I … have no words.

“So he’s gonna end up eaten anyway?” someone behind me shouts, and I giggle.

Leila rolls her eyes. “It’s a metaphor. A hard truth.”

“That’s certainly … interesting.” Professor McPherson offers an exaggerated nod.

“Thank you so much!” Leila beams before bowing.

“What’s the trope you chose?” one of the juniors asks.

Leila moves strands of her wavy brown hair behind her ear. “I was thinking the Eat Pray Love journey. The whole, like, journey in search of the self. Very existential. Very representative of our modern culture and collective unhappiness.”

She doesn’t seem to notice that’s not really a trope and more of a cliché.

Professor McPherson eyes her and makes a note in her pad.

The juniors lead the class in applauding her.

I swear I’m not bitter.

“Who’s next?” Professor asks. “How about you, Gray?” When people laugh, she adds. “Relax, I know his name is Chase. Can I joke?”

My legs wobble as I rise to my feet and move to the front of the room, passing Leila, who offers a tight-lipped smile.

I take a deep breath. “Have you ever had one of those electricity charged moments that changes your entire life, even if it looks like something small from the outside? One of those moments that forever alters your body chemistry? That’s something I tried to capture with this.” I pause so I don’t trip over my words. I try to make eye contact with each of the juniors so they can feel my sincerity. “My flip animation is called ‘The Prince Who Captured Lightning.’ It’s a fairy tale. I’d like to read the intro to you first, if that’s okay, Professor.”

I look for her approval, and she gives a terse nod. I clear my throat and launch into it. I wrote the intro yesterday after I animated my flip-book—when I couldn’t stop thinking about Jack and rereading the poem he texted me.

My flip starts with a bird’s-eye view of the Prince, looking down at his cupped hands. As the pages turn, it zooms in on a close-up of his hands until the only image on the page is that of a personified lightning bolt with dotted black eyes and a zigzag smile.

Sparks shoot from the Prince’s fingers.

The insides of his fingers are tattooed with Lichtenberg figures.

“Wow,” one of the juniors says. She has light-brown skin and long, pin-straight black hair that shines under the fluorescent lighting. “I love the shading you did there to represent the glow of the spark.”

“And the story was beautiful,” adds another junior with rich dark skin and piercing green eyes. She gives me a thumbs-up.

Leila’s hand shoots in the air. “I mean, I can obviously see the trope. Or tropessssss.” She lingers on the s, and I squirm. “You got a prince meeting his true love, a wicked witch, a fabled once-upon-a-time beginning, star-crossed lovers. Like, pick a struggle.”

Professor McPherson bites the inside of her cheek and narrows her eyes at Leila before moving her gaze to focus on me. “What say you to that?”