Saint and Scholar (11 page)

“I…
no
. We didn’t.” Carla fished her phone out of her purse and read the incoming text.

Miss Gill–are you available? Two reports of attempted assaults on female joggers. Both women are accessible this evening for interviewing. -Durham Police, Central Command Admin

She hovered her thumbs over the touch screen as she thought. She had planned to go to the airport after leaving the mall, but she wasn’t really in a position to turn down money. She responded.

Yes. After six. Please email me confirmation.

She stuffed her phone into her purse and turned her attention to Sharon. “We were sort of interrupted by someone at the door.”

Sharon’s jaw dropped so Carla could see her wealth of silver fillings. “Huh! Lose your chastity belt, miss? I’ve never known you to give it up before the fifth date.”

“So, why’d you ask?”

“Duh! Your neck. He must have a magic mouth for you to lose your clothes.”

Carla took a gulp of her coffee and slumped in her seat. “Oh my God, Sharon. You don’t understand what it’s like being around him. He’s so intense and attentive, and every time I looked at his face my nipples got hard. I would have just laid there and let him do whatever he wanted to me.”

Sharon scoffed and leaned sideways to chuck her empty coffee cup into the nearby trashcan. “Well, that’s no fun. He may have a few years and some experience on you, but you don’t have to play student all the time.”

“You sound suspiciously like you’re speaking from experience.” Carla gathered her paper trash into a pile.

“No comment. Hey, you got some time to shop? We need to get you some layering pieces for your trip. Oh my God, I’m so stoked for you. Just don’t screw it up by letting that hellcat temper out before he puts a ring on it.”

“Ring? Ha. Slow down, sweetheart. We can shop. I have about an hour. Also, I told him about the temper.”

“Telling is one thing. Showing is another.”

* * * *

After an impromptu session of office hours where Grant sat in his empty office waiting for students interested in doing so to pick up their exam booklets, he’d intended to confront Carla’s ex-advisor about his rudeness. However, his
own
advisor intercepted him as he was trying to haul ass out of the history building.

“Dr. Fennell!”

“Fuck.” He stopped in his tracks and had a smile on his face before he spun around to greet Dr. Arthur.

“I guess I
am
a doctor now,” he said.

“Pity you won’t be around to receive your degree in person. So sorry to hear about the job.”

He furrowed his forehead.

Dr. Arthur slapped the side of her head with her palm. “Sorry, what I meant was ‘sorry there wasn’t an opening in the department here.’ You’re a fine scholar and I think your research is very thoughtful.”

God, what does she want, more thanks? Was mentioning her in the acknowledgements of the fucking book not enough?
“I appreciate the kind words. You’ve been an excellent mentor.” He lied as though butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth.

“Oh, stop it!” She put her hand over her heart and giggled. “You really went at it alone, mostly. You always seemed to have a knack for knowing where to look for things.”

True
.

“So, when are you leaving?”

“Monday.”

“So soon! Gosh, you know, I saw Francesca earlier. She didn’t tell me you were shoving out so fast.”

Fuck
. “Oh, that’s right. You cosupervised her dissertation, didn’t you? I’d forgotten about that.”

It was easy to forget, since he never saw the woman until he had to track her down to have a form signed.

“Yes, I did. Such a charming girl. She told me you’re seeing someone new?” She twirled her wedding bands idly and stared at him with a lecherous intensity. “I didn’t realize you’d broken up. I thought you’d be together forever.”

“Yes.” He decided simple was best. He’d get fewer follow-up questions that way.

“Oh. Well, that won’t last.”

“
Excuse
me?” He wondered if he could safely tell the woman off. He certainly didn’t need her reference any longer, but he figured it’d be just his luck he’d run into her at a conference or something, so he held his tongue.

“The long-distance thing. It never works, you know.”

He shifted his bag to his other shoulder. His luck being what it was, he noticed a familiar short man with a shiny pate exiting the administration building and heading toward the employee parking lot.
Shit, shit, shit
. “Really? You have a lot of experience with long-distance relationships, Dr. Arthur?”

“Some.” She looped her arm around his and started walking in the direction he had previously been hurrying in. “Listen, Grant. I’m in London about four times per year. Drop me a line sometime and if you’re in the area, maybe we’ll meet up for old time’s sake, eh?”

She gave his rear an indecorous pat and clicked away down the brick path in her heels, giggling as she trod. The best thing for him to do at that moment was to leave campus immediately. Nothing he had in mind to do would be the slightest bit diplomatic, and again–he wanted to be able to board his plane.

* * * *

The very last place Carla wanted to be on Saturday morning was at the recreation department where she’d picked up some session work. Normally, she enjoyed being with the gaggle of middle school-aged girls and hearing about their unattainable crushes and prepubescent angst. Their mirth was contagious and she had come to rely on the once-weekly pick-me-up. Still, she was distracted by thoughts of long flights, the scent of spicy soap, and dark silky curls twined around her fingers.

The girls had been having their usual fifteen minutes of free sketch time. When she didn’t halt them after her timer dinged because she was so busy daydreaming, Kate Morton piped up. “Miss Gill, aren’t we going to do a project today?”

