Saint and Scholar

by Holley Trent

  “Telling is one thing. Showing is another.”

  * * * *

  After an impromptu session of office hours where Grant sat in his empty office waiting for students interested in doing so to pick up their exam booklets, he’d intended to confront Carla’s ex-advisor about his rudeness. However, his own advisor intercepted him as he was trying to haul ass out of the history building.

  “Dr. Fennell!”

  “Fuck.” He stopped in his tracks and had a smile on his face before he spun around to greet Dr. Arthur.

  “I guess I am a doctor now,” he said.

  “Pity you won’t be around to receive your degree in person. So sorry to hear about the job.”

  He furrowed his forehead.

  Dr. Arthur slapped the side of her head with her palm. “Sorry, what I meant was ‘sorry there wasn’t an opening in the department here.’ You’re a fine scholar and I think your research is very thoughtful.”

  God, what does she want, more thanks? Was mentioning her in the acknowledgements of the fucking book not enough? “I appreciate the kind words. You’ve been an excellent mentor.” He lied as though butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth.

  “Oh, stop it!” She put her hand over her heart and giggled. “You really went at it alone, mostly. You always seemed to have a knack for knowing where to look for things.”

  True.

  “So, when are you leaving?”

  “Monday.”

  “So soon! Gosh, you know, I saw Francesca earlier. She didn’t tell me you were shoving out so fast.”

  Fuck. “Oh, that’s right. You cosupervised her dissertation, didn’t you? I’d forgotten about that.”

  It was easy to forget, since he never saw the woman until he had to track her down to have a form signed.

  “Yes, I did. Such a charming girl. She told me you’re seeing someone new?” She twirled her wedding bands idly and stared at him with a lecherous intensity. “I didn’t realize you’d broken up. I thought you’d be together forever.”

  “Yes.” He decided simple was best. He’d get fewer follow-up questions that way.

  “Oh. Well, that won’t last.”

  “Excuse me?” He wondered if he could safely tell the woman off. He certainly didn’t need her reference any longer, but he figured it’d be just his luck he’d run into her at a conference or something, so he held his tongue.

  “The long-distance thing. It never works, you know.”

  He shifted his bag to his other shoulder. His luck being what it was, he noticed a familiar short man with a shiny pate exiting the administration building and heading toward the employee parking lot. Shit, shit, shit. “Really? You have a lot of experience with long-distance relationships, Dr. Arthur?”

  “Some.” She looped her arm around his and started walking in the direction he had previously been hurrying in. “Listen, Grant. I’m in London about four times per year. Drop me a line sometime and if you’re in the area, maybe we’ll meet up for old time’s sake, eh?”

  She gave his rear an indecorous pat and clicked away down the brick path in her heels, giggling as she trod. The best thing for him to do at that moment was to leave campus immediately. Nothing he had in mind to do would be the slightest bit diplomatic, and again–he wanted to be able to board his plane.

  * * * *

  The very last place Carla wanted to be on Saturday morning was at the recreation department where she’d picked up some session work. Normally, she enjoyed being with the gaggle of middle school-aged girls and hearing about their unattainable crushes and prepubescent angst. Their mirth was contagious and she had come to rely on the once-weekly pick-me-up. Still, she was distracted by thoughts of long flights, the scent of spicy soap, and dark silky curls twined around her fingers.

  The girls had been having their usual fifteen minutes of free sketch time. When she didn’t halt them after her timer dinged because she was so busy daydreaming, Kate Morton piped up. “Miss Gill, aren’t we going to do a project today?”

  Carla turned her gaze down from the drop ceiling she’d been meditating on. “Sorry, girls. Yes. Um…”

  This is why I get paid the big bucks.

  “I’ve got some stuff in my bag. For our last session, I thought it would be a good idea to review the techniques and ideas we’ve worked with this spring and use them all in one special project.” She found the folders hidden behind her laptop, pulled them out and began to distribute them to the ten girls at the long tables. It’d taken her nearly an entire spring to warm up this group, but she knew once they were done, she’d miss them. The girls were so rude, so irreverent, but at the same time had a certain charm that had her chuckling to herself when she was driving or home alone watching television.

