We hear people shuffling behind us, so we move to the final room of the exhibit, which is accessible by a crawl-through hole in the wall. The floor of the gallery has been transformed by synthetic grass, and there are giant beanbag chairs around the perimeter. We’re still on our knees when I look up and see vines of icicle lights hanging from the ceiling, and in the center of the room is a giant plasma globe with pink and purple electricity emanating from its nucleus.

“I think we’re meant to sit and look up,” I whisper.

Jack flips over and lies flat on his back, hands behind his head as if we’re outside on the grass under the stars.

Suddenly speakers play the sound of rain, and a machine puffs out air that smells of freshly cut grass and wet earth. The plasma globe zaps high-voltage charges toward the surface of the globe, and it looks like lightning.

Jack reaches to touch it, concentrating all the electric discharge to his fingers as if he’s holding lightning.

I turn to him, eyes closed, and whisper, “Everyone always says it is lucky to be struck by lightning. Nobody ever tells you how to live once you’ve been struck. All I know is that it is impossible to harness.”

His hand slowly drifts down to his side, and he turns to face me. “My poem. You—”

“Memorized it, yeah.” My voice is shaking.

“Why?”

“Because you wrote it.”

“Damn it, Chase.” He reaches around me and pulls me close.

“You inspire me,” I breathe into his chest, against the fabric of his shirt. “Come with me. I want to show you something.”

I pull him to his feet and don’t tell him where we’re going until we get to the visual arts building.

It’s late, so the building is empty; all the classrooms are dark. They keep the studios accessible for students who want to work well into the night.

“Hey, isn’t that your not-friend?” Jack points into one of the only lit rooms, and I spot Leila in a dirty smock, hair tied up into a messy bun as sweat drips off her brow. Her arms and hands are caked in a layer of gray clay as she molds something shapeless that, once it’s done, I’m certain will be breathtaking.

I yank Jack out of view, not wanting to stop and make small talk. I’m on a mission.

“Where are we going?” he asks.

“Patience,” I say, rounding a corner to a windowless studio for solitary work, sort of like those soundless Do Not Disturb rooms on the fifth floor of the library where students work and never know what time of day it is. It houses our portfolios, the big stuff we don’t want to cart around campus.