Fall Semester (2 page)

“Comin’ right up, chief,” Rob said, grabbing a tumbler and loading it with ice.

Chief?
Malcolm rolled his eyes. The other girl caught it and looked away.

Rob handed him a glass of amber and ice. Malcolm mumbled a thanks and took a sip.

Aaah. I just might survive this.

He turned from the bar. Malcolm considered the prospect of returning to the living room. Surely, all of the talk would be about Jack Wilson’s book. In fact, all of the talk for weeks would be about that. Still, he didn’t want to stand at the bar and possibly encourage Rob the Oblivious to speak to him.

Malcolm spotted a couple of wingback chairs in the corner across the room from the bar. He carried his glass and sat down, pretending to admire the view of the backyard through Dorothy’s French doors.

He sipped his drink. The Crown’s perfume gave him something to observe, to mull. It was almost like syrup, potent and immediate, like an outdoor concert. Something better. He sipped again. Yes, it was definitely better here in the corner watching the lawn.

Malcolm glanced at the bar. Rob was serving the girls beer. Helene had a Corona with lime. Rob served her first, but his eyes were on the other girl, who’d asked for an Abita.

She must be a local.

That Rob kept glancing at the girl while Helene itemized her course-load was not surprising. Helene wasn’t unattractive; she was tall, svelte, blonde with a high forehead and clear, blue eyes, but she was about as fuckable as a
Holman’s Handbook of Literary Terms.
That girl had the soul of a pedant—if pedants had souls.

“With the independent study and special projects course, that makes 13 hours,” she reported, standing even more bolt-upright. “Dr. Russo said that Dr. Sheridan might not allow it, but she did!”

The new girl shook her head in awe. She wore her brown hair in a French braid with a knot that fell between her shoulder blades. That and her tan skin—and khaki shorts—led Malcolm to guess that she had been admitted to the master’s program. Too young to be a doctoral student. He figured her to be 22, tops. Malcolm hoped that she’d read
Huckleberry Finn.

Damn. Twain and Howell.

Certainly, it was covered ground, but Wilson was deliberate and—for fuck’s sake—passionate. It would be brilliant, fresh. It had to be if Scholastic was running with it. It would be something that every Twain scholar would read, and each begrudgingly commend. Malcolm cringed at the inevitable trial when he would read it, as he would certainly have to.

When had Wilson’s last book come out? A year ago? Eighteen months? And Malcolm had lost count of how many texts the man had authored or co-authored.

He took a healthy swallow of Crown and tried to push down the panic that was rising under his ribs. It was like a drain inside him that felt big enough to swallow him whole. A swirling tug into darkness.

Malcolm struggled to think of something besides the fear, besides Wilson and his book, besides the only conclusions one could draw, but there was nothing else. He had forgotten about the view of the lawn and the drawing room. He could only just feel the wingback chair and the glass in his hand. He gripped it as it began to slip.

“Are you Dr. Vashal?”

Malcolm was clamping a hand to his forehead when the voice leapt at him.

“What? Yes!” He shook his head free and pretended to smooth his hair. The girl with the French braid was standing in front of him. He could scarcely hear her above the roar in his ears. He frowned at her, afraid that she would ask him if he was feeling ill.

“I’m Maren Gardner. I just transferred from Denver.” She held out her hand.

Malcolm blinked at it. He moved his drink to his left hand, wiped his palm on the knee of his jeans, and shook hers lightly. The panic was still in every joint, every vein, but her approach and his total confusion as to what the hell she wanted had spooked it.

“Mind if I sit down?” She pointed to the twin chair next to him and moved toward it before he answered.

“I…no….,” he muttered. He glanced back at the bar. A few more students had come in, and Rob was busy with their drinks. Malcolm checked his own glass; it was still half-full. He caught his breath and turned back to the girl.

“Denver? Why on Earth did you leave
there
to come
here
?”

What is her name? Marilyn?

