The Handbook_A Contemporary Teacher Romance

  “I don’t care,” I answered as I leaned up on my elbows and tried to find the guy she was talking about. “They all look the same from here. How can you even see his face?”

  “Who gives a shit about his face?” she frowned back at me. “Do you see that body? I could probably see those muscles from Mars.”

  “Oh, God,” I grumbled as I lay back down and covered my face with my hat. “Why don’t you go talk to him?”

  “’Cause that’s not how it goes,” she answered with authority. “I just gave him a little wave and a smile and now it’s his responsibility to come to me.”

  “Let me know how that works out for you.”

  “Well,” she started before pausing dramatically. “It seems to have worked out well, because he is now on his way.”

  I had to admit I was both surprised and impressed. “Wow, look at you,” I answered.

  “Act casual,” she continued.

  “How’s this?” I responded while not bothering to sit up or take my hat off. “I mean, there’s nothing more casual than sleeping, right?” Dani didn’t respond, but seconds later the sounds of heavy footfalls in the sand interrupted the quiet.

  “Hi,” Dani said in her best sexy voice. I had to admit she was pretty good at this stuff.

  “Hey,” the deep voice responded. “How you girls doin’?”

  Hmm, so it seemed Dani had attracted a caveman. I imagined this would be an interesting exchange.

  “We’re fine,” she answered. “What’s your name, handsome?”

  “Harvey.”

  I tried to keep my snicker to myself, but a little bit of it escaped.

  “I’m Dani,” she said as she swatted my thigh. “And my very rude friend here who won’t take off her hat to say hello is Nikki.”

  “That’s cool,” Harvey the Caveman said, and I could have sworn he grunted.

  “Hi,” I said, still not bothering to remove my hat or even open my eyes.

  “You have any friends with you?” Dani asked as my stomach dropped.

  “No friends needed,” I responded immediately. “I’m good at entertaining myself.”

  “Um, no, I don’t have any friends with me,” Harvey said, sounding confused, probably by my overt friendliness. “I’m here with my cousin.”

  “He a dude?” Dani asked.

  “No, she’s a she and her name is Shelley,” Harvey answered.

  “Oh,” Dani said, sounding disappointed.

  “Cool,” I piped up. “Shelley sounds good to me. I’m all about the womenfolk.”

  There was an uncomfortable pause. “Is she,” Harvey started, his tone of voice dubious.

  “No, she’s not a lesbian,” Dani responded with a laugh. “She’s just going through a breakup.”

  “Damn, Dani, do you have to broadcast my business to the whole world?” I asked, suddenly irritated. I could just imagine Harvey returning to the cave and updating the rest of the Neanderthals about Nikki’s hopeless dating career. And then they’d start trying to make fire or something.

  “Dude, sorry,” Dani responded, sounding offended. “I didn’t know it was a secret.”

  “Well, Ima go swim for a little while longer,” Harvey suddenly announced, obviously uncomfortable with our little tiff. “But you free later?”

  “Sure,” Dani answered. “We’re staying at the little white bungalow up there,” she said, and I imagined she was probably pointing to her parents’ beach house.

  “Just hit us up later.”

  “Cool,” Harvey replied as the sound of his retreating footsteps met my ears.

  “Hmm,” I started. “I didn’t know Cro-Magnon Man could swim?” I felt Dani swat my thigh as I pulled away from her. “You think it’s instinctual, like how a dog knows how to swim?”

  “Haha, Nikki,” she grumbled. “You didn’t have to be so rude.”

  “You didn’t have to have such a big mouth,” I responded with no amount of apology. “I don’t want anyone feeling sorry for me.”

  “Point taken,” she answered. “Didn’t mean to make you mad.”

  “You didn’t,” I said with a sigh and tipped the brim of my hat up so I could look at her. “So … was Prehistoric Man cute?”

  “Super cute,” she answered with a huge grin. “I hope he comes by later.”

