He would miss sitting in her class and watching her lecture. She was a great teacher, and he had to admit it was beyond sexy being the teacher’s pet. Rakell seemed to really enjoy giving him private tutoring. He grinned as he walked across campus toward the faculty office building. He missed Rakell badly. He’d never ached for a woman this much after only one day apart. He’d been keeping some distance from her lately because, after reading some horror stories online, he was worried. He was probably overreacting—I’m not a teenager being taken advantage of. No one’s going to jail.—but he couldn’t live with himself if Rakell was hurt in any way for wanting to be by his side.
Jerzy entered the faculty building and received the usual fake smile from the receptionist, but he noticed the smile was extra painful for her to do today.
“Professor Dunn is busy right now,” she said.
“Oh. Is she talking to someone?”
The receptionist’s phony smile became a smug smirk. “I heard some telltale sounds coming from Professor Dunn’s office last week. The assistant dean is having a word with her about it.”
Jerzy stared at her in disbelief. He shook his head. “No.”
“I warned Professor Dunn what would happen if she didn’t end her disgusting relationship with you.”
His top lip curled. He jabbed his finger at her. “You don’t know shit.” He strode down the hall to Rakell’s office. He put his ear to the door, praying that Alisa was lying. His stomach dropped as he heard a woman’s authoritative voice. Alisa opened her mouth like she was about to rat on him. Jerzy threw Alisa a vicious look, daring her to say something. Her mouth snapped closed and her whole face blushed red. Indignantly, she went back to typing, and Jerzy continued to listen in on the conversation.
“…as vice dean of Simmons County Community College, I have to take a complaint about possible inappropriate teacher-student relationships very seriously. Such conduct would reflect poorly on this school. Unfortunately, I will have to conduct a very thorough investigation. The investigation is confidential. None of your peers will know about it. If I find anything during my investigation, I will meet with the dean to decide what disciplinary actions to take. I hope it doesn’t come to that. I’ll be keeping an eye on you for a while.”
Jerzy’s green eyes burned with anger and sadness. He wanted to scream. Rakell hadn’t done anything wrong. He was the one who propositioned her. He was the one that pushed her into having sex in her office. This was all his fault. He could only imagine how humiliated Rakell was feeling right now. Urgently he wanted to hold her, kiss her, and comfort her, but he had to leave. He exited the building, but not before saying a few words to the blonde at the reception desk. “I’m in love with her. Think about that before you go to sleep tonight.” Alisa was pleasantly silent.
Jerzy left campus on edge. He sat in his Camaro in the parking lot with no will to go anywhere. Guilt and worry were paralyzing him. If he quit school now, it would look suspicious. If he called Rakell, that could be used against her if the vice dean requested her phone records. Was the vice dean allowed to do that? He wasn’t sure. Could the dean hire a private investigator to watch Rakell’s home or question her neighbors? I don’t know. I don’t know anything. I’m a fucking idiot. He couldn’t risk it. No more visits to her home. No more phone calls. He’d find some other way to talk to her. Jerzy sighed. “I need to see her. I need to know if she’s okay.”
When Mrs. Guzman left her office, Rakell was pissed off, but relieved. She was confident that the vice dean would find nothing. Rakell never used the office phone to call Jerzy and never sent him any emails from her school email account. She’d even taken the flowers he’d sent her yesterday home with her. Alisa’s account was the only thing Mrs. Guzman could hold against Rakell and that was as flimsy as the blonde’s false lashes. Determined not to let Alisa trip her up, Rakell remained in her office for thirty minutes more to grade a few papers. When she left her office she had a few things for Alisa’s stubborn ears to hear. Rakell rested against the front of the reception desk. She saw that Alisa’s eyes were red, but she didn’t care why. Rakell glared down at the girl. “Nothing is going to come out of this, Alisa. There’s no proof. In the end, he and I are going to be together. And you? You’ll still be you. How sad.”