He realized that his guesses had been a little off. She was older than 22. Hard to say how much, but in her 20s. Likely, she had read
Huckleberry Finn.

“Well, I’m from here, originally. I came home this summer. My father is dying.” She spoke with a matter-of-fact clarity, not a trace of self-pity or tragedy infected her voice.

Malcolm dragged the back of his hand across his forehead, trying to clear the perspiration.

“Dying?” His breathing had almost returned to normal, and he forced himself to exhale slowly, inaudibly.

“Yes. He has pancreatic cancer,” she explained, never breaking her eye contact with him. “It has metastasized.”

Malcolm frowned. Why should she be telling him about her terminally ill father with such an intrusive stare.
She
was intrusive.

“Well…that
is
awful,” he managed and took a sip of his drink.

“Yes,” she said, thoughtfully. “Yes, it has been, but I think he is glad about the semester starting....”

Malcolm stared at her. He had just begun to wonder if she was one of those students who couldn’t make friends of their own because they stood too close to other people and had the odd habit of showing their scabs. Rejected by their peers, such students tended to seek the company of their professors who, as mentors, had to show a little more diplomacy and support.

“He’s glad to have me home, of course,” she continued. Malcolm bobbed his eyebrows. “But when someone is very slowly, but undeniably dying,” she frowned and finally looked down to collect her thoughts. “They do need the attention drawn from them from time to time. It’s exhausting to know that everyone is suffering for you.”

She looked back up at him then and smiled again. She had a lucid smile, clear and confident up to her eyebrows. Malcolm hadn’t the least idea what to say.

“Well,…I’d never thought that before,” he allowed. “I suppose that’s so.”

A vision of his mother flashed in his mind’s eye, and he shoved the image aside with a sizeable pull at his glass.

She nodded and started again.

“I guess I—”

“Maren?” Helene called, rising from the bar. They both turned. “Are you hungry? The guys said the burgers are done.”

“Oh,…yeah. Just a minute.” Maren looked back at Malcolm. “Are you hungry, Dr. Vashal?”

“Um…” Malcolm pursed his lips. While it was rare that a student invited him along, Malcolm also thought it seemed a bit desperate. “No, thank you. I think I’ll pass.”

She rose to go, straightening her short khaki shorts and tucking a stray lock behind her ear.

“Well, I just wanted to say hello since I think you are my TA observer this semester.”

“Oh!” Malcolm observed four teaching assistants each term, and he usually did not give the matter a thought until a few weeks before exams. “Well, then…”

“It was nice meeting you.” She offered her hand again, and Malcolm took it, just as perplexed as he’d been the first time.

He watched her join Helene and head toward the kitchen. She was a rather pretty girl. Perhaps it would help her to make friends.

Malcolm didn’t stay late, but he was drunk enough to be too numbed to care about the success of his colleague or to obsess about taking his own life. Instead, he fell into bed, ready to begin the school year with a hangover.

Chapter 2

Maren

M
aren Gardner twisted her French braid around itself and pinned it securely before stepping into the blessedly warm bath. The A/C blasted icy air into the small, aqua-tiled room, and Maren sunk down until L’Occitane’s jasmine-scented bubbles met her chin.

This was how she quietly coped with her roommate’s acclimation to South Louisiana’s heat and humidity.

Tuva Lundqvist, a native Swede, Maren had quickly learned, was perhaps the sweetest person alive, and if Maren had to sleep under a pile of blankets in fuzzy socks while the air conditioning was set to 65, she would gladly do it for the girl.

They had found each other, of all places, on Craigslist. Of course, anyone would have doubts, but those evaporated at their first meeting at CC’s Coffee three weeks before when Tuva, who towered over Maren in her white-blond radiance, swept Maren into a hug as she laughed in relief.

“You are not a sex offender!” Tuva piped in her heavy Swedish accent, scandalizing onlookers and their coffee. Maren burst out laughing at her candor and humor.