  “Me too!” I answered with feigned excitement. “Maybe he can tell us all about what the Neolithic period was like!”

  ***

  As it turned out, Harvey did end up coming over. As soon as the sun set, I turned in to read for a while in my guest bedroom, and seconds later I heard the sound of his deep voice and Dani’s much lighter one. It was probably thirty minutes after that that I heard other sounds. These sounds were more along the lines of Dani’s headboard banging into the wall as Harvey grunted and she moaned … loudly.

  I couldn’t say I was annoyed by what was obviously going on next door, but I did decide to put my headphones on so I could pay better attention to my book, the title of which I’d already forgotten.

  While the headphones drowned out the moaning, they didn’t do much for the incessant pounding of the headboard against the wall, and I found it increasingly difficult to pay attention to my book. In fact, I’d read the sentence I was currently on three times already and I still couldn’t say I had any idea what it meant.

  I sighed as I took my headphones off and stared out the window, watching the moonlight ripple against the waves. Maybe this was what my life was now reduced to—attempting to read while my best friend got nailed in the next bedroom.

  FOUR

  NIKKI

  By the time we returned to the ZTS house, I was eating three meals a day again and could actually crack a smile. Granted, I wasn’t fully restored to my normal, bubbly self, but I was on my way.

  The idea of bringing another man into my life was completely repugnant, though, and in response, I tried to avoid them at all cost. Not exactly an easy feat when you live in and belong to a sorority which seems predicated on mingling with the opposite sex. But I was determined, and as such, I became much more active in the ZTS house, picking up the slack that others had had to do for me. With another inspection from the NPC (the National Panhellenic Council) scheduled for April, there were plenty of responsibilities I could pour myself into.

  Dani, maybe fearing I would fall back into the abyss of despair, was eagerly by my side. Well, for maybe a week or two. After that, though, she wasn’t quite as available, and I figured her absences were owing to an interest in someone of the male persuasion.

  “Wow, imagine seeing you here,” I grumbled to her as she opened the door to our bedroom and smiled at me sheepishly. I hadn’t seen her for, oh, the last three nights in a row. “I thought maybe you’d gotten abducted by aliens or something.”

  “Ha ha,” Dani replied as she shook her head but couldn’t keep a huge smile from her mouth. She leaned against her closet door, which wasn’t able to fully close, owing to the six or so articles of clothing currently acting the part of doorjamb.

  “So are you going to go into full detail about the alien probing or what?” I demanded.

  “I fully get that you are still a man hater,” Dani responded as she crossed her arms against her chest and eyed me with what looked like pity. “But I have to admit, I’m not. I’m a man lover.”

  “And, just like that, another one bites the dust,” I replied as I sighed and shook my head. I couldn’t say that I was thrilled by this news. Not in the least. There was definitely something to that old saying about misery loving company. But my miserable company had been abducted by Cupid’s arrow-toting aliens who had turned her to the dark side.

  “Sticks and stones, Nikki, sticks and stones.”

  “So what’s his name?” I asked drily and then added a frown.

  “Craig,” Dani sang as that huge smile overtook her mouth once again.

  “Hmm, that’s great.” I stood up and neared the door. “Last I heard, the toilets need to be cleaned, and I’m on cl
eaning duty,” I started.

  “Nice try, but we have a cleaning lady.”

  I stopped walking and then slowly turned around to face her. “She’s on vacation?” I asked as Dani shook her head, crossing her arms against her chest to show she wasn’t amused. “Oh, I know!” I continued. “She met this guy named Craig and now she’s smitten and has decided to bail on her best friend as well as her cleaning duties!”

  “Sooner or later, love is gonna get ya,” Dani started singing the most annoying song known to man. “Sooner or later, love is gonna let ya!”

