by Jody Gehrman
“You heard me. No need to throw my words back at me.” You try on a stern tone, but you blush like a little girl. It’s all I can do not to wrap you in my arms and squeeze until you squeal. “But Sam, it’s fabulous. Sure, a little rough around the edges, but the story’s all there.”
“Thanks. That means a lot.”
“I mean the narrator is just so creepy. Chilling, really. And the voice, the dramatic tension, the slow burn to the climax. It’s…” You hesitate. “Amazing.”
I believe you. The energy in your voice—in your hands, which stir the air like a conductor—everything about you says you’re sincere. I’ve gotten compliments on my writing before now, but none of it’s ever meant as much as this moment. If I could bottle the liquid joy in your eyes, I’d live on that elixir for the rest of my life.
You push a stack of pages between us. It takes me a moment to realize it’s my manuscript.
“I’ve made a few suggestions,” you say.
“Of course.”
Your fingers flip through, looking for something. Your nails are unpainted, trimmed and neat. I like that. So tidy, unadorned. Simple. I’d like to put each of your fingers into my mouth, one by one, taste the shape of them.
“Most of my notes are self-explanatory,” you say, not looking up, “but this one in chapter seven, I want to go over.”
You slip on your glasses and lean forward, scanning the page. I fucking love you in glasses. They disguise your angelic radiance with an intellectual air. Twin lines of concentration appear between your brows, the faint quotation marks that mean your brain is kicking into gear.
I scoot my chair closer. My entire body’s electric. The whiskey-warmth of my relief is eclipsed by your proximity. I lean toward you, breathing in your smell. No perfume or scented lotion for you, Kate. You’re not trying to disguise yourself as a strawberry. You’re the cold of October. You’re musk and radiance, pure animal heat.
Your hair falls forward, revealing the back of your neck. Your skin is milk and moonlight, the curve of your spine graceful as a ballerina’s. I lean a few centimeters closer. The subtle knuckles of your vertebrae are so near I can almost taste them, can imagine the salt of your skin. Every part of me is wide-awake, coiled. I’m getting hard just looking at you. Do you sense me breathing you in, or are you really that engrossed in my words? The light pools in your hair, on your skin. I have to touch you. Your white neck beckons. You’re a wild animal that must not be startled. I watch your hands turn the pages, your fingers caressing my words.
“You have beautiful hands,” I say.
You’re surprised. “I never really look at them.”
“And yet they do so much.”
You breathe out an embarrassed laugh. “Let’s see yours.”
I watch you.
“What?” Your eyes spark with a challenge. “You can study mine, but I can’t study yours?”
I put both hands out in front of me. Slowly, checking my face for signs of protest, you turn them over. When my palms are faceup, my wrists exposed, you take a long moment to drink them in. Jagged pink scars run like lightning along my veins.
“What happened?”
“I had a really bad night.”
“You don’t have to talk about it.”
“I’ll tell you anything you want to know.” The air grows thicker around us, dense and humid. “Anything.”
You run a finger along the raised ridge of one scar. “Did you really want to die?”
I consider this, though it’s difficult to concentrate on anything except the texture of your skin against mine. “Honestly? I don’t remember.”
There’s a knock at the door. It’s so damn loud in the silence. Even as the intruder’s rapping for permission, they’re turning the handle and pushing their way in. I want to hurl myself at this person, whoever it is. I want to tear their jugular out with my teeth.
You and I both flinch at the sound, turn toward it. Standing there filling the doorway is a bony woman with frizzy red hair, reading glasses pushed into the haystack atop her head. Her beady green eyes go wide with surprise. She narrows them to slits, honing in on how close we’re sitting, the look on my face.
I’m pretty good at controlling my expressions. In the third grade my teacher told Grandma she should have me tested for autism because I showed so little emotion. From that day on I spent hours in front of a mirror, forcing my facial muscles to convey every human sentiment from joy to despair. This red-haired goblin caught me off guard, though; no doubt I look drunk. She sniffs, like she can smell my longing.