Carla turned her gaze down from the drop ceiling she’d been meditating on. “Sorry, girls. Yes. Um…”

This is why I get paid the big bucks.

“I’ve got some stuff in my bag. For our last session, I thought it would be a good idea to review the techniques and ideas we’ve worked with this spring and use them all in one special project.” She found the folders hidden behind her laptop, pulled them out and began to distribute them to the ten girls at the long tables. It’d taken her nearly an entire spring to warm up this group, but she knew once they were done, she’d miss them. The girls were so rude, so
irreverent
, but at the same time had a certain charm that had her chuckling to herself when she was driving or home alone watching television.

“Last week I gave you some homework. I asked you to think about who you are and what
makes
you who you are.” She returned to the front of the room and perched atop her own table. “Now, open your packets and read the instructions. Remember, you can use any media we’ve worked with, as long as you finish in two and half hours. I’ve already made mine and I’ll share when everyone is done.”

A bossy blonde whose name she could never remember turned her nose up and said, “
Trees
? Where’s the fun in that?”

“This is about creativity,” Carla said, nonplussed. “Remember what I said the first day. You don’t have to be literal with these prompts. Use who you are and what you want to be to inform your art. Integrate past, present and future. Your tree can be as realistic or abstract as you want, but you have to make your tree a personification of
you
. Okay?”

The blonde looked confused. Carla had been teaching art long enough to know some people’s brains just don’t operate in the right space for creativity. The blonde was very good at recreating or mocking established work, but when asked to start with no base work, she floundered because she had no real imagination. She’d probably make an excellent web coder or number cruncher.

“Just do the best you can. You’re not being graded. This is only for enrichment, okay?” I’ll come around and help as you need me. Get started.”

The girls stood in unison and raced toward the cabinets and bins to claim their favorite supplies, so Carla stole a minute to deal with the text message chaos on her phone. Alex had texted her that morning to ask if she had been able to look at her schedule. She was happy to be able to tell him:

Sorry, Alex. I’m off the market now. Happened rather quickly. Hope you understand.

Alex hadn’t responded, but he’d obviously got the message because Tony texted her:

Are you bullshitting Alex? That’s pretty low. This is exactly why guys can’t trust chicks.

That had pissed her off sufficiently enough for her to tell her brother what he could go do with himself and
where
.

Mom had chimed in:

I just saw you two days ago. You didn’t say anything about a boyfriend. It is a boy, right?

She had told both Gills to mind their business and they’d been sending angry texts every fifteen or twenty minutes ever since. When she looked down at her phone there in the rec center, she saw Ashley had joined in the fray. She deleted all the messages without responding, except for one from Grant she’d overlooked. It was his flight information with the note:

Let me know if I can help.

The girls worked steadily for a while, hardly talking except to ask for supplies to be passed around the room. Usually when they got in a groove, someone broke the silence by asking Carla some inappropriate question.

“Hey, Miss Gill?” Kate asked.

“Hmm?”

“How come you’re not married? You’re kinda old.”

Carla gaped. “I am
not
! I’m twenty-five.”
Nearly twenty-six. Oh my God, did I sleep through a year?

“Well, that’s like double my age.”

“That may be the case right now, but when you’re twenty-five I’ll be thirty-seven. Hardly double.”

“Ew.”

“No
ew
! There are great things about every age.”

Ella Fontaine snorted and accidentally dropped her paintbrush on the floor from the force of it. “What’s so great about being thirteen?” she asked from under the table. “My skin hurts ’cause of acne, I’m mad all the time and all the boys hate me.”

“I’m sure they don’t hate you. Boys are weird at that age.” Carla used a wet paper towel to wipe up the bit of paint from the tile. She paused. “For that matter, they’re weird at every age.” She shrugged from her crouch and stood to toss the paper at the can near the door. “Sometimes they act one way when their minds are thinking another.”

“Why do they do that?” the blonde asked. She had her pastel crayon paused midstroke and furrowed her brow as if the subject matter was more perplexing than trying to reconcile a checkbook to find a missing seventeen cents.

Carla crouched in front of her and helped her blend some hard lines on her picture. “Hard to say. But to answer your question, Kate, I’m not married because no one has ever asked me.”

“Well, that sucks.”

Carla backtracked to her table and slid into the hard chair behind it. “Well, it’s not a race.”

“Do you want kids?” asked someone in a muffled voice from the supply cabinet.

All the girls stopped what they were doing and stared at their teacher. Already, that had become a topic their opinions of her would hinge on.

“You know, it’s funny you should ask,” Carla said with a chuckle. “When I was in college, my friends Meg and Sharon and I had these sleepovers pretty much every night in the dorms. Every now and then we’d talk about how much fun it would be for all of us to be pregnant at the same time.”

“I think I saw a Lifetime movie about that,” the blonde said before resuming her scribbling.

Carla raised a brow, but soldiered on. “Well, Meg has been married for about three years and she’s pregnant. Sharon and I are still in the figuring-things-out stage, so it won’t happen this go-round.” She chuckled. “I’d like a kid or two when I grow up, though.”

That seemed to satisfy the girls. They bent their heads over their papers and went back to creating art in earnest.