Jess found me on the back steps of the humanities building, a quiet refuge where the lingering heat of the day’s sun still radiated from the concrete. The evening air was a familiar, comforting blend of the institutional scent of vending machine coffee, the fresh cut of mowed grass, and the delicate perfume of lavender. It was the kind of sensory memory that marked the passage of another day at college, days that were slowly filling with hope, replacing the despair and frustration of my first weeks. Jess had been tutoring me on music theory, and her patience made all the difference.

I was lost in my own world, hunched over one of my well-worn notebooks, my head bowed and Dean's zip-up hoodie wrapped around me as if to create a physical barrier against the outside world. My pen scratched rhythmically across the page, my head buzzing with a quiet symphony of creation.

“Tell me you’re writing a breakup anthem,” Jess said, her voice cutting through my focus with its usual vibrant energy. She dropped down beside me with the effortless grace of someone who never questioned her right to occupy any space. It was something I both admired and envied.

I smirked, a small, private gesture that didn't require me to lift my gaze from the page. “More like a pre-heartbreak anthem,” I murmured, the words feeling heavy even before they were fully formed.

Jess raised a perfectly arched eyebrow, a knowing glint in her eyes. “Those are always the best ones,” she declared, her tone suggesting a wealth of experience with such emotional landscapes.

I didn't offer a reply, simply continued my slow, deliberate writing, each stroke of the pen across the paper a careful, almost tender act.

Jess waited, providing a silent, comforting presence. She possessed an incredible gift for silence, for not filling the void with unnecessary chatter, only interjecting when truly needed. It was a rare quality, and one I deeply appreciated.

Eventually, the words found their way out. “Do you ever write something,” I began, my voice barely above a whisper, “and feel like… if you say it out loud, it’ll become too real?”

Jess tilted her head, her expression one of immediate understanding. “All the time,” she confessed. “That’s the reason I write. And the reason I burn half of it.” A faint, almost imperceptible smile touched my lips at her honesty. Then, my voice even softer, I added, “Bastien said something tonight.”

Jess simply nodded, a silent invitation to continue, a quiet assurance that she was there to listen without judgment.

“He said… he sees me.” The words hung in the air between us, fragile and loaded with a complex mix of fear and yearning.

Jess leaned back on her palms, her gaze steady and unwavering. “Because he does,” she stated simply, as if it were the most obvious truth in the world. “I do, too.”

I finally looked up at her, my eyes shadowed by unspoken anxieties. “I'm not really sure if that's a good or bad thing,” I admitted, the vulnerability raw in my voice. “I look in the mirror and don't know what I'm supposed to see.”

Jess gave me a look, one of those piercing, understanding glances that only someone who knew the deepest parts of me could get away with. “What do you want to see?” she pressed, her question gentle but firm.

I frowned, the simple query surprisingly difficult to answer. “The parts that you and Bastien see, I guess.”

“They're the best parts,” Jess responded immediately, her conviction absolute.

I blinked, looking away, a surge of discomfort washing over me. “I don’t know,” I mumbled, the familiar self-doubt creeping in.

“Sure you do,” Jess said gently, her voice both soothing and reassuring. “You just don’t trust it yet.”

The orange glow of the streetlight surrounded us as it buzzed overhead, creating a constant, low sound that  melded with the wail of sirens in the distance. The urban symphony was a reminder that the city never truly slept, only shifted its restless rhythms.

I finally looked back down at the lyrics I’d been meticulously crafting. Scrawled across the page were fragments of my inner turmoil, raw and unpolished:

I don't know… is what I'm feeling right or wrong?
Can't let go. Seems I can't seem to belong...
Does it show?

Jess leaned over, peeking at my work. A soft smile played on her lips. “That one’s gonna hurt in the best way,” she predicted, her voice laced with an uncanny understanding.

I laughed softly, a genuine, unburdened sound. “Hope so.”

She stood, brushing dust and bits of concrete from the back of her jeans, a signal that our quiet moment was drawing to a close. “Let's head inside,” she suggested. “It’s open mic again. You’ll definitely want to hear the kid who covered Calum Scott like his life depended on it. Bastien's already there.”

I remained on the steps for a moment longer, letting her words and the encroaching night settle over me. Perhaps I didn’t have all the answers yet, and the path ahead felt murky and uncertain. But in the quiet assurance of Jess’s words, in the unspoken understanding of Bastien’s gaze, I felt a glimmer of hope. I wanted to find those answers, to discover who I truly was, and I wanted to find them in the best parts of myself, the parts they already seemed to see so clearly.