~🌺Chapter Ten 🌺~
Coming back to campus felt strange. Everything looked the same , the buildings, the paths, even the familiar wind whipping across the quad but the whole atmosphere seemed different. Or maybe it was me who had changed.
Maya was waiting at the door and practically tackled me. "Fellowship winner!" she practically yelled.
"Please, don't start," I said, but I couldn't help smiling.
"Oh, I'm definitely starting," she shot back. "You're stuck with it now."
The fellowship kicked off right away, which meant a flood of emails, meetings, and getting my own set of keys. I was assigned a desk in a shared office, a little name tag taped to the corner. It wasn't fancy, but seeing my name there made my chest do a little squeeze.
In our first meeting, Harrington shook my hand like I was a colleague, not a student. "Well deserved," he said.
"Thank you," I replied. "For... nominating me."
"I just pointed at a door," he said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. I just let it go.
"So, what's next?" I asked.
He paused, looking at me for a moment. "That really depends on what you want."
His question hit me because it was so direct, no hidden agenda. "I want the research to actually matter," I said. "Not just in papers."
He nodded. "Then you'll need more than just good analysis. You'll need people. You'll need collaboration, influence, and a whole lot of patience."
"I'm not great at"
"You're better than you think," he cut me off. "You've been doing it quietly. Now it's time to do it on purpose."
Part of the fellowship meant teaching, and I was assigned to lead discussions for an introductory ethics course. Twice a week, I'd walk into a room full of first-years who looked at me like I held all the answers.
The first class was a bit rough. My voice felt too loud in the quiet room, and I gripped my notes like a lifeline. Then, I switched gears and started asking questions instead of trying to be the star. The students got into it, arguing, disagreeing, surprising each other and, honestly, surprising me.
After one session, a student hung back. "You're good at this," they said.
"At what?" I asked.
"Making it feel like we're actually allowed to think out loud," they replied, and then they were gone before I could say anything. I just stood there, eraser dust on my hands, feeling something finally settle.
A few weeks later, after a departmental seminar, Rowan approached me. She looked as composed as ever, but there was a softer edge to her. "Congratulations," she said. "On the fellowship."
"Thanks," I said. She hesitated for a second. "I owe you an apology. For last semester. I was... not fair."
It was so direct, I wasn't sure how to react. "I appreciate that," I said carefully.
She let out a breath. "I spent so much time trying to prove I belonged that I forgot to just... belong. You didn't have to do all that. You just kept showing up."
I didn't correct her, didn't try to soften it. I just nodded. "We don't have to be friends," she said, almost wryly. "But I'd rather not keep doing whatever we were doing."
"Agreed," I said. And that was that. It wasn't exactly warmth, but it was definitely a relief.
The semester fell into a rhythm: teaching, research meetings, working on drafts, and committee stuff. I was busy, but it felt like the work was actually *going* somewhere, not just filling time. Maya noticed it first. "You're happy," she said one night.
I blinked at her. "I'm what?"
She pointed her fork at me. "Don't play dumb. You're smiling now." I didn't argue, mostly because she was right.
Then, one evening, my phone buzzed with a message I hadn't seen in months. It was from him. *Heard about your fellowship. Congrats. You deserve it.* I stared at it for a long time. A year ago, I would have fired back a response, trying to be gracious, or measured, or mature. I would have tried to prove something. Instead, I just deleted it. It wasn't anger, it was clarity. Maya saw the movement. "You okay?" she asked.
"Yeah," I said. "Actually... yeah."
The fellowship opened doors pretty quickly. A regional conference, a co-authored paper with Harrington, a spot on a committee reviewing department policy. Each opportunity led to another request. And with the new visibility came the usual side noise whispers from people who thought I'd moved too fast, looks that lingered a bit too long. It stung sometimes, but it didn't knock me flat like it used to.
Harrington addressed it directly, like he was stating a fact of nature. "People resent speed," he said. "Especially when it messes with their usual way of seeing things."
"What if they're right?" I asked. "What if I'm not ready?"
He raised an eyebrow. "Do you think anyone is ever really ready before they start?" He let the question hang in the air. "You'll learn because you'll have to."
Mid-semester, the student who had approached me in the library a few months prior asked if I'd mentor her officially. "I want to learn how you think," she said, her voice earnest and steady.
"I'm still figuring things out," I told her.
"That's why I'm asking you," she said. "You remember what it feels like." It was hard to argue with that. We started meeting once a week. At first, it was a little awkward, too polite, too formal. But it loosened up. She'd ask questions, and I'd answer when I could. When I couldn't, I'd help her figure out the next step. One day she asked, "How do you deal with criticism?" I thought for a moment. "I try to keep it focused on the work," I said. "Not on me." She squinted. "Does that work?"
"Not always," I admitted. "But it helps."
Later, I found Harrington alone in his office, staring out the window like he was watching something moving too slowly to see. "You okay?" I asked. He turned, a tiredness around his eyes. "Yes. Just thinking."
"About what?"
"About how quickly things can change," he said. I didn't say anything. He didn't push it. We just let the quiet sit between us.
Spring arrived slowly, almost imperceptibly, changing the campus colours bit by bit. People seemed to wake up again, and even the air felt less sharp. One evening, Maya and I were sitting on the residence roof technically forbidden, but nobody seemed to care if you were quiet. "What do you think you'll be doing in five years?" she asked.
"I don't know," I said.
She laughed. "That's actually comforting, you know. You always look like you have a plan."
"Looking like you have a plan isn't the same as having one," I told her.
"Fair enough," she said. Then, softer, "But what do you want?" I looked out over the campus, watching the lights flicker on one by one. "Something that matters," I said. "Not just in journals. In actual systems. With actual people."
"That's still pretty vague," she said.
"I know." She nudged my shoulder. "Vague is allowed. As long as it's true." We sat in silence for a while, listening to the wind whisper over the rooftops. After a minute, Maya said, "You know what's wild?"