  ***

  As the week flew by, I realized whatever probing Dani had experienced at the hands of the aliens might have been contagious. I found myself doing something I hadn’t done in weeks—checking out guys again. I resisted the initial shock of this realization, but discovered I wasn’t nearly strong enough to ignore this part of me. Eventually, I even began to relax and accept my roving eye. However, the very suggestion that I join Dani and Craig for a double date with Craig’s friend, Beau, was more than enough to send me into a complete and total nosedive.

  FIVE

  DEREK

  The month of April was always a good one as far as I was concerned because it meant the coming of the end of the Spring Semester in May. Even though there would be finals to correct, summer was just around the corner, and that made everything okay.

  This summer would see me traveling to Thailand with three of my good friends I’d known since grade school. And that would be a well-needed break.

  At the sound of a knock on my office door, I kicked my feet down from where they’d been propped up on my desk and turned the speaker down which was currently blasting In the Hall of the Mountain King by Grieg from my iPhone. It was one of my favorite orchestral classical pieces.

  “Come in,” I called, already feeling grumpy because the sign on the outside of my door listed my office hours and now wasn’t one of them.

  The door opened, revealing the head of the school, Dean Peterman. At the sight of him, my stomach dropped. Visits from the dean were never a joyous occasion.

  “Derek,” he said in greeting, his voice incredibly deep for such a short and skinny little thing. He came up to the bottom of my chin, and although I was considered tall at 6’3, he was still pretty damn short.

  “Dean Peterman,” I responded, as I pushed my hair back behind my ear and wondered if he would mention that it was getting too long again. Not that there was a rule that professors couldn’t have longish hair, but the dean was very forthcoming with his opinions in general. And it was probably true—I did need a haircut. My dark and somewhat wavy hair was now tapering down just below my ears. I gave him a smile as I pulled out the only other chair in my office which was covered with a couple of sweatshirts, a scarf and a box full of bags of M&Ms. Yep, I was a choc-o-holic.

  “No thanks, I will just stand,” he announced as he pushed his Coke-bottle glasses back up his narrow nose. “My visit today won’t be a long one.”

  Hmm, did that mean I was about to be fired? “Okay,” I responded, not meaning to sound hesitant, but there it was. “To what do I owe this pleasure?”

  The dean smiled, but it was a quick one and I could tell it was just for show. We didn’t like one another. That much was obvious. “There’s been discussion going around about you and one of our graduate students, Rebecca Glasner, carrying on an illicit affair?”

  “Well, I don’t know how illicit it is,” I responded right away, fully aware that there was nothing in the rules that said a professor couldn’t date a student as long as said student wasn’t in any of his classes. Sure, it was frowned upon, but as long as it wasn’t specifically stated as a no-no in the handbook, I didn’t care. Furthermore, it wasn’t like I was dating Rebecca. Banging her, yes, but dating her, no.

  “Liaisons between students and professors are strongly frowned upon here at Hamilton,” the dean announced as the puzzle pieces started to fall into place. Hadn’t Rebecca mentioned something about the dean always calling her into his office for no apparent reason? Hmm … interesting.

  “I understand,” I started. “And I can assure you that I am not in a relationship with Rebecca.”

  “Let’s keep it that way,” he responded, nodding vehemently. “And that goes for any sort of relationship with her, as well. We want Hamilton State to be a university where parents can feel proud to send their children.”

  “Well, Rebecca is technically in her twenties, so I doubt her parents are much concerned with whatever it is she’s doing,” I argued with a placid smile. This guy was wasting my time with this crap, and I found it annoying to say the least.

  “Yes, but I’m thinking of our younger students, in particular. We don’t want them to think that this sort of behavior is tolerated or accepted. Relationships between professors and students should be purely platonic.”

  Hmm … what about relationships between the dean and the students? Especially when said dean was already married? “I understand,” I said, figuring I should keep that last bit to myself as I didn’t think it would go over well. And, really, the truth of the matter was that this was a great out for me to use with Rebecca. I was sick of her, and the sex had lost its luster. Now it wasn’t even enough to keep me interested. So the dean was doing me a favor without even realizing it.

