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From the front of the room, the professor whips his head towards me. He’s decked out in a full suit—a three-piece suit at that. I’m surprised there isn’t a stopwatch hanging from his wool vest.
A ring of white hair circles his head, a large bald patch crowning it. His bushy eyebrows furrow above his black, thick-rimmed glasses, and his lips surrounded by a pointed goatee sink in a frown.
He does not look pleased.
His gaze on me is so cold that I feel frozen, unable to step forward.
And, of course, as the seconds tick by while the professor, at the front of the room, targets me with his gaze, silent and obviously displeased, one by one the heads of my fellow students turn towards me.
Great, I’m the class exhibition.
“Well, good morning, miss,” he intones. “Do you intend to take a seat any time soon, or will you be disruptingmyclass not only by arriving late, but by standing around like a statue as well?”
My stomach churns in embarrassment. “Sorry,” I peep, scanning the room for a desk. I scurry over to the first empty one my eyes fall on, my shoulders hunched over.
Of course, the professor’s disapproving gaze follows me every step of the way. As do the gazes of most of the other students in the room.
Finally, he lets out a frustrated sigh and mercifully turns his attention back to the board. It goes without saying that it takes a couple seconds longer before all my classmates’ eyes are off me, too.
I try to shake off my mortification and bring out my notebook and pencil to take notes.
I start to get into the flow of the professor’s lecture. After getting a little taste of his personality, it’s not a surprise that he’s not using the first session of the semester to just go over the syllabus and basic course expectations.
Nope, he’s jumping right into the material.
I catch up to what he’s talking about and take notes. But as I do, I feel a sort of magnetic pull on my eyes towards the desk to my left.
Not wanting to turn my head, I let my eyes flit to the side. I can tell immediately that the desk next to me is occupied by a guy with a bulky, muscular torso. His arms are long and thick, his shoulders and chest clearly taking up a lot of space even at a peripheral glance.
He seems to be really into taking notes, as he’s hunched over his desk, his right hand hyper-active. He must be jotting down every word the professor is saying.
It’s hard for me to snap my eyes away from him, until I realize I’ve just missed about a minute of the professor’s lecture.
I blink my eyes tight and then re-focus on the front of the room.
But even as I try to concentrate on the lecture and on my notetaking, it feels like there’s a pair of hands gripping my head, trying to twist it to the left.
When the professor turns his back on the class to write a list of terminology on the board, a folded piece of paper slides onto the corner of my desk.
I regard it with a raised eyebrow. It could only have come from the guy to my left. With the professor’s back still turned, I turn my head to chance a full glance at him.
My stomach does a flip as the first thing I notice are his big, round shoulder muscles that strain against the green t-shirt he wears.
My eyes trail up from there, taking in the powerful column of his neck. My heart skips a beat when my gaze finally crawls up to his striking profile. His jaw is square and sharp, his features exquisitely angular. A thick, messy tuft of sandy-blonde hair sits on top of his head.
He's leaning forward, his thick and veiny forearms on his desk, and he’s looking straight towards the front of the room as if he didn’t just pass me a folded note like we’re in middle school.
Though, I think I can detect a hint of a smirk on his plush lips that betrays that fact.
Sensing the professor about to turn around, I quickly whip my head back to my desk. The last thing I need is to be called out for ogling my seat neighbor instead of paying attention.
Surreptitiously, I place my palm over the paper he slid over and drag it towards me. Like we’re really in middle school, I unfold it carefully over my lap under the surface of my desk, out of view.
When I open it up, it’s not a message, but a drawing.
It takes my mind a second to make sense of the cartoon-style scene, but once it clicks, I have to clamp down on my lips to keep from erupting into laughter.
The professor sweeps his gaze across the room, stopping on me. No doubt I look ridiculous with my lips pressed tightly together, my chin trembling, and my cheeks red from holding back giggles.