“Sorry to interrupt.” She says it through a mouth so tight and pinched, in a tone that’s not sorry at all. What a fucking bitch. Forget about her jugular—I want to tear her face off.
“Frances!” You swivel your chair all the way around to face her. Your hands fold into your lap like a schoolgirl’s. “What’s up?”
She eyes you with hostility. “Wanted to make sure you got that email. About the meeting.”
“Oh, yes, Tuesday, right?” You are composed, poised. I’m so proud of you. A subtle nectarine flush along your throat is the only sign you’re flustered.
The goblin nods. “If you can just accept my invitation through Meeting Maker…”
I’d like to shove Meeting Maker up her withered ass.
“No problem.” Your smile’s so warm. How do you do it? You glance at me. “Sam, have you met Frances Larkin? She’s chair of the department, an award-winning poet.”
I almost laugh out loud. The thought of this wretched little frizzy-haired orc writing a poem! Instead, I school my features into one of the many expressions I’ve mastered: starstruck.
“Wait, this is Professor Larkin?”
There’s a brief, confused beat, during which nobody seems to know what to say, but then you step in. “None other.”
I want to stand and reach to shake her hand, but I’m hard despite the total buzzkill of her intrusion. Still seated, I try to make that work for me, gazing up at her gnarled face like a peasant addressing the empress.
“Your work’s amazing. The whole reason I came here was to study under you and Professor Youngblood.” I shake my head, like I can’t quite get over the honor of being in her presence.
She’s mollified. Her red slash of a mouth still turns down at the corners, though, like she’s just sucked on a lemon. “That’s nice. Kate, I’ll see you Tuesday.”
The door closes, thank fucking god, and we’re alone again.
You don’t deserve this shit. You and I belong in the pulse and throb of Manhattan. Our days will be filled with words and our nights with glittering parties, and we’ll reinvent what it means to be bohemians in love. You’ll never have to accept a Meeting Maker invitation again, and Frances fucking Larkin can suck my dick.
KATE
When Frances is gone, I take a shaky breath.
“You okay?” His eyebrows pull together in concern.
“We should—” I scoot my chair in, tapping the pages of his manuscript “—get back to this novel of yours. Sorry for all the distractions.”
“Did I lay it on too thick?”
“What do you mean?” My heart goes on racing. God, what’s Frances thinking right now? Was I still touching his hands when she barged in, or had I already jerked away like a kid caught stealing candy?
“About coming here to study with you and her. In my defense, half that statement’s true.”
I shake my head, willing myself to breathe normally. “You didn’t come here because of me.”
“I did.” His face goes abruptly serious. “I love your work.”
“You don’t have to do that.”
“I’m not doing anything.” His expression is even more solemn. “I’m your biggest fan. Don’t you know that?”
I don’t know how to react. To cover my confusion, I stand, go to my filing cabinet, and pull it open. “I meant to share this short story with you—it’s similar to the mood you’re evoking in your novel.”
>
Suddenly he’s behind me. I can feel him there. The heat of his body presses against me, though he’s standing a few inches away. I don’t dare turn around. He traces one finger down my spine. An involuntary shiver works through me.
“I need you to understand.” He kisses the back of my neck so lightly—the touch of a raindrop, a swath of mist. “I think about you all the time.”
“Sam.” It comes out hoarse. I clear my throat. “We can’t.”
He turns me around, his hands on my shoulders; the heat of his fingers presses through my blouse. “We can.”
“No. This is not going to—”
He’s kissing me. I’m kissing him back. He pins me against the file cabinet. The cold metal presses against my skin and this is bad, so bad, but I can’t stop. I have to stop.
After way too long, I find the will to push him away. I give him a helpless, pleading look. “I really can’t do this. Not here.”
“Where?” He stares at my mouth.
“No, I’m not saying…” I want to kiss him again so badly, I ache. “This can’t happen. It’s too dangerous.”
He looks at me with sudden patience. “It will happen. But I can wait.”
“Sam—”
Already he’s walking out the door, though, leaving me breathless and bewildered.
