The Jungles Of Academia

He had waited three days after their first date to call her again. Not to make a point. Not to see if she called him. He just hoped three days were enough not to look like he was desperate to see her again.

“Dr. Mason’s office,” an amused-sounding woman who was not Ophelia answered.

“Is…Is Dr. Mason available?”

There was a significant pause, during which he could hear at least two other voices before the woman who answered returned to the line.

“Depends on how you’d define available. She’s just about to wrap up an argument. Can you wait?”

Eliot stared at the phone, narrowed his eyes at it, then realized whoever this was couldn’t see him.

“I guess?”

“Great!” the woman said. To someone other than him, he heard her stage whisper. “I think it’s that hot guy you were telling me about.”

“Really, Melanie,” Ophelia responded, exasperated and across the room. “Wanna spill a few more of my secrets while we have an audience? Maybe give out my social security number?”

He didn’t mention that he already had it. Nobody needed to know that right now and it wouldn’t further the conversation in any sort of progressive direction, although he thought a discussion of what she might consider ‘her secrets’ might be interesting.

“You undersold,” Melanie continued. “He sounds really hot. Like, maybe too much for you.”

What passed between them next was too quiet for him to hear, but he heard a door shut firmly and a heavy, defeated sigh.

“Give me that,” Ophelia said as she grabbed the phone from Melanie’s hand. “This is Dr. Mason.”

“I didn’t realize you were a doctor,” he said.

“Would it have been more or less helpful if I had worn a tweed jacket and glasses?” she asked, smiling into the phone.

“It’s the hot guy, isn’t it?” Melanie asked. “I knew it!”

He rejected his first response, which would have been “jacket and glasses and what else?” before soldiering on with his second question, which had been his first question until the extremely recent past.

“This is Eliot Spencer,” he said, just in case she hadn’t figured it out. “The hot guy.” If she didn’t already think of him that way, it might now hurt to encourage her by using her friend’s language. “Anyway, I called to see if you’d like to go to dinner on Friday.” He thought for a second before amending his question. “With me.”

“Hi Eliot,” she said. “I would really, really love to go to dinner with you Friday, but I have to attend the back to school faculty mixer and represent the history department. So instead of an evening of interesting conversation and good food, could I offer you an evening dreadful boredom and university catering?”

“You…you’re…what?” He was no longer in control of the conversation.

“These things don’t usually include a plus one,” she confided, “but I really don’t want to go. And it’s entirely possible that if I bring a date, I’ll be asked to leave. Which is beneficial to just about everyone.”

“Beneficial how?” he asked, still trying to find his feet in this conversation.

“If I get kicked out of the faculty mixer the first week of school, the word will spread to my classes almost immediately. I’ll be the professor everyone fears just a little. Second, if I get thrown out, then I won’t have to stay and eat something called meatballs that probably contains nothing that meets the legal definition of meat, and I won’t have to listen to three droning speeches welcoming everyone back that I’ve heard so many times I could probably recite them myself. And third, if you come with me and I don’t get thrown out—“

“She’ll be the professor who’s dating the hot guy,” Melanie said, loudly enough for Eliot to hear.

“Who is that?”

“Dr. Melanie Allen,” Ophelia supplied. “You wouldn’t like her. Plus she’s dating the conditioning coach for the football team and thought I didn’t know. But I do.”

“I think we should let him decide,” came the response.

“You share an office?”

“We share nothing,” Ophelia assured him. “Except for a complete lack of reverence for Academia and all that it entails. What do you think? Or did you suddenly remember you have to alphabetize your socks Friday night?”

Honestly, if she’d meant any of that as a deterrent, she had utterly failed. He was tempted to get in the car right now to find her office and see if the rest of today was anything like the mixer she had described.

“Because if you don’t want to go to a faculty mixer, I can understand that. I’d call in sick, except that it’s like three days into the first week and it’s not even reasonable to pretend to be sick yet.”

“I…Are you sure? I mean, it wasn’t what I had in mind, but I guess I can.” It would a window into her world, maybe. And her voluntarily opening one for him was much easier than smashing it in with a rock. Metaphorically.

“Aren’t you just the bravest or absolutely most reckless thing?” she chuckled. “It’s not formal. The invitation says business casual, but that’s honestly anyone’s guess.”

“So, no flip flops?” he guessed, having a very vague idea of what business casual might entail. And while he suspected he would very much enjoy her friend’s input on her own clothes, maybe that was best saved for a later time.

“You don’t really strike me as a flip flops kinda guy,” she chuckled. “But no flip flops.”

“Because they’re not business casual?”

“Because they’re terrible,” she answered. Her friend laughed in the background like she’d heard that before.

“What time does it start?” he asked. She was right: meeting her coworkers was not an optimal second date. On the other hand, he really wanted to see her again before she decided the whole thing was a hallucination and forgot all about him.

“Eight o’clock,” she answered. “But I’m pretty sure there won’t be a roll call. Pretty sure.”