  “Last week I gave you some homework. I asked you to think about who you are and what makes you who you are.” She returned to the front of the room and perched atop her own table. “Now, open your packets and read the instructions. Remember, you can use any media we’ve worked with, as long as you finish in two and half hours. I’ve already made mine and I’ll share when everyone is done.”

  A bossy blonde whose name she could never remember turned her nose up and said, “Trees? Where’s the fun in that?”

  “This is about creativity,” Carla said, nonplussed. “Remember what I said the first day. You don’t have to be literal with these prompts. Use who you are and what you want to be to inform your art. Integrate past, present and future. Your tree can be as realistic or abstract as you want, but you have to make your tree a personification of you. Okay?”

  The blonde looked confused. Carla had been teaching art long enough to know some people’s brains just don’t operate in the right space for creativity. The blonde was very good at recreating or mocking established work, but when asked to start with no base work, she floundered because she had no real imagination. She’d probably make an excellent web coder or number cruncher.

  “Just do the best you can. You’re not being graded. This is only for enrichment, okay?” I’ll come around and help as you need me. Get started.”

  The girls stood in unison and raced toward the cabinets and bins to claim their favorite supplies, so Carla stole a minute to deal with the text message chaos on her phone. Alex had texted her that morning to ask if she had been able to look at her schedule. She was happy to be able to tell him:

  Sorry, Alex. I’m off the market now. Happened rather quickly. Hope you understand.

  Alex hadn’t responded, but he’d obviously got the message because Tony texted her:

  Are you bullshitting Alex? That’s pretty low. This is exactly why guys can’t trust chicks.

  That had pissed her off sufficiently enough for her to tell her brother what he could go do with himself and where.

  Mom had chimed in:

  I just saw you two days ago. You didn’t say anything about a boyfriend. It is a boy, right?

  She had told both Gills to mind their business and they’d been sending angry texts every fifteen or twenty minutes ever since. When she looked down at her phone there in the rec center, she saw Ashley had joined in the fray. She deleted all the messages without responding, except for one from Grant she’d overlooked. It was his flight information with the note:

  Let me know if I can help.

  The girls worked steadily for a while, hardly talking except to ask for supplies to be passed around the room. Usually when they got in a groove, someone broke the silence by asking Carla some inappropriate question.

  “Hey, Miss Gill?” Kate asked.

  “Hmm?”

  “How come you’re not married? You’re kinda old.”

  Carla gaped. “I am not! I’m twenty-five.” Nearly twenty-six. Oh my God, did I sleep through a year?

  “Well, that’s like double my age.”

  “That may be the case right now, but when you’re twenty-five I’ll be thirty-seven. Hardly double.”

  “Ew.”

  “No ew! There are great things about every
age.”

  Ella Fontaine snorted and accidentally dropped her paintbrush on the floor from the force of it. “What’s so great about being thirteen?” she asked from under the table. “My skin hurts ’cause of acne, I’m mad all the time and all the boys hate me.”

  “I’m sure they don’t hate you. Boys are weird at that age.” Carla used a wet paper towel to wipe up the bit of paint from the tile. She paused. “For that matter, they’re weird at every age.” She shrugged from her crouch and stood to toss the paper at the can near the door. “Sometimes they act one way when their minds are thinking another.”

  “Why do they do that?” the blonde asked. She had her pastel crayon paused midstroke and furrowed her brow as if the subject matter was more perplexing than trying to reconcile a checkbook to find a missing seventeen cents.

  Carla crouched in front of her and helped her blend some hard lines on her picture. “Hard to say. But to answer your question, Kate, I’m not married because no one has ever asked me.”

  “Well, that sucks.”

  Carla backtracked to her table and slid into the hard chair behind it. “Well, it’s not a race.”

  “Do you want kids?” asked someone in a muffled voice from the supply cabinet.

