Page 3 of Bare
He repeated it like a grammar rule. Subject, verb, object. His body ignored him.
Sue leaned over. ‘Bit dishy, isn't he?’
‘I hadn't noticed.’
‘You've gone white.’
‘It's September. Everyone's white.’
‘Martin isn't white. Martin's been to Spain.’
‘Sue.’
‘Fine. But for the record: dishy.’
Martin Clarke, on Sue's other side, shrugged with the comfortable disinterest of a married heterosexual man who didn't understand the question and wasn't going to pretend otherwise.
Rory reached Mrs Webb's side and turned to face the room. Green eyes made a slow pass across the assembled staff. Confident. Genuinely interested in what was in front of him. His eyes found Neil. Stayed. One beat. Two. Curiosity. A second look.
Neil broke first. Dropped his eyes to his notepad, where the indent of his pen sat like an accusation. His pulse knocked against the side of his throat. He swallowed.
Mrs Webb assigned Rory the courtyard mural. The blank exterior wall, two years abandoned, three proposals dead of committee. He stepped forward. No notes. No PowerPoint. Spoke about it with total, unselfconscious absorption, the wall as a living surface, a tree with roots below and canopy above, built over time with student input at every stage. Years layering on it. New classes adding branches and texture.
His hands moved as he talked, shaping branches in the air. Paint sat in the creases of his knuckles, ochre and blue, ground in like a second skin. Neil tracked those hands and forgot to take notes. Forgot to pretend to take notes.
He wrote MURAL - CAVANAUGH - TBC on his notepad in capitals that were too large and stared at them until the letters lost meaning.
The meeting ended. Chairs scraped. Colleagues converged on Rory with the choreography of a new-term welcome. He handled it with ease, open body, direct eye contact, the half-smile widening to a full one when a remark amused him. Charm he didn't know he had. The worst kind, it couldn't be dismissed as performance.
Neil stayed in his seat. Let the crowd thin. Organised his folder with unnecessary precision, agenda clipped to the inside cover, notes aligned, pen secured in the spiral. When he stood, the hall was nearly empty.
Rory had broken free of the last cluster. He was heading for the door. His path took him past the third row.
Their eyes met again.
Up close, the details sharpened. Paint ground into his knuckles. A faint scar through his left eyebrow. Hair at his temple darker than the rest, damp, like he'd showered in a hurry and his hair was still deciding. And the smell, turpentine, coffee, and underneath it, skin and desire Neil's brain refused to categorise.
Rory offered a nod. The ghost of that smile.
‘Saw you taking notes. Nobody else was taking notes.’
‘I take notes at everything.’
‘Dedicated.’
‘Compulsive. There's a difference.’
The smile widened by a fraction. ‘Rory Cavanaugh.’ He offered his hand.
Neil took it. Brief, correct. The hand was warm and rough and had paint in the creases and the grip was solid, solid, practised, a practised grip, solid. Neil let go faster than was natural.
‘Neil Ashworth. English department.’
‘English.’ Rory's eyes travelled across Neil's face, thorough, not predatory. A painter's eye, studying surfaces for a living and couldn't help applying the skill to people. ‘That makes you my cross-curricular liaison for the mural project. Mrs Webb mentioned the English department was on board for the writing component.’
‘So I've been informed.’
‘Lucky me.’ It didn't sound like a joke. The tone balanced on the line between workplace courtesy and interest. ‘I'll need writing from the kids. Poems, responses, whatever you reckon works. Tied to the mural themes.’
