Tory’s arm, Phyllis pulled her toward the door. “If I am breaking a law, that’s my choice,” she said firmly. “You may think I’m the only friend Christine had, but I know she was the only real friend I’ve ever had, and I’m not letting her down. Or you, either. Let’s go.”
Perhaps it was a sign of her cowardice. Or weakness. But Tory went.
And two hours later, when she stepped into the first college classroom she’d ever been in—the first of five she’d be stepping into that week—when she saw the rows of desks, the students sitting there, and walked right past them to the front of the room, she refused to let the weakness show.
She was Christine Evans. The best damn teacher any one of those intimidating intelligent students had ever had.
IN A CHAIR right in the middle of the room—not so far back that he wasn’t a part of things and not so close to the front that he missed what was going on behind him—Ben watched as his fellow classmates filed in and took their seats. So far, he was the oldest of the bunch. Not too many seniors took American Literature 101.
Still, he wasn’t daunted. Or even the slightest bit disappointed. This was his classroom. His school. His day.
Pulling out the black spiral-bound notebook he’d bought for this class and a new pen, he sat back and waited for his teacher to arrive. C. Evans.
Was “C.” a man or a woman?
Listening as a rather immature boy, clearly fresh out of high school, tried to pick up the blond cheerleader-type in the back of the room, Ben smiled. He felt the way Buddy had looked in the bathroom that morning.
Let the games begin.
A young woman walked in just then, clearly fresh out of her high school, if the confident tilt of her head was anything to judge by. Ben’s euphoria faded just a little as he watched her. Overdressed compared to the rest of the shorts-clad students, she stood out in her proper blue suit and white blouse. And she was far too striking to be wearing the no-nonsense pumps she had on.
What bothered him, though, wasn’t her clothes. Or even her confidence. It was the way his nerves tensed when she passed his desk. He’d been looking at female students all morning, and he could have been looking at a herd of cattle for all the reaction they aroused in him.
Staring down at the desktop in front of him, at his notebook lying there ready and open, Ben avoided noticing where the young woman sat. He wasn’t in the market for an attraction, a flirtation or a romance. Or anything at all that had to do with a woman. Maybe once he’d graduated, enough time would have elapsed and he’d be willing to venture down that road again. Maybe. But for sure, it would be no sooner than that. He wasn’t going back to working till he dropped, working at dead-end jobs just to pay the rent.
“Okay, everybody, let’s get started, shall we?”
His gaze shooting toward the front of the room, Ben came to attention. He’d been so set on ignoring one of his fellow students, he hadn’t even realized the teacher had come in.
Yes, he had. He just hadn’t known she was his teacher.
C. Evans. A woman. The suit.
Damn.
She looked straight at him, almost as though she’d read his thoughts, and Ben received his second jolt of the day. Her eyes, so compelling, so full, held his, and he sensed, somehow, that she was speaking to him. And what she had to say was far more intense than anything to do with American literature. For a few brief seconds, it was as though only the two of them were in that room.
“I’m Christine Evans,” she said, breaking eye contact with him. After glancing around at the rest of her students, she focused on him again.
Her look wasn’t sexual. Wasn’t the least bit suggestive. It seemed more as if she was searching for a friend. And that she’d chosen him.
Ben couldn’t accept the honor.
Glancing away from her, he observed the rest of the students in the room. Had any of them noticed the odd communication? Had any of them experienced it, as well, when Ms. Evans had looked at them? All the students in his line of vision seemed young, inexperienced, oblivious. So much so they didn’t recognize the undercurrents? Or were there simply none being sent their way?
“This syllabus covers the entire semester, and we’ll be following it exactly,” Ms. Evans was saying, passing around handouts.
She hesitated beside his desk, then dropped the stapled sheets on his notebook and moved on.
“Since I’m brand-new to town, I don’t know a single one of you, but I’m usually pretty good with names, and I expect to have them all learned within a couple of days. Until then, please bear with me.”
Like him, she was a newcomer.
“We’ll take a few minutes to go over the syllabus,” she went on, “plus my requirements of you and the expectations for this class, including the weekly essays you’ll have to write. Then we’ll be moving on to this week’s topic, the Emerson years…”
She might be new to town, but she clearly wasn’t new to teaching.
Ben settled in, making himself concentrate on what the teacher was saying with the same sheer strength of will that had seen him through eight years of toiling at jobs he hated so he could feed his baby girl. Nothing was going to keep him from getting his college degree.
Nothing.
“BEN? COULD I SEE YOU a minute?”
Ben stopped on the way out of his American literature class on Monday, the second week of class. His teacher wanted to see him.
“Sure.” Backpack hanging off one shoulder, he approached her desk. Stupid to feel underdressed in his shorts, T-shirt and sandals, but he did. Didn’t seem to matter to Christine Evans that it was over a hundred degrees outside. She’d worn a suit to class all four times they’d met.
Not that Ben had permitted himself to dwell on what the woman wore. At least not when he could help it.
She waited for the other students to finish packing up and leave the room, gathering her own stuff together at the same time. Ben started to sweat. He’d spent far too much of the weekend thinking about his English professor.
What secrets were hiding behind those big blue eyes? What made her expression so shadowed sometimes?
How old was she, anyway? And had she ever been married? Would she think him a fool for the mess he’d made of his own life?
Despite his resolve to allow no feelings to complicate his life, he could feel the woman’s sorrow. Maybe because it mirrored his own?
“I just wanted to speak with you about your piece on Thoreau,” Christine said when the last student had left the room. “Your portrayal of him as an intensely deep and lonely man, rather than the quack many considered him, was quite moving.”
“Thank you.”
She asked him a couple of questions about his research and he answered her. When she held the paper out to him, her hand was shaking.
“There’s