Eyes wet and lips trembling, Alisa jumped up from her seat. “You are screwing one of your students, Professor Dunn!” she exclaimed, trying to shame Rakell and hoping other faculty and staff in the building would hear.
Rakell kept her voice even. “Bitch, you just wish you were me.”
Alisa paused, blushed, and then laughed, unsmiling. “Be you? Become the laughingstock of this college? No thanks, honey. Even if you don’t get fired, the gossip that’s gonna spread across campus is going to make you wish you had been.”
Rakell stepped back from the desk and pointed to her butt. “Smooches.” She strutted out the door and went to her car. She rested in the driver’s seat a moment to regroup. A chuckle burst from her mouth. Because she was lucky enough to have a guy like Jerzy in her life, what other people thought about her didn’t matter so much anymore. Losing her job wasn’t scary anymore. So this was the new way to feel that Jerzy had described. It was like having the world at your fingertips and realizing that it’s made of clay. She could mold her world into what she wanted it to be. Nothing Alisa had started was permanent. Rakell could reshape her life and make it better than before. She wanted to be with Jerzy tonight. Rakell started her car while she called him with her cell. It rang and rang and eventually went to voicemail. “Hey Baby. It’s me. I’ve had a crazy day. I need to see you tonight. Call me back as soon as you can.”
While driving home, Rakell glanced up at her rear view mirror. Her heart jumped at the sight of the black Camaro behind her. “Jerzy?” She wasn’t sure it was him until she made a couple more turns and saw that the car was still behind her. She smiled. He was following her. Rakell wished his windows weren’t so tinted so that she could see his face.
Jerzy followed Rakell into her neighborhood. He slowed as she parked in her driveway and stepped out of her car. As she walked to the end of the driveway in the direction of his vehicle, he saw that her beautiful brown eyes were bright and dry. She was even smiling. He exhaled, reassured that Rakell was a resilient woman who could handle the investigation and keep her head up until he could be with her again. Then he did one of the hardest things he’d ever done.
Rakell stopped in her tracks as she witnessed Jerzy drive way, right past her without any acknowledgement. She stared at the receding black car. “What is he doing?” She stood there a while, but the car rounded a corner and disappeared. She hurried to the passenger side of her car to get her cell phone from the front seat. She called him, a few times, but there was no answer. Confused, she went into her house. She wondered if it was a case of mistaken identity, but in her heart she knew without a doubt that it was his car and that Jerzy was driving. The rumble of Jerzy’s car was distinct, and she’d felt his gaze.
Her confusion depreciated into emptiness as the night went on without so much as a text message from Jerzy. She bathed and ate and straightened up around the house while she dealt with the rollercoaster of thoughts in her head. Her mind peaked with heated accusations, fear and insults and plummeted into numbness, rushed upwards again fueled with adoration and trust in his sweet words, then zoomed back down from overwhelming longing. She managed to fall asleep that night by convincing herself things would become clear in the morning, but when her eyes opened to the morning light her vision was clouded with tears.
VII
Before class the next morning, Rakell called Jerzy again. When it went immediately to his voicemail greeting she knew he’d turned his phone off. Wounded, she left a message.
“Jerzy…I…Jerzy, just call me. Please.”
She entered the lecture hall a few minutes late because she needed a moment to fully gain composure before speaking in front of her class of nearly one hundred students. She wasn�
��t surprised to see Jerzy’s seat in the front row empty. Rakell put on a smile and began giving the second half of her talk on Paradise Lost. A female student leaned toward another and began whispering something in her ear. Rakell did her best to ignore the suspicion that she was the topic of the discussion. She turned her head to look at the other side of the crowd. Her eyes scanned the room and saw two guys whisper about something and then look at her with curious smiles on their faces. Rakell heard her own voice begin to tremble. She paused to clear her throat and then continued speaking. Her gaze trailed across the back of the room and froze on a familiar face. Her voice crumbled into silence. Jerzy looked away from her, down at the floor. He’d been sitting in the back row all along.