“I’ll pick you up at 7:30?” he ventured.

“Perfect! See you Friday night!” She at least sounded enthusiastic, he thought. “I’m glad you called.”

“Really?”

“Yes, really,” she laughed. “Talk to you later!”

“What are you even trying to do,” Hardison asked. “Because I can’t guess.”

“Ophelia invited me to some mixer thing at her school,” he said. “And she said it was business casual. I’m not sure what that means, but she wasn’t either.”

“And your solution to this was to google image search ‘hot professors’. Did you even think before you started typing? Or are you trying to break the firewall?”

“You can’t break a firewall, Hardison,” Eliot barked. He was pretty sure that was true.

“It means don’t wear a tie. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go kill about 20 viruses that suddenly got in here.”

He took a tie anyway. Just in case. She made it sound like it wasn’t important, but he knew work things could be very important and didn’t want to embarrass her.

It was his turn to be relieved when she and Devil answered the door. She was wearing a tweed corset and jacket beneath a cardigan, a relatively short skirt, and low heels similar to the ones she’d worn on their date last week. She had to walk the line between not being over-dressed for her coworkers while not being under-dressed for a date; after more than an hour of discussion with Melanie (on the phone) and Devil (on the bed), she had decided there was no need to own clothes like these if she couldn’t have a little fun wearing them. And then Melanie had dared her to wear it after seeing a picture. It would be a long semester if she let this challenge pass unacknowledged. Melanie thought it was the least she could do for Phee’s new boyfriend.

“Happy Friday,” she enthused. “I thought you’d find an excuse not to come.”

“Happy Friday,” he returned, trying to simultaneously focus on the fact that she was wearing tweed and squash the idea that she was wearing a tweed corset because that just seemed like a dare. “You made this sound so bad I had to see it for myself.”

She scratched Devil on the ears and gave him some instructions about watching the house before pulling the door shut behind her.

“These things are so boring,” she complained lightly. “That’s why someone gets assigned to go. Otherwise nobody would, except for the people who have no life at all. And you can imagine how exciting the conversation is under those circumstances.”

He pulled her hand through his elbow to walk her to the car, smiling when her fingers relaxed around his arm.

“Are you going to be the only history person there?”

“Probably not,” she said. “I think there are two new adjunct professors coming, because they want to be full time professors. A couple of the teaching assistants will be there, because they hope to get hired as adjuncts when they graduate. And old Dr. Harvey who teaches Western Civilization and has been in his office longer than the university has existed will be there. You won’t be able to miss him, he’s 200 years old.”

“He likes these things?”

“We have no idea,” she admitted. “We think maybe he just lives at the school.”

He didn’t want to talk about what he had been doing that week (preparing for a job that would take him out of town tomorrow), so he asked what she had been doing, thinking that there was not much involved with being a professor the first week of school. He was not prepared for the long but amusing list of things she related, many of which seemed to involve pulling her rowdy coworker out of trouble.

She directed him to a parking space in a small, crowded lot.

“Last chance to back out,” she warned him. “I promise we don’t have to stay long.”

“How bad can it be?” he asked. She reached for his hand and pointed towards the lit house at the end of the walk. “It’s a bunch of college professors.”

“What a charming idea,” she said with a wistful smile. “I should cross stitch it on a pillow.”

The affair was being held in the university president’s house. Eliot looked around, thinking that if he were president, his place would surely be fancier than this. The building was nice from the outside, but had the unmistakable air of a 20^th-century dormitory about the inside of it.

“Dr. Mason,” the man at the door said. “I heard you lost the draw.”

“President Walker,” she smiled. “You heard right. The good news is that next semester, it definitely won’t be me. How is Mrs. Walker this evening?”

“She had an urgent appointment out of town,” the man answered.

“Dr. Walker, this is Eliot Spencer. He did not have an urgent appointment fast enough. Eliot, this is Dr. Walker, the president of the university.”

“Nice to meet you,” Eliot said, offering him a hand. “Ophelia’s talked about you a lot.”

“My god,” Dr. Walker said grimly. “And you’re here anyway. Welcome. Enjoy yourself. Have a look around.”

Ophelia contained her giggle until they were almost out of earshot.

“So is he, like, your boss?” Eliot asked.

“He’s not. He runs the university. My boss is the head of the history department. He won’t be here tonight because that’s one of the perks of being the head of the department. He always assigns this to someone else.”

“What did he mean when he said to have a look around? Is this an open house?” A college student carrying a tray of something that smelled like meat approached them. Ophelia waved him off.

“It’s a public university,” she explained. “So this is technically public housing. Most people will look through the obviously public areas; the really bold ones will go through the bedrooms upstairs.”

“Anything interesting?” he asked, looking around. The art he could see was uninspiring, and the furniture looked more useful than antique. Sophie, to pick a person at random, would have abandoned the place as completely unworthy of being burgled.

