attractive this way than when she’s
being timid. I bet she could take charge in the bedroom. Christ,
Jack, what the hell. I
banish that thought to the darker recesses of my clearly overworked
mind.
“I’d
like to talk to you,”
she says, all in a rush, like this was a difficult admission.
She’s
American, I notice with surprise. Something about the loose gray
sweater she’s
wearing, paired with jeans and high boots, had suggested local girl
to me. I readjust the settings in my head, think about her as a
confused exchange student instead. It certainly helps explain her
bewilderment in class.
I
really don’t have
time for this, but I sigh and point up the corridor toward my own
office. “I can give
you five minutes.”
Harper
Do
the right thing, Harper.
I
stand outside the office of the registrar, my heart torn in two. I
really, really wanted to take this class. But there’s
no way I can sit through his lectures knowing what happened between
us. Especially when he obviously doesn’t
realize. That much was clear from the way he gave me a blank look in
class.
I
don’t know why that
bothers me. It’s
better like this. I’ll
drop the course, find another class to replace it. It’ll
set me back a semester at home, because I was supposed to fulfill my
poetry requirement here, but better that than getting myself
embroiled in yet another mess.
This
one would be the worst yet. Worse than my TA, worse than the time I
accidentally slept with my mother’s
new boss (who, in my defense, is a lot younger than she is).
Hey,
you survived those, I
tell myself. That gives me the courage to push open the door to the
registrar.
That’s
when voices catch my attention. Raised voices, coming from another
office a few doors down. One voice that I recognize. “ Screw
the bloody curriculum .”
I
can’t help it. I
creep closer to the open door, one eye on the empty hallway around
me. Ignore it. Turn
around, go into the registrar. Drop the class. My brain fires all kinds of helpful, sensible, non-stalkerish
suggestions at me.
Naturally,
I ignore them all.
If
someone comes by, I’ll
leave. But the hallway remains empty, and anyway, Professor
Kingston’s next
words freeze me to the spot. “ Never
before seen work. From Eliot himself .”
No.
Freaking. Way.
The
words themselves practically make me nerdgasm on the spot. Another
student passes by, shooting me a weird look as she walks around me
into the registrar’s
office. I completely ignore her, and tiptoe closer to the open
office. Dean something-or-other is written on the door. I listen to
their whole conversation, my heart beating faster with every word
Jack says—and not
with lust this time.
Well,
with some lust. But mostly of the holy shit, I need to get that research
position variety. This could totally make my undergraduate career. I
can already see my faculty advisor back home salivating over the
thesis I could write on this.
So
when Jack— Professor
Kingston, I mentally
correct myself—backs
into the hallway, I don’t
do the smart thing. I don’t
run. I stand there, take a deep breath, and let him nearly run
straight into me. He’s
taller than me, I now notice. A lot taller. Almost a foot—I
know I’m short at
5’5”,
but wow.
Emotions
flicker across his even-hotter-close-up face—anger,
surprise, recognition—and
then he seems to settle into mild annoyance, even after I manage to
ask to speak to him.
Five
minutes. I can totally explain this and plead my case within five
minutes, right?
He
leads me down the hallway into his office, a cramped but surprisingly
homey room, the walls lined with huge, dusty old leather-backed
tomes, and a massive mahogany desk commanding my attention the moment
I step inside. My traitor imagination immediately notes how the desk
is perfectly positioned at waist-height, just begging for someone to
be bend over it . . .
My
face flushes, and I swallow hard. Stop
it. This is exactly
the kind of thinking I