* * *
It’s five o’clock on Wednesday, and I’m drunk.
Not just tipsy or buzzed—pretty much wasted.
After my meeting with Sam, I drove straight home and yanked a bottle of Bombay Sapphire from my liquor cabinet. I filled a highball with ice cubes, poured gin until the glass was half full. A splash of tonic, a wedge of lemon, and it was down the hatch.
On the second and third, I didn’t bother with the lemon. Or the tonic.
I don’t usually drown my sorrows. When I do drink, it’s a couple glasses of wine with dinner or cocktails with Zoe. We’ve definitely gotten drunk together more than we should, usually inadvertently, once or twice with grim determination. Those are special occasions, bona fide disasters: when she found out her dad had cancer, for example, or when I caught Pablo fucking his child whore in our bed. Now, though, with Zoe all pregnant and pious, I’m left to my own devices.
This is not a bona fide disaster. It’s not even a full-on train wreck.
All I know is, when Sam walked out of my office, something inside me snapped. I knew right then I needed to get drunk. My long, elaborate to-do list transformed into one word: “drink.”
I really did start out with teacherly intentions. Before Frances walked in, I was wading deep into his sentences, trying to formulate the exact way to phrase my critique. Usually, my notes fall on the harsh side. Students need to hear the truth if they’re ever going to improve. I get flack for it, especially from the entitled babies who’ve never heard anything but praise. I don’t back down, though.
Sam’s different. In spite of his controlled exterior, his ability to project any emotion he deems appropriate in the moment, I sense he has a volatile inner life. It’s in his writing. In the dark shadows that sometimes pass over his face, like storm clouds sweeping over sunlit fields. My respect for his work means I’d never lie to him. Still, my fear of discouraging him at this early stage has turned me uncharacteristically cagey.
His novel is good. It’s raw and pulsing with angsty power. It’s also just a draft, though. He makes an amateur move in chapter seven, one that Maxine will hate—a ham-fisted foreshadowing that pretty much ruins the ending. I sense a stubbornness in him I don’t want to engage. Making him see what needs to be changed without pushing him away feels important. Monumental. Like the first and only significant moment in my teaching career.
I sip my fourth drink, leaning against the balcony upstairs. I can see into my unkempt, leaf-strewn yard, over my fence, which is heaving under the burden of passionflower vines. I see into my neighbors’ yard. Their son’s playing a game with a red fire engine, driving it through their immaculately groomed garden, making a siren sound. Fabricating an emergency.
Is that what I’m doing? Making up a disaster so I’ll have a valid excuse to get blind drunk?
I relive the scene in my office. Me dithering over his pages, trying to arrange my words just so. Him there beside me, so close I could hear him breathing, could feel little currents of air on the back of my neck. My desire to guide his revisions with the deft precision of a great teacher was so strong, so overwhelming. Desperate.
But if I’m being totally honest—four drinks in, I lack the ability to delude even myself—I wasn’t just thinking about his revisions. I wanted to kiss him even before he kissed me.
And then, after Frances left. God, the energy between us. That kiss. The way everything disappeared around us. Those eyes. Those hands. How long can I resist the magnetic pull he exerts on me? I’m like a swimmer paddling in a panic as a muscular riptide pulls me farther and farther out to sea.
Falling for Sam wouldn’t just be tenure-wrecking; it would be career-ending. Okay, that might be overly dramatic. Technically, there are no laws against getting involved with adult students. I just don’t see myself getting tenure if my committee suspects I’m dating an undergrad. That’s a serious scandal. If they don’t give you tenure, they get rid of you. A dismissal after seven years at Blackwood, tepid or even hostile references, the rumors. Not good. I could kiss the possibility of a respectable academic career goodbye.
Ha! Kiss it goodbye. Very nice.
Underneath this realization, there’s something even more disturbing, something I can only bear to face good and drunk. If he hadn’t walked out of my office when he did, there’s no telling how far it would have gone. The heat rolling off him. It was like sitting next to a bonfire. All that impulsive, tormented energy. I felt more alive than I’ve felt in a decade.