“Nothing,” she confirmed obliviously. “Art by the yard, most of it donated by wealthy alums for the tax write-off. The furniture either belongs to the president or gets sent over from some state housing department warehouse. Most of the books have been retired from the library because they’re either in no condition to be used, or the information is really outdated.”

She was so candid, he had to smile.

“What?” she chuckled. “Honestly, if you were sent to retrieve anything you can see here, would you think it was worth the effort?”

“I think most of it came from a home goods store,” he answered, leaning to speak in her ear. “But no, most of it wouldn’t…I mean, the owners wouldn’t even…”

It was her turn to smile.

“They couldn’t offer you enough money to take this job?”

“Not really,” he confirmed uncomfortably. “Is your friend here?”

She looked bemused for a minute, but he wasn’t sure if it was the sudden change of subject or something else.

“Shrimp caper?” a student offered.

“You can if you want to,” she said to Eliot. There was a definite warning tone to her voice. He took one to be polite. She did not.

“Which friend?” she asked as he spit the shrimp back into a napkin.

“What was that?”

“University seafood,” she answered. “I would stick to vegetables. Those won’t kill you if they aren’t cooked.”

“That was disgusting.”

“I did warn you,” she reminded him.

“You did. Your friend who answered the phone. Is she here?”

“If she is, she’s hanging out with the athletic staff telling dirty jokes,” she said. “Normally she wouldn’t attend this if someone held a gun to her teapot, but she’s trapped that conditioning coach down pretty hard and doesn’t want him circulating among the other professors until she flings him back.”

They wandered through the open doors of the first floor. Frequently, someone would stop her to speak for a moment. Less often, she would stop to talk to someone; she always introduced Eliot to them, so he figured she wasn’t embarrassed that he was here and that his lack of academic credentials didn’t bother her.

“Am I going to have to remember all these names?” he asked as they walked away from Dr. Harvey. To Eliot’s surprise, the history professor did appear to be about 200 years old. He angrily mistook Ophelia as a student who had skipped his midterm until she gently reminded him that she worked down the hall as a professor, and it was just the first week of school. After that he seemed jovial enough, until he was approached by one of the new adjunct professors, who got an earful about passing notes in class.

“I have no idea what you’d do with them later,” Ophelia said. “It’s fine to nod and smile and pretend you’re interested. That’s what pretty much everyone else is doing. Unless they’re trying to get ahead, I mean. And those are the people who will repeat your name seven times in a three-minute conversation.”

He started to ask another question when they were approached by a young woman on a mission. She seemed determined, in any case, and not completely happy.

“Dr. Mason?” The girl student spoke with a boldness that was at odds with her uncertain look. “Do you have a moment? The vice chancellor is here and Dr. Walker says you have to come meet him.” The student looked at her earnestly. “And he said to tell you that no, he would not come over here and ask you himself. I’m supposed to stay with you until you give in.”

Ophelia flashed a tight smile at the student which even Eliot knew was insincere. She managed not to roll her eyes, but just barely.

“I’m so sorry,” she apologized to Eliot. “Will you excuse me for a minute? I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

“Sure, go ahead,” he said. “I’ll be—,“ he gestured at the room. “Mixing.”

“Good luck,” she grinned, then returned her attention to the student. “Let’s go,” she said. “Are you taking a history class this semester?”

The rest of their conversation was lost in the gentle hubbub of the crowd. After taking a moment to appreciate watching her form as she walked away, Eliot went to the makeshift bar to find they weren’t serving alcohol and helped himself to a drink. He saw why Parker, for example, hated things like this. Here he was, suddenly without his date, didn’t know a soul in the room, and itching to take the security system apart just to have something to do. And that, he figured, wouldn’t take very long, even if she blindfolded him with his own tie. Which would certainly be a more interesting conversation than whatever he might find while she was gone.

He was reading the titles on some books in the library when two younger men approached him to introduce themselves. He was barely paying attention but caught that they were physics professors. He regarded them warily until he realized that they, too, were attempting to mix with other people.

“I haven’t seen you around campus,” one of them offered. “What do you teach?”

“I’m not a professor,” Eliot confessed immediately. “I’m here with Dr. Mason.”

“Dr. Mason from the history department?” one asked incredulously. “You’re here with her?”

“Are we going to have a problem?” The question came out before he could consider it. The shorter of the two men stepped back, but it wouldn’t have been far enough if Eliot had been in a punching mood.

“No sir! I just didn’t realize she was dating anyone,” the other stammered. “She taught the orientation class for the new professors this summer. She seemed really nice. I just wanted to thank her for—“

“I think she’s meeting with the vice chancellor and the president,” Eliot offered. “I didn’t know teachers taught other teachers. I thought she just taught history.”

“It’s voluntary,” the second new professor explained. Hastily. “She took us on a tour of campus and everything. Some of my students have her for class, and they really seem to like her. Plus they’re big fans of her books.”