  “As long as you end things with Rebecca appropriately and in a timely manner, I will keep this between us,” he continued as he looked around my office with what looked like distaste.

  “I will,” I answered tersely as I wondered when he’d show himself to the door. It couldn’t be too soon.

  “There is one more thing I’d like to discuss with you,” he started.

  “Okay.”

  “I’m sure you’ve heard that Sonama Greco was recently in a car accident and is in the hospital?”

  “No, I hadn’t heard anything about that,” I answered honestly as surprise washed over me. Sonama was another professor in the English department, her classes revolving around feminism. “Is she all right?”

  “As far as I understand, she has many broken bones and a fractured pelvis, so no, I believe it safe to say she is not all right.”

  “That’s terrible to hear,” I offered as I wondered what in the world Sonama’s car accident had to do with me or why we were discussing it.

  “I didn’t come here to update you on her current state, Derek,” the dean started and then cleared his throat as if he were annoyed. “I need you to take over her classes for the remainder of the spring semester and possibly those over summer.”

  “I can’t do the summer,” I immediately responded, not even bothering to think about the load I already had for spring semester. But the summer was a bigger deal. No one and nothing was going to get in the way of me and Thailand. “I’ve already made traveling plans.”

  “Well, think it over,” the dean started, looking frustrated all the while. “I know this is last minute, and I know I’m springing it on you, but I feel as if I’m doing you a favor by keeping my mouth shut regarding you and Rebecca, and I would appreciate the favor returned …”

  “There is no me and Rebecca,” I interrupted, my eyebrows furrowing in the center of my face as anger started to heat up within me. Who the hell did this guy think he was?

  “There are those who would say otherwise,” he responded placidly.

  “Who exactly?”

  “I must keep my sources to myself as they have requested to remain anonymous.”

  “Then it’s simply their word against mine.”

  He shook his head. “One of my sources I hold in the highest esteem, and I know she would not lie to me.”

  She. Hmmm. That had to be Rebecca, herself, who had gone to him about our supposed “relationship.” Why? Maybe she figured it would get her closer to nabbing the spot of my T.A.? Of course, she knew the dean had the hots for her, so that didn’t exactly make sense. Maybe she’d noticed my waning interest of late and decided to get me in trouble? The more
I thought about it, the more I decided that was probably more along the lines of the truth.

  I sighed because he had me cornered and we both knew it. Besides, I’d already semi-admitted to something with Rebecca earlier, so no use in backpedaling now. It would just make me look bad. “Look, I have no problem picking up Sonama’s classes until the end of the semester as long as they don’t conflict with mine,” I started.

  “And they do not. I’ve already checked to make sure.”

  “But the summer is out,” I continued as I shook my head. “There’s no way I can do it, because I already have other plans, like I said.”

  The dean just stared at me for a few seconds as his eyes narrowed. “I thought we could sweeten the pot for one another,” he began as he pretended extreme interest in the top of my desk.

  “What does that mean?”

  He looked up at me and I could see the gears turning in his mind. “I know you’ve been waiting for an assistant for a while?”

  “Yes, I have.”

  “Well, if you do me a favor, I will do you one.”

  “You’ll give me an assistant?” I repeated, eyeing him pointedly because he’d never waved this carrot at me before, and it was one I sorely wanted. An assistant would make my job infinitely easier.

  “Yes, and if you help me out over the summer, I will increase your pay as well for that time.”

  I was less interested in summer pay, increased as it would be or not. “So this assistant,” I started. “Would it just be a summer thing?”

  “No,” the dean said as he shook his head. “You’ve been requesting one for a while and we just haven’t had the funds to make it happen, but desperate times call for desperate measures, I suppose.”

  So he couldn’t find the money to hire an assistant for me until he needed a favor in return. How nice. “I’m happy to help out with Sonama’s classes for the rest of the semester, but I will have to get back to you about the summer.” I mean, Thailand was Thailand.