The Hedonist (4 page)

Shawn became incredibly bored with her and couldn’t have been happier to return to his younger friends. He immediately went back to hanging out with them but boredom always seemed to kick in when he returned to an empty home.

He loved the independence that came along with living alone and he enjoyed hosting parties. But he admitted only to himself that he also missed his mother. He spoke to her often but had yet to visit her since moving to Ashmore. He felt bad about not keeping his word.

He had neither a wife nor children to share his large house with. A lack of company left him in a slightly sullen state when he arrived home each evening and perhaps that was why he stayed out as much as he could. When he wasn’t on campus, he hung out with student friends, went to bars, or any event that could keep him occupied. He also enjoyed playing golf all weekend long. It was perhaps his most mature pursuit.

When he finally arrived home at night, he’d bring with him a nice bottle of his favorite distilled cognac. He bought the most expensive French bottles available at the local Package Shop and began consuming a full bottle each night. When he became bored of the cognac, he’d switch to something else. Brandy, Gin, Vodka, Rum. He bought it all.

When the alcoholic beverages were not enough he turned back to his old habit: pills. His professional position gifted him with numerous acquaintances. He met a doctor that would prescribe him anything he wanted. Vicodin, Demerol, Percocet, Oxycontin, Palladone. Shawn had an entire cabinet of habit-forming painkillers and he loved the euphoric high they gave him.

“Too much of a good thing is a great thing,” he told his young friends who worshiped his rock star lifestyle.

One day Stacy Hines questioned his drug use.

“You don’t look so good, Shawn,” she said during a sparse dinner.

“I’m fine,” he assured her.

“I don’t think so. How much have you been drinking lately?”

“Not much, just a small bottle here and there. Nothing heavy.”

“Well you look extremely tired. You need to rest and lay off the liquor.”

“Jesus, woman. I told you I was fine. I just had a long day.”

“Shawn, I’m going to leave now. I care about you and that’s why I want you to contact me when you become a little more sober. I just can’t have someone abusing alcohol around my children.”

When she left he headed straight to the restaurant’s bar.

The next day he showed up to his class totally hung over. He moved slowly and told his class to freely discuss whatever they’d like. He then proceeded to end class twenty minutes early and told his students he wouldn’t be able to speak to any of them after class.

An hour later he was in his office and felt much better after taking an aspirin and downing two cups of black coffee. He kicked off his shoes and loosened his tie. Then there came a knock at his office door.

“Come in,” he said while lounging back in his leather chair.

It was Lauren Styles with a worried look on her face.

“Shawn, you looked really tired in class today. Are you okay?”

“I was just going to ask you the same, Lauren. But I’m fine now. Just had a few too many drinks.”

“I missed you.”

He smiled. “We should spend more time together.”

She sat down in one of the chairs in front of his desk as her eyes welled up.

“What’s wrong?” Shawn asked with extreme conviction.

“My roommates started treating me like crap. They’re all backstabbers. I couldn’t take it so I moved out.”

“That’s heavy,” Shawn said flatly.

“I’ve just been staying with other friends but I don’t have any permanent place. And I don’t have a job right now so I can’t pay for my own apartment.”

“If you ever need any help, just say my name three times,” he joked.

“I may have to leave school and move back in with my parents,” she said as her voice quivered.

“Lauren, I’ve got an idea,” he hesitated for a moment before abruptly asking, “How about you move in with me?”

Her eyes became the size of silver dollars. Her tremble became a wide grin.

“You’d let me do that?” she asked exuberantly.

“Absolutely. I’ve got a five bedroom house and only one room is occupied! And I’d love some company.”

“And we’d get to spend more time together,” she said excitedly.

“That would be nice, wouldn’t it?”

“But I see you’re getting pretty close to Professor Hines. Would she be okay with that?”

“Oh yeah,” Shawn said without thinking. “We’re only friends. She has kids and lives in her own place.”

“She has kids? Uggh!”

“Having kids is what mature people do, Lauren.”

“That’s why I don’t have any,” she beamed. “I’m way too young for kids.”

