Page 6

Chapter six

Bad Reputation

T he problem with small college campuses is that gossip spreads faster than Victorian-era cholera. By Monday morning, three separate versions of Saturday night's party at the hockey house were circulating through Preston University's rumor mill, each more outrageous than the last.

The whispers followed me through the quad, growing louder with each passing group of students:

"Did you hear? Jack Morrison threw this insane party. “I heard he actually drove someone's BMW into the fountain... "No, no, he got into this huge fight with the football team... "My roommate's cousin said he broke Sarah Thompson's heart. You know, the swimmer?"

I tried not to care. I had more important things to focus on - like the Victorian medical text waiting for cataloging or the paper on 19th-century surgical innovations due next week. But my phone kept buzzing with updates from the campus gossip Twitter account, each notification more ridiculous than the last.

This is exactly why you made all those rules, I reminded myself as I scrolled through yet another thread about his exploits. He's the kind of guy who treats hearts like library books – something to be checked out and returned damaged.

The library study room felt smaller than usual that Tuesday evening, the tension palpable as Jack slouched into his chair fifteen minutes late. His copy of "Jane Eyre" looked suspiciously well-worn for someone who supposedly spent his weekend destroying campus property.

"Did you really put someone's car in the fountain?" I asked, trying to sound casual and probably failing spectacularly.

Jack looked up from his book, his jaw tight. The fluorescent lights caught the edges of a bruise near his collar - from fighting or hockey, I couldn't tell anymore. "Thought you didn't listen to gossip."

"I don't. But when the dean emails the entire classics department about proper fountain etiquette—"

"Why do you care?" He shut his book with more force than nineteenth-century literature deserved. The sound echoed in the small room, making a freshman at the next table jump. "Doesn't fit your neat little rules? Your perfect organized world where everyone behaves as they should?"

Because I spent all weekend thinking about how carefully you handled those museum pieces. Because I can't reconcile that Jack with this one. Because maybe I want the rumors to be false and that terrifies me.

"I care because I'm supposed to be helping you maintain academic eligibility, not watching you self-destruct over some girl—"

"Some girl?" His laugh was harsh, nothing like the warm sound I'd heard in the museum. He stood up abruptly, sending his chair scraping across the floor. "You really believe everything you hear, don't you? Miss Perfect Sophie Chen, judging from her ivory tower of dental tools and Victorian literature."

A group of students at nearby tables looked up at the commotion. One girl was already typing furiously on her phone, probably adding to the campus gossip mill: "Jack Morrison fights with tutor in library - romance gone wrong?"

"At least I'm not the one with a Twitter account dedicated to my bad decisions!"

The silence that followed was deafening. Jack stood up slowly, and for the first time, I saw real anger in his eyes. Not the performative kind he used to maintain his reputation, but something raw and genuine that made me want to take a step back.

"You want to know the truth?" His voice was dangerously quiet, barely carrying across the study table between us. "I was working at the bookstore Saturday night. Because that's not just my job – it's my mandatory work study. Part of my disciplinary probation."

He yanked up his sleeve, revealing a time card stamped with Saturday's date. The movement made his shirt pull tight across his shoulders, but for once, I wasn't distracted by that.

The time card showed an eight-hour shift, spanning the exact hours of the alleged party destruction.

Wait, what? My carefully constructed narrative wobbled like a poorly organized display case.

"Yeah," he continued, pacing in our small study room, running his hands through his hair in a way that looked less calculated and more genuinely agitated. "Turns out when you get caught breaking into the library at 3 AM, they don't just let it go, even if you're the hockey team captain. Even if you were only there because—" He stopped abruptly, turning to stare out the window.

"Because what?"

The silence stretched between us, punctuated only by the soft whir of the library's ancient heating system and the muffled whispers of students pretending not to eavesdrop.

He spun back to face me. "Because I needed to use the rare books room for research. My dyslexia's worse at the end of the semester, and the quiet helps. But try explaining that to campus security."

I sat there, processing. The infamous library break-in last semester had been attributed to a party gone wrong. The official report mentioned alcohol, vandalism, and a stolen mascot costume. But now...

"Why didn't you just request access? The library has accommodations—"

"Right, because what I need is more people knowing the hockey team captain can barely read under pressure." His bitter laugh hurt something in my chest. He grabbed his leather jacket from the back of his chair, the movement sharp with frustration. "Better to be the bad boy who breaks rules than the guy who needs help."

A few books tumbled from the table. I reached for them at the same time he did, our hands colliding.

"Jack—"

"Don't." He straightened, shoving his books into his bag with none of the care I'd seen him show in the museum. "I don't need your pity."

"It's not pity. I just... I didn't know."

And isn't that the problem? How many other things don't I know? How many assumptions have I made based on campus gossip and carefully maintained reputations?

"No, you didn't. Because you decided who I was the moment you saw me. Bad boy, party animal, another dumb jock breaking hearts and rules." He shoved his books in his bag with enough force to make the table shake. "Guess what? Sometimes people live up to their reputations because it's easier than fighting them."

Like uptight museum girls who make rules about everything because it's easier than admitting they might be wrong about someone?

