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“Sorry to bother you, but I was wondering if you had any paper,” she said, waving behind her. “I’m Professor Stan’s new T.A. and, apparently, the old one never refilled anything.”
“Sure,” I said, rummaging around under my piles of books because I knew I had a fresh stack of paper there, but I never really used anything loose leaf because I was too good at losing things. “Damnit damnit damnit,” I grumbled when a stack of books I was pretty sure I hadn’t even nudged started crashing to the floor, one of them—the largest, because that was how my luck ran—knocking me on the head before it made its way to the ground.
There was a tinkling little sound, almost like a laugh, but it was over before I could even be sure that’s what it was.
“Sorry to be such a bother,” the woman said as I straightened with the still-packaged stack of paper.
“Oh, you’re no bother. I’m just a slob,” I said, waving toward the disarray of my office.
It didn’t seem to matter how many times I spent an evening cleaning and organizing it. Invariably, within a week, it was back to looking like an entire herd of buffalo had stampeded through the space.
“Anytime you need anything, if you feel brave,” I added, grimacing, “you can help yourself to my office supplies. I have a bit of a… office supply problem,” I admitted. “So I have what would constitute a small stationary store at my apartment.”
“That’s really nice. Thank you, Professor.”
“You can call me Charlie,” I offered.
“Charlie,” she repeated. “I’m At… Atty,” she said, fumbling over her own name. Which I maybe would have found unusual if I didn’t hear a kid, stone-cold-sober, refer to himself as ‘TheBlobinator’ just a few days before. And she hardly looked any older than my typical student.
“Nice to meet you, Atty. Can I give you a word of advice about Professor Stan?” I asked.
“Sure.”
“Don’t stand too close to him on Wednesdays.”
“Why not?”
“Professor Stan is… regimented in his eating schedule,” I said, putting it nicely. The man was compulsive about it and had a lot of rituals that went along with eating as well. Including bringing his own plastic utensils to work for lunch. “Tuesday nights, he eats something that is so loaded with garlic and onions that it seeps out of his pores the whole following day. I sat next to him in a meeting once and, yeah, I won’t make that mistake again.”
“That is really good to know,” she said, looking a little grossed out. “Thanks again, Charlie,” she said, waving the paper at me, then moving out into the hall.
“God, what is wrong with me today?” I grumbled when I turned back toward my desk, only to whack my hip into my little side table, sending two days’ worth of empty coffee cups toppling to the floor.
As I stooped to pick them up and finally toss them, I could swear I heard that strange little laugh again.
Maybe I had a brain tumor or something.
I didn’t have any family history of that, though. We were healthy, if a bit neurotic, stock.
“You know what it could be,” I mumbled to myself.
The lack of proper sleep, too much caffeine, stress, and the never-ending, ever-expanding to-do list I had going on for my life that was constantly getting pushed aside for my career.
And now, it seemed, to help some random, incredibly handsome, stranger with his app.
His app that he could, potentially, make hundreds of thousands of dollars from, but hadn’t offered me anything for my time.
I mean, I didn’t need the money, though.
See, the thing was, really gifted and talented kids who get into college as a young teenager often get a lot of scholarships. On top of that, progeny of former, beloved professors also got quite a discount as well.
Which meant I walked away from my university days with almost zero student loan debt, and with a job that offered a starting pay that was something like three times the national average.
On top of that, I was a woman of simple needs.
I had an apartment that was big enough for me and my books, but didn’t cost all that much. I wasn’t home often, so I didn’t have cable or a lot of subscription streaming services.
I ate out a lot because it was easier and, ultimately, cheaper than buying a bunch of groceries that were likely going to go bad in my refrigerator.
