One Plus Two Minus One

by Tess Mackenzie

“Next time I’ll just fuck you before I let you come,” he said. And grinned again to make it seem like a joke. Except it wasn’t.

  She looked at him for a long, long time. Thought about calling him on the next time, but knew, just knew, he’d smirk and tell her of course she’d want a next time. Which was probably true. She’d had crushes on people like him before. Had watched from a distance, knew how they worked. He’d made her come twice, in half the time any decent girl takes, and she didn’t want to make his smugness worse.

  Instead she said, “How old are you?”

  “Does it matter? Do you care?”

  She shrugged. She didn’t really. She’d just wanted to put him off a little, kick a dent in his cockiness. That hadn’t worked, now he was grinning twice as much.

  She knew she shouldn’t like him, knew his smartass shit probably hid a bastard or someone deeply insecure or both. Knew that ten years ago someone like him wouldn’t have looked twice at someone like her. But this wasn’t ten years ago, and he was cute and kissed good and if she was some fantasy he had, then why not let him fuck her.

  Before she decided she thought really hard about what she was doing. It wasn’t the rules, exactly. Not the actual rules on paper. There were other rules, more important rules. Things everyone understood. She was a woman, and she did maths, and that meant they were doing her a favor by letting her in, no matter how good she was and how great she could become. She shouldn’t make trouble, and this was trouble. This was exactly what you weren’t meant to do to help your career. She should tell Ethan to go, and she almost did, except that dozens of male professors were married to women half their age, and it wasn’t fair they got to and she didn’t. And Ethan was here, the opportunity was here, so she couldn’t see why she shouldn’t.

  “Are you doing anything tonight?” she said.

  “Not yet.”

  “Have a drink with me. At six.”

  He nodded slowly. “Where?”

  She thought. The bars on campus were swill-pits for students, and the staff club was out. That meant town, she supposed, but she didn’t really want to walk hand-in-hand across campus.

  “Come back here,” she said. “We’ll work something out.”

  He nodded.

  “Hey,” she said, and kissed him. “You’re really fucking good. That was wonderful. I just can’t, during the day.”

  He kissed her back and said, “I know.”

  She almost didn’t like him again.

  “Five to six,” she said. “The doors and lifts will lock and you won’t be able to get up.”

  He nodded and opened the door and left.

  *

  Beth sat at her desk all afternoon and wondered what she was doing. She was wet. She was wet and distracted and excited, and kept trying to tell herself what a stupid idea this was.

  She’d spent a long time working to get here. She had a plan, knew where she was going. She’d taken a job at a second-tier university because they wanted her more, had tried harder to get her, had let her negotiate less teaching and have more research time. That was good, but it meant she had to produce something, had to prove herself to get out. Otherwise, it was here, in this office, forever. She wanted to be in a research position by the time she was forty, and although it sounded like a long time, it wasn’t. She’d started off slow, had more to catch up. She needed to produce something, and to do that she needed free time, and no distractions, and Ethan was a threat to both.

  She was almost brilliant. Only almost. Somehow you just knew. She wouldn’t set the world on fire, but would have one or two good ideas and make do. Her life would count, but she would never be one of the greats. She’d almost not done maths at all, had failed calculus at high school because she didn’t understand it, and drifted into an arts degree, had taken a discrete math course out of interest and realized she was good. As good as the professor. She’d wasted a year on that, and another year taking all the core maths papers she hadn’t done the first time around and needed. She’d got her scholarships and her doctorate but had always known she was just that little bit older than everyone else now. That made her worry about time just that little bit more.

  She had to be where she wanted to be by forty, or it was all over. And from the age she’d started doing maths properly, she had already been halfway there. She worried she was wasting time on teaching when her mind was at its best, that she’d never get this time back, and now she was horny instead of thinking. She had to fuck this kid, or not fuck this kid, whichever it was to get him out her system. One or the other. She couldn’t afford the embarrassment he could be to her, but she also couldn’t afford the distracted horny time.

  She tried to work, but couldn’t think, so she marked assignments instead. She gave out a couple of large projects to cut down the risk someone good would crack in an exam and completely fail. With assignments, half the time she could just turn to the back page and check they had the right answer, then give them full points and go to the next. She gave out assignments where that worked on purpose, so marking was quick. It was dull, but needed doing.

  Halfway through she came to an assignment by Ethan Wilson.

  She sat there and looked at it and wondered what the little fuck was up to.

  She checked her class lists and he was in her advanced crypto course, and had been coming to tutorials all semester.

  She sat there for a moment, stunned.

  She should pay more attention to her students. She knew the best students by name, but Ethan was just below those. She tried to remember, and was fairly sure he’d never asked a question, good or bad, so she’d never noticed him before.

  She checked his record. He was a maths and computer science double major. Third year, in the pre-honors program. Doing better at compsci than maths, but doing okay. He wasn’t her, he wasn’t going to get one of the few academic jobs, but he wasn’t going to end up a high-school teacher.

  She scrolled up the page and found his date of birth. He was twenty-one. That made her feel a little better.

