Lauren beamed back at Dean. Success was putting it mildly in her eyes. Right now, she was convinced she could do anything, write anything, and be anything. She also knew that she had Dean and his creative mind to thank for it.
“These two melded their minds together and made pure, passionate love on paper!” Anthony announced as he waved his hands around. The classroom erupted into fits of laughter, brought on both by Anthony’s theatrical methods of explanation and his enlightening phrases. From the corner of Lauren’s eye, she could see that Dean was glancing her way. She kept her focus ahead, but bit her lip to stifle the grin she knew was threatening to appear.
“I shall be honored to behold what this heavenly pair of minds will conceive in our next assignment,” Anthony said, and Lauren noticed he was careful never to make eye contact with her or Dean while singing their praises. There was the possibility that he didn’t know who they were, but more plausible was that he was being careful to allow everyone their anonymity. Lauren respected him for that. Her and Dean’s secret was theirs to keep or theirs to share if they sought fit.
The room grew quiet as Anthony began to pass around a list of pages for his students to read if they chose to keep up with the required curriculum. Once again, he stated his belief that, after reading the first assignments handed in, he was more than convinced very few of the people enrolled in this program would have any trouble with such basic writing requirements. However, the choice was theirs to follow along or not. Lauren wondered idly how many printouts would be left strewn across the chairs and floor of the auditorium when everyone went home later that afternoon. After the pages were passed out, Anthony smiled mischievously and explained the next assignment.
“Take an excerpt of something you’ve already written, or, if you need to, you can write something new. Either way, I want you to write something in the voice of someone else. Take a gamble, my friends! Who have you always wanted to be? Is there a particular trait you’ve always yearned to possess? In this assignment, you can be exactly who you want to be! There is no right or wrong answer. I just want you to take on the persona of a character, someone so unlike you that you struggle to see how you yourself could have ever been the author of such a piece of work. Same rules apply. Hand it in tonight before you leave or tomorrow morning. You are brave, remember that!” Once again, Anthony’s constant hand gestures and flair for drama caused muffled laughter from his audience.
“Is it just me, or does he get crazier with each passing moment?” Dean chuckled.
Students were beginning to turn to their partners and discuss the wild ideas they had for their new assignments. Lauren looked toward the front row where Libby had turned to face her. She winked at Lauren and then turned away to pack up her things.
Lauren turned back to Dean. The second assignment had been dealt, and she couldn’t believe her luck. Not only could she write the assignment tonight on her own time, she had already done the research. She had spent the last two classes not only pretending to be someone she wasn’t, but beginning to believe it herself.
Being Sarah had allowed her a sense of freedom she hadn’t felt in ages, perhaps ever.
“Maybe we all get a little crazier as we go,” Lauren said in a low voice.
Chapter Eleven
As she sat perched in her chair in the auditorium, she became aware of the muffled ringing of her cell phone. She dug for it and smiled when she read Michael’s name on the caller display.
“I was beginning to think you had skipped town yourself,” she joked when she answered it.
“As you can imagine, my attempt at working less hours is proving to be more difficult than I expected. How’s New York? You a city girl yet?”
Lauren scoffed at the idea. “Hardly. You have to take out a second mortgage on your house just to afford a coffee with a fancy name around here. I miss regular coffee and our quiet life that allowed us to make it at home. I miss you.” The hollowness of her words hit her unexpectedly. Of course, she did miss Michael.
Did she miss the rural life she’d left behind, though? She realized she hadn’t given it a second thought since she had turned and headed for the plane. She didn’t have the heart to admit that to Michael.
“I miss you, too.”
Lauren thought she could hear emotional distance in Michael’s tone. Was it a sense of loneliness, perhaps? Maybe the guilt that still chipped away at the back of Lauren’s mind was just playing tricks on her. Maybe she just thought Michael would be lonely without her. She couldn’t be sure, especially not after only a few days.
“I did really well on my first assignment yesterday. Things are going great.”
“That’s good. What was it about? The assignment, I mean?”