Eliot remembered something from Hardison’s file about a book or something she had written, but he hadn’t examined it very closely.

“I guess that’s good, right?” he asked. “If the kids like her.”

“Everyone likes her,” the taller one said. “Her friend Dr. Allen is dating the new conditioning coach, but everyone says it’s because Dr. Mason turned him down first. Guess we know why.”

“Of course,” the other one said, “everyone says Dr. Allen always dates Dr. Mason’s castoffs, so there’s that.”

“I heard Dr. Winslow asked her out,” the first one confided. “She said no to him too.”

“She didn’t just say no,” the second one answered. “He took it so bad he didn’t teach classes for three weeks, I heard. The head of the music department had to stage an intervention, but I heard he got a lot done on his tragic opera.”

“Maybe she just doesn’t want to date coworkers?” Eliot said, his jaw tensing. He’d prefer these two twerp strangers not discuss his new girlfriend like this while he was standing right there. Neither of them took the hint.

“Maybe it’s just Dr. Oh No Mason striking again,” the second one lamented. “Breaking hearts everywhere she goes. It’s not that she leads these guys on, it’s that she never gives an explanation.”

“You think she’s married and just doesn’t want everyone to know it?” the first one mused. “I’ve heard that too.”

“Probably not if she’s on a date,” the second one reminded him. Neither of them acknowledged him, but they went right on arguing. Eliot made his escape from the room without speaking to either of them again, almost running straight into Ophelia in the library door.

“Here,” she said, offering him a flask. He had no idea from where she had pulled it. “I don’t know who you were talking to in there, but your expression leads me to guess the Chemistry professors. Don’t worry, nobody understands them.”

He took a quick drink then another, somewhat surprised to find she was a bourbon girl. Good bourbon, too.

“Where did you get this?” He failed to clarify whether he meant the bourbon or the flask, but it was fine since she elected not to answer that question anyway. Upon reflection, he decided that he could get the answer on her timeline.

“That’s third date information,” she said, casually confirming that they did indeed have a timeline that extended past tonight. “But you looked like you need it now.”

“I was talking to two guys from…Physics,” he said. “Do you know them?”

“Two guys together? One looks like a giraffe in a tennis sweater but slightly more confused, and the other is shorter but talks too much?”

Eliot glanced back over his shoulder.

“You nailed that,” he assured her.

“Yeah, they were in my orientation class. Interesting guys. They keep turning up places thinking I’ll be surprised.”

“One of them called you Dr. Oh No Mason?”

She blushed to the vee in her shirt, which Eliot found charming despite himself.

“Do you want to get out of here?” she asked suddenly.

“I think that’s supposed to be my line.”

“I’ve done everything I need to here, so there’s really no reason to stay.”

“I…”

“And what are your feelings on chili dogs?”

“Sure,” he said. “You won’t get in trouble?”

“I’m way past the point where the university can notify my parents,” she said. “Let’s go.”

They stopped briefly on the way out so Ophelia could attempt to introduce her friend Melanie to Eliot, since they’d spoken on the phone. Melanie was polite, but clearly only had eyes for the guy describing his high school homecoming game in explicit detail. She barely bothered to give Ophelia a leering look before they were out the door and back in the car.

She was a good navigator, telling him where to turn well in advance instead of waiting until they flew past it to speak up. His normal bar for women who weren’t Sophie giving directions was fairly low, he would have been the first to admit. But she managed to convey directions while maintaining an interesting conversation and not asking how fast he was driving. Finally, they pulled up to a small building surrounded by concrete picnic tables lit by bright fluorescents. It looked like it had been designed by prison architects.

“This is it?” he asked doubtfully.

“Best chili dogs in the county,” she confirmed. “Unless you hate chili dogs, and then we might need to discuss other options.”

“No, I mean, I like chili dogs just fine, but you look really cute and I kinda thought…”

“I’ll be right back,” she said, then let herself out to go order at the one small window. She returned to his open window a few minutes later.

“They’ll bring it to the tables,” she said. “Because you probably don’t want to eat in the car.”

He didn’t, but he was surprised she knew that. He followed her to a table where she perched on top. He sat on the hard bench, facing her.

“So, the physics guys?”

“I don’t date coworkers,” she said. “As a rule. Sometimes I’ll make an exception, but not usually.”

He picked up an abandoned pepper packet so he’d have something to occupy his hands.

“Yeah?”

“I especially don’t date younger coworkers,” she continued. “But I try to be polite about it.”

“You said they keep showing up where you are,” he said. She was surprised he had caught that detail and waited until now to address it. “Are they stalking you?”

“If they were, it would be like a pack of boy scouts stalking deer: loud and obvious. And I’m not that easily startled by physics professors, plus I know where all the exits are.”

“I can go back and tie them together,” Eliot offered. “It’s not too late.”

“They’re not worth acknowledging,” she said dismissively. “And they’re not so much the problem.”