"The car in the fountain—"

"Was the football team. But hey, blame the guy with the record, right?" He headed for the door, his boots echoing on the library's wooden floors. Several students quickly pretended to be absorbed in their books as he passed. "You know what's funny? I actually thought you might be different. Might see past the reputation. My mistake."

"Wait," I stood up, my chair scraping loudly against the floor. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have assumed—"

"Rule 335, remember?" His smile was sharp enough to cut. "No personal discussions."

He left, the door closing behind him with a finality that felt like punctuation. Through the window, I watched him cross the quad, students parting before him like water. His shoulders were tight with tension, none of his usual performative swagger in sight.

The library seemed too quiet now. Too empty. The stack of Victorian literature on our table looked accusatory, especially his copy of "Wuthering Heights" with its careful annotations about social class and identity.

The rest of the week passed in a blur of awkward silence and rigid professionalism. Jack showed up exactly on time to our sessions, answered questions perfectly, and maintained exact rule-mandated distance. It was horrible.

By Friday night, I couldn't take it anymore. I found myself at the campus bookstore, hovering near the classics section like a Victorian ghost haunting its former library. Jack was shelving books, steadfastly ignoring me. The store was empty except for us and a bored-looking cashier who was too engrossed in her phone to notice the tension crackling through the aisles.

"I saw you," I said finally, breaking the silence that hung heavy between shelves of leather-bound classics. "Last Saturday. Through the window."

He paused, a copy of "Paradise Lost" in his hands. Fitting. The lamplight caught the gold lettering on its spine, matching the flecks in his eyes that he quickly turned away.

"You were reorganizing the rare books section," I continued. My voice sounded too loud in the quiet store. "Color-coding the reference system. At 2 AM."

The only response was the soft thud of books being shelved, methodically, precisely, with none of the carelessness his reputation would suggest.

"Maybe I was drunk." His voice was flat, but his hands betrayed him, treating each volume with careful reverence.

"You were wearing reading glasses and had three different colors of sticky notes."

He finally looked at me. He looked younger in the warm bookstore lighting, without his usual performative smirk. More real. "Are you going somewhere with this?"

"I'm trying to say I was wrong," I said quietly. The words echoed slightly in the empty store. "About you. About a lot of things."

A customer wandered into our aisle, took one look at the tension between us, and promptly found somewhere else to be.

"Careful," his voice was rough. "You're dangerously close to violating Rule 335."

"Maybe some rules need to be broken."

He stared at me for a long moment, then turned back to his shelving. "You should go."

"Jack—"

"Please."

I left, but not before seeing him pull out his reading glasses and a pack of sticky notes. I watched him work through the window - methodically organizing, carefully labeling, completely at odds with the chaos he was supposed to represent.

The next day, the Victorian literature section had a new organizational system cross-referenced by theme and historical context. Each book bore a small sticky note with reading notes, cross-references, and suggested companion texts. The handwriting was familiar - the same careful script I'd seen in the margins of his "Wuthering Heights."

That night, I pulled out my phone and typed a simple message:

"The Victorian literature section looks better organized than most doctoral dissertations. I have questions about your classification system for the Gothic novels."

Three minutes passed. Four. Five. The typing indicator appeared and disappeared several times, like someone starting and stopping a confession.

Finally: "Rule 335. No personal discussions."

I looked at his response for a long moment, then typed:

"This is purely academic. Besides, I thought you were a rule breaker."

The response came faster this time:

"Tomorrow. 2 AM. Bring coffee."

The campus rumor mill was already buzzing with a new story: Jack Morrison, spotted in the library at midnight, reorganizing the entire Victorian literature section. Some said he was plotting something. Others whispered about a lost bet. A few suggested he'd finally cracked under academic pressure.

But I knew better now.

I knew about the dyslexia.

Knew about the late-night studying.

Knew that sometimes reputations were just convenient masks for the things we didn't want others to see.

My phone buzzed again. This time, a photo: a carefully annotated page of "Wuthering Heights," with a sticky note that read, "Some characters are worth a second look."

I smiled and replied: "Some people too."

The next day, a new Twitter account appeared: "Jack Morrison's Literary Hot Takes." The first post was a surprisingly insightful analysis of social mobility in Victorian literature, complete with color-coded citations.

The campus couldn't decide which was more shocking: that Jack Morrison had secret literary opinions or that those opinions were actually good.

Two days later, the football team took credit for the fountain incident, but hardly anyone noticed. They were too busy discussing Jack's thread about parallel themes in Gothic literature and modern sports narratives.

And if anyone noticed that the campus bad boy now spent his Saturday nights organizing books instead of breaking rules, well, some reputations were worth changing.

Some stories were worth rewriting.

And some people were worth the effort of a second look.

Even if they came with leather jackets and literary annotations.

Even if they broke rules and quoted Keats.

Even if they made you question everything you thought you knew about them.

I saved his number under "Victorian Literature Consultant.”

He saved mine under "Dental Tool Wielding Literary Critic."

Sometimes, the best stories are the ones that don't fit the narrative.

The bookstore became our unofficial meeting spot. Late nights among the classics, coffee cups balanced precariously on stacks of first editions, discussions that wandered from Victorian literature to hockey strategies to the proper way to organize medical texts.

And if anyone thought it was strange to see the hockey captain and the museum girl debating literature at 2 AM... well, some reputations were better off broken.