My doorbell rings, making me jump. Who the hell is that?
With the blithe, insouciant confidence only four G & Ts can inspire, I swig the rest of my drink and head for the door.
“Hi.” I lean against the doorjamb, feeling light-headed.
Raul stands before me, looking strong and handsome and age-appropriate. His suit is so impeccably tailored, he could be the romantic lead in a Bellini film. “You okay? You seem a little breathless.”
“I was upstairs.” I roll sideways against the wood, rub my spine against the frame like a cat. God, I’m so drunk. This is bad. “What are you doing here?”
His smile’s easy, open. Not rehearsed, like Sam’s expressions. I swear, he’s so calculating. Why am I thinking about him right now? It’s wrong. Maybe I’m having a midlife crisis. Must be nice, being worshiped all day by guys like that. Zoe’s words echo in my head. God, I’m so depressingly typical.
“Thought I’d stop by,” Raul says. “Is that okay?”
I step away and open the door wider. “Of course. Come in.”
As we make our way into my kitchen, I try to decide if I should confess about how drunk I am. Probably he can tell, right? But what kind of loser gets wasted alone before dinner on a Wednesday? I busy myself tidying up, putting dishes in the sink, straightening a tea towel. I pointedly ignore the big bottle of gin, now half empty, sitting on the counter.
“Do you want something to drink? Maybe coffee or tea?”
He tilts his head, glances at the gin, eyes sparkling. “Maybe something stronger?”
“Oh, sure. I didn’t know if you had to work or—?”
“I’d love a beer, if you have it.”
I pull a Heineken from the fridge, start rummaging for an opener.
“I’ve got it.” His key chain has a bottle opener on it. It’s silver, with the distinctive open mouth and lolling tongue of the Rolling Stones. He applies it deftly and flips the discarded top into the garbage.
I look for my glass, remember I left it upstairs. I go to grab a fresh one and almost drop it.
“Seems like you may have already started.” He puts his hand on my waist. Only then do I notice I’m swaying.
I cover my face with both hands. “Jesus. I’m so embarrassed.”
“No! Why?” His hand is still on my waist, I note distantly.
“I never do this. I had such a wretched day. As soon as I got home, I started on the gin.” I throw my head back and groan. “I swear I’m not an alcoholic.”
“Of course not.” He leans closer, staring down at me with those dark chocolate eyes. “Anyway, you’re cute when you’re drunk.”
“I’m not! My face gets splotchy and sometimes I cry.”
He touches my nose gently with one finger. “Your face is beautiful. If you cry, then you cry. So what?”
“You’re not afraid of tears?” I can feel myself spinning into his orbit. It’s ugly and wrong, but I need to distract myself. This man will not get you fired, I remind myself. This man is yours for the asking.
“Remember our friend Pedro Calderón de la Barca? ‘If love is not madness, it is not love.’” With that, he leans down and kisses me.
He’s hesitant at first, his lips trying to find how they fit with mine. Once he’s sure I’m kissing him back, though, his mouth becomes firm, muscular. Insistent. He pushes me against the kitchen island. I feel my spine pressing against the edge. Before I know what’s happening, he’s lifted me up onto the tiled surface, his fingers cupping my ass. He spreads my legs with deft hands, pushing against me. I can feel how hard he is through the fine Italian wool of his suit.
This is a man, I tell myself. A man who wants you.
I try to concentrate on that—just that.
Every time I remember Sam’s eyes unwrapping me, his fingers offering me a cigarette, I force myself to kiss Raul harder. My lips feel bruised with the effort.
But I don’t stop.
SAM
The law favors poor impulse control when it comes to homicide. In Ohio, first-degree murder will get you life. Second-degree murder—you couldn’t help yourself, you stupid fuck—draws as little as fifteen.
This might lead you to believe that spur-of-the-moment homicide is somehow preferable to a homicide that’s planned. As if spontaneity proves you’re a better person.