Page 19

Eliana

I was currently sitting next to Violet as Bethany introduced Katherine Fisher as the guest speaker for today. Violet scored us seats close to the front of the room; close enough to see Katherine give me a small smile from the stage.

Katherine’s talk goes by in a flash and I line up behind a group of faculty who approach her, listening in to them to discuss future directions and potential collaborations.

Violet comes with me for moral support, and before I know it, we get so distracted talking about the latest episode of Selling Sunset that neither of us realizes most of the room has cleared out.

Luckily for me, Katherine has still stayed behind, leaving me with the perfect chance to speak to her without an audience. “Hi Katherine. I’m Eliana.”

“Hi Eliana! I was hoping we’d get to meet in person before you started. We’re so excited to have you this summer.” She gives me a warm smile. “So, what do you think about the work we’re doing in the lab? Any immediate interests?”

“It was amazing. I’m curious if you think a social reward might be more enticing to adolescents, rather than the monetary ones used. Do you feel like their responses would have been different?”

“That’s an interesting question. I have some initial ideas, but maybe we could talk more later about how we could test that in an experiment. Why don’t you shoot me an email? Normally I’d offer to stick around and chat, but I promised my son I’d grab dinner with him.”

“Of course. I’ll definitely be in contact! Does your son go to Westchester?” I realize I know nothing about Katherine outside of being a researcher.

“He sure does. Though I know Westchester is a large school, so I wouldn’t expect you to know him.”

That’s fair especially given psychology is one of the more popular majors.

There was also the chance that he wasn’t a psych major.

That’d be surprising, given who his mom is, but I could also respect wanting to carve out your own niche.

I couldn’t imagine the pressure that came with being Katherine Fisher’s son. “Is he in psychology?”

“Nope. My two daughters are but he’s the rebel of the family. Decided to follow his own path, and I couldn’t be any prouder of him for pursuing his own dreams.” She beams, the unconditional love coming through on her face.

My heart clenches, “He sounds great. Maybe one day our paths will cross.”

“Why don’t I introduce you two? That’s him right there.” She walks over to the door where I see an incredibly tall blonde leaning against the wall with his back to us. That slouch looks oddly familiar.

The mass of a man turns around and I’m met with a set of piercing blue eyes and a sharp jaw that I know was toned over years of sweet talking. I blink once. Then twice. “ Jake is your son?! ” The shock flies out of my mouth before I can stop it.

“Eliana?” His eyes flash between me and his mom and widen as he realizes we’ve been talking to each other.

Katherine wraps around her son, giving him a big hug topped off with a kiss on his cheek. “Hi Mom.” I expect him to be more embarrassed, like any other college boy being smothered by his mother, but he just returns her hug.

“Well, I was just about to introduce my new summer intern Eliana, but it seems you two have already met.”

Huh. Never in a million years would I have guessed that I was tutoring Katherine Fisher’s son.

I figured that boy would get all of the psych support he needed, but maybe she was too busy.

He confessed it’s hard for him to ask for help, so maybe working with a tutor seemed easier than going to his parents.

“How do you two know each other?” Katherine asks.

Easy enough of a question. “Oh, I’m Jake’s t?—”

“GIRLFRIEND. She’s my girlfriend.”