“Was it that Dr. Winslow guy?”

“Wow, they talked a lot,” Ophelia marveled. “That story has been blown way out of proportion. He asked if I’d like to attend the Portland Opera with him. I said no, then he got the flu and was out for a couple of weeks. Some of the stories have him threatening to jump from the tower, but I promise that’s not true. I just didn’t want to go to the opera.”

“With that guy?”

“That’s right, he wasn’t there so you didn’t get to meet him,” she answered, suddenly enlightened. “Dr. Winslow is one of my very favorite people, but he’s in his 60s and married to a man. His husband and I both hate the opera. His husband is not a fan of the theater at all, so this was not the first time he’s asked if I’d like to join him for some show or another. And usually I do, because I also really like musical theater. But I don’t like opera. I think it’s boring and I have never seen one where I spoke the language. Plus, the few I’ve seen weren’t…they didn’t…,” she paused, apparently at a loss.

“You can say opera sucks if that’s what you mean,” Eliot prompted.

“Opera sucks,” she replied. A teenager with a tray emerged from the back of the building and bore it to their table.

“I guessed on what kind of shake you’d like,” she said, gesturing at the full tray while changing the subject. “If you prefer vanilla, I can order another one.”

He didn’t know whether to be glad the food was here to provide a change, or if he needed to admit that he didn’t much care for the theater either.

“You think this is a date, right?” he asked again.

“We went to an uncomfortable event and now we’re discussing the fall-out,” she answered. “What else could it be?”

“You’re sure those two guys aren’t bothering you?”

“Positive,” she nodded, dipping one of her fries in her shake. “I think this is just the first time either of them has had a real university job, and they’re not good at university politics yet.”

“Are you?”

“I can get by,” she laughed. “I really have to want to, though. But that’s okay. I like my job, I like where I am. I’m not trying to get to the top of the university power structure.”

“Are you gonna tell those guys not to run around telling your business everywhere?”

“I…”

“Because I can,” he offered. They would never speak her name again if she let him deal with it his way.

“Can I tell you a secret.” Her tone was conspiratorial, but she seemed happy.

He fought past his immediate response and managed to croak out, “Sure.” She leaned in close enough that he could smell her perfume; whatever she was going to say next almost didn’t matter.

“It never hurts to have everyone at the university think your answer is always no. It’s a great big time saver. And the more stories that get out about Dr. Winslow and his opera and how Melanie offers a shoulder to cry on after I’ve tossed someone out, the fewer offers I have to reject, because nobody tries. So I get all the credit for being unapproachable and a little mean, but with literally none of the effort it would take to be any of those things.” She sliced off a piece of chili dog with her plastic fork and ate it. Eliot wasn’t sure how she made eating a chili dog look classy, but there she was, managing to pull it off.

“Is that why you wanted me to go tonight?” he asked suspiciously. “So you could say you were dating someone and scare off anyone else?”

“No. I just wanted to see you but still had to do this thing,” she said carelessly. “Although if I had to guess, you did an excellent job at scaring off Miller and Reeves, but that’s like an extra credit assignment.”

“Did you turn down that coach she’s dating first?” There was no possible way to be jealous of a guy who remembered playing a high school homecoming game that well at his age. Just, none.

“I’m not sure I’ve even met him,” she said. “He certainly never asked me out. Melanie had him in her orientation class.”

He couldn’t hide the expression at her phrasing about Melanie and the coach; she grinned and didn’t restate herself.

The echo of the first part of her statement caught his attention.

“You really wanted to go out again? With me?”

“I thought we settled that, but yes. And as luck would have it, here we are. Exactly where I hoped to be. And hopefully being exposed to my coworkers wasn’t super terrible. I mean, I know it wasn’t fun. But at least there wasn’t live music.”

“You don’t like live music?”

“The university chamber orchestra is great,” she explained, “unless you’re having to talk over them. You’re not saying you called me by accident, right? That, like you meant to call someone else and got dragged into this?”

“I definitely meant to call you,” he said. “I wasn’t planning on chili dogs outside on a bench, but I really meant to call you.”

“What was your plan instead?” He took her question for interest, then realized he didn’t have an answer.

“I didn’t really have one,” he shrugged. “So I’m glad you came up with this. You’re right, these are really good. I wouldn’t have guessed you were a chili dog kind of girl.”

“I am all kinds of surprising things,” she promised. “But you are too. You can come up with something next weekend, maybe?”

He had to tamp down his reaction to her open and clearly hopeful question, then found he had to swallow back what he’d been about to say, because it was far too early in the game to tell her that.

“Actually, I’m going to be out of town next weekend,” he said. His disappointment was genuine. “On a job. I’ll probably be gone about a week. Maybe two, it’s hard to say.” And it was hard to say how long it would take him to recover from whatever the job turned out to be, but he couldn’t tell her that. He was immensely satisfied at her quickly hidden crestfallen look.

“Where are you going? Or can you tell me?” she asked, quieter now.

