Sneaking Candy

by Lisa Burstein

  “A student The New Yorker named a ‘Writer to Watch,’” Professor Dylan pressed.

  James put his head down.

  “Excuse me?” I said, practically choking on my water, feeling my actual head almost explode.

  “He didn’t tell you?” Professor Dylan asked.

  I turned to James, but he just shrugged.

  “I’m pushing him to finally finish his debut so I can blurb it for him,” Professor Dylan said. “Ticktock, James,” he added.

  “It’s not a big deal,” he mumbled.

  He said it like it didn’t mean anything at all. It made my ribs feel like they were suffocating me. Only people who were “big deals” said that. This guy who I was supposed to teach was better than me. Much better than me.

  Professor Dylan had never told me my work had glimpses of anyone, and it made me wonder if he was only saying it to James now because I was sitting there to hear it. To remind me James was a star student. I guess everyone thought James was a genius and the thing was, he was. He’d gotten me to sleep with him without even trying.

  “It’s not a small deal either, James,” Professor Dylan said.

  “Who does Candice’s work remind you of?” James asked, seemingly desperate to move the subject away from him.

  “Good question,” he said, taking a sip of beer. “For you,” he looked at me, “I’d say Plath minus the suicide.”

  “So a lively Sylvia Plath,” I replied, watching James out of the corner of my eye. He was looking at me with the same regard he had when J.D. Salinger hung between us, and hearing Professor Dylan’s choice, I had to admit I felt it, too.

  “I suppose.” Professor Dylan replied. “Your work feels as confessional as hers did, without all the darkness.”

  “But isn’t that what makes Plath, Plath?” James asked.

  Asshole. What the hell does “glimpses of Nabokov” mean anyway?

  “Right,” Professor Dylan said, “just like the lack of it is what makes Candice, Candice.”

  “I’m learning there are a lot of interesting things that make Candice, Candice,” James said, turning to me. I could tell he was not talking at all about what happened last night. It was what had happened before what had happened last night and what Professor Dylan had said about me.

  “Who do you think would win in a bar fight, Plath or Nabokov?” Professor Dylan asked.

  “Here’s to finding out,” James said, raising his glass.

  Professor Dylan raised his and I raised mine and took a long drink, choosing not to clink either of their glasses. I couldn’t give either of them any extra attention. Not with the other one sitting right there.

  I felt myself wishing it were just James and me, like it had been last night, and I hated that I wished that.

  I also couldn’t deny the other side of me wished it was just Professor Dylan and me at the table. That he could keep telling me how much he liked my writing. And, I could lap up his compliments, his praise, his reassurance I had made the right life-altering decision.

  But I was a girl in between two prohibited relationships. The University of Miami was literally cock-blocking me.

  I put my glass down. I was between them and that was where I had to stay. Even though sitting between them right now was more than I felt like dealing with.

  “I think I’ll head out. Thanks for the water,” I said, standing up and walking out of the bar before either of them could respond. The sticky Miami air hit me when I got outside. I needed to go home. I needed to sleep.

  I probably needed to transfer schools.

  The bar’s door opened and James walked out without his backpack.

  “Are we having that bar fight now?” I asked.

  “I don’t think I’m drunk enough yet,” he said, looking past me, the evening sun bringing out the stubble on his face, the tawny highlights in his hair.

  “Then what do you want?” I asked, even though it was clear it was to talk to me.

  “What do you want?” he replied, his impossible eyes punctuating his sexual allusion.

  I turned my focus away from him, trying to hide my real answer. “You actually left your boyfriend inside alone. What if someone suctions onto his ass while you’re gone?”

  “Well, you already left,” he said, “so I don’t think I have to worry about it.”

  “There’s nothing else to say. You should probably go back inside.”

  “I’m not out here for you,” he said, “I came for the sunset.” He squinted up at the sky.

  My face felt like it was covered in a barbecue sauce of embarrassment. I turned so James couldn’t see. It wasn’t that I hadn’t noticed the sunset, but turning to look at it was something else. The sky was layered with amber and blue tissue paper, the sun a big orange orb in the middle of it. It was one of the sunsets the University of Miami used to lure people here. It had worked on James and on me and would continue to work on others.

  He pointed at the sky. “It’s stuff like this that makes me hate being a writer sometimes. How do you describe something this stunning, this fluid? How do you convey the way it feels in your chest?”

  I knew exactly what he meant. Ours was a hard task. Unlike visual artists, we had to use words to make people feel and see something like this. It was a lot to be up against.

  “I think we’re writers because we have the balls to try,” I said.

  He turned to me. I heard a sharp intake of breath. “I may have been drunk when we slept together,” he said, “but I’m pretty sure you don’t have balls.”

  “Metaphorical balls,” I said.

  “So are you saying being writers makes us fearless?” he asked, the sun making the skin on his chiseled arms golden, his brown eyes shine like new pennies.

  “I don’t know. I guess.”

  James moved across the feet between us like they were inches, wrapped me up, and kissed me. I went to push him away at first, but it felt so good I couldn’t stop him. I couldn’t do anything but kiss him back. He kept kissing me, his lips so penetrating I almost dropped to my knees.

