AllFreeNovel
Share Us
She laughs. “Definitely not, my dear fellow. I know that for a fact. You’ve got hordes of beautiful young women ready to make an honest man out of you.”
This wouldn’t have interested me yesterday.
After seeing my woman, it’s more than that. It provokes a violent revulsion inside of me, the thought of holding, kissing, being with any woman other than mine.
My thoughts place me on that bus, but it’s empty, just me and her. Our lips are fused as my hand slips down her body, between her legs, finding her soaked spot and rubbing like I own her.
Because, I do.
I snap out of it, hoping Mary didn’t notice.
Maybe this really is what a mental breakdown feels like.
“Like I said,” Mary goes on. “Better than most. Do you have any idea what this is about?”
“No clue,” I reply. “But I’d rather be in my office.”
* * *
The president, Jocelyn Dixon – a Brit with a schoolmistress manner – stands at the front of the seminar room. She’s got her arms folded, her lips set in a firm flat line.
I’m forty-one, but Jocelyn’s got me feeling about twelve.
“As many of you will know, I made the decision recently to let Paul Simmons go.”
A few of the teachers exchange glances, the desire for gossip rising, but my mind is elsewhere. Usually, it would be on the market or my session at the gym later, the obsessive pursuits that have blotted everything else from my mind.
But now it’s her. Always her. I wonder if it will ever stop.
And I know I don’t want it to.
“Up until now, I’ve kept the reason secret.”
“Pft,” Mary says, then holds her hands up. “Sorry.”
“Perhaps I should say I’vetriedto keep it a secret,” Jocelyn goes on, giving Mary a stern look. “Paul slept with several of his students.”
Everybody gasps.
I lean forward, resting my forearms on my knees.
It’s theseveralthat gets me the most. Perhaps there’s a world where a man falls for a woman, claims her, marries her, dedicates himself to her for life.
Maybe then, it would be okay, the fact she’s a student.
But to use his position for cheap pleasure?
I used to like Paul, as much as I’m capable of liking anybody.
Maybe I’m old-fashioned. But I think when a man claims a woman, he shouldreallyclaim her. Not just for a few minutes or hours or days or weeks.
For life.
There I go again, thinking of my woman, whose name I’ll probably never learn.
“What Paul did wasn’t illegal,” Jocelyn goes on, in her prim-and-proper British voice. “But it was strictly against our policy. This is for the good of the students, not any judgment on their age difference.”
That phrase causes the woman on the bus to return to me. But that’s not saying much, since I could stare at a blank wall and fill it with visions of her.
