AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Diego’s sitting behind his desk working on something on his laptop. Probably a paper for one of his classes. He has a ton of coursework of his own. He’s one of the few people on this campus as completely overloaded with responsibilities as I am, yet we’ve managed to find time for each other. We’ve found time to grow, to make something of this thing between us. Can’t he see that that means it’s real?
I settle across from him. He keeps typing for a few seconds, and I hug my backpack tighter and tighter, like it’s a teddy bear and I’m a kid who woke up from a bad dream. Maybe I’m in the midst of the bad dream right now.
Diego finishes whatever he’s typing and finally regards me. He looks like he’s fighting not to flinch. I don’t say anything, leaving it to him to set the tone. Are we going to pretend we’re not fucking, even while sitting in his office with the door closed?
“Avery,” he says, and the way his mouth forms the shape of my name is more than professionally friendly. I relax just a little. “Sorry for making you come out here. I know you’re always really busy.”
“I don’t mind,” I say. Was that too fast, too eager? Is it obvious I’m desperate for him to give me any scrap of how he feels after the other night?
“I wanted to talk to you about your academic career,” he says.
“My … what?” Of all the things he could have said, that was perhaps the one I expected the least.
“Do you have the paper I returned yesterday?”
“Yeah, um, it’s somewhere in here.” I set my backpack on the floor so I can root around in it and extract the slightly crumpled essay with Diego’s note to meet him. I smooth it on the desk between us.
Diego doesn’t flip through it. He simply sets his hand on it, like it’s a soap bubble and he doesn’t want to pop it.
“Avery, this paper is excellent,” he says. “Really excellent.”
“Thanks.” The praise is nice and all, but I gotta admit — I don’t care all that much what he thinks of an essay at the moment.Do you love me or not?
“Avery.” Diego lowers his voice, as though there’s anyone in this room but the two of us. He leans forward at his desk. “I’m serious. You’re far beyond any of your classmates. It’s … a bit ridiculous.”
Okay, cool. Again, appreciate it, but come on, man. This can’t be the reason you asked me to see you a couple days after what happened on my couch.
Except … it could be. This is Deigo. He could have called me here for this reason and nothing else. It wouldn’t surprise me in the slightest. I simply don’twantthis to be the reason. Is he really going to ignore what we did, what I said? Has he forgotten about it that quickly? Did he sweep it aside the moment it happened? Despite all the nice things he’s saying, I somehow only feel worse and worse.
“Are you listening?” Diego says.
And I don’t know. Something about his tone, his teacher-y, detached tone — it snaps something inside me. He’s really going to spend this whole meeting talking about a God damn essay.
“What?” I say, sharp and hard. “What do you want me to say? It’s an essay, Diego. I’m glad you like it, but I don’t really give a shit right now.”
That breaks him from this professional distance thing he’s doing.
“We’re in my office,” he says in the same tone as “eat your vegetables.”
I wave at the shut door behind me. “Yeah, we are. With the door shut. With the halls empty. No one is around. So stop talking to me like I’m a stranger.”
“I’m not speaking to you like a stranger. I’m trying to keep this professional. I’m trying to be your TA talking to you about an essay.”
I shoot to my feet before I can stop myself and snatch up the essay so I can fling it to the floor. “Fuck your essay,Diego. I don’t care about the essay. If all you have to say to me is ‘nice essay’ then I have better things to do.”
He remains sitting, jaw and throat working as he apparently selects and discards whole paragraphs. Before I can unload any of the paragraphs waiting behind my own clenched teeth, I grab my backpack and start heading for the door.
“Wait,” Diego says. His chair clatters from how abruptly he stands.
Stupidly, I turn back. He’s standing, his hands planted on the desk.
“I didn’t just want to compliment your essay,” he says. “I wanted to talk to you about your plans for the future.”
My eyebrows try to knot themselves together. “The future?”
“Yes. After this. After you graduate. I’ve asked you before but you didn’t have an answer.”
I remember that conversation. I’d laughed and told him I would probably go get a job. That answer hasn’t changed.
