Page 67 of Deeply Examined

I’m here forher.

Jessica.

The woman who loves me, and I love her back.

The spring musical is coming up in one week, but the drama teacher, Mrs. Fletcher, tripped down a flight of stairs and busted her hip. Jessica, being the angel she is, offered to take over as director. This year the musical isWicked, and that’s why my condo is now filled with songs about “defying gravity” as Jessica panic crams the lyrics, memorizing them. Rehearsals every night last from the end of school until 9:00, sometimes 10:00 p.m. This means that Jessica spends over fifteen hours a day here on campus.

At first I stayed home, but that’s a lot of hours away from my girl. Too many hours. If I want to see her—which I do—it dawned on me thatIneed to come toher. It took twenty minutes to drive here and exactly five minutes before she put me to work.

“West,” Jessica had called, raising her voice to be heard over the obnoxious squeaking of the cadet band as they warmed up. “Could you help the set design team? They need to move some heavy pieces of furniture.”

“Fine,” I’d grumbled, not excited to be the servant of some pimply-faced sixteen-year-old. “Moving furniture” quickly turned out to be rearranging a two-dimensional version of the Emerald City, complete with a Yellow Brick Road. In my teenage years, when I was desperate for money, I’d worked every job imaginable, including construction, so on my third trip to rehearsal, when the Yellow Brick Road crumbled for the fifth time and pieces of mortar landed on Jessica’s still-healing feet, I’d finally had it. I’d plucked a hammer out of a kid’s hand and had barked orders, sending the rest of the kids scrambling.

“You,” I’d pointed, “nose-ring girl, get me a measuring tape, and you, redhead with the bad attitude, we need a level. This wall is crooked. That’s why it keeps falling over.”

The redhead, who I later learned was named Steven, stuck his lower lip out pouting, but he did as I asked. Next thing I know, I’m spending lunch hour in the hospital drawing blueprints for a pulley system that will magically, and safely, hoist the main actress into the air so she can fly on her broomstick. A few days later, forty-eight high schoolers burst into awed applause when it actually works, and the Wicked Witch soars high above their heads.

“Good job, Adam,” said Jessica, slipping her hand into mine. It wasn’t until hours later, when I was buried inside her, that I realized I hadn’t flinched when she’d said my name. I hadn’t broken apart, fallen to pieces. For the first time, that name didn’t cut—it stitched something back together.

“Thank you,” I’d whispered to the heavens as she shattered beneath me, shuddering and moaning. “Thank you for sending her to me.” Later, when she drifted off in my arms, in my bed, where she now sleeps every night, I stared at her for over an hour, filled with wonder that someone as miraculous as her was destined for someone as flawed as me.

Now, it’s past 10:30 p.m. The students have left. Jessica and I are cleaning up, stacking chairs on top of one another until they make a wobbling tower as tall as my chest.

“They like you,” Jessica says after we’re done.

“Who?”

That bright laugh of hers. “The kids.”

I do a double take, to make sure she’s serious. “Really?”

“Yes, really. They look up to you. I can tell. Oh!” Her eyes light up the way they do when she’s excited about something. “I know! You should come talk to them!”

I wave at the now-empty stage. “I’ve been talking to them. Every night for the past week. It’s excruciating.”

She laughs again. “No, I mean come to my classroom. Tell them about how you came from humble beginnings, just like them, but you made it. Now you’re educated and successful. You could be an inspiration to them. Show how they can build a better life.”

I snort. “I’m not an inspiration toanyone.”

She frowns at that, deep creases at the corners of her mouth. “West,” she says in a scolding tone, the one that usually makes me relent.

“Okay. Fine.” I hold up a hand. “Maybe I’ll do it.” She’s more correct than she’ll ever know. I understandexactlywhat it takes to come from this school and end up with a stable life. Still, I hesitate. “Are you sure? I’m so bossy with them, the kids.” I haven’t bothered to baby any of her students, but I haven’t talked down to them either. I’ve found myself teaching them as I worked beside them. Showing them how to use a plane to shave off curling pieces of wood until it’s straight and true.

“Mmm,” murmurs Jessica, lifting up on her toes to kiss me, her lips soft. She leaves behind the faint taste of cherry Chapstick. “I personally love it when you take control.”

Her words head straight to my dick, which twitches as I visualize all the ways I’d like to control her.

“It’s fun when you take charge too,” I remind her, thinking of how much more assertive she’s become in the bedroom recently. It sparks a feeling of pride in me, to think how over eight months ago she couldn’t even say the word “pussy” out loud.

We grin at each other, the connection between us humming and alive.

“Say you’ll do it,” she says, breaking the silence. “You’ll come talk to my classroom. We can schedule it for the first day back after spring break. You said you’re off that week.”

“Okay, I’ll be there.”

“Promise?”

“I promise,” I say, knowing I’d do anything she asked.

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