“Can’t tell you,” he said briefly. “It’s part of my agreement with the client. I guess it’s too bad; you could probably tell me all about it, right?”

“Writing travel guides is just one of my many talents,” she joked. “If you change your mind, let me know. I can at least give you a list of the highlights.”

He drank from his milkshake and tried to remember the last time he had one. He really was surprised she had chosen something so casual, but the food couldn’t be beat He thought this might be her way of saying a date didn’t have to be an event to be enjoyable. Of course, it was equally possible after spending part of her off time with her coworkers, she just needed some junk food. Had he asked, she would have told him in her open, casual way that she had chosen this place specifically for the lack of other people, so they could enjoy the opportunity to be alone together.

“You’ll be my first call if something changes,” he said.

They had finished their food, and he didn’t feel like he could follow a dinner with a main component of milkshakes with an offer for desserts. (He was very wrong, but he would discover that another time.). Still, he didn’t want to take her home just yet.

“Do you want to go to Powell’s?” she asked, with just a hint of trepidation. The question, coming as it did on the heels of his acknowledgment that he did not want the night to be over, caught him off guard.

“The bookstore?”

“Yeah,” she nodded. “The bookstore. The big one. I know it seems like a wild time, but I’m pretty confident I can control myself.”

“Do you need something?” He had no idea if she was joking.

“I’m not sure why you think I’d need something to go to a bookstore,” she said. “But it is a place I like to go. For fun. I mean, it’s not coed naked mud wrestling, but it has its moments.”

He quirked an eyebrow at her.

“I teach college students,” she reminded him. “And it’s a Friday, and the semester just started. There’s definitely coed naked something happening this weekend. But probably not at the bookstore. Probably.”

“I guess it wouldn’t hurt to check,” he said, still baffled as to why she’d want to go to a bookstore late on a Friday night. But maybe it was just a thing teachers did; either way it meant he didn’t have to return her home just yet, and that was his primary goal right now. “You ready?”

“I’m ready,” she said. “Unless you’d like a milkshake for the road.”

“You spiked yours, didn’t you,” he realized. She laughed.

“Of course I did. What a question.”

Honestly, he’d never had such an interesting date that didn’t involve handcuffs.

“What do you like?” she asked. He had reached for her hand when they left the car, and she had not released it. He looked around the massive building full of books and customers and frankly a ton of unknowns and had no idea.

“I need more information,” he said, to his own surprise. It was true, he was just impressed that it came out sounding intelligent instead of baffled.

“What subjects interest you?” she said. “Travel? Fiction? Gothic? Adventure? Science fiction? Horror stories? Tom Clancy?” She looked at him carefully. He clearly thought a blue blazer and v-neck sweater looked professorial; he wasn’t wrong. “Romance novels? Lord of the Rings?”

That was something he recognized. He thought Hardison had seen all 15 movies, and would have been surprised to hear that there were only 6. He hoped to god she didn’t like them the way Hardison did.

“Adventure?”

“Thank god,” she giggled. “I was afraid you’d say the Hobbit.”

“You don’t like it?”

“Fantasy novels are fine, really,” she said, as if she had been less than convincing in saying that before, “but there’s really only so much of that I can take. And I draw the line at fictional languages.”

She set off for a far part of the store, pulling on his hand. He had to guess, but he supposed they were not headed for the fantasy section. Assuming this place had a fantasy section. But it was so huge and so full, he felt sure that it did.

“Have you seen the movies?” he asked.

“One,” she said. “I was so bored. And I didn’t realize it was the first of like 20. Some of my students adore it, though, and all of them think they’re the first people to ever read it. Did you see the movies? I guess I can see it, with the battles and stuff. It’s just the lead-up that’s excruciating.”

“I’ve seen parts,” he said cautiously. “I don’t think I’ve seen all of any of them. One of my…friends is really into that. He keeps trying to make me watch them.”

If she noticed the long pause before the word friend, she didn’t acknowledge it. He had no idea where they were, and hoped they never had a job that involved getting in and out of this place. It was like a maze of easily toppled dominoes, and he couldn’t believe she knew her way around it this well. Finally, she led him under a doorway made of shelves that was crammed full of books and into a small, intensely book-packed room that was empty but for some comfortable chairs. Both chairs looked like they had been experienced a number of their own adventures before arriving in this space.

“Have a seat,” she offered before going to search one of the shelves. “Get comfortable.”

While that didn’t seem likely, he looked around to see that there was nobody else in the room or either of the adjacent rooms, then sat in one of the large leather chairs. He really hoped she wasn’t about to crack open a book and start asking him about plots of any of these novels. They weren’t the kind of thing he read, as a rule, but he definitely didn’t want to open a discussion of his most recent reading material.

“Ah!” she exclaimed quietly. “Found you!” She pulled a book from a shelf and returned to where he was sitting, then kicked off her shoes and seated herself on the arm of his chair. It was built with the idea of setting a tray on it without the seated person having to be concerned the tray would dump its contents immediately; it was easily wide enough to seat one history professor.

