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I could feel my shirt collar doubled up on itself at the back of my neck. The resulting bundle was somewhat small, but it sat on my spine, against the small hairs that were already standing on edge. My hands kept drifting towards the folded fabric, trying in vain to get it to lay flat. They would pat and lightly pull the cloth until it was somewhat in the right position, but the cotton blend would only settle for a moment before it bunched back up.
It had dried that way after I last washed it, I could hear my mother tell me, because I hadn’t hung the shirt properly when I went to air dry it.
It was the sort of lecture she had given me before. She didn’t understand how little I cared about that sort of thing and assumed the answer was in more lectures or rebukes. But really, it just didn’t matter to me. I wasn’t in the line of work where those small details could make or break a career, and honestly, a career that delicate didn’t seem worth having. But above all, a messed-up collar gave me something to fidget with while I waited for Professor Evory.
Fixing that collar was a distraction from the pounding in my heart. The old nerves from my student days had been revived, specifically the anxiety from days when I was the one getting an assignment back. The tension was in the air. The expectation of some sort of reckoning relative to one’s flaws or failures proved suffocating. And in some sense, that was still what I was waiting for. It was just a different sort of test this time around. One that felt more binding and more definitively than those exams and essays.
I kept looking up at the door, anticipating Professor Evory’s arrival. He had told me 11am, which would give us plenty of time to walk over to Bird-Blake Hall together where his class was. We had gone over that plan repeated and likely in too much detail because he knew how anxious I could get.
But even still, I didn’t think he was going to wait until then to drop by. He knew something was wrong, and only I could get him to the bottom of it. It wasn’t even that deep of a bottom. The meeting with Stephen was still fresh in my mind. Its hurts and wounds were still open and raw. That throbbing discomfort proved impossible to hide. Even Chris had seen more of it than I would have liked. The resulting conversation was defined by my frustration and displeasure at that. And for someone who knew me as well as Professor Evory did, I had to assume he had seen everything but had more tact in bringing it up.
Professor Evory did try once, the day before when he stopped by my office to ask which of his instruments I thought he should play for the class as part of his lesson.
“I’m always going to be partial to your trombone,” I said.
He smirked. “That’s what I played during your class, right?”
I nodded.
“Good to know that memory’s still good. But that was also the year I started tap dancing lessons, which I debuted the following semester.”
I crossed my arms over my chest. “You took tap dancing lessons?”
“Still do,” he replied and tried to demonstrate, but with my office carpet, the trick fell flat.
All the same, he chuckled, and his face set in a smirk when that was done. He was clearly proud of himself, and rightfully so. He wasn’t afraid of putting himself out there or of taking anything that might look like a social risk in the right light, which is why I should have expected his next question.
“Did the meeting with your godfather go okay?” he asked.
With that, the air was sucked out of the room. The joy and amusement that came from seeing his rudimentary and foiled tap-dancing routine was suffocated. The lingering wisps of smoke led my eye to his, but I tried to not stare too deeply into them.
But I pursed my lips anyway and tried to answer. “It was alright.”
Professor Evory bristled. He was clearly hoping for a better answer, though I wasn’t sure if he was hoping for one that was more direct or one that pointed to a good outcome, however that was defined. In pursuit of the former, he held his tongue for a moment, trying to figure out what the best approach was. But despite his years of experience, I was a hard person to read.
I ran my tongue over my teeth for a moment, trying to find something that vaguely looked like resolve to be more truthful than I was being. But I didn’t know if I could muster it. I didn’t really know how I felt about the conversation.
Not knowing what else to say, I told Professor Evory the few truths I had. “I don’t know what I was expecting, I guess. I mean the fact that the two of them drifted apart says... something.”
Professor Evory nodded, but of course, his mind latched onto the ambiguity of what I said, the placeholder that could have been the mark of some sort of crisis. He muffled a sigh and returned to his seat, realizing this was going to be a longer conversation than he had first thought.
“What do you think it says?” he asked.
