Kill Switch by Penelope Douglas

Midnight drives way over the speed limit on a school
night, because we just needed to get out of the house.
She smiled less the older we got, but just now, it came so
easily. I could tell already. She was different.
I descended the steps slowly, one at a time, the auditorium
having emptied a few minutes earlier after her class was over.
She always stayed, though, and graded the pop quizzes after
every lesson for the professor.
Quite the little student now.
“It’s a lot of politics, history, and sociology,” I remarked
on her course list. “Why those classes?”
She shrugged and dropped her eyes, looking thoughtful as
she glanced back at the papers at her seat. She’d done most of
my homework in high school, and it was always well above
passing, so I knew she was smart and a quick learner. It gave
me pause to hear she was in college, though. It never occurred
to me she enjoyed it.
“The world was small growing up,” she finally answered,
looking up at me again. “Now, everything I learn makes it
bigger. I want to know everything. Every person who walked
before me. Every war fought. Every culture that breathes the
same air. I can’t explain it, I just…”
“You just did.” I stopped a few steps up, aggravated even
though I didn’t want to be. I knew she meant me. Even though
she didn’t come to live at my house until she was twelve, I
was part of the reason her world was so small growing up. I
wanted her to be happy, but I hadn’t outgrown that
possessiveness. I still had a hard time being happy that she
was happy, when the reason she was happy wasn’t because of
me.
And this—I looked around the room—it was one more
thing taking her away from me. The bigger her world became,
the farther away from me she got, and out of any emotion that
I avoided, I hated loss the most.
“I’m glad you’re in school,” I told her. “I never imagined
you like this. But it suits you.”