Winter Jacket (4 page)

“That’s sweet of you,” I said with an embarrassed smile.

“I have an idea,” she proposed. “Let me make you breakfast, and I can catch you up.” She smiled warmly and I nearly forgot my discomfort. “I make a mean frittata.”

“That’s really nice of you to offer, but it’s really not necessary.”

She raised a painted eyebrow. Huh. I never noticed in the bar that she didn’t actually have eyebrows – they were just makeup.  Weird.

“Not necessary because you’re not hungry,
” she asked for clarification, “or not necessary because this was just an almost one-night-stand that’s not going to go any further?”

I had to give this woman some credit.  She didn’t mess around.  It was kind of refreshing actually. And because of her directness, I knew I owed it to her to be explicit as well. “Megan, you seem like a really nice girl…”

She held up her hands. “Whoa. Let me stop you right there.”  She climbed out of my bed and gathered a few discarded pieces of clothing from the floor.

“Really?” I asked, blinking in disbelief. “Just like that?”

She grunted, pulling on her skinny jeans. “I get it,” she stated as she hopped around and slid into her painted-on pants. “I don’t need an elaborate speech.  Last night was fun.  But I get it – that’s all it was.”

It felt like a giant weight had been lifted from my shoulders, but I was still skeptical. “You’re being surprisingly cool about this.”  I inspected her face, looking for some kind of hidden emotion.  “Where’s the U-Haul?”

She picked her jacket off the ground and gave me a quick peck on the cheek as she made for the bedroom door.  “No U-Haul,” she chuckled. “Lucky for you, I’m not a lesbian.”

T
he floorboards creaked as she descended the stairs, followed by the sound of the deadbolt unlocking and the front door opening.  “See you around, Dr. Elle,” I heard her call out.

I heard the door close again, and I was suddenly alone as if the previous night had never happened.  But the
cold water still tickling at my toes reminded me that it hadn’t been a dream.

+++++

CHAPTER
TWO

“I
still can’t believe you,” I said, shaking my head. “How could you let me drink so much,
and
how could you let me bring that girl home?”

Troian gave me a skeptical look
.  “When did I become your babysitter?  You’re a grown ass woman.”

“You don’t drink
alcohol though,” I pointed out, still frustrated with myself, but taking it out on my friend.  “I thought you’d have my back when Megan bought all those shots.”

I had met up with Troian at a coffee shop near campus.  We hadn’t spoken
since our night out at Peggy’s, a little over a week ago when I’d unintentionally brought home the new bartender.  I wasn’t purposely avoiding my friend though; I wasn’t even really that mad anymore.  But I’d been out of town on a research trip over Spring Break, so I hadn’t had the opportunity to see her since that night.

Troian was
appalled that I hadn’t taken advantage of the situation, while I was equally horrified that I’d gotten myself into that situation in the first place.  I normally had a pretty high tolerance for alcohol and knew my limit, but when it came to hard liquor, I tended to overdue it.

“I
do
have your back,” Troian replied. “Which is why I let you have fun.” She pursed her lips in disappointment. “I can’t believe you didn’t tap that when you had the chance.  That girl is seriously cute.”

“How can you tell?
” I snorted. “You’ve never looked at another girl since you and Nik started dating, back at the Beginning of Time.”

My best friend shrugged. “I don’t feel so guilty when Nik looks, too.”

“I’m trying to be a better person,” I sighed. “We all know I haven’t had the best track record when it comes to women.”  I paused and took a sip of my coffee.  I was trying to cut back, but like my students, my caffeine consumption steadily skyrocketed the closer the semester came to a close. “I’m like a bull in a china shop when it comes to emotions.”

“
I can appreciate you wanting to do things right in your next relationship, but what I don’t understand is why
now
?” Troian asked over her oversized mug.  Everything was oversized in comparison to her. “Are you having a mid-life crisis?  Is this what I have to look forward to when I’m old like you?”

I made a face.  Troian was younger than me, but only by a few years. 
She liked to tease me about my advanced age as much as I liked to taunt her about her diminutive stature.

“If I was having a mid-life crisis I’d be buying a red sports car and dating a girl half my age.”

“Ohhhh.” Troian nodded her head sagely. “So
that
explains your crush on Winter Jacket.”

