Page 15 of Misadventures with a Professor
Zandy
The oxytocin isn’t wearing off. Or at least it’s not wearing off the way I thought it would.
I’m frowning at the glass of my train window as the countryside swishes by—flattish fields studded with animals and telephone poles, just like in Kansas—and I’m feeling an inconvenient restlessness, like I’ve left something important back in London. Something back in bed with Oliver.
Stop it.
It’s not like he’s a phone charger or a passport. I don’t need him for anything else while I’m in the country, and this…this…mooning over him is immature. And if there’s any advantage to losing my virginity at the ripe old age of twenty-two, it should be that I know better.
But it’s weird, this feeling. It’s immune to logic; it defies knowing better. I find myself smiling whenever I shift in my seat and the secret aches inside me declare Oliver’s touch. I find myself biting my lip as I replay the fire and frenzy of his hand on my ass. And I squirm when I remember his words.
Good girls hold still.
Good girls come on the cocks their teachers give them.
Jesus.
But I do manage to stop myself from searching for Oliver Markham on social media. There’s no point. Even with all these infatuated thoughts pinging around my brain, I know I’d never be so crazy as to track him down and reach out. My research indicated those things are unwanted. Considered clingy.
So I put my phone away and watch as the fields outside London slowly fold into rich, slow worlds of green trees and far-off church spires, and there’s nothing Kansas-like about the view anymore. And with no homework and my job for Professor Graeme not yet started, I find myself in the luxurious position of having nothing to do.
I doze off to the gorgeous green view and the slow shake of the train.
And when I do, I dream of Oliver.
The rain is making it hard to hear my dad’s voice. I press the phone closer to my ear and squint through my clear umbrella at the house in front of me—a white, thatched affair with deep windows and riots of flowers crowding the front.
“I said, did you make it to Graeme’s house okay?” Dad repeats. “I should have done a better job with the timing or had him pick you up in London.”
He sounds nervous, which is always how my father sounds. He teaches Victorian social history at the University of Kansas, and he’s more comfortable in his cluttered office or in front of a whiteboard than he is in the real world, and these kinds of situations, even secondhand, tend to stress him out.
“The timing is fine, Dad. I wanted to have a night in London, remember?”
He makes a fretting noise. “I just wish he were there now to help you get settled in.”
Professor Graeme scheduled an impromptu research trip to London after I’d already booked my flight, and I assured Dad—and told him to tell the professor—that I honestly didn’t mind being by myself for the weekend. I mean, a chance to rattle around an adorable old cottage and explore the gorgeous sights of the Peak District? I’d pay to do that, so the opportunity to do so for free is not a hardship.
“I’ll be fine,” I soothe. “I can find my way to the kitchen and the bathroom, and that’s all I need.”
“Well, okay,” Dad says in a worried tone. “You call me if you need anything. Graeme is a good man, but he’s always been a bit reserved and not a little distracted. I can’t imagine he’ll be a very attentive host.”
“Dad, you didn’t set this up so I could sample English hospitality. You set it up so I could have hands-on experience with a private collection before I start library school.” I walk up the flagged path to the front door, looking for the bright-blue flowerpot that should be hiding the key. “And if I can handle you, I’m sure I can handle him.”
Whether man or woman, fussy old scholars are all the same. And I should know, because after my mom died, my father’s fellow professors basically became my second family. I’ve spent my entire life around the species, and I’m incredibly grateful my dad’s extensive network of academic colleagues yielded the chance to spend my summer in one of the most beautiful corners of the world.
However, I have adjusted my expectations to include all the things that living with an old person working on a book will mean.
Terrible television shows.
Stale store-bought cookies.
Finicky and exacting demands on my time.
But it will be worth it.
I say goodbye to Dad and let myself inside the house, parking my suitcase and wet umbrella carefully by the door so I don’t drip water all over the clean flagstone floor. And then I step through the narrow hallway into the house of my dreams.
The flagged hallway is lined by bookshelf after bookshelf, each one crowded with a combination of well-worn paperbacks and sleek leather volumes and colorful modern hardcovers. The librarian’s itch I feel to sort them is pure joy, pure brain-lust. I could spend hours poring over these shelves…and I will, I decide right then. I’ll ask Professor Graeme if I can shelve these in my spare time, while I’m not helping him catalogue research. It would take me several delicious days to decide on a method, weighing my options between the traditional Dewey or a contemporary, more intuitive scheme…