“Me too!”

Lauren quickly packed her things and moved in that evening. She owned only four large briefcases of clothes which she placed in an empty bedroom in Shawn’s house.

“I think that’s pretty cool,” Shawn stated.

“What is?” she asked.

“Only owning a few luggage bags of clothes. That’s the life of a free spirited college student. You can move from place to place whenever you like and without a care in the world.”

“Is that why this place is so empty?” she asked.

“Yep. If ever I leave for another city, I won’t need a truck to haul mounds of junk. I still live like a college student.”

“That’s such a great idea,” Lauren said with the utmost gaiety.

“Lauren, if anyone ever tells you to ‘grow up,’ you kick ‘em in the nuts!”

She laughed with delight. Then she eventually realized that she had no bed to sleep on. Shawn went through his phone, dialed a number, and a few minutes later a brand new queen-sized bed was being driven to their place of residence.

             
***

Another two weeks passed and appearances on campus were as good as ever. Shawn was ‘dating’ Professor Hines and showed up to class suave and sober. He heard little else from Professor Hugo Sawther and was still able to enjoy a relationship with Lauren. He did as he pleased without a care in the world.

Then one afternoon, without a single knock, his office door flew open and in walked Dr. Laura Daniels, the Department Chair who did the hiring and the firing.

“Shawn, we need to talk,” she said sternly. “There were previously complaints about your lectures being overly liberal. There was another complaint about you showing up to class far from sober and some have said that you’re getting a little too close to your students. Improprieties will not be tolerated at Ashmore Regents University and may be penalized by immediate termination.”

CHAPTER 4

              Dr. Daniels had just confronted Shawn over allegations of improper conduct. Allegations that he was sure were leveled by Dr. Hugo Sawther.

              “That’s pure stuff and nonsense,” he said of the allegations.

              “They’re quite serious and I’m not sure what to make of them. I hope these things aren’t true, Shawn,” she said unpleasantly.

              “I fully admit that my lectures tend to veer to the left of the political spectrum but I haven’t acted in any improper manner. I’d like to know who has brought these ludicrous charges against me.”

              “That remains anonymous for now.”

              “Regardless… it’s pure drivel.”

              “Perhaps we need to talk about this more closely,” she asserted.

              “How about we straighten things out over dinner?” he asked.

              “Dinner… when?” she asked half surprised.

              “How about tonight? I know a great place. We can sit back, relax, and go over anything you feel we need to discuss,” he said coolly.

              “Well… I suppose we can do that and get straight to the bottom of this.”

              “Exactly what I was thinking,” he said before Dr. Daniels turned around and left his office.

              When she was out of sight, he closed his office door and plopped onto his small leather cream colored sofa.

              Shawn arrived to his house around six o’clock that evening where he was met by Lauren Styles. He told her about Dr. Daniels confronting him and how he persuaded her to work things out with him over dinner.

“If they try to do anything to you,” she told him, “I’ll defend you.”

“I know, I know,” he attempted to assure her.

“And so would all of the other students that like you.”

“I appreciate it, Lauren.”

“This college is nothing without you!” she declared.

“You mean that?”

“Fuck yeah, I mean it!”

              “I don’t know what I’d do without you,” he said while kicking his shoes off.

              He went into his closet and picked out a dapper grey suit along with a fashionable blue tie. He had a matching handkerchief and cuff links to go along with it. He topped off the look with his Rolex watch on one wrist and a newly purchased platinum bracelet bearing his initials “S.S.” on the other wrist. It was acquired by credit which continued to pile up at an expeditious rate thanks to his spending habits.

Credit was used to purchase Lauren a top-of-the-line queen size bed but that was not enough; she went on to ask for a new television and a set of dressers. While Shawn endowed her with a large state-of-the-art television, he refused to purchase dressers or home decorations.

He wanted to live by his prior commitment of packing up and leaving as breezily as possible. He already had enough furniture and any more would just be cumbersome.

“Perhaps I shouldn’t have gotten a place so big,” he sometimes thought to himself.

