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Chapter Three
Naomi
The real first day of classes were always on the second day. Dr. J lectured on the first two chapters of our book, which was the development of a child’s brain from the first six months of their life to the first year. He also talked about how children learn and experience things in those early stages of life. Honestly, I loved the lecture, I thought it was fascinating and I wanted to talk about some of the cognitive development points he made and broach the topic of psychosocial development. Dr. J didn’t mention the second theory at all but it was mentioned early in the first chapter and here and there throughout the second.
As soon as the chorus of laptop keyboards quieted down and the sound of everyone packing up to leave started up, a line began to form at the head of the room. I hurried to pack up my stuff and waved bye to Jacob. By the time I got out of my seat, nearly all the girls in class had lined up to talk to Dr. J. I sighed and waited at the back of the line. The longer I waited, the more certain and determined I became that my questions were important enough to wait in line for.
Nearly twenty minutes had passed before the last person had gone and I was up to ask questions. “Hey, Dr. J, I have a question about some of the theories you talked about in lecture,” I said. He looked at me and clear annoyance changed his expression.
“I really can’t stay any longer to talk, Naomi. Just hold the question until next class and I’ll address it then,” he said tersely. With that, he grabbed his leather briefcase/messenger bag and slung it over his shoulder before hurrying out of the classroom as if I’d set it on fire. Confused, I stood in place and watched the door swing shut behind him.
“Okay…” I muttered. He stayed late to take everyone else’s question but mine? What was that about? It wasn’t like I was coming on to him like the other girls in class. I rolled my eyes and left, annoyed. He’d literally been in no hurry to answer everyone else’s questions. Unfortunately, I fumed about that until I got home later.
I was surprised, when I stepped into the apartment, to find V sitting on the couch cuddling with Jerry. “Um, break in much?” I said. V got up and we met halfway in the kitchen, I hugged her tight. Veronika was just as tall as me, she had long curly black hair and dark brown eyes. V was the most hipster person I knew. She wore huge round wire framed glasses, a grey tank top with her jacket tied around her waist, leggings and boots.
“Oh please, you need to hide your spare key better,” she said. “It’s not like this is the first time I’ve let myself in,” she said. “Jerry needed company.” V walked back to the couch as Jerry slunk through my legs. I bent down to scratch behind his ears and then walked to the kitchen to put my things down.
“How was your day?” I asked.
“Crazy. I almost scaled my first lamp post today to get these aerial shots of a bunch of kids on bikes chasing a guy who stole a woman’s purse,” she said.
My eyes popped. “Wait, what?”
V nodded excitedly. “It was amazing, I’d been having a dry spell lately and then this high speed chase just unfolds across the street from me. So, instead of climbing the light pole, I ran back into the gallery and sprinted to the roof. I got the whole thing in a series of shots. They chased the guy around our building and caught up to him by the dumpsters,” she said.
“Wow, V. That’s freaking incredible,” I said, wishing my life was half as interesting as hers.
“Yeah, I should’ve brought my camera but you’ll see the photos once they’re sorted out. I got some good ones,” she said. V curled her legs underneath her on the couch and rested her elbow on the back of it. “How’s school going? Do you work today?”
I walked to the fridge and pulled out half of a sub I had left over from lunch. “I work tomorrow and the rest of the week. Do you want anything?” I asked.
“Pizza?” V suggested. I put my sandwich back in the fridge.
“Sounds good.” We ordered the pizza and went for a quick wine run at the store. We talked about the gallery V runs and I almost forgot about how pissed I’d been earlier. We got back to my apartment and I put the wine in the freezer to chill.
“Wait, you never told me about your classes and stuff. How’s that hot professor?” V asked. I rolled my eyes and shut the freezer door. “Oh, that doesn’t seem good,” she said.
“He’s hot, fine, it’s objectively obvious. But I’m not checking for him, I don’t want to ‘get on his good side,’ I’m just there to learn. After lecture today practically the entire class, mostly women, lined up to ask him stupid questions. He stayed twenty minutes after class to answer every single one, yet when it came to my legitimate question, he brushes me off as if I have leprosy that he doesn’t want to catch,” I said.
V’s phone rang and she answered it, the pizza guy was downstairs. She left to go grab the food and I set the table and put Jerry’s dinner out.
V came back with two large pies in hand, New York Style. She set them on the table and sat down. I grabbed the red wine out of the freezer since it didn’t have to chill that much. “Okay, so I think you should go to his office hours,” she said.
“He guards them like a troll. He sent everyone an e-mail the first day of classes to basically say he won’t hold office hours unless he has a gun to his head,” I said. I opened the bottle of wine then took a slice of pizza when V opened the box.
“You should still e-mail him. You can frame it as like discriminatory that he didn’t take your question over everyone else’s,” V said.
“Yeah, like that would work,” I said.
She shrugged. “You’re not interested in him at all?” V asked. She pulled out her phone and started looking for something on it.
“No, why would I want to set myself up for that kind of stress? I just want to be treated with respect and not like his other students who are obsessed with him,” I said. V poured wine for me and herself then picked up her phone again. Her eyes popped.
“This is your professor?” she asked. V showed me her phone, sure enough she’d found a picture of Dr. J. Actually, she found his Facebook page.
“Yeah, that’s him,” I sighed.
“Naomi. My god, he’s hot-hot,” she said. I laughed. “Please, please let me live vicariously through you and have a sexy fling with your teacher. Please,” she said.