The question was cutting. It stabbed into me and hit something at my very core. There was nothing inherently wrong with it. There was no malice or invasion, but it forced me to think about something I wasn’t ready to. And it made me wonder why Professor Evory was so keen on me going to therapy when it seemed like he could just do it himself.
I pushed my crossed arms against my chest as I took to my own chair. Retreating behind the desk seemed like my best option. It was still overwhelmingly empty, giving him a clear view of me. But even without any visual obstructions, it gave me some sort of protection. Or the perception of such.
He waited for me to speak as I got settled in. There was really no escaping his question. There was no way to avoid this unpacking that he was so keen on me doing.
But the confession came out with a sigh. “It just seems like if you care about your friend or the kid you agreed to be a godparent to, you wouldn’t lose contact so easily.”
Professor Evory nodded. He didn’t try to advocate for the devil, though I knew there was an argument to be had about how much of that lack of contact really was anyone’s choice. Maybe it wasn’t easy, but the past few years had made it easier. It was possible for Stephen to reach out to me before this year, is what I meant, even if I was bad at wording it. And Professor Evory seemed to understand as much.
“So you think he doesn’t care about you?”
I shrugged. “It doesn’t matter if he does,” I tried to say.
But it did matter. It would have been a sign of worth, a sign that I could avoid a certain fate. As it stood, I had nothing of the sort.
“But I don’t think I’m going to hear from him again.”
Professor Evory raised an eyebrow. “That bad, huh?”
I didn’t know, so I focused on what I did. “I mean, if I want to carry a relationship on my back, then we’ll probably stay in touch, but I’m just not in the mood for that.”
And Professor Evory had to accept my assessment. I would be the expert, after all. I was the one who was there. I had witnessed everything. Also, I was the one whose labor was being called into question. It had to be my choice. But he worried as to why I was making said choice. The furrow in his brow gave that thought away. His lips turned over the words of some sort of doubt, some plea that I take heed. But he did not give it air.
He simply nodded. “Well, if you want to talk about it, or anything,” he said.
It was a classic thought on his part. It was the sort of thing he had said to me a thousand times before, and it worked in almost every situation. But right then, it came up short.
Setting aside my bitterness and disappointment, I put on a brave face.
“I know,” I said. “And I appreciate it.”
Both statements were factually true, even if there was more to say. I could have told him that I had every intention of taking him up on that offer. Really, that was what he was hoping to hear. But I didn’t want to lie to him. So I left that part out.
Blessedly, he didn’t seem to notice. He nodded in response to what I said, confirming that he heard me and accepted my remark as some sort of a complete thought. Or a promise, maybe. Maybe it was just a part of the vow he had me take years ago, in that same office but in different seats. It wasn’t written in blood, per say, but there was supposed to be some sort of mutual understanding that it was binding. I had been ready to call it binding, but I wasn’t sure what that meant.
After all, I had learned a lot about the world since then. For example, it is surprisingly easy to make promises when you can’t fathom what life will look like a couple of years out. You are bringing something into an endless void where you know there will be space for it, and said void will swallow it up just like it will swallow everything else. So it fits. It finds some sort of place to park itself. And because it’s a void without nature or character, there’s no picture to try and fit it into. It will always fit, not that you will ever understand how.
Then you find yourself in that moment. You find yourself in that future where the promises you made suddenly matter, and you can see the mess you’ve made for yourself by just constantly kicking things down the road. Once you do, you have to find some way to make it work.
Maybe it should have been obvious, but it wasn’t. The incompatibilities were the only obvious thing. They were all I could see.
I didn’t know how to keep that promise anymore. I never expected to have to keep it this long, but there I was: bound by a simple promise that came up against my urge to not be a burden onto him. I was the connecting piece between two segments of rope being pulled in opposite directions by equally strong superhuman forces. My core was starting to give out. The first threads were starting to snap. One by one they split. Bit by bit I came apart.
But I couldn’t let him see that.