Page 4 of All My Love
4
Ben
“Happy birthday, by the way,”I say as I unlock my office door. She steps inside, turning in a circle to take everything in. I have my diplomas framed and hung on the wall just in case they think I conned my way in here so I can point to the evidence, and on one bookcase I have all of the books I’ve picked up in my seven years as a professor. Well, adjunct first, then full professor. I have a couch against one wall of my office and a small table in front of it, and a couple of chairs facing my desk. I also have several plants lining the windowsills. I like to make the space as inviting as possible so students won’t be intimidated. Liz goes to the bookshelf as I slide my laptop into my bag and observe her from a littledistance.
“Thanks,” she says over her shoulder, grabbing a slim volume from the shelf. “You wrotethis?”
“Yeah, that’s one of mine,” I say, coming up behind her. “This is one I wrote as a kind of intro to the way simple math concepts can be used every day. It’s not one of my more important books, but they sell it in the regular book store, so I think that’scool.”
She thumbs through the book and turns to the back cover, where my pictureis.
I peek over her shoulder and feel her breathing change with a small tick. She peers up at me with her dazzling blue eyes through thick, darkeyelashes.
“You were very cute back in the day,” she says, tapping her index finger on my picture and making my already-hard cock harder. The scene brings to mind the moment I’d shared with her a year ago and her old man made the decision to leave me alone with his daughter. If he knew all the positions I’d been picturing her in that day he would have taken me out back and shot me like the dog I was. All we were doing was stashing her books one-by-one on the narrow bookcase in the corner of her room, but it felt intimate. Toointimate.
She averts her gaze from mine and slides the book back to where itwas.
“That photo is only from two years ago,” I tell her as we step out into the hallway. I look down at her, her alabaster skin flushing up her bared collarbones and to her cheeks. She just smiles and scratches the back of one ankle with her toe. Dammit. I lock up my office and when I turn back to Liz I see one of my students walking towardus.
This student, I forget her name, is a pain in my ass. She’s objectively attractive and she knows it, but she does nothing to inspire attraction in me and in fact the way she acts is a huge turn-off. She sashays toward us and flips her long blonde hair over her should as she smiles. This girl once came into my office, closed the door behind her, and said she’d do anything for an A. She was wearing this little black dress that barely concealed her breasts, and I asked her if she’d really doanythingfor an A. She nodded her head, bit her lip, and I told her if she’d do absolutely anything for an A then I suggest she try studying and turning assignments in on time, and that if she pulled another stunt like this I would have to inform the dean ofstudents.
“Professor,” she croons at me, twining her fingers through her hair, “hey.”
Her thick French accent, long legs and long hair are like poison to some men, but she’s not my type. Elizabeth is my type. Little, petite, curvy, and would never try to do something inappropriate to curry favor with aprofessor.
“If you’re here to talk, unfortunately office hours are over,” I tell her. “I have a class to getto.”
“Can we walk and talk then, Professor?” she asks. She looks like she wants to either chomp my head off or throw herself down at my feet. Sadly, she doesn’t seem to notice that I have someone with me who I’m already walking and talking with. I don’t judge her choices aside from the one where she tried to pull some shit to get a better grade, but I can’t help thinking she’d benefit from taking a page from Liz’splaybook.
“Can’t,” I tell her, looking at my watch. “I’m running late. Sorry. Next time please come to office hours during normal officehours.”
I start to walk away and put my hand on Liz’s lower back to get her to come with me. She stiffens at my touch so I pull my hand away but she takes the hint, walking with me toward the other end of the hall. I stop outside my classroom and hold my keys up forLiz.
“This one is for the door to the building,” I tell her, fanning them out, “this one is for the apartment, and this one here is for the door inside the attic. I’m going to text you the directions. It’s not far, you go straight there, and then text me the second you get inside,okay?”
“Okay,” she says, accepting the keys tentatively. “Do you have a mnemonic device to help me remember the order of thekeys?”
I chuckle and close my hand aroundhers.
“As a matter of fact I do. You start with the big one, that’s building, then you work you way smaller. The second one is apartment, and the third one is moonlight. B, A,M.”
She smiles up at me with her soft, pretty blueeyes.
“Bam. Why is the last onemoonlight?”
“You’ll see,” I reply. She gives me asmile.
“Thank you. I’ll see you athome.”
Home. The word buzzes throughme.
She starts to walk away and I take in the sight of her body as she moves. Her tight black jeans are frayed at the bottoms and conform to her candy-apple ass, so sweet and thick that I want to see it with my teeth marks in it. Her sweet shampoo lingers in the air and I breath it in, making it coat the insides of my lungs. Her short blonde hair is now clipped at the base of her neck and I just want to take that clip out of it so I can watch her hair cascade around her cheekbones as she spreads her legs out on my bed and throws her head back in dreamylust.
She turns back toward me and catches me looking. I give her a smile and a wave, and when she turns the corner, I take a deepbreath.
I didn’t even find out how long she’s here for. Whatever amount of time it is, I hope I can get through it with myself intact. Because Elizabeth Marsau could be my ruin. My absolute fuckingdownfall.