  She wondered what to do. She wanted to see him. She wanted sex. She wanted more head like he’d given her, about a month of that without doing anything else. But his being her student, in her course, was very bad. It would be painfully complicated if anything went wrong, and probably end up very public.

  If nothing else, she was pretty sure she should be having someone else to mark his assignment, right now.

  She looked at the last page. He had everything correct.

  She thought. Right now, her wanting to fuck him didn’t make any difference to his mark. So probably she should fuck him. She could get someone else to look at his other work, she supposed. Say there was a personal relationship, that he was a family friend. She’d marked for someone else earlier in the year, checking an exam against a model answer for a professor’s friend’s son.

  After a while she thought to herself that the worst was already done. If she hadn’t been too horny to work, and marking this afternoon, she wouldn’t have noticed until later. So it didn’t actually make any difference. She could fuck him tonight then realize again tomorrow and nothing would actually change.

  About five she went and had a shower. The building had a couple of toilets with bathrooms, so staff could bike in or run at lunchtime. She had gym gear in the cupboard, including a clean towel. She was still a little suspicious of what Ethan was doing, and annoyed with him for not saying he was in her class. She wasn’t sure what she was going to say if he turned up.

  She was back by twenty past, then sat at her computer staring at the screen for half an hour wondering if he’d turn up.

  At ten to six she got up and closed the blinds.

  At two minutes to six someone tapped on her door.

  She stood up, and opened it. Ethan.

  “Hey,” he said.

  “You lied to me.”

  “Ah…” he said.

  “By omission,” she said. “It fucking counts.”

  She’d been mak
ing herself angry. She was almost going to tell him to fuck off. Tell him that whatever he thought this meant, it didn’t, that she was going to own up to the head of school tomorrow so whatever his plan for blackmail had been, it was over.

  “Yeah,” he said. “Sorry. I did.”

  She pulled him inside and closed the door. A lot of people worked odd hours, anyone could still be around.

  “You’re a shit,” she said. “You should have told me.”

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “But you just assumed, and you were already upset about last semester.”

  That was true.

  “How long did you think it would take me to realize?” she said.

  “Ah,” he said. “Well, since apparently you don’t recognize anyone in your class…”

  “I would have eventually.”

  “At least until tonight. Hopefully longer if I didn’t go to lectures.”

  “You’d skip lectures to fuck me?”

  “Of course.”

  She liked how he didn’t need to think about that. How he thought wanting her was obvious.

  “And I could ask you for notes, anyway,” he said. “Afterwards, when you realized.”

  She just looked at him for a while, then said, “Dickhead.”

  “How did you work it out?”

  “Marked your assignment.”

  “Ah.” Grinning. “Um, yeah. That was kind of a fuck-up of timing.”

  “Yep.”

  “How’d I do?”

  She almost told him. Then said, “Find out when everyone the fuck else does.”

  “You swear more than when you’re teaching.”

  “No fucking shit.” She looked at him. “So what?”

  “It’s hot.”

  “Hot?”

  “Yeah, it turns me on. You’re a real person, when you’re like this.”

  “You’re a shit,” she said. “You really are.”

  He just stood there. She didn’t know why she’d said it, really, but he was. He was too confident, for twenty-one. Too confident for someone trying to bang their professor.

  “Come here,” she said, and kissed him. Kissed him for a while.

  He tried to pull her top down, get to her tits.

  “No,” she said, and grabbed his hand, “Clothes on, here.”

  He got his hand inside her skirt and underwear, and she sat there and kissed him and let him finger her.

  He knelt down, tugged her underwear to the side.

  She owed him, she should be getting him off, but he was doing her again and didn’t seem to care. He started licking her, and she melted. Felt herself go all warm and gooey. She closed her eyes and tried to balance sitting up. Held his head with one hand and the edge of the desk with the other and wriggled around knocking things onto the floor. She ended up bent forwards over him, holding his head against herself, hugging him. Trying to lift herself onto his mouth. Breathing hard, trying to stay quiet. The desk was moving, things were tipping over. A few pens rolled off the side, and fell. A badly-placed book. Her computer hummed and switched on.

  She felt it very close. Felt it building up. Her knee twitched and her tits ached and she couldn’t breathe. She said, “Shit, oh shit,” very quietly, and came.

  And kept coming. She was a bit surprised by that. She’d been doing herself for too long, had forgotten what someone else felt like when you had the time to enjoy them and weren’t already pulling your clothes back into place as it started.

  She opened her eyes and looked down at him and wondered what the fuck to do now. He kissed her a few more times, licked her, acted like he really wanted to be down there. That was kind of hot.

  She was sitting on her desk, in an office she’d worked her whole life to get, with a student kneeling between her legs. His hands on her, his chin wet with her. Licking her still.

  She watched him for a while and decided this was turning into a thing. It wasn’t just once, and she needed to think about that.

  After a while she said, “No-one can know. No-one from around here.”

  “Okay,” he said.

  “And not your friends. Definitely not your friends.”

  “I won’t tell anyone.”

  “I mean it.”

  “I get it. I won’t tell anyone, I swear.”

  She felt a little better. “And if you have some plan with this, if this is some bullshit scam to get something out of me, it won’t work.”