Lauren bit her lip. “Oh, I just spruced up one of the excerpts from the romance novel I’ve been working on and handed it in hoping for a critique from the professor. He liked it, though.”
“Ah, more of that gushy stuff you want to write, huh?”
Lauren almost laughed. The assignment had included the option for eroticism. The topic was far from mushy romance, but that was another thing she didn’t feel like getting into with Michael.
“Something like that, I suppose. I’m working on my second assignment now.”
“Meet anyone interesting?”
The air suddenly grew thick around Lauren and she struggled to maintain breathing at a normal pace. Her mind began to spin in multiple directions. Dean. Did she want to tell Michael about him? The more Lauren realized she didn’t want to mention him, the more it bothered her.
“Libby. Her name is Libby.” Lauren swallowed the lump in her throat and struggled to compose herself. “She’s just a girl in my class. Only spoke to her for a few minutes, but she seemed nice enough.”
“Well, it’s only been a few days. With a bit more time, you might meet some other people.”
Lauren brought her hand to her throat, convinced she could feel her pulse threatening to beat its way out of her body. “Perhaps you’re right.”
“Look, Lauren, I should go. I just thought I should return your call seeing as you called a few times last night and this morning. Have a good day, okay?”
“Oh, okay. Will I talk to you again tonight?” She didn’t want to sound needy or like she was keeping tabs on him, but she did want to talk to him again before she went to sleep, even just for a moment.
“I’ll try, Lauren. I love you.”
Once again, she heard the call end before she’d even said goodbye to him. She pulled the phone away from her ear and stared at it.
“Is it going to do tricks?”
Lauren snapped her head up to see Libby standing in front of her clutching her own cell phone in her hand. She smiled at the woman and shrugged, tossing the phone back into the bag in front of her. “No, I just don’t know if it’s working right, that’s all.”
As if on cue, the cell in Libby’s hand began to ring, glowing bright blue with each tone. “Well, it looks like mine is working just fine.” Her eyes lit up when she saw what Lauren assumed was the name on her caller display. A lover, perhaps? The romantic in Lauren hoped it was. She also felt a small tug of jealousy. It had been a long time since Lauren had that reaction due to someone else.
“Anyways,” Libby said in a rushed tone. “I need to take this call, but I have to leave a bit early. If something interesting happens, will you let me know? I can’t miss all the fun.”
Lauren chuckled. “Of course. I was thinking of hitting up the campus cafe later, but I’ll be staying until class ends anyway.”
“Cool, I can meet you at the cafe if you want some company. We can talk shop for a bit,” Libby offered with a smile. The expression on Lauren’s face must have registered as uncertainty rather than the shock she was feeling because Libby quickly added, “Only if you want to, though.”
“No, no, that’s great, sure.” Lauren felt silly for coming across like she didn’t want the company. She did. “I just can’t say there’s ever bee
n a time when I’ve been able to sit down and talk shop, as you call it, with anyone.” Lauren laughed as she made quotations with her fingers in the air. “I’d like that. Seriously.” She glanced down at the time on her cell phone. “How about four-thirty or so? I should be able to finish up the class and make it there by then.”
“Sounds awesome. See you at the cafe then, Sarah.” Libby hurried up the stairs of the center aisle to leave the lecture theater through one of the back doors.
“Cafe, huh? I could use some coffee myself.”
Lauren turned from the direction Libby was headed to face Dean, a lopsided grin on his face as he pushed his laptop bag higher onto his shoulder. Where in the world was everyone coming from? Sometimes, she could go for hours without speaking a word out loud, yet she’d just talked with Michael, Libby, and now Dean in rapid succession.
“Hey, I didn’t see you there.” As soon as she said it, Lauren felt foolish. She was sure it was quite obvious she wasn’t sure what to say.
