“Abernathy, splendid. I was just leaving. The thirty-six students left in this classroom are yours for the teaching. Miss Polk took another thirty-five over to Philosophy, and thirty are following me to the adjoining auditorium.”
I nod, wondering why I got stuck with the largest section.
“Glad you could join us,” Conrad adds with the slightest touch of annoyance as he shepherds a line of chatty first-years back up the steps to go next door.
“Sorry, I’m late,” I lament. I pull my glasses from my briefcase and automatically start rubbing them with the cloth before I slip them on. When I do, thirty-six apathetic stares look back at me, all imagining, I’m sure, that they’ve gotten stuck with the worst bet out of the three sections.
“My name is Weston Abernathy. I’m an adjunct for the English department here. My specialty is Joyce, but we’ll be looking at works of Elizabethan poetry in this course. I assume you all have the textbook. Let’s begin by reading a little Marlowe of Kent, while I take attendance. Does anyone know if Dr. Blowers organized you all alphabetically?”
Someone blows their nose. Dr. Blowers’s name always manages to elicit giggles, even in college-aged kids.
“A-H,” some kid offers.
Makes sense, since I’m Abernathy.
“Let’s see, Allen, Gregory, could you raise your hand and start reading from Tamburlaine.”
The kid drones on, and I continue marking off names.
“Connor, Tim. Conoley, Kate. Dashen, Crosby—”
I barely get the name out and lift my head to the sound of, “Here.”
Sitting just a few rows from my desk, slightly slouched in the auditorium chair, is the most breathtaking redhead I’ve ever seen. Pink-cheeked like she’s been running, full lips shiny and peach, warm hazel eyes, delivering me an almost mischievous smile around a pen she has set between her teeth. She wearing a loose-knit sweater that falls off her freckled shoulders, a flowered dress that exposes her whole neck, graceful clavicle, and throat. One Dr. Martens-boot-clad foot is up on the seat so that her knee is bent. She’s perched almost like a naughty graceful cat, just waiting for the stupid professor to look up and catch her in the act.
“Dashen, Crosby,” I whisper her name. I’m oblivious to the rest of the world as I maintain direct eye contact with her, and the two years between us fall away like struck stage sets on the closing night of a play.
“Miss Dashen,” I repeat apprehensively.
“I’m here,” she says again. Unblinking. Unflinching. Crosby.
8
Crosby
I may have been the one gallivanting around the fashion capital of the world, but Hartford has been good to Weston. His dark hair is slicked back with pomade, longish on top but shaved close on the sides. Dark-framed glasses only serve to accentuate his seductive eyes. The man doesn’t need a tailor because his suit fits him perfectly, as if it were custom-made for his body. Crisp, clean lines, it’s a lucky fabric to be able to hang so close to his warm, bronzed skin. He’s too gorgeous for an adjunct; it’s hard to concentrate on what he’s saying. I type some notes on my laptop, jot a couple of things in my notebook, but something tells me they’re not very coherent. West avoids looking at me, and whenever our eyes catch, we both look away quickly. Heat spreads through me when I remember our last interaction in the kitchen. My face reddens as I admit to myself how many times I’ve used that same imagery to pleasure myself over the last two years, recalling his quick, possessive hands, the slip of his tongue, how I didn’t ever want him to stop. I feel like Weston and I were made for one another, cast out of precisely designed molds that fit perfectly together. But then maybe our placement down here on earth went askew. An acquaintance might have been okay, but my brother’s best friend is too close for comfort.
“What do you think—Miss Dashen?”
“I think it’s beautiful,” I say as I look him dead in the eye. I’m still chewing on my pen. I have absolutely no idea what they’re talking about.
“Is that all?” he asks me. Professor Abernathy runs a hand through his hair like he’s slightly agitated. I continue to stare him down, taking in the color of his lips, the shadow of stubble on his strong jaw. I nod my head and smile at him, my eye contact challenging him to ask me more. He knows I don’t know the answer; he can see me blatantly drooling over his masculine form in a suit and tie. There’s no way I can take this class. I’ll have to pick some other course that satisfies the requirement.
“Maybe you can stay after class, Miss Dashen, and tell me what you really thought of the Marlowe reading.”
I nod again and chance a wink. Professor—probably soon-to-be Dr.—Abernathy tries to glower, but it isn’t working. He was never good at staying angry at me. Ever since I was little, he was the first to call a truce whenever we’d squabble like siblings. Weston’s professor poker face doesn’t work on me.