job.”
“I know it’s not,” Summer said.
And that was when it hit.
What he wanted.
Why teaching felt wrong, but being at Albin...
Being at Albin didn’t feel wrong at all.
His heart rose into his throat.
The tiniest flutter of hope went through him, hope and a sense of purpose, elation, lightness.
“But if we could talk...” He scrubbed his sweaty palms against his thighs. “I’d like it to be.”
Walden parted his lips to respond.
Only for an angular, strong shoulder to bump into Summer, hard, nearly knocking him aside as Fox edged through the doorway past him.
And walked away without a backward glance, his stride swift and tight enough to make the few loose tendrils of his hair lash back and forth sharply in his wake, the set of his shoulders hard and taut.
“Fox...?” Summer called.
But Fox didn’t stop.
If anything, his stride only quickened.
Before there came a loud bang, echoing down the hall, as Fox disappeared into the stairwell.
Summer’s heart plummeted.
What was wrong?
Why was Fox...?
He threw a wide-eyed glance back at Lachlan. “Please. Can we talk later? I—I need to—”
He wasn’t expecting the softening of Lachlan’s frigid blue gaze, or the understanding in his voice.
“Go,” he said. “It would appear you have some things to discuss with your mentor.”
Summer took a shaky breath, nodding.
“Thank you,” he rasped.
Before he turned and ran, chasing after his elusive fox with the sudden and terrified feeling that he might have lost him for good.
* * *
Fox Iseya was...
Was an entirely selfish asshole.
And this was why he was so bad for someone like Summer.
He’d known what was coming the second Summer had said he’d known counseling the students wasn’t his job; had looked at Walden with that particular light he got in his eyes when he was terrified but intended to be brave, to take a chance anyway.
Summer wanted the guidance counselor job.
Instead of replacing Fox as the psychology instructor, he wanted the guidance counselor job, which meant...which meant...
Fox couldn’t leave.
He could, he could walk away and leave Albin without a psych instructor for an elective course that was entirely optional despite the AP college credits attached, but whether or not he morally and ethically would was another question.
And that changed everything between himself and Summer, because he had realized, in that moment standing there like a shadow who wasn’t supposed to witness what he was seeing...
That Summer had been his excuse.
Summer was both Fox’s thing to run from...and the excuse that let him run in the first place. Because as long as Summer was his replacement, Fox wasn’t needed here anymore, and he could just...
Go.
Wander into that gray nebulous nothing and disappear. Stop existing. There would be no place for him anymore, and he’d wanted that, but with the idea of Summer shifting tracks into the guidance counselor role suddenly Fox would be here, would be bound by his own sense of responsibility to stay, and if he stayed...
If he stayed, then he would have to love Summer.
He would have to love Summer in the bright, eager way he threw himself at everything, the way he gave his heart without question and without shame, the way he cared so much about other people, the way he fought himself to be brave so often even when it did terrible and terrifying things to him. The sweet way he put up with Fox’s cantankerousness. The way he made Fox want to be bright, too, to remember how it felt to be someone who created things, who helped others, who touched and held and cradled others’ feelings tenderly instead of cutting them off so cold and living numb.
But if he had all of that, he...
He would just lose it again.
Just like he’d lost Michiko.
And if that happened again...
He wouldn’t survive it.
He wouldn’t survive that shattering of his heart a second time.
He sat on the shore of Whitemist Lake, staring into the water as he pulled up flowers, threaded them together, letting his hands move out of habit to give himself something to do. Something to keep himself occupied so his thoughts wouldn’t run in circles as endless as the loops he formed with delicate flower stems.
These hands...these hands had done so many things in his lifetime. Splashed about the shallows of Joudogahama. Drawn kanji in wet sand. Written line after line of intense studious work, throwing himself into his schooling. Learned herbs by touch and texture, by their scent when they bruised, by the softness on the underside of their leaves. Held slender fingers in his own, caressed hair back from a delicate