In our yard, there is a young apple tree planted in memory of Jacob Freytes.
It does not offer much shade yet. Its branches are still small, and no one passing by could see the roots quietly taking hold beneath the soil. But we know they are there.

I often think about how much of a child’s story exists beneath the surface too.
There are children who move easily through school—children whose strengths are immediately visible, whose needs fit comfortably within established routines, and whose behavior rarely asks adults to look more deeply.

Then there are children who become known first by what they struggle with.

They may be remembered for the work they did not complete, the rule they did not follow, the emotion they could not contain, or the moment they disrupted a classroom. Their hardest moments can become the lens through which everything else about them is seen.

But a child is never only the most difficult moment of his day.

My son Ethan understood that about his friend Jacob.

When I asked Ethan how he would describe Jacob to someone who never had the chance to know him, his answer was simple:

“He was funny, kind, a good friend—and he struggled, just like the rest of us.”

That last part matters.

Jacob struggled, but struggle was not the whole of him. Beneath it was a boy who was funny and athletic, who loved football, basketball, LEGO, and Ninjago. Physical education was one of the places where he and Ethan felt happiest together. Jacob also possessed another unmistakable gift: he could make people laugh.

One of Ethan’s favorite memories happened in their Social Studies classroom. Jacob suddenly stood up and performed what Ethan calls “the thank-you dance.” Ethan still laughs when he remembers it—not because the story is especially elaborate, but because Jacob had a way of turning an ordinary moment into joy.

Joy is the word Ethan uses most often when he describes their friendship.

“He made you laugh, and he wanted to make you feel good,” Ethan told me.

The boys spent hours together on FaceTime. Sometimes they vented about school. Mostly, they made ridiculous faces and played a game they had invented: each would try to take a screenshot of the other before he could jump out of view. If you captured the picture in time, you earned a point.

There was nothing complicated about those moments. They were simply two children being silly, safe, and entirely themselves.

During Jacob’s first visit to our home, I asked the boys if they wanted to play Bananagrams with me at the coffee table in the living room. Ethan looked mortified. Like many middle schoolers, he seemed certain that playing a word game with his friend’s mother was an impossibly uncool suggestion. But Jacob surprised him. He was immediately enthusiastic and eager to include me.

There was another reason the moment stayed with me. Ethan has dyslexia, and Bananagrams—a game built around letters and spelling—had always been difficult for him. But that day, for the first time, Ethan was the one who knew how to play. He explained the rules to Jacob, modeled what to do, and helped him when he struggled.

Jacob looked at Ethan as though he were the smartest person at the table.

For a child who was accustomed to feeling defined by what was difficult for him, being seen that way was transformative. Jacob gave Ethan the chance to recognize something in himself that school had not always reflected back to him: that he was knowledgeable, capable, and someone another person could learn from.

Something took root between them that day.

As they played, both boys were able to become more than the things they struggled with—and to see that possibility in each other.

Ethan saw something especially rare in Jacob.

“He could tell my emotions,” he said. “He was aware. He was caring and supportive.”

Jacob never made Ethan feel ashamed for being emotional. When Ethan was upset, Jacob did not avoid him or make fun of him. He noticed. He asked what was wrong. He offered support and then tried to make Ethan laugh.

That is a remarkable kind of friendship at any age.

Jacob understood how to look beneath another person’s behavior and recognize the feeling underneath it. He offered Ethan the very things every child deserves from the adults responsible for caring for them: warmth, compassion, curiosity, and the assurance that someone was still on his side.

When I asked Ethan what he wished the adults at school had understood about Jacob, his answer was painful in its simplicity.

“I wish they actually tried to get him,” he said.

Ethan wishes that, when Jacob struggled, more adults had responded by reaching out—by connecting him with a counselor, helping him with his work, and showing him that they were on his side.

“Instead of just reprimanding him and separating him,” Ethan said, “I wish they could see he was struggling.”

Ethan remembers Jacob being placed toward the back of a classroom, even though he was often the child who forgot his glasses. To another person, that detail might seem small. To Ethan, it represented something larger: a child who needed adults to move closer was, in his eyes, being moved farther away.

There may be details and circumstances that Ethan, as a student, could not fully know. This is not an attempt to assign responsibility for Jacob’s death to his school. It is an attempt to honor what Ethan witnessed, what their friendship taught him, and what Jacob’s life can still teach all of us.

Because Jacob was not the only child who needed to be looked at more closely.

In schools everywhere, there are children whose behavior is met with correction before curiosity. They are sent out rather than drawn in. They are separated when what they may need most is connection. Adults ask, “How do we stop this behavior?” before asking, “What is this child trying to communicate—and what support might be missing?”

Accountability and compassion are not opposites. Children need limits, structure, and opportunities to repair harm. But accountability without relationship can feel like rejection. Consequences without curiosity may stop a behavior temporarily while leaving the need beneath it untouched.

A child who appears defiant may be overwhelmed. A child who refuses work may be protecting himself from embarrassment. A child who makes everyone laugh may be carrying pain no one can see.

And sometimes the child who seems to need the most patience has already received the least.

We understand that schools cannot prevent every tragedy, and educators cannot carry every burden alone. Many are working within demanding systems without enough time, training, or support. But every adult who works with children has opportunities—sometimes small, ordinary ones—to communicate: I see you. I have not given up on you. You are more than what happened today.

Those moments are not extras. They are not rewards to be offered only after a child demonstrates perfect behavior. Warmth, dignity, and connection are part of what allow children to learn, trust, and grow.

No one would look at a young tree that was struggling and conclude that it needed less sunlight, less water, or less care. We would look at its environment. We would wonder about its roots. We would ask what conditions might help it become what it was always capable of becoming.

Children deserve that same curiosity.

When I asked Ethan what his friendship with Jacob taught him, he gave me the words at the center of this story:

“If you look closely at someone, you can see who they are underneath the struggle.”

That is what Jacob did for Ethan. He looked closely enough to see past dyslexia, anxiety, and emotion. He saw a friend who was funny, smart, and worth knowing. And because Jacob saw those things in him, Ethan began to see them in himself.

Now we are asking adults to do the same for other children.

We cannot change what happened to Jacob. But we can choose what grows from the way he lived and the way he made others feel. We can create schools where children are not reduced to their behavior, where support does not have to be earned through perfect compliance, and where being difficult to reach does not mean being left unreachable.

Finally, I asked Ethan what he would say if he could have one more conversation with Jacob.

He said:

“You changed my life in the best possible ways, and I wish this never happened to you. You should have had a better year than you did. I feel so lucky that we were friends.”

One day, the apple tree planted for Jacob will be larger. Its roots will stretch farther beneath the ground. Its branches will offer shade, and perhaps it will bear fruit. Ethan will have a place to sit beside it and remember the friend who made him laugh, understood his emotions, and saw something in him that he was still learning to see in himself.

Ethan was lucky to know Jacob.

The rest of us can honor him by learning to look more closely—and by creating the conditions in which every child has the chance to take root, be known, and grow.

Jennie Kohler is a Montgomery resident, longtime educator and founder of Thrive504, where she supports parents and guardians in understanding their child’s educational, social and emotional needs and advocating for appropriate support in and out of school. Her son, Ethan, is a 13-year-old student and was a close friend of Jacob Freytes. Together, they wrote this essay to honor Jacob’s life and friendship and to encourage adults to look more closely at the children in their care.