it away from my skin.
Let it go.
The elastic snapped lightly against the inside of my wrist.
There were several responses sitting somewhere inside me.
I could've told her I didn't agree with majority of the things Rodney said. I could've told her she'd never sat at a dinner table with him while he explained exactly what would happen if I disagreed with him publicly.
I could've told everyone in this room that standing beside someone didn't always mean you stood with them.
Instead, I said nothing.
Because what was I supposed to say?
My husband is abusive, so please don't associate me with his politics?
My fingers pulled the scrunchie again.
Snap.
Heat crept slowly up my neck.
I hated that feeling.
The awareness of being looked at without actually catching anyone looking.
The room suddenly felt smaller than it had ten minutes ago.
Professor Platek watched the student for another moment.