  All the girls stopped what they were doing and stared at their teacher. Already, that had become a topic their opinions of her would hinge on.

  “You know, it’s funny you should ask,” Carla said with a chuckle. “When I was in college, my friends Meg and Sharon and I had these sleepovers pretty much every night in the dorms. Every now and then we’d talk about how much fun it would be for all of us to be pregnant at the same time.”

  “I think I saw a Lifetime movie about that,” the blonde said before resuming her scribbling.

  Carla raised a brow, but soldiered on. “Well, Meg has been married for about three years and she’s pregnant. Sharon and I are still in the figuring-things-out stage, so it won’t happen this go-round.” She chuckled. “I’d like a kid or two when I grow up, though.”

  That seemed to satisfy the girls. They bent their heads over their papers and went back to creating art in earnest.

  Chapter 8

  Between Friday morning and Sunday evening, Carla had managed to only spend forty-five minutes with her new boyfriend. After leaving the rec center on Saturday, she got called in by Raleigh PD to sketch a hit and run driver. When she did touch base briefly with Grant, it was at the airport on Sunday morning where the airline was giving her a hard time with redeeming her voucher. She’d tried first by phone, but had grown tired of the runaround. She figured that was their scheme–to wear customers down to the point they’d stop caring about satisfaction.

  Grant really meant it when he’d offered to help. By the time he arrived at the ticketing counter, she’d started to shake from frustration. He’d listened calmly to both sides of the drama, and asked the same very reasonable question Carla had. “What can you do?”

  The agent didn’t look up from his keyboard as he dismissed him. “Nothing. Turn the ticket over and read the fine print. Next, please.”

  Grant put up an arm to halt the person in line behind them. “Just a moment.” He slid the voucher across the counter. “It doesn’t say anything about blackouts.” He managed to sound quite pissed without actually raising his voice. “What it does say is that it expires in eight weeks. So, since she’s blacked out from using the sodding thing, that means it’s effectively void right now! Sounds like a heap of bullshit to me.”

  “Grant, I can just buy a new ticket,” Carla said. She was ready to be done with the shit. She’d lost. The continued argument wasn’t worth the spike to her blood pressure.

  “No, love, you shouldn’t have to. They should grandfather the voucher in, since it makes no mention of blackout dates. It’s not a discount. It’s a replacement. They’re playing games.”

  A woman in the line somewhere behind them shouted, “I know, right? It’s some bullshit. I ain’t paying to check this bag, man. Y’all better put this shit underneath the plane and stop playin’ with me. I’m a goddamned veteran. Shit.”

  The agent kept tapping keys. “We’re sorry for the inconvenience, sir. She’s welcome to try another airline for a last-minute flight.”

  Grant drummed his fingers on the countertop and stared at the agent, who wouldn’t look back. The veins in his neck visibly pulsed.

  Carla wrapped her hand around one of his wrists. It’s like I transferred my anger to him. “Grant, it’s okay.”

  “No, it’s not.” He pulled a narrow folder out of his back pocket and slid it across the counter beside her voucher. “Here. Refund this.”

  The agent finally looked up. “Sir?”

  “Do it. Charge me the fuckin’ fee and refund my card the difference. You aren’t the only airline flying to Dublin via New York. Hell, your first class isn’t even all that great. You’re doing me a favor.”

  Suddenly the agent got really cooperative. Grant’s ticket was first class, platinum status.

  He looped his arm through Carla’s and said, “Hey, love. Want to get a bite?” as they walked toward the parking deck.

  “Sure, but after that display of machismo I’m sort of hungry for other things.” Watching that usually pleasant man inch closer and closer to catastrophic meltdown had been the ultimate turn-on. Oh, he could get angry. She could tell. He reminded her something of her father–a generally easygoing guy who would snap in an instant if his family was threatened.

  She also hadn’t noticed before how careful he was in suppressing that accent. He was nearly unintelligible when he got angry, especially when he got all growly. She wondered if he growled at other times, too, and giggled at the thought.

