“Tomorrow night? Um, studying?”
“Why don’t you come over to my place. You can study over there.”
“Sure,” I said, even though I knew studying was the last thing that we’d be doing.
10.
Leo
I was heading to the faculty parking lot when I heard someone yelling my name. I turned and saw Jack, hurrying after me, his Timbuk2 messenger bag stuffed full of books and papers, bouncing off his side as he jogged.
“Hey, what’s up man?” I said when he caught up with me. He stood there for a moment, trying to get his breath back. I eyed his bag. “What the hell do you have in that thing, anyway?”
He waved a hand. “Oh, you know. The essentials. What are you doing right now? You want to go grab a drink later?”
“I can’t,” I said. “I’ve got plans.”
His face lit up. “With Colette? It was really good seeing her the other night.”
“No, not with Colette. Why don’t you call Colette?”
Jack tried to hide his disappointment. “No, I’m not going to do that.” Jack had been very heartbroken to hear that Colette and I had broken up. At first, I thought he had liked her himself and would have been thrilled that he could have waited a few months and then made a move, but so far, that wasn’t happening, and I was beginning to believe that what Jack really enjoyed was getting to hang out with Colette and me as a couple.
“I’m sure she’d be thrilled to hear from you.”
“No, she wouldn’t, because I’d remind her of you. So it would probably just depress her. What are you doing tonight?”
I paused. I hadn’t decided on whether or not I was going to share the latest developments with Tessa with Jack, but since he was asking, I decided I might as well.
“Tessa’s coming over,” I said. “She decided to take me up on my offer for extra credit.”
Jack laughed. “Ha, ha, that’s a good one. What are you really doing?”
“That. I’m doing that.”
“I thought you were going to apologize to her.”
“You know, I was. I really was. I had full intentions of saying I was sorry and I was a dirty rotten scoundrel, but then she said she wanted to take me up on the offer. And you know what? I decided to go for it.”
Jack shook his head. Now he really looked disappointed. “I can’t believe that you’re going to actually do something like this. It’s not going to end well. It might be all fun and exciting now, but it’s going to turn into a shitshow, and not the good sort of kind.”
“Who knows? Maybe she’s the love of my life.”
“Stop it, Leo. This is wrong. You shouldn’t be doing it. You’re abusing your position of power. You’re taking advantage of a student who is in a desperate situation. It isn’t right, and I know that you’re not the sort of person who would do something like this.”
“See, I’m not really looking at it that way,” I said. “I don’t see myself as this person in power, taking advantage of anything. If anything, I think this is going to be a mutually beneficial thing.”
“You really think that?”
“Yeah, I do. It’s kind of hard to describe, but I just got this feeling that this isn’t something she’s doing out of desperation.”
“Or that’s just what you’re telling yourself.”
But I did have that feeling, especially after our almost-rendezvous in my office earlier. I didn’t feel like this was something that she was being forced to do—she wanted to do it.
“It’s not,” I said. “It’s not just what I’m telling myself. But even if it was, I don’t really care.”
“I’m worried about you,” Jack said. “You don’t really do any of the same stuff you used to do.”