“Wind, Sand, and Stars,” she said, showing him the cover. “It’s one of my favorites. Have you read it?”

“Can’t say that I have,” he stammered. She was going to start asking questions. He was a dead man, and about to demonstrate what an uncultured, unread one he was too.

“Even better,” she said, and seemed happy with his response. “Sit back.”

With that, she opened the book to the first page and began to read aloud. He started to protest, started to say this was unnecessary and he wasn’t a child, but then something about the way she spoke commanded his attention. It wasn’t just her voice that he heard, but her love for the words and excitement at the story, although that wasn’t even the most interesting thing he heard. Underlying all of that was her obvious passion for sharing stories she liked with people she liked; anyone could read words off a page to someone else. But those words would be flat and uninspired and probably unmemorable. He would remember for the rest of his life her joy at the two of them, sharing an adventure alone while still very much in public. She was enchanting; he was spellbound.

At some point, he realized her bare feet were now resting on his knees and he was slowly rubbing one of her ankles as she continued to read. He wasn’t sure how that happened, but she didn’t seem to mind. He definitely didn’t mind. Except for the sound of her voice, the room was utterly silent; he could hear the scratch of the pages as she turned them, and the creak of the book’s spine in her hand. The smell of old book leather permeated the place like a presence, but occasionally she would shift to get more comfortable and he would smell just a hint of her perfume. It was a large chair, which allowed him to sit at an angle which was perfect for watching her face and the drama playing across it just for him. He also had an excellent view of her outfit from here, and the complicated lacing job holding her corset together, which was just another sort of mesmerizing. Later, when he was supposed to be doing surveillance, the larger part of his mind would be occupied with both the fastest and slowest ways to unwind all that ribbon and which method she’d enjoy more.

To his ongoing surprise, he found himself engrossed in the story, so much so that when the lights flashed and a voice announced the store would be closing in 15 minutes, he crashed back into consciousness like a man who’d been thrown through a window. It took a moment for him to remember where he was, although he had no trouble remembering who brought him here. Time had completely fled from him; he no longer knew if they’d been there an hour or a week.

“Oh,” she interrupted herself. slowly, blinking in surprise. “Bugger. We were just getting to the good part.”

She seemed to remember where she was all of sudden as well, and flashed a timid smile at him. “Unless you were just monumentally bored, I mean.”

He was certain he could listen to her tell him stories every day and every night for the rest of his life. With a clarity he’d never had before, he realized that Scheherazade was not just about a woman telling a story every night for 1000 to save her own life; it was also about a man so besotted with a woman that he begged her for more every morning. That…explained a lot.

“I wasn’t bored. I promise,” he said gruffly, his voice coming from far away. “That was great.”

He bit back the temptation to ask if she did this kind of thing with all her dates. Maybe this was just a thing she had shared with him, and if he didn’t ask, it always would be.

“I guess we better go,” she said, still without moving to close the book. “Before we get closed up in here for the night.”

“That wouldn’t be the worst thing that could happen,” he said without thinking. But it was true; he meant it. Without asking, he stood and picked her up, setting her down gently after a moment.

“Let me put this back,” she said still staring into his eyes. He hoped she wouldn’t look away, because that would almost certainly break the moment, and it was a moment he didn’t want to lose just yet. It was a relief that she seemed at least as affected by the evening as he was.

Almost as an afterthought, she stepped into her shoes. Almost, she seemed embarrassed. Maybe she was taken aback by her own creation of such an intimate situation. He didn’t want her to be.

“Here,” he said softly, holding out his hand for the book. “I can’t just abandon them in the middle like that. I have to know how it ends.”

She glanced at the book in her hand, having forgotten she was holding it.

“Okay.” She shook her head as if to clear it. “If you’re sure. If you don’t want to buy it, I can lend you my copy.”

It was the first real indication he had that she actually wanted to see him again. Sure, she said it, but this was a concrete action. Anyone who loved a book as obviously as she loved this one would want her copy back. For just a moment, he wondered if he should buy this copy because she had performed some sort of magic with it that would not be as compelling with her copy, then agreed with himself that the whole idea was ridiculous, because she was obviously the one with the magic and the book was just a tool. She felt torn about discouraging him from buying a book in a bookstore before the more mercenary and self-interested side of her brain said that if she loaned him her own copy, the possibility that she would see him again increased to a near certainty.

“Even better,” he smiled.

He couldn’t prove it, but he had the unsettling feeling that room, the books, the smell of leather, and the chairs all vanished into thin air as they left. It was sad, in a way, because the experience might never be repeated. On the other hand, if it never happened again, it had happened to the two of them and they would have the memory of it nobody else ever would. He found that idea extremely satisfying.