  He pulled back from me. I could barely breathe. “I told you to stay away from me,” I said.

  “I had to be fearless,” he said. “Besides, your lips seem like they might not agree with that statement.” I felt him scanning my face, his gaze featherlight, waiting for me to deny it. “And mine can’t, either.”

  Could he sense it, too? While my mind, my heart, was working so hard to shut him out, my body was struggling, more than struggling. Was he trying to show me he didn’t care about rules and when it came to just being with him, maybe I shouldn’t, either?

  But what about Candice’s unspoken rule? To never allow herself be exposed enough to be hurt again.

  He leaned in, kissed me lightly on the cheek, and whispered, “At least you’ll remember that tomorrow.”

  Chapter Eleven

  I did remember it tomorrow. It was all I could think about as I made my way across campus for my office-hour punishment with Professor Dylan. It was all I could think about last night, staring at my Big Bird ceiling, wishing I was staring at James’s ceiling—wishing I couldn’t even see James’s ceiling because he was obscuring my view.

  I wondered if I would find Professor Dylan in his clothes from the night before, having been seduced by James like I was, or vice versa.

  It was clear I was under James’s spell, which was a scary proposition, considering I was the one who was supposed to be calling the shots—academically speaking, anyway.

  My phone was in my face as I made my way across campus, but what was I expecting? A call or text from James? Yeah right.

  The kiss last night was an invitation, a challenge. I needed to make the next move. I just wasn’t sure what that move should be.

  I was sure however, there was no way I could let myself fall for him, really fall for him. Sex was one thing, but having feelings for him was another.

  Professor Dylan was freshly showered behind his desk, typing away, when I arri
ved. He didn’t even acknowledge me when I entered his office, which was fine—I looked like crap. Going on night two with barely any sleep, there was only so much makeup could do.

  The whole room smelled of his shampoo, sharp like alcohol. I sat at one of the seats at the back of the room, opened my laptop, and started typing, too. At least I could get some writing done on the piece I was having workshopped in class next week. It was definitely not getting the attention it deserved, considering it was the first thing any of my fellow graduate students here would read.

  The only things getting my attention were writing for Candy, which, since what happened with James was getting very little, and James. Which, since what happened with James, was getting a lot.

  My story for class next week, “Boxed In,” was about a woman who was going through the items in her parents’ house after they had both died and finding a note her mother had written to her, apologizing for everything she’d done wrong in her daughter’s life. So un-Candy, so very Candice. So very what I wished one day for Candice.

  Not the death part, but the apology part, hopefully in live form. The you made the right life-altering decision part—not just from Professor Dylan, but from my parents, too.

  Perhaps that was the confessional nature Professor Dylan said he liked in my work. He hadn’t read this piece yet, but I did tend to write my truth. As Candice I wrote from my soul, sometimes to a fault. As Candy I just wrote, letting the characters tell me their stories.

  And sometimes that felt truer.

  I’d just finished writing the lines, I sometimes felt like my life was an empty box. An aching, bottomless box sitting on top of a black hole that, no matter how much I tried, would never be filled; filling these boxes now, it felt more vacant than ever.

  It made me think about what James had said, how hard our job as writers was. Was that enough to convey the character’s pain at losing her parents just when she finally saw they loved her? Would it ever be enough?

  I heard Professor Dylan stop typing, heard the wheels on his chair roll as he sat back in it. I felt him watching me, but I kept writing.

  “I like watching you write,” Professor Dylan said. It was not at all what I’d expected him to say.

  “Thank you,” I replied. He liked my writing and he liked watching me write. Daddy-issue cliché or not, it felt good to have someone who supported exactly who you wanted to be—or, at least, half of exactly who you wanted to be.

  “You and James seem to be getting along,” he said.

  “You told me to get along with him,” I replied, faster and more defensively than I meant to.

  “I know,” he said, watching me. “Interesting it’s the first directive of mine you’ve completely followed.”

  “Why wouldn’t I?” I asked. “It’s not like we hang out or anything; he’s my student,” I added, attempting to protest something he had no idea I needed to be protesting.

  “I just thought you might be jealous of him. I’m glad you can see past his talent.”

  “I haven’t even seen his talent,” I said, realizing Professor Dylan and I were talking about very different things. “I’ve only heard about it.”

  “Would you like to?” he asked, ready to shoot to his keyboard to send me something.

  “I don’t know when I’ll get to it,” I said. “I have my own writing, my own classes.”

  He paused, which let me know he knew my excuses were just that.

  “It’s fine,” he said, probably because even though I was trying not to, I must have seemed visibly upset. “You aren’t his writing professor. I am.”

  “Right,” I said, remembering Professor Dylan was mine, too, which made me wonder if he’d offered to send James some of my work. Even with all his votes of confidence, I immediately felt my insides quiver. If James saw my truth, if he accepted it, how was I supposed to keep myself from falling for him?

  “That doesn’t matter. What matters is it’s important to have a good rapport with students.”

  I nodded in agreement, but I didn’t think he meant giving them hickeys you couldn’t remember.