Nevertheless, he stayed where he was and gave generously to Lauren when she occasionally asked. She, in turn, had to accept that he couldn’t spend every moment with her. She had to agree with their arrangement to be independent. So Shawn would leave to do whatever he wanted and so would she.

              When Shawn told her that he was having dinner with Dr. Daniels, she smiled and informed him that she would be going out with her friends to a small party. Her friends had just gotten ahold of a bit of spice, or synthetic cannabis, and she always wanted to try it.

“Alright, just be careful,” he told her. “Too much of that stuff can drive you crazy.”

“What do you mean? You know someone that went crazy ‘cause they had spice?” she asked curiously.

“Yeah, this one guy I knew… But he was already pretty nuts anyway. Just don’t take too much.”

“Alright, alright! Go sweet talk Dr. Daniels. Bye!”

Shawn had invited Dr. Daniels to a fine restaurant named “Cinders.” It was a high end restaurant in which most of the patrons dressed up as he did. He arrived at the restaurant around seven o’clock and promptly greeted his boss when she entered shortly after him.

Dr. Daniels was dressed in one of her usual dark colored pantsuits. Rings shimmered across each of her fingers and her heels were polished to the point of gloss. Her attitude was more relaxed than when she questioned Shawn in his office and she seemed pleased to see him.

“Glad you could make it, Laura.”

“Anytime, Shawn. Anytime.”

They were shown to a table and quickly approached by the waiter who asked what they would like to drink.

“How about a Martini,” Shawn told the waiter.

“And you, ma’am?” the waiter asked Dr. Daniels.

“Water,” she said looking above her menu.

“Water? C’mon, Laura, try a nicer beverage. It’s all on me,” Shawn smiled.

“Alright, give me a martini like he ordered,” she declared to the waiter.

The waiter was off when they began their discussion.

“So, Shawn, we’ve got to straighten things up.”

“Exactly what I was thinking,” he said staunchly.

After they placed their orders for dinner, Dr. Daniels returned to her inquiry. When she brought up the interaction between him and his students, Shawn told her that he merely enjoyed relating to them. When asked about being less than sober during a lecture, he asserted that he was simply tired that day. She accepted his shallow answers as she swiftly downed her martini and asked for another.

“These are really good,” she told him. “Waiter… waiter, one more! Is that fine, Shawn?”

“Absolutely!” he said with delight. “Have as many as you’d like. Go on!”

She drank two additional martinis almost as quickly as the waiter had brought them out. When their dinner was served, Dr. Daniels asked for a glass of red wine to go along with her steak.

“Red wine goes great together with steak,” she told Shawn.

“Oh, I’m quite aware, Laura. I’m quite aware.”

Shawn had found her weakness. Although a lover of alcoholic beverages himself, he preferred to save face and was only finishing his first martini when Dr. Daniels began on her glass of red wine.

“I think I’m feeling a little tipsy!” she said.

“After three martinis and a large glass of red wine you should be feeling more than tipsy!”

She fell into a fit of uncontrollable giggles as she was attempting to cut her steak.

“Yeah, I’m feeling good alright,” she told him. “I feel like Professor Ruse right now. Have you ever met him?”

“No,” Shawn professed, “Tell me more.”

“He’s an art professor… he’s an old drunk who shows up intoxicated to almost every class. But he’s got that ah… ten… ten…”

“Tenure?” Shawn interrupted.

“Yeah, he’s got tenure,” she said while laughing. “He comes to class smelling like vodka. One semester he couldn’t find a dog sitter so he brought his dog to class with him each day. He had the dog doing tricks in class, jumping over the desks!”

              She went from chuckling to bursting into laughter. With her guard totally down, Shawn used this to get more information.

“Laura,” he asked while eating. “What’s up with Dr. Wilkins?”

She looked at him bewildered while stuffing a piece of steak into her mouth.

“You know,” Shawn said. “The woman who’s being released from her contract after this semester. I was hired to take her spot. But I can tell there’s something else going on.”