‘I apologise for the earlier setback. I hope that everything so far is clear. Have you understood broadly how the course will take place?’
One hundred and fifty heads nod in unison. Apparently I will not be haunting their nightmares, at least not tonight.
I take my leave, signalling to Eleonora to conclude the lesson, and then head like a lightning bolt towards the department. I have to go to my office to reflect and calm down.
I don’t turn or look around me. All I need is to meet Teo in the hallway. Any more bullshit from him is likely to send me over the edge.
My heels strike the marble floor with violence, as I think of new and original insults to dedicate to my new student: I will make his life so difficult that he will beg to change faculty.
Absorbed in devising ever more elaborate tortures, I fail to notice where I’m putting my feet, until I find myself colliding with another person.
‘Oh, look where you’re going!,’ I say rudely, and then fall silent, mortified, at the sight of Professor Costa. He is wearing his usual expression of someone who looks at you without quite recognising you. Despite the fact we’ve been working together for five years.
Still, geniuses are always a little distracted.
‘Oh! Excuse me, Professor,’ I stammer, mortified. It’s true that I want to fall into his arms, but I’d prefer to do it with a touch more grace, and ideally not in the middle of the corridor.
‘Sara! Difficult day?’ he asks me with his intellectual smile. Thank goodness he remembers who I am, at least!
Instinctively I throw my chest forward.
I feel like a stupid teenager, but today, like never before, I’m sick of being timid. Maybe it’s time to test just how strong my walnut desk actually is.
‘I was just thinking. I’m on my way to my office to draft the article. Do you… do you want to get a coffee? ‘
There, I did it. The little devil on my left shoulder is dancing with glee, but the angel on the right shakes his head disapprovingly. Shut your face, little spoilsport, I just want to have some fun!
I accompany the proposal with a look that, to me, quite clearly says ‘throw me down and stamp me like a protocol sheet.’ He returns my smile ‘Good idea. Bring it to my office in about ten minutes, along with the drafts of your article,’ he says, apparently oblivious to my seductive wiles. What’s wrong with me? The professor walks away placidly, leaving me standing like a lemon in the corridor.
‘Shot down!’ a voice exclaims behind me. I don’t need to turn around. I already know who it is. Enjoying my embarrassment, no doubt.
‘I don’t understand the reason for your presence here. Students are only allowed in the faculty for appointments on lecturers’ reception days’ I tell him, remaining motionless in my ridiculous conquest position.
‘What day is it?’ he asks.
‘What? Wednesday.’
‘Well, according to the bulletin board, Wednesday is the day you see your students. And I would like to be received.’
I turn and glower. I wish I could disintegrate him with my eyes.
‘Well, I don’t want to receive you. If I were you I would leave, unless you’re here to help me out with some kneeball practise?’
He sags at the waist a little, remembering.
‘It was a good shot, I admit it. But you know I don’t give up until I get what I want.’
‘Well, I’m glad you’re feeling tenacious, because you’re going to have to wait for me to die before you pass this examination.’
‘Perhaps you’ll die of a broken heart,’ he replies, nodding towards the door where the professor is hiding.
‘That’s none of your business,’ I say, fists clenched, while he advances with his hands raised in mock surrender.
‘I come in peace.’
‘Tell that to someone else.’
‘Really, I come in peace. And I have a proposal for you. A proposal that you cannot refuse,’ he whispers, earning himself a slap. He’s lucky he’s too tall for me to reach his face.
‘I have already rejected your proposal, get used to it,’ I reply, starting to walk away.
‘But this one will be acceptable to you too. Unmissable, I might also say. I’m proposing a fair exchange.’
‘Sex in exchange for grades? You already know my answer. I don’t want it.’
He shakes his head. ‘Assistance in exchange for assistance.’
Eh? What the hell is he plotting?
‘What assistance could you ever give me?’
‘Well… I will come on a Wednesday and ask you to help me with what I don’t understand about the course, and in exchange I will teach you all the things you don’t understand about men. That’s all.’
The nerve of him!
‘I understand men perfectly well!’ I reply, offended.
I certainly don’t need his help to get one.
‘Allow me to contradict you. You didn’t understand that one just now at all.’
Ok. On this point he is right. But that’s only because my professor is too busy improving himself with intellectual pursuits. He has no time to waste on frivolities.
‘You don’t understand anything about this world, we’re not like you.’
‘That’s for sure,’ he agrees, looking me from head to toe. I remember that expression. Evaluating how much I suck from one to ten.
Well, for the record, he sucks twelve.
‘Have you finished staring at my tits?’ I ask him, catching his eyes lingering for too long on that particular point.
‘You can’t look at what you can’t see,’ he retorts, reaching out and unbuttoning a couple of buttons on my blouse.
‘What the hell?’ I grab his hands roughly and hold them away. And no, I don’t like feeling them against my palms, warm and smooth, big, and well-proportioned. It has no effect on me whatsoever.
‘Don’t worry, I’m not trying to undress you in the corridor. But I have just increased your sex appeal by a few points. I mean, I’m not a miracle-worker, but I’m guessing this guy isn’t too picky. He’s so far off in the clouds that he probably wouldn’t even notice something when it was right under his nose …’
Meanwhile, I’m still holding his hands, and in a corner of my mind I am aware I should drop them as soon as possible. But somehow, mind and body don’t seem to be connected. Because I’m concentrating on his words, of course. Not because I can’t let him go.
He catches my troubled expression first, then lowers
His eyes to look at our hands. He quickly retracts them,
shaking them as if to get rid of a persistent insect.
‘So, do you want to give me a chance?’ he asks, taking a couple of steps backwards.
I sigh, thinking carefully. Technically, I could not refuse to receive a student. And unfortunately, he is my student, at least on paper. I could make sweat through every page. I can’t deny I would enjoy making him squirm. I could make him re-sit the exam three or four times, and finally squeak him through with a weak third. In these terms, the prospect seems more appetising.
On the other hand, his offer to help me understand men offends me and I don’t understand the point of it. It is true that I don’t go out much, but I interact perfectly well with the other sex and I really don’t see that I have any need of his help.