Chapter 5 Obsessed
I’ve been told I can get obsessive.
That was before, back when I still had a zest for life, back when my fixations looked like ambition instead of something closer to neurosis. When something caught my attention, it didn’t just interest me, it swallowed me whole. I’d lock in, hyperfocus. Forget to eat, forget to sleep. It felt good, like being high on purpose. I’d forgotten what that felt like.
Until last night.
Until I went back to grab my bag and found his book sitting there on the seat, abandoned like it hadn’t been clutched moments earlier like it mattered more than oxygen. I stared at it for a second before picking it up. Just a beat. Like touching it too fast would break whatever spell had settled in. The pages smelled like him. Not perfume, nothing intentional, just warm and human.
I flipped it open.
Ryan Ashbrook, Westridge High....it read.
I read the name once, then again. Let it sit on my tongue. Ryan Ashbrook. It fit him. Soft where it needed to be, solid underneath. He looked like a Ryan Ashbrook. I stood there longer than necessary, replaying his face, his hands, the way he bolted like staying would cost him something.
I went home buzzing.
I don’t even remember taking my shoes off. I pulled out my laptop and started digging like a man possessed. Search results, dead ends. Then the school, Westridge High. I checked the Faculty page on the website and there he was.
Ryan Ashbrook. Literature Teacher.
There was a photo beside a short paragraph praising his passion, his rapport with students, his commitment to fostering critical thought. I barely read it at first. I couldn’t stop looking at the picture. He was smiling in it. Bright enough it almost hurt to look at, like catching the sun straight on. It was the kind of smile that made you wonder how someone carried that much light without it spilling everywhere.
I cracked open a beer. Then another. Then another after that.
I did nothing but stare at the screen, reread the paragraph, trace the curve of his mouth with my eyes. Literature teacher,.of course he was. I told myself that I was just riding the old familiar high. But deep down, I knew better.
This wasn’t curiosity.
It was fixation.
And it was that same fixation that made me jot down the school’s address without thinking. The same fixation that had me waking up earlier than I had in months, showering, shaving, actually putting on something that didn’t scream indifference. The same fixation that landed me parked across the street from Westridge High, engine off, hands loose on the wheel like I hadn’t driven here with purpose.
I glance at the passenger seat. The book sits there, innocent and damning all at once. My flimsy excuse. I watch students file through the gates in clusters....laughing, shoving, dragging their feet. I stay where I am, waiting. Is he already inside? Maybe he isn’t coming in today. Maybe I’ve driven all this way just to sit here like an idiot. I run through what I’ll say if he asks what I’m doing here this early. I run through it again and again. Yes, this is stalker behavior. There’s no dressing it up.
I still don’t leave.
Then I see him.....
He comes down the street on a bicycle. A fucking bicycle. Pedaling easy, coat flapping slightly, like he belongs in a different decade where mornings are slower and people still notice things. I stare, a laugh catching somewhere in my chest. It's like he’s too good to rush headfirst into the day the way the rest of us do.
Seeing him again hits all at once, like my body remembers before my brain catches up. Any illusion that I could’ve stayed away dies right there in the street. This was inevitable. I watch him ride closer, watch the way students light up when they spot him. They wave. He waves back, easy and familiar. It looks like something out of one of those feel-good movies I’d never sit through, all warmth and purpose. I can’t stop watching anyway.
I grab the book from the passenger seat and, for reasons I don’t interrogate, check my reflection in the rearview mirror. I glance up just in time to see him slow, hop off the bike, lock it up with practiced ease.
I open the car door and step out. The cold bites immediately. I hate the cold, always have. It feels invasive and unnecessary. Ryan starts toward the gates and I follow without thinking, then slow when a student catches up to him, falling into step at his side. Probably asking a question. Probably talking about an assignment or a deadline or something that feels like the end of the world when you’re seventeen.
I remember his voice. Low and calm. The kind that settles instead of demands. And all I can think, watching them walk ahead of me, is that the kid’s lucky.....getting to hear it this early in the morning, like it’s just part of the day.
I blend into the crowd without trying. Students pour through the gates in loose clusters, voices loud and careless. My eyes never leave him. I track the dark line of his hair, the clean cut of his suit, the way he moves like he already belongs to the place. When I get close to the gates, my gaze flicks around on instinct....security, staff, anyone who might stop me. There’s no one. And even if there were, I know I wouldn’t have turned back. I step onto school grounds like I’ve done it a hundred times before.
The student walking beside him peels away a moment later, veering off toward another building. Ryan keeps going alone now. This is where I could close the distance and catch up. Hand him the book. Get it over with. Deal with the awkwardness that's sure to come afterwards.
I don’t.
I follow him instead.
Inside, the halls are already alive, lockers slamming, shoes squeaking, laughter bouncing off the walls. If anyone notices me, I don’t register it. All I see is him, moving with purpose, briefcase in hand, another dark suit fitting him like it was tailored. His hair catches the light as he turns a corner, gleaming in a way that feels unfair.
He heads into what has to be the staffroom. I slow, then stop just short of the doorway, pressing myself into a corner like I’m hiding from my own reflection. I lean back against the wall, the book heavy under my arm, and drag a hand through my hair.
What the fuck am I doing?
I wait. Count it out in my head. One minute. Two...three.... Long enough to reconsider but not long enough to leave.
I hear footsteps, then the door opens.
Ryan steps back into the hallway, two books in his hands, already reading one as he walks. He doesn’t slow or look up. Just keeps moving, absorbed and alive, exactly the way he looked in that photo.
And without thinking, I push off the wall and follow.