“That’s not it at all!” I hushe
d, feeling an involuntarily blush creep onto my cheeks. 

Troian smirked. “I don’t know why you don’t just ask her out.”

“Are we still talking about Megan?”

“Or Hunter.” Troian leaned back in her chair and smiled even wider than before. “You seem to have some options, lucky girl.”

I took a final drink from my mug before standing up. “I have to go,” I said, ignoring her blatant teasing.  “I have student meetings.”

I pulled
on my jacket to prepare for the Winter that refused to go away. The Ground Hog had said only six more weeks of Winter.  This season, however, was further proof that you should never trust a rodent with the weather forecast. It was nearly April, and we still had a few feet of snow on the ground.

“
Is one of those meetings with Winter Jacket?”

I made an uncomfortable noise in the back of my throat. “Maybe.”

Troian grinned. “Awesome.  I wanna hear all about it when she’s gone.”

I slung my messenger bag over my shoulder.
“Maybe.”

+++++

I rushed up the stairs to the fourth floor of the campus building that housed the English and Writing Department.  I had overextended myself by meeting up with Troian off-campus and was now running short on time before I had to meet with my first student of the afternoon.  I hated being late.  I hated feeling rushed.  I liked having ample time before commitments so I could mentally prepare for my next responsibility.

When I pushed
through the stairwell door, I bumped into someone on the other side.   I immediately blurted out a sincere apology when I saw papers scatter in the air.  Thad Darwin, an Associate Professor in my department, stooped to pick up the student papers I’d made him drop.

I
crouched down to the floor to help him collect the discarded assignments. “I’m so sorry, Thad,” I apologized again.  “I never should have had that extra cup of coffee; I knew it was going to make me late.”

“Don’t worry about it, Elle,” he said as he continued grabbing papers and re-arranging them into a
neat pile. “But you may owe me a cup of coffee now.”   He smiled charmingly, and I wasn’t sure if he was serious or not. 

Thad was cute, in that hipster-glasses, tweed jacket with leather patches at the elbows
without irony kind of way, but apparently he’d never gotten the memo that he wasn’t my type. He was a leading scholar in Medieval Literature and I respected his scholarship, but I routinely found myself cornered in the mailroom by him and having to make up excuses why I couldn’t have dinner with him at a quaint, new restaurant or why I was too busy to check out a must-see band at the local theater. 

When I saw where his eyes had landed, I stood up and self-consciously straightened the neckline of my top.
He stood as well and raked his fingers through boyishly shaggy blond hair.  I knew our undergraduate women thought it was adorable; I thought it made him look like a surfer. I hoped he wasn’t growing it out so he could wear it in a ponytail.  There were enough tragic clichés in our department already without that addition. “So, uh, I hear you’re hosting the party for the graduating seniors again this year?”

“Uh huh,” I nodded, mindful that the longer I stood in the hallway with my colleague
, the greater the chances I’d be late for my first student meeting.  I didn’t want to be rude and dash off after colliding into him, but I hated being late.  It was practically a phobia. 

“Do you need any help?” he offered.

“That’s nice of you to offer,” I said, genuinely touched that he’d offered, even if he had ulterior motives, “but I think everything is already taken care of.  Tricia is taking care of food and drinks with the campus catering services, but you could ask her if she needs help.  Hosting is actually pretty easy; I just make sure my house is clean enough for undergrads.”

Thad laughed, dark blue eyes crinkling at the corners. “So what you’re saying is, you don’t have to clean.”

I nodded.  “Exactly.”

I could tell he was gearing up for Round Two of the conversation, so I cut him off before he could delay me any longer.  “I hate to hit and run,” I said, already moving, “but I’ve probably got a line of students waiting outside my office door right now.”

He closed his mouth and knowingly nodded. “Some other time then.”

I gave him a quick smile that I hoped didn’t look too forced or too flirty before hustling around the corner to where my office was located.

When I unlocked my office door and hurried into the room, my phone buzzed with a text message.  I paused long enough to produce the phone from my bag and read the note from Troian:
Have a great meeting with Winter Jacket today.  Try not to stare at her tits too much.

I threw my phone
back into my workbag and sat down.  I rested my elbows on my desk and rubbed at my temples. I really needed the semester to end. 