“Well, seeing as you kind of deserted me as soon as Anthony set us all loose to work on our assignment, you’d think I would have gotten the hint. Good thing I’m not easily swayed.” Dean crouched down by the corner of Lauren’s seat and smiled up at her. She got the feeling he was trying to tell her something more, but she didn’t have it in her to decipher it right now. Besides, it was taking everything she had not to blush like crazy.
It turned out, even as Sarah, she wasn’t as smooth and stealthy as she wanted to be.
“I didn’t desert you,” Lauren defended herself. “You were talking to that dark-haired girl, I think her name was Jessica. I thought maybe you two knew each other, so I didn’t want to be a third wheel. I came back here to work on the assignment, that’s all. It had little to do with you.” Now, she was babbling, and she knew it. At this point, she needed to just stop talking because she wasn’t sure if her explanation was making things better or worse.
“We were just discussing the professor’s reaction to the first assignment and the unknown pair who wrote such gorgeous, romantic words.” He winked at her. “Her description, not mine.” His grin was cocky, and Lauren couldn’t help but smile. The satisfaction he felt about their public recognition was obvious. She couldn’t lie, she felt like she’d won the lottery.
“Did you tell her?”
“That it was us who made love on paper? Nah, I don’t kiss and tell.”
Lauren felt her face flush as she gave a nervous chuckle.
“You are too much.” She shook her head, laughing to herself more to fill the gap in conversation than in response to the humor.
“You have no idea,” Dean said with a sly smirk as he raised himself up to stand, hauling his laptop bag up with him. As he slung it back over his shoulder, he asked, “So, how about a coffee? You mentioned the cafe, now I’m in the mood.”
“I kind of have some work to do, Dean. And according to the professor who assigned another project, I think you do, too.”
“Come on, we’re practically his favorite students right now. Let’s not break the trend while we’re ahead.” He held out a hand. “Or is there someone you have to rush home to?”
Lauren knew very well his choice of words was deliberate. He was asking her about having coffee with him, but his real question was whether she was taken or not. Lauren’s eyes didn’t meet his, and the struggle going on in her mind told her in no uncertain terms to be straight with him.
She had a husband. If she said those words, all his flirting and suggestive comments would undoubtedly stop. Their relationship would remain purely platonic and she wouldn’t have to worry about mentioning him to Michael during their next conversation because there would be nothing to tell other than how they had collaborated on their first assignment and won the praises of their professor.
Was that what Lauren wanted? Better yet, was that what Sarah wanted? Did Sarah need Dean in all his flirtatious glory in order to succeed in this course? Her mind immediately went to the night before, the way her fingers had flown over the keys, words being strung together across the computer screen as fast as she could type them.
Sarah, her character, needed Dean. He was a part of this story, the one who had helped Lauren unleash the fever that was driving her to write the romantic story between Sarah and her new lover. The male character Lauren had written into the story last night had fit Dean’s description. From the dark wavy hair to the chocolate eyes that seemed to see and suggest more than she would normally allow, Dean was a part of this story.
She wasn’t sure who needed him more, her or Sarah, but for right now, that didn’t matter. Right now, she knew he was needed and she couldn’t stop this charade purely because it would be the right thing to do. Sarah would never allow for that.
“It’s just coffee,” she stated, giving Dean a sly grin of her own.
If she had left it at that, she wouldn’t have done anything wrong. But the moment she casually slipped her gloves off her hands, her wedding ring hidden inside, and pushed the gloves into her bag, she knew some sort of line had been crossed, she just wasn’t sure what it meant. Right now, Sarah didn’t care.
Chapter Twelve
“I don’t think you were as surprised as you pretended to be that Anthony liked our first assignment, were you?”
Dean sat across the table from Lauren in the heavenly smelling cafe, nursing a to-go cup of dark roast coffee with milk, steam floating in misty swirls from the opening in the lid. Lauren hadn’t been planning to order anything, but Dean insisted. His treat, he said. She had been about to persist and decline again, but felt she may need something else to focus on should their conversation take an unexpected turn. She was Sarah, after all. She had to watch what she said while also taking note of Dean’s remarks and his mannerisms. She may be able to use them later when she sat down at her computer to continue writing her novel.