In an instant, things became clear. Alisa had probably made good on her promise to spread rumors about Rakell and Jerzy’s relationship and somehow Jerzy caught wind of the gossip yesterday, most likely from Tim McAllister. That’s why he wouldn’t answer her calls. Rakell thought they would brave it together when the storm came. Instead, he abandoned her at the first hint of trouble. Someone who really loved her wouldn’t pretend he never knew her. Someone who loved her wouldn’t sit back and watch her be fed to the lions. No, he doesn’t love you. He never told you that. You only assumed. He promised to protect me no matter what. That was nothing but a lie. He’s just a sweet talker. ‘A jerk with a silver tongue.’ Rakell looked away and raised her chin. A boost of righteous anger helped her finish the morning lecture.
Her drive home was an eerie replay of the afternoon before. The black Camaro was her car’s shadow, turning down the same streets, following her into her neighborhood. He could follow her home but couldn’t give her a call? Was it possible that he still cared? She parked in her driveway and stepped out of her car, hoping like hell that he would stop this time. Her spirit dimmed watching him drive away, deserting her once more.
Rakell spent a miserable day in her office. She and Alisa ignored each other and her colleagues were nervous, awkward, or icy when she attempted to have any sort of conversation. Borrowing a bottle of whiteout was a crash course in politics. The notion that she’d escape campus for the weekend kept her sane. Sitting peacefully at home, doing nothing at all and talking to no one at all would be paradise compared to this examination and judgment. A promise of solitude was waiting for her at home in the form of her favorite robe and her favorite ice cream. Her plan was to hold on to her dignity until she could be miserable in private, but like Lot’s wife she looked back. There Jerzy’s black Camaro was, leaving the campus at the same time she was, right behind her. It made her skin crawl to be under his surveillance. She’d had enough. Let me forget about you!
Her body were sizzling with fury when she got to her drive way and threw her car door open. She ran to her porch to pick up the blue blown glass globe that was held by an angel lawn decoration. She snatched it up and ran down the driveway, throwing it at the back of Jerzy’s car without a second thought. It crashed against his rear windshield, littering his trunk and the road with glittery blue shards. The car came to a sudden stop. “Come back and talk to me, you coward,” she whispered through gritted teeth. The car sat in the middle of the road, engine rumbling. “Come on. Come on!” She waited for Jerzy to put the car in reverse. Instead, he drove away. Bastard! Hot tears irritated her face and angered her even more. She grabbed her things from the car and stomped into her house with her cell phone at her ear. Jerzy, as usual, didn’t answer so she left a message. “Stop spying on me or I’ll call the cops on your stalker ass!”
Then Rakell became the stalker, unable to calm her ire and quit making calls to his phone. Over the next two days, she called him incessantly to irritate him, to leave scathing messages, and, in weak moments, called just to hear his voice on the voicemail greeting. By Saturday evening, the number was disconnected.
Rakell remained restless and mad. Unlike when she was betrayed by her ex-husband, she wasn’t feeling weak and humiliated. What she wanted after this betrayal was to get even. But there was nothing she could do to get back at Jerzy without losing her dignity and class. The best revenge is moving on, right? But I can’t. Her heart was still hurting. Her resentment was still burning. Frustrated to tears, she went to her storage closet to dig for the exercise bike hidden behind boxes of holiday decorations. She and exercise weren’t good friends, but she had an urge to move, to fight. Negative energy was poisoning her and a healthy way to release it was to break a sweat. Plus, she’d end up with a nice firm ass. Now that is the ultimate payback.
She woke up Sunday morning with very sore legs, but knowing precisely how to get over Jerzy. She’d have to fake it until she could make it. Time for a makeover.
Rakell stood at the edge of the lecture hall stage feeling like a queen. Underneath her usual motherly smile was a conceited smirk. Her students slowly filled the room. Each surprised set of eyes, every appreciative once-over, and all the whispered wow’s and whoa’s added more steel to her spine. There were some chuckles of disbelief in the crowd as well, but Rakell felt too good to let it bother her. The students and staff had been gossiping about her for days. Her new appearance would answer their questions and give Jerzy the slap in the face he deserved. She was coming out as the naughty teacher.
