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18
Natalie
I’d meant what I said, and to my credit I stuck to it. Despite having to see Luke in my classes several times per week and occasionally grade his papers. Despite the fact that he’d somehow managed to obtain my phone number—but wouldn’t tell me how or from whom, because “I never reveal my sources.” Despite getting off to thoughts of him—replays of our time together, or dirty, dirty shit from the depths of my imagination—almost every night. Despite actually really kind of missing him. Despite more than once responding to his lewd messages when I knew I should just delete and block.
Messages like the ones he sent me one chilly Fall morning, as I prepared myself in the few minutes before class started.
LUKE: You know I’ll take you any which way I can get you, but I have to admit that the sexy lecturer thing does it for me, so bad.
LUKE: I don’t know if it’s the tight skirts or the sheer blouses, but no matter how interesting your classes are, I spend the whole time with the boner from hell, reminiscing about how good you felt wrapped around my dick, and how much I’d like to fuck you right on the desk, maybe even with the whole class watching. LMAO.
OMG. My face flushed immediately on reading his words. Hell, my whole body flushed, especially the parts below the waistband of my skirt. I was glad I kept an emergency change of clothes in my office—I was going to need fresh panties when the class was over.
I had no idea why I’d looked at the phone when it pinged, in the first place. I should have just ignored it.
Who was I kidding? I’d known full well that it was going to be a message from Luke, and I’d responded anyway, because I’d come to enjoy our X-rated banter. It was stupid of me, but somehow sexting back and forth with a guy his age made me feel youthful and desirable and powerful—something I didn’t experience very often, and certainly hadn’t felt since I’d heard that my douche of an ex-husband had traded me in for a younger model. What a fucking cliché, but two could play at that game. I wasn’t afraid to admit to myself, or to Nala when she pressed me on the issue, that Luke’s unrelenting interest in me was a huge ego boost.
What I hadn’t told her, but wasn’t too stupid to see for myself, was that I also enjoyed the thrill of the chase—or in this case, the illicit nature of our interactions. Apart from the obvious fact that Luke was cute AF, fucked like a champion, and seemed to be as into me as I was him, the whole “we shouldn’t be doing this, but we can’t not” aspect of our thing added something extra that heated my blood every time.
I switched my phone off and did what I always did when I received one of Luke’s messages in class, or while walking the halls. I ignored it and him. Apart from the flush—over which I had no control, but which, with my golden-brown skin, I hoped wasn’t obvious to most—I showed no reaction. I was also careful to show as much, or as little interest in Luke as in every other student. I figured ignoring him completely would be almost as much of giveaway to anyone watching—not that I thought anyone was—as lavishing him with attention. I did neither.
If we passed in the halls, I acknowledged his presence as often as seemed natural. Sometimes I would be seemingly engrossed in conversation with another member of staff or student, or in my own world and fail to glance his way. Other times I’d meet his eyes with a curt nod. Yet other times, I’d gift him with a tight smile. Likewise in class, if he raised his hand to ask or answer a question, I’d acknowledge him and answer just as much as I would anyone else.
It had been a long and crazy day, starting off with a staff meeting at eight a.m. and finishing with a full evening of lectures, with a seminar over lunch, just to ensure I never had a moment to myself.
I’d barely had a chance to sit down all day, and when I finally collapsed at my desk, I had the time and energy to take a quick glance at my inbox to check that there weren’t any impending disasters, and do a quick tidy of the papers scattered on top of my desk. If there was one thing I hated, it was to start the day with a messy workspace. Tidy office, tidy mind as the saying kind of went.
In shuffling things around into some semblance of order, I focused on a pile of papers and envelopes that I’d grabbed from the mailbox on the way out that morning—though it seemed like a hundred and fifty years earlier—but hadn’t had time to look at during the day. I sifted through quickly, setting aside the majority of it to go into the recycling bin on my way out of the building. It was mostly the usual crap—takeaway flyers, generic letters to “the resident”—basically, junk disguised as addressed mail, plus a few expected bills. I opened the second-to-last envelope absentmindedly, ready to toss it into the recycling pile also.
I glanced down at it and almost had a panic attack when I realized what it was. My final divorce papers. Though we’d been legally separated and in the “process” of divorcing for the best part of two years, Doug had been a complete dick about the process, refusing to sign the final paperwork for this spurious reason or that, even though it was an uncontested divorce, that he’d brought about.
I obviously needed to check my mailbox more often—I so rarely received snail mail that I would forget for weeks on end to even bother—as the last letter turned out to be from my lawyer, informing me that I’d be receiving the final court paperwork in five to seven days. It had obviously been sitting in my mailbox for quite some time.
Welp, I was in real shock. I sucked in huge gulps of air, trying to fill my lungs enough to inhale and exhale smoothly, but it didn’t seem to help. My breathing continued to come in rough jagged bursts. I wasn’t sure if I was having a panic attack or a heart attack or if my heart was finally actually breaking, but I knew it hurt like hell. I silently berated myself for still being so affected by anything that douchebag Douglas did. After all, I’d been the one to actually instigate the formal divorce proceedings, and I’d had a long time to sit with and get over the emotional wounds he’d inflicted on me.
Still it was clear from my reaction that I wasn’t done grieving. Refusing to break down in the office, and craving a bucket of wine and twenty pounds of quality chocolate, I pulled myself together as best I could and headed down to the parking lot. I just wanted to get home as soon as possible.
However, once in the safety of the confines of my car, my brain had other ideas, and I lost my battle with the tears I’d been gulping back since I’d opened the letter from the court. Through my tear-clouded vision, I noted that the lot was thankfully almost deserted, so I was free to dissolve into a blubbering mess for a moment, without disgracing myself in front of my colleagues.
I turned the radio up loud and let it all hang out, complete with snot and hiccups. After I didn’t know how long, fifteen, twenty minutes, maybe, I was nearing the end of my bawling stamina when a sharp rap on the window almost gave me a heart attack for real.