  “Don’t tease me, love. I’ve had a rough couple of days. And what’s so funny?”

  “Oh, nothing. I was…uh…just thinking about something Sharon said.” Maybe the airline had somehow flagged her name from her last tantrum, just in case they needed to give her a hard time in the future.

  After a quick lunch at Grant’s favorite barbecue joint, the two parted ways to finish last-minute chores before their flight. While she was at home snipping tags and pulling labels off the new clothes she’d purchased for the trip, the laptop she’d had open awaiting a conference call from Sharon and Meg pinged to notify her of a new message. It was from Grant. Upon seeing his name there in the from line–Fennell, Dr. Grant D.–she had an immediate gripping fear he’d done the cowardly thing and emailed her saying he’d changed his mind. She wouldn’t have been surprised, really, because the whole weekend had reeked of too good to be true. Of course he didn’t really want her, she thought. Just like every other man who’d she’d crossed paths with since puberty, he was probably only interested in what was between her legs.

  She worried for nothing. The subject line put her at ease: Found this for you.

  Hey, love, it started. She fell backward onto the floor and shrieked wordlessly much like she had as preteen when her favorite boy band came on the television screen. Then she got a grip. After all, she’d be twenty-six come November. She was way too old to be going all fan-girl over a man, especially one who was technically her boyfriend. Maybe that was what the problem was. Boyfriend. It felt odd to be referring to a man who was over thirty as her boyfriend. What else could she call him? Lover? No, not yet. Partner? Didn’t seem right either. She shrugged and maximized the message.

  Packing? Be mindful of the baggage weight limits. We wouldn’t want to raise a fuss during check-in like our veteran friend, yeah? Try not to pack too many shoes.

  She got up and tossed a pair of espadrilles and cork-soled platforms from her bag, before resuming her reading.

  I connected some dots and found out that Phillip Callaghan entered the U.S. via Philadelphia with his brother Patrick. They were both indentured to a Delaware landowner named James Craig who paid their passage. Please take some comfort in the fact that they willingly indentured themselves. I believe if you study your family tree
carefully, you’ll see that Phillip later married a Craig woman. That’s no coincidence. I have a contact at a church who located the marriage record and as well as a subsequent birth record. The marriage occurred in May. The birth occurred in July. Anyhow, that’s neither here nor there, just thought you’d find it interesting.

  Phillip and Patrick sailed from Dublin, but weren’t from there. Dublin was just the major hub a lot of convicts and bondspeople were processed through. We found Patrick’s indenture contract in Craig’s personal papers and I learned they came from Ulster, probably County Cavan or Monaghan. I don’t know if they were Ulster-Scot or really old Irish, but I’ve made some inquiries, so I expect to have access to some more information by the time we land. Perhaps people will respond more quickly when they read the “Dr.” in front of my name. A guy can hope.

  Can you pick me up from the car dealership off the Boulevard in the morning? I’m ending my car lease. We can go straight to the airport from there. If it’s out of the way for you, I can ask Seth or Curt.

  He signed it with -G.

  She trimmed the more private information and forwarded the rest of the message to Ashley. Next, she responded:

  Of course I’ll pick you up. I wouldn’t want to deprive your friends of their last goodbye, but it’s probably best that you witness my bad driving sooner rather than later. If my Katherina temper doesn’t scare you off, my driving will. My mother says I drive like a Roman woman, but when she says it I swear it’s a compliment.

  What is the “D” in your middle name an initial for?

  He responded:

  Daniel. Don’t worry about Frick and Frack. They’re here right now laying claim to my furniture and regaling me with tales I’d rather not rehear. See you in the morning, love.

  No sooner had she minimized her mail, her cell phone started ringing at the same time the conference call from Sharon and Meg popped up. The phone call was from Ashley. She answered it and said, “I’ll call you back,” and quickly ended the call before he could get a word in edgewise. She accepted the incoming videoconference and fixed her computer screen so she could pack and be seen simultaneously.