Sleek black four-inch heels gave her an instant sense of sensuality and domination. Her chic black faux leather pencil skirt ended above the knee and had a generous slit up the thigh. The pink blouse she wore tucked into the skirt could’ve been modest, but she was wearing a black leather corseted underbust vest over it and the top buttons of the blouse were open to show off her cleavage, for once. The matronly bun in her hair was long gone, replaced with an edgy, short style, a lustrous deep brown “Posh” bob.
When Jerzy walked into the lecture hall he almost tripped over his gaping mouth. Anger, lust and a hint of fear were in his green eyes, exactly what she wanted. Rakell got an incredible adrenaline rush. Her classroom had never been so well-behaved, respectfully waiting in silence for her to start her lecture. She’d taken her power back from everyone.
Yes, boys and girls, I had sex with my student, ‘cause I got it like that. No, Jerzy, you will never get to have all of this bent over a desk for you ever again. You’ll never get this image of me out of your mind and I hope it hurts.
She began the day’s lecture, inwardly delighted with how Jerzy couldn’t sit still in his seat or take his eyes off of her for more than two seconds. His fingers kept rubbing at his mouth and his knee was bouncing. She made a loud victory cry inside when Jerzy stood from his seat ten minutes in and strode out of the classroom.
Jerzy was livid. She looks good. Too fuckin’ good. Her legs were out, her breasts were out. What the hell is she doing? He didn’t want other guys looking at her like she was ripe for the picking. She’s mine. He knew Rakell was trying to piss him off, but she was adding fuel to the rumors, too. She deserved respect, and he worried that her anger and frustration with this whole situation was spoiling her good judgment.
She doesn’t trust me. She probably thinks I’m lying to her or cheating on her like her ex did. Her insecurities and mistrust of men were getting to her, blinding her from seeing the truth. His words to her meant nothing because he wasn’t there. He promised her on their first date that he would protect her, no matter what. This was the ‘no matter what’ part; he was going against his unrelenting yearning to be near her. She wasn’t seeing that keeping his distance from her was hurting him, too. He drove by her house or followed her home because it was something both of them needed. She’d threatened him to stop, but he couldn’t stop. He needed to see her. Whether she protested his patrolling or not, he knew Rakell desired the evidence that she was on his mind every day, and that he’d never let go.
Teaching her class that morning was exhilarating for Rakell, but afterwards the low was crippling. For the first time, she seriously contemplated quitting her job and never teaching again.
Rakell walked into the faculty office building. Seeing
Rakell’s new look, Alisa’s eyes widened then quickly relaxed into their standard haughty glare before turning back at her computer.
She was tired of dealing with Alisa. Kiss my ass, you jealous tattling skank…No offense. Ugh! She was tired of being on the defense, tired of the urge she had to be extra polite to gain the favor of colleagues who she never liked in the first place. Did she ever, in the seven years she’d been at Simmons County Community College, truly enjoy being there? Rakell remembered the first year being rewarding. After that, her feelings fluctuated in correlation with the state of her marriage. Rakell separated her unhappiness with her personal life from her experiences as a professor and saw that she still loved teaching. She just didn’t love teaching at this school.
Besides, she’d look guilty if she suddenly quit. Instead, she would turn in a letter to human resources letting them know she wouldn’t be returning after the completion of the semester. In her office, she typed up the letter, printed it out and signed it. There was a twinge of sadness in her heart, but no fear. Her fear of change had diminished because the challenge of the latest events had revealed her strength. When she stopped by Alisa’s desk on her way out, she was surprised to find that her hatred of the girl had also disappeared. The intensity of her stress had fallen now that she knew a peaceful day of voluntary departure was possible.
Profess Your Love Page 10