  He got up from his desk and sat down in the seat next to me. I could smell his aftershave, something piercing, acidic. Feel the wetness of his just-showered hair.

  The thing was, being with James wasn’t even my worst offense. If Professor Dylan would have clicked the right files on the laptop on my lap, my escapades writing as Candy would fly out. He would have seen I was one of the self-published romance authors he loathed.

  That, right under his nose, I was doing the kind of writing he despised.

  I prayed like never before a student actually came to his office hours.

  “So,” I said, anxious to change the subject, “are you using the notes you took in my workshop for your book?”

  “I guess you’ll find out soon enough,” he said, putting his hand on my chair. “Or not so soon enough, if we’re talking publishing time.”

  There had been some rumors that his publisher was considering dropping him after what had been referred to as “far less than anticipated” launch numbers for his latest book, which in publishing terms meant he hadn’t earned out his advance and at this rate never would. Not that Professor Dylan was showing any signs of that being the case, but if it was true, I might never read it.

  “Don’t you use things from your life in your work?” he asked.

  “Of course,” I said. More than you know, I thought.

  “I’m excited to read your piece,” he said, nodding at my laptop, his hand still on the armrest of my chair, level with my chest. He was close enough to me to lean his head on my shoulder.

  Having been with James, I started to understand what I had felt for Professor Dylan wasn’t at all sexual. What I craved from him was acceptance. What I wanted was to make him proud.

  “I’d hold your applause until after you read it.”

  “Confidence isn’t something you earn. It’s something you learn,” he said.

  I got that, but didn’t he understand, especially as a writer himself, that you never felt confident about any new work, especially when it was still being written?

  “What’s with the pep talk?” I asked. I liked it, of course, but since James had entered the picture, Professor Dylan had been increasingly nicer to me. He wanted something, or wanted me to want something.

  “I suppose I’m feeling generous today,” he said, walking back to his desk.

  Maybe James had brought him home and screwed the crap out of him, too.

  When my time was up, I closed his door behind me and found Julia standing against the empty reception desk. Yes, Professor Dylan had office hours before even the department secretary came in.

  Apparently Julia had taken to his hours, too.

  “You sure are spending a lot of time in Tony’s office,” she said, picking up a pencil out of the pencil cup on the reception desk, like maybe we were going to start fighting over him or something.

  I had plenty of pencils in my bag if it came to that. I had pens, too. I had big fat highlighters.

  Her blond hair was up in a tight ponytail, the kind you are sure has to make the person’s head hurt. She was in her uniform: tight black shirt, black pants.

  Poet gear.

  The thing was, I didn’t think she was pretentious because she was a poet. I thought she was pretentious because she spoke like you were a subject in her sentence, not like you were a person.

  “I’m his TA,” I said.

  “Still,” she said, “he has other TAs.”

  So go bother them, I wanted to say. But she was right. None of them were here at seven a.m. He hadn’t asked any of them to be here at seven a.m. I had thought it was a punishment, but was it really something else?

  I shrugged and said, “His choice, not mine.”

  “What would I find if I walked in without knocking?” she asked, rolling the pencil between two fingers.

  “Nothing,” I said.

  Now if you walked in on Ja
mes and me…

  “It better stay that way,” she said, walking toward her office.

  I wanted so badly to tell her Professor Dylan had tried to kiss me. That he probably would have if it wasn’t for a choice between a cow patty and a pig intestine. Just to see her face.

  She held her door open and watched me. “Reputation is everything in this business. It can take very little to ruin one,” she said, closing her door behind her.

  I hated Julia, but she was right. It was why I’d been so afraid of anyone finding out about Candy, about James, and it seemed about whatever she thought was going on between me and Professor Dylan.

  Considering I felt like I had so much I needed to hide, it was clear my reputation was just asking for it.

  Chapter Twelve

  After class I headed to the library to get some reading done. It felt like the only place on campus I knew I could go and be free and uninterrupted. I mean, the building itself was a gray concrete behemoth practically screaming, People do boring things inside me.

  Libraries were all about silence and scholarly thought. Not about being kissed or kiss-arly thoughts. It was exactly the break I needed. I found an empty study carrel and opened Breakfast at Tiffany’s. It was the third book on my syllabus and I wanted to be at least a book ahead of my students, just in case anything came up and I didn’t have time to read.

  It’s amazing I’d gotten as much reading done as I had, considering everything that had come up so far.

  Don’t even say it, Candy.

  I highlighted the line, “I’ll never get used to anything. Anybody that does, they might as well be dead.” It made me think about Keith, how when we’d been together I’d known exactly what he was going to do before he would do it. At the time, I’d thought a routine stability like that was what I wanted, but having been with James, I wasn’t so sure anymore.

  He kept surprising me.

  Candy would have agreed with Holly Golightly. Even Candice was starting to.

  I shook my head—scholarly thoughts only. I turned the page and started reading again when I heard the chair in the carrel next to me screech along the floor as it was pulled out. I didn’t bother even turning to look until a familiar voice said, “I love reading in libraries, too.”