Page 3 of Pining For My Professor
3
I stareat myself in the mirror for a few seconds. Although Alicia promised that she’d watched several YouTube tutorials on the correct way to drape a toga, I still feel like the final product is a bitoff. It leaves very little to the imagination, hitting me at mid-thigh and artfully hanging off of one shoulder. I swivel around to see how the toga looks from the back, and I can’t help but be pleased with how it clings to my curves.Maybe Alicia knows what she’s doing afterall.
Just then, Alicia busts in – I know that she’s caught me checking myselfout.
“So, you’re happy, then!” she exclaims, rushing towards me with a shot glass in hand, her own toga fashioned into a barely-there bandage dress. Her long brown hair is cascading down her back, and she’s wearing one of those laurel wreaths to complete thelook.
“Take this,” she says, “and put this on.” She thrusts the shot into my hand and comes up behind me to put a wreath on me,too.
We look at one another through the mirror and Alicia grins atme.
“Alright, Little Miss 4.0,” she says. “Have fun tonight. Youdeserveit.”
“Weboth do,” Irespond.
Arm in arm, Alicia and I walk across the quad to Alpha Phi Alpha, the frat house hosting the toga party. The word on campus is that the party will start at Alpha Phi Alpha but probably bleed out onto the quad as the night wears on. “Our goal,” I overheard one frat guy say a few days ago, “is to partyso latethat we’re still on the quad when they have to start setting up the tents for graduation.” I don’t feel optimistic about my ability to party for twelve hours straight, but a feeling of excitement is starting to hit me. I’m feeling good and, more importantly, I’m feeling eager to make up, in whatever small way I can, for all of the parties I didn’t go to for the past four years. I know I can’t relive all of college in one night, but for the first time in along timeI’m feeling loose andrelaxed.
Alpha Phi Alpha is decorated to perfection: I have to admit that the frat guys really went all out. The grand staircase is covered in fake grapevines and ivy garland. There are even plastic columns dispersed throughout the main room, and old-timey busts are propped onto every available surface. There are balloons everywhere, too – white and gold – and all of the guests are dressed to the nines. I feel myself blushing. There are a lot of hot guys here andallof them areshirtless.
“Grapes?Olives?”
Dave – Alicia’s crush – saunters over and hands us twodrinks.
“Just kidding, it’s only beer. The budget wasn’tthatgood.”
On our walk over to the party Alicia made me swear that I wouldn’t leave her alone with Dave right away, so I stay put to chat with them. Finally, she gives me “the signal” – we uncreatively decided that she would pull on her right ear when she wants me to leave – and I excuse myself by pretending I need to say hello to someone from my Game Theory class. As I walk away, Alicia winks at me and I can tell that Dave is relieved.Even if nothing else happens tonight, at least I’ve been a good wing-woman!
And then I see him. It’s Dylan. Professor Dylan Landry. I subconsciously adjust my toga and smooth my hair. I start to futz with my laurel crown. I desperately try not to make eye contact with Dylan, looking over my shoulder and around again to try to avoid him.What is he doing here?To my extreme delight (and disappointment), Dylan isn’t in a toga. Rather, he’s wearing a version of what he typically wore in class: impossibly tight jeans, brown boots, and, instead of a button down, a tight black tee. He looks like a textbook “bad boy” and not a newly hired English professor at a liberal arts college. He looks like the kind of man with muscles so strong that he could just pick me up and carry me off without missing a beat. But seriously,what is he doinghere?
Despite all of my best efforts to avoid his glance, we lock eyes. Everything seems to bleed into slow motion as he walks towards me. In an act of true desperation, I chug my beer, hoping that something – anything – might help me with the interaction that’s instore.
“Maxine.” He says my name calmly, as if it’s the answer to a hardquestion.
“Professor!” I’m trying to play it cool, but I’ve already screwed up. “I mean, Dylan. Dylan.Hi!”
I wave dorkily despite the fact that he’s right in front of me. For a split second, I long to be back with Dave and Alicia, but a quick glance in their direction reveals that they’re already heavily making out at the foot of thestairs.
“I just want to say– in person – well done. Your final paper on George Eliot was trulyastonishing.”
“Wow, Dylan. That’s incrediblykind.”
Dylan moves towards me just the tiniest bit, and I feel myself moving towards him too. I feel like the world’s tiniest magnet is slowly drawing us closer and closer to oneanother.
“Well, it’s not really meant to be kind. You’re talented. I don’t bullshit my students. Especially not the goodones.”
“I can tell. I remember your speech on the first day. You said that everyone who was there for an easy grade should ‘get the hellout.’”
Dylan laughs, but not unkindly. “A speech, was it? I thought it was more of a salespitch.”
I giggle in spite of myself, not wanting him to find me silly but still genuinely entertained by him. His gorgeous mouth morphs into the sexiest crooked smile I’ve everseen.
We’re so close now that he barely needs to reach out at all to touch me. He puts his hand on my shoulder and rubs the fabric of my sheet/toga between his thumb and pointerfinger.
“Nice costume,” hewhispers.
“I see that you chose to come sans toga. Not a big fan of classical antiquity?” I whisperback.
Then I feel emboldened. “Dylan – what are you doinghere?”
“The boys asked me to set up. Technically I’m the faculty advisor for this frat, although I’ve never been much of a fan of Greek life. More of a lonewolf.”
“I think wolves travel in packs,” I respond, shocked by how open I’m able to be with him. He’s so hot that I can barely breathe, but Istillfeel an undeniable sense of ease, like I can truly bemyself.
“Well, I think you get theidea.”
He moves another inch towards me until our foreheadstouch.
Before I can offer any sort of retort, he grabs my hand and leads me through the party and out the front door. The ivy, the kegs, and, most of all, the drunk frat boys hoping to get laid are all behind me in aninstant.
