Her muscles tensed under his touch, and she stood up and stepped aside. “Yeah, I got it,” she said, fixing the bobby pin that held her bangs away from her face. “Geez, why is it so hot out here? Isn’t is supposed to be winter?”
“Do you want to put your sweatshirt inside before we go?” he asked, gesturing to their dorm building behind them.
“Nah, I’m fine. Let’s go,” she decided, starting down the sidewalk to the walking trail.
He ran to catch up with her. “So, why didn’t you go to the Academic Fair?”
“I didn’t really need to,” she said as they jogged. “I already knew I wanted to write music, so it seemed like a waste of time.”
He shook his head, in awe of her certainty. “Man, I’m so jealous of that.”
“Of what?”
“Being so sure,” he said. “I’m so much older than you, and I still have no idea what I want to do with my life.”
“You’re not that much older than me,” she retorted with a snort.
“How old are you?” he asked.
“Twenty-six.”
“Really?” he replied, trying to do the math of how old the average Junior in college is supposed to be. Definitely a few years younger than that, he determined. “Huh,” he muttered, wondering why the long gap between high school and college. “Well, still. I need to figure this stuff out while I still have the time, so I’m going.”
“Have fun with that,” she chuckled, stifling his hope that she would join him at the Fair. Given that she was a Junior and he was a Freshman, they didn’t have any classes together. When he heard that the Academic Fair was open to all students, he had hoped that meant they could go together, but apparently Jenna had different plans.
“I will,” he replied.
After his run with Jenna, Jacob headed back to his room for a quick shower and grabbed a power bar from his backpack before heading to the gym for the Fair.
It was an open-house-style event, with students and teachers and parents coming and going throughout the day, so at 10am, the crowds were already insane. The ratio of floor space to bodies crammed into the gym elicited his anxiety, so he decided to check the list of classes at the first administration booth, as most people seemed to bypass that station. Given that the entire Fair was optional, nobody wanted to spend the Friday after midterms in a classroom. Well, with the exception of….
“Callie?” Jacob asked as he stepped up to the administration booth.
She peeked up from her meticulously organized binder. “Jacob! Hey! What classes are you doing? They have a list here, and you can sign up for as many as you want.”
He laughed at her excitement. He had never seen her this energetic before, flipping through the color-coded tabs of her binder and jotting down the times and classrooms for each course on the list at the booth.
“I’m not sure yet,” he said, picking up the sheet of paper to get a closer look.
Callie stepped closer to him, her eyes never leaving the paper as she continued to record the list in her notes.
He held it closer for her to see. “Which ones are you doing?”
“Um…,” she paused and flipped to the front of her binder, her finger scanning down the list. “First up is Social Work. I’m taking Intro to Social Work next semester, so I figured it would be good to meet the Professor and get a feel for the class.”
He smirked at her over-achieving nature. “Yeah, that’s a great idea.”
“And then I’m gonna try to fit in as many as I can after that,” she shrugged. “Although, some of them are at the same time, so I’ll have to choose between them,” she frowned.
He looked over the list of courses for the day. Brief introductions to social work, nursing, history, teaching, math, science. He was waiting for something to jump off the page, demanding his attention and screaming “this is it!” but the words stayed flat and still on the bland, black and white page.
“Maybe I’ll join you,” he decided. He wasn’t entirely sure what “social work” was, but he had no desire to weave his way through the crowds to visit the booths in the gym, so he decided maybe Callie’s over-zealous plan for the day was the best route. “I mean, if that’s alright with you,” he added, not wanting to insert himself in her plans if she didn’t want him there. She was always friendly, but now that Jenna had pointed it out, he couldn’t un-see the unrequited longing that often touched her eyes when she looked at him.
Thankfully for him, though, Callie was far too captivated by the full day ahead of her to pay him much attention. She just answered, “Yeah, of course!” and went back to organizing her self-made class schedule for the day.
Once she finished recording the class list in her binder, they made their way to Module 2, where the typical white plastic tables had been traded for a circle of folding chairs. A gray-haired woman in a tweed skirt-suit with a large, peacock broach on the lapel was standing at the head of the circle.
“Come in, come in!” she greeted them with an inviting grin, waving them inside to join the other two students already seated around the circle.
Callie walked straight up to the professor to introduce herself. Jacob could have done without that part, but being that they entered together, it seemed rude not to follow suit. The woman – Professor Stein, he now knew – gave him a weak handshake with her cold, soft palm.
Once they took their seats, the professor shut the door and began the introduction of the course.
“Good morning, everyone. My name is Professor Janet Stein,” she began, slowly scrawling her name in barely-legible cursive on the white board. “And I’m here today to talk to you about why you should choose Social Work as your major,” she pointed her marker at the students with an Uncle Sam severity, made comical by her tiny, frail frame.
“So, some of you might be wondering,” she put her hands on her hips and put on her best petulant teenager voice, “what’s the difference between Social Work and Psychology, anyway?”
Jacob smirked and Callie chuckled, already furiously scribbling notes in her binder. On what, he hadn’t a clue, since the professor had yet to tell them anything but her name.
“Well, that’s a good question!” Professor Stein encouraged with a smile. “Who here has visited a psychologist?” she asked, raising her hand in demonstration.
Jacob’s face flushed, and he glanced around the room. The girl across the circle from him was looking around as well, but the boy beside her was picking at his nails, barely paying attention, and Callie was still writing away in her notes.
“Oh, come on, now, don’t be shy. There’s nothing to be ashamed of,” the professor encouraged.
She looked around the circle, her eyes landing on Jacob, and he slowly raised his hand a foot from his lap. When he did, he noticed the girl across from him follow suit.
“Very good!” the professor said. “So, you’re familiar with what a psychologist does,” she continued.
Callie’s hand hesitated on her notepad as she peeked over at Jacob. He tried to pretend he didn’t notice, and she went back to writing.
“Most people are more familiar with that picture. A lot of what we see in movies – individuals attending therapy sessions, marriage counseling, neurologists researching the way the brain works – all of that would typically fall under the category of Psychology,” she explained. “The main point in which Social Work differs is that Social Workers generally work with the family or community as a whole, rather than just the individual.