Lauren shrugged, her bare hands clutching the small coffee in front of her. “That piece was different, unlike anything I’d written previously. Call me crazy, but I guess you could say I knew there was something different about it, something personal, stripped, and overwhelming. You and I both were unable to ignore the urgency of it as we tried to perfect it. I was confident that Anthony would have that same inability.” Her lips were pressed in a firm grin as she raised her cup to her lips, never taking her eyes off Dean as she stared at him over the rim of it.
“Well said,” Dean remarked, taking a sip of his own. “You surprise me, Sarah.”
Lauren arched an eyebrow. “Oh? And why is that?”
He put his cup down. “It’s like I can’t quite figure you out. I mean, you’re obviously extremely talented in the craft of writing, I’ll give you that. There isn’t a person in that class that could argue with that. However, the part I don’t get is that sometimes you’re so sure of yourself, to the point where you can almost be intimidating. Then again, it seems like there are moments when that foundation of confidence wavers, and an uncertainty comes shining through the cracks in that foundation that make me question what it is that is really driving you, who you really are.”
“Who I really am?” Lauren’s voice came out weaker and more fearful than she intended. The mask she’d been attempting to wear refused to stay on. She evidently had yet to master the art of staying in character.
Dean offered a small smile. “I’m sorry, Sarah, I don’t mean to be asking personal questions or putting you in an awkward position. I’m one of those people who kind of calls it like I see it. With you, I like what I see even though I’m not actually sure what I’m seeing, if that makes sense.” He leaned in closer and his smile grew bigger. In a lowered voice, he said, “Who is Sarah? That’s what I want to find out.”
With that, he leaned back, giving Lauren her space again. Unfortunately, it seemed that an inability to make her own voice audible had overcome her. Any answer and statement she made now would seem like a cover up, no matter how she phrased it. She wasn’t prepared to tell him who Sarah was,
mostly because she hadn’t quite figured that out herself. However, their eyes were fixed on each other and Dean was obviously awaiting a rebuttal.
“Am I interrupting?”
Lauren broke eye contact with Dean and looked up to see Libby standing in front of their table, a glint in her eye as she switched her gaze between them. Lauren fought the immediate urge to defend herself, wanting to say it was nothing, just coffee with a friend. Without looking in Dean’s direction, she leaned back slightly and waved her hand to one of the empty tables beside theirs.
“Not at all, Libby. Pull up a chair,” she managed. She hoped her voice sounded more casual to them than it did to her.
“You sure you don’t mind?” Libby’s amusement was obvious, and Dean sent a knowing smirk in Lauren’s direction as well. He was fully aware of what Libby was thinking and he didn’t seem to mind.
“Not at all. You know Dean, right? He and I were partnered up in class.”
Libby turned to drag a chair toward their table and then held out her hand to Dean. “Good to meet you, Dean. Let me get myself a coffee and I’ll be right back.”
Lauren nodded with a weak smile and watched Libby head over to the counter. It took Dean only a second to lean forward and whisper, “She thinks there’s something going on between us, I think.”
Lauren rolled her eyes but knew he was right. She would have to set Libby straight. “I’ll be sure to let her know that’s not the case, don’t worry.”
“You mean there isn’t?” Dean’s words caught her off guard, and the mischievous grin that followed them made her stomach knot in apprehension. She opened her mouth twice, intent on saying something that would diffuse the topic, but instead she was halted with a gentle pat of Dean’s hand against hers and a wink.
“I’ll let you two talk about whatever it is women talk about.” Dean squeezed her hand before getting to his feet. As he slung his laptop bag onto his shoulder and plucked his to-go cup from the table, he set his eyes on Lauren once more. “Please let Libby know it was a pleasure to meet her. See you in class tomorrow, Sarah.” She watched him turn and walk out of the cafe, the bell above the door sending a shrill toll throughout the room. She then turned to see Libby receive her change back from the barista and head back to the table, a to-go cup in hand.
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