  “It isn’t.”

  She was still suspicious.

  “You’re beautiful and brilliant and I just want you,” he said, and he seemed sincere. She almost believed him. She knew she wanted to, and told herself to be careful. Part of her felt like the punch-line of a joke waiting to happen, but maybe she shouldn’t be so suspicious and insecure. Maybe he just liked her. Perhaps if she’d ever had a crush on a professor she might get this more easily.

  “You spent all last year perving at me,” she said. Watched him carefully.

  “Yeah,” he said.

  “Tell me.” Still watching.

  “Every lecture, all last year. You’re clever. And hot. You dress well. You have tattoos. And when you talk about maths you forget you’re in a lecture and for a moment think of us as people.”

  “I’m not that bad.”

  “You are. You really are. You’re arrogant and dismissive and that’s hot too. But it’s okay, because you’re smarter than anyone in the room and actually doing us a favor by talking to us.”

  “I know that,” Beth said. “How do you know that?”

  “It’s just obvious. All the other teachers I’ve had, all the other professors. You answer questions differently, you just know how to explain it.”

  She sat there for a while.

  “I really like that,” he said. “You’re hot, but smart too.”

  “It doesn’t scare you?”

  “A little.”

  She decided she believed him. She didn’t know why, probably just vanity, but she decided she did.

  “Get my bag,” she said, and pointed.

  He handed it to her. She took out a couple of condoms she kept in a zipped inside compartment. Stood up and tugged her undies down, and sat back on the desk. She bit the condom wrapper, and opened it.

  He started undressing. Half lifted his shirt off. He had a nice stomach. Pretty firm, for a compsci and maths nerd.

  “Don’t undress,” she said. “For fuck’s sake.”

  He pulled it back down.

  “Christ,” she said. “Just get it out and fuck me. Try and be subtle. And lock the door.”

  He stood there for a moment like he couldn’t work out which order to do things in. Suddenly he seemed nervous, so maybe his cockiness was an act and he was a bit insecure too, not the smug asshole he was pretending to be. She sat there, swung one leg, kept her face expressionless, let him suffer.

  He decided in the end and went over to the door. “How?”

  “Put the snib up.”

  He came back over, looked like he was going to kneel down again.

  “Fuck,” she said, grabbed him. “Lay off.”

  She pulled him close, kissed him some more, unzipped his pants.

  He was hard. He was twenty-one and hard and twitching like he was about to come in her hand. She rolled the condom onto him and looked down at him and just savored that moment. That cock, that thick hard cock in her hand was about to be inside her. He was breathing roughly, had his eyes closed. Her hand, she supposed. She liked that, liked having the power now. Not always being the one getting head and being desperate. She held him, pressed her lips to his neck. Breathed on him, and bit, and kissed. He was shaking, almost. Hot and solid in her hand. He felt too substantial, more than flesh ought to be.

  She put her foot behind him, pulled his body against herself, slid his cock into her. She wanted to be all controlling this time, like he’d done to her, but couldn’t manage. She felt all spread and wet and tingly, and he was this hard bar inside her. She gasped and moaned a
nd felt like she just about fainted as he went in.

  She hadn’t been fucked in a year. She’d forgotten what it was like. Someone else’s breath on her neck, warm skin against hers, his face pressed to her shoulder. Some else’s groans and grunts and murmurs that she felt so fucking good as she made the same noises herself.

  She suddenly realized she was making noise, and tried to bite it back. She put her free hand over his mouth, to try to keep him quiet, but he sucked her fingers instead.

  He was clumsy. Only a little, but not as smooth as he’d been giving head. Once he was in, he started fucking her a bit frantically, a bit uncontrollably. More energy expended than was necessary. The desk shook beneath them. Things started falling off again, more pens, her lamp sliding towards the edge, so she had to let go of his face and grab it. The edge of the desk banged on the wall. She moved a bit, tried to sit differently so it didn’t rock as much, to wrap herself around him and control how he moved. She held his head, pressed his face to her shoulder to shut him up, pressed hers to his to just feel him, to know he was real, another actual person was inside her for once.

  She breathed in the smell of the shirt he’d been wearing all day. She listened to his grunts and gasps and the squelchy sucking as he went in and out. He went quiet, and she listened to his breathing, all hoarse and needing, listened to her own.

  She was close. She was startlingly close, and hadn’t noticed. “Oh shit,” she said. “Harder.” She tried to grab her clit, push down, got tangled in her clothes. He understood, pushed his fingers up against her.

  She came. Came on his cock, around his cock. She was surprised she was again, must be turned on by illicitness.

  When she was done, she just sat there, quietly, holding him. Lifting herself, as best she could to make his angle easier, while he pounded away at her, fucked her madly, with everything he had. In a couple of minutes, he came too.

  She pulled him out, rolled the condom off, and bundled it up in tissues. Then sat there and looked him and said, “Shit.”

  He kissed her, leaning close into her. His cock still out, soft and hot and damp on the inside of her leg.

  She put her hand out and felt it, wanting it again. “I really shouldn’t have done that.”