I loved teaching writing
because I was providing students with concrete skills. Unlike the other Humanities, we in the English Department didn’t have to scramble to justify our existence to the Board of Trustees when budget cuts loomed every year.  Plus I didn’t have to lecture too often.  I'd throw in the occasional presentation about thesis statements, MLA style formatting, or the importance of the Oxford comma, but classes were generally seminar style and discussion based.

On the class periods leading up to a paper being due I didn't
have to teach at all. Instead, students used the class period for Peer Reviews.  During those sessions, I divided the class into small groups, and they used the period to give feedback on each other’s papers. I chose the groups for them so I could pair weaker writers with stronger students.

Lately I found myself being especially mindful of the groups I put Hunter in. 
I didn't give her an unfair advantage over students, but I made sure no cute boys were in her group. I knew it was totally inappropriate and unnecessary, but I also knew it would drive me crazy watching some frat boy with questionable hygiene flirt with her.

She seemed the type to listen politely and laugh at the appropriate times
even if she wasn’t interested.  I also worried that perhaps her reticence to actively participate in class was due to a lack of self-esteem. I felt protective and didn’t want her to fall trap to an undergraduate boy with ulterior motives being nice to her. 

I also
found myself avoiding looking in the corner of the room where she habitually sat.  If I did dare look in that area, I simply passed my gaze above the heads of the students in that vicinity.  I actually felt guilty looking at her.  It was a small classroom though; I
had
to look at every student. 

A
t one level I recognized my paranoid guilt was unwarranted.  I wasn’t giving her any kind of advantage over the others.  In fact, she might have thought I didn’t like her because I now refused to look in her direction.  Troian had been the one to point out that detail, but I didn’t know how to deal with this.  The best I could do was soldier through the rest of the semester.  I’d suffered through worse, I told myself.  I could handle a little student crush.

My head snapped up at the sound of knuckles
rapping against my open office door.

“Professor
Graft?” Hunter stood in the threshold, wearing her unmistakable blue winter jacket and looking charmingly concerned.  I realized she’d probably just caught me looking sullen and miserable.  I banished the sour look from my face and forced a smile there instead.

“
Hi,” I greeted.  “How are you?”  I gathered whatever papers were on my desk and stored them inside the top drawer to give her my undivided attention.  When I was a student, it had always annoyed me when my own professors had tried to multitask during a scheduled meeting.

“I’m good,” she confirmed.
“And you?” I was still amazed by how polite the students were at this school.

And then she did something so unexpected, I think my eyes literally bulged out of my head –
she began to take off her coat.  

The simple act made me
immediately lose my train of thought. Our meeting was only scheduled to last 15 minutes, but she was hanging her jacket on the back of the chair as if settling in for an extended amount of time.   It struck me as peculiar – why would she take off her jacket in my office when she never took it off during a 50-minute class period in a significantly warmer room?

Beneath her coat
she wore a half-zip running top, the kind whose material clings to curves for aerodynamics.  It was an immaculate white as if she’d worn it straight off the rack.  She wore it unzipped and it fluttered open near her neck, showing a hint of a pale, defined collarbone.  She tugged at her sleeves, pulling them up to a three-quarter length, revealing delicate wrists and more of that porcelain skin.

I pulled
myself together, but dedicated the details to memory knowing that Troian would bug me about them later and be disappointed if I failed to entertain her with a vivid retelling of how my meeting with Winter Jacket went.

“Good, good,”
I confirmed, bobbing my head. “Busy,” I unnecessarily noted, “but that’s to be expected with the semester coming to an end.”

She nodded solemnly, that penetrating gaze making me instantly uncomfortable. “I don’t know how you grade so many papers.  I have a hard enough time completing a 5-page paper.”

“Oh, don’t sell yourself short,” I said. “You do very well writing 5-page papers.”

She ducked her head demurely and her cheeks flushed attractively.  I
always tried to be warm and approachable as a teacher, and that included giving students positive feedback. But anytime I said something remotely encouraging to Hunter, it felt unprofessional.

“Any plans for summer?” I found myself asking. 
With any other student, I would have just thrown myself into the paper corrections after exchanging surface pleasantries.

She sh
ook her head. “Not really. Just going back home to spend some time with my parents.”