It was after midnight when they left, yet he was somehow surprised they emerged from the bookstore into a cool damp night instead of into the blazing Sahara, which was a testament to how closely he’d been following her story. He even opened her door so she wouldn’t burn her hand on the hot metal, only realizing after he touched it that there was no danger of that. He had no idea what they talked about on the way to her house, just that they reached it far faster than he wanted to.

“Come in,” she invited as she unlocked the door and pushed the dog back in it with her foot. “I know where my copy is. If you want it now, I mean.”

“I’ll take it on my trip,” he said. And read the same chapters she had over and over to keep her voice in his mind. “I appreciate it.” Appreciate it? He sounded like an insurance salesman.

She went to a shelf in her living room and pulled the volume from its space with barely a look. So she not only knew where it was, she knew its precise location and was able to retrieve it without even trying to play any games with him about misplacing it or having to look for it. Her assertion that he would like it, then, was not just an act to get him in her place. She wouldn’t have needed one.

She passed him a well-worn hardback with dog-eared pages and several markers stuck in it. He had no doubt there were underlined passages and notes on the pages. It would be like she was there. And just like that, they were outside again, standing outside her door. He had no idea how.

“Thank you so much for coming to my mixer,” she said. “I know you had a dozen other things you could have done tonight.”

He had to concentrate to process what she’d said while he wondered if he asked would she give him the magic word to break this spell, because his brain felt like a fogged in airport on a busy night. Or if she would tell him how to extend it. Or if she had the ability to do the exact same thing again when he had more time, and she was wearing something that laced up.

“It was fine,” he said, wishing he could slap himself for continuing to sound like it hadn’t been an amazing night. “It wasn’t that bad.”

Her uncertain smile told him that sentence had sounded just as bad out loud as he thought. She really was going to think he was just humoring her or not interested or a variety of other things that could easily come between them.

“I mean: I really did like the chili dogs. I would have gone to something much more boring than your mixer if it meant we still went to the bookstore.”

“Really?” She sounded so hopeful, he wanted to cheer.

“Yeah,” he said, borrowing her conspiratorial tone. “I shouldn’t tell you this, because it’ll just go to your head, but I had a really good time with you tonight. If you’d told me this afternoon that I’d like chili dogs and a bookstore this much, I’d…,” he trailed off, not sure what he would have done. He wouldn’t have believed it, certainly and telling her that he would have done it just to humor her would hurt her feelings while also deeply undermining what he’d felt. “I’m glad you suggested it.”

She was genuinely flattered, even putting a hand to her throat. He thought women only did that in movies.

“You really enjoyed all that?”

“I can’t remember the last time I’ve enjoyed a date more,” he said simply. If someone had described this idea to him and suggested he would find it anything other than a frustrating waste of time, he would have thought they were insane. “If I wasn’t supposed to be on a plane in six hours, we’d still be at the bookstore getting locked in for the night.”

They were standing very close, and he could see she was considering the idea with no small amount of regret.

“I’m so glad you enjoyed it,” she said finally. “Maybe we can do it again when we have more time. Be careful on your trip.”

He couldn’t remember the last time someone had suggested he be careful on a trip; the fact that she was worried enough to mention it made him think she had enjoyed tonight too.

“I’ll take this with me,” he repeated. “But you know what this means.”

“You might run off to Africa to have your own adventure?”

He’d done that plenty of times.

“It means you’ll have to see me again so I can bring it back.” He knew they were standing close together, but didn’t realize how close until he saw the sparkle in her eyes.

“I suppose it does,” she said, swallowing hard. “But it means you’ll have to see me again to return it.”

“Does everyone who stands this close to you kiss you the way I’m about to?”

“Are you about to kiss me? I thought it was the other way around.”

For days afterward, their first kiss would be a burning blur in his memory. At odd times, he would remember the ease with which her arms wound around him, how she felt between his hands, the cool breeze around them, the way the bourbon she’d been drinking tasted on her lips. Almost, his memory would give him the words she whispered against his lips, and whatever he had urgently whispered back. They slid away whenever he tried to concentrate on them, but he was positive that every utterance of “I have to go” (said every time to convince himself) was met with “I understand”, and that he had tried to say how much he wanted to stay but completely mangled it. Finally, her benediction of “come back home” floated to the surface of his conscious mind. He knew he’d left without taking her back inside the house, which was all he had really wanted to do. Everything else was a blank.

The next thing he knew, he was on a plane with a mosquito droning in his ear. Only after slapping himself, to the dismay of his seatmate, did he discover that the droning noise was Hardison yammering about this job. All of them heard his hand impact with his face. A flight attendant looked down the aisle to see if there was about to be an issue. He shook his head and flashed a purely reflexive smile without noticing any details about the woman, which Sophie thought had to be a first.

“There you are,” she said from her seat somewhere else in the plane. “I’m glad you could join us. Where on earth have you been?”

“Shut up,” he explained, which did nothing to reassure the passenger next to him. “I’m reading a book.”