“Neither are you!”

And the two grad students, one in petroleum engineering, and one in English, never looked back. In the span of an hour, they had covered Tuva’s history as the child of a Chevron engineer who had lived in—to name a few spots—Scotland, Nigeria, Singapore, Texas, California, and Louisiana; Maren’s transfer from the University of Denver’s graduate program in literary studies to the University of Louisiana’s graduate program in creative writing—and the sad circumstances that brought her home—and last, but not least, the
other
roommate Tuva would be gaining: Maren’s overprotective and overweight, two-year-old rat terrier, Perry.

As Maren soaked in the tub, she gave thanks to the Goddess of Roommates that Tuva had been a better find than she could have hoped for. Maren knew when her father had been diagnosed at the end of the spring semester that she had to transfer home, but being in town and moving back in with her parents at 24 were two different things. Having a place of her own—especially as things would get worse at home—was an absolute necessity, but she needed a roommate to split the rent.

Changing schools and changing programs would slow her down, too, but that hardly mattered now. She would only be taking nine hours this semester. There would be time to focus exclusively on her degrees and her eventual career...later.

But it
had
been nice to go to the party. And she
was
relieved that the semester was starting tomorrow.

She had already been to a few TA meetings and had claimed her cubicle in the “bullpen”—as the other grad students called the corral of grad student “offices” on the second floor of Griffin Hall. That was where she had met Helene, who had insisted that they go together to Dr. Sheridan’s party.

Maren leaned back against the tub and thought about the evening. She had met several of the professors in the department, including two she was considering for her thesis committee. Dr. Sharon St. Marks and Dr. Larry MacIntosh were the two poets on the faculty whom she most wanted to advise her, and she looked forward to the workshop that they were co-teaching this semester.

Helene had graciously introduced her to both of them at the party, and while she found Dr. St. Marks a little coolly intimidating, asking Maren’s age, the number of readings she had done, and if she had any publications, Dr. MacIntosh had introduced himself as “Larry” and had the good grace to praise Helene as a scholar and a writer.

They had eventually found their way to the bar in Dr. Sheridan’s sprawling house, and Maren was grateful for the chance to sit and take everything in without having to talk about herself. Of course, Helene knew the dark-haired, long-lashed Ph. D. student, Rob, who was serving drinks.

“Corona with lime, Coulter?” he’d asked.

“You know me well, Terrence,” Helene bantered. “Rob, this is Maren Gardner. She’s a transfer into the creative writing program. Maren, Rob is specializing in post-modern drama, and he’s writing his dissertation on David Mamet.”

“Wow. I love Mamet. That sounds like a lot of fun,” Maren said, genuinely smiling.

“Well, then, I have two questions for you: What are you drinking? And what’s your favorite Mamet?” Rob leaned on the bar and cocked an eyebrow.

“Abita Amber and
American Buffalo
,” Maren responded without missing a beat.

“I like
Oleanna,”
Helene chimed, taking her Corona from Rob and stuffing the lime down its neck. Rob handed Maren the beer, and she took a long pull.

“You would,” Rob teased, rolling his eyes. He glanced at Maren and winked. She looked away, turning to Helene, who had begun to protest.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” she asked, laughing.

“You know, angry female student ruins condescending professor....Isn’t that just wish-fulfillment?” Rob goaded.

“Only about some of them,” Helene whispered as she watched someone enter the parlor.

Maren turned to see who had come in and found herself staring at a gorgeous face. Older, mid-thirties, maybe. Weathered, yes. But gorgeous. Golden complexion. Smoky green eyes behind long lashes.

Like Harrison Ford in the first
Indiana Jones
movie
, she found herself thinking and smiled.

“What’ll it be, professor?” Rob asked him.

“Crown,” Indiana Jones said, frowning as though his head hurt. “Lots of ice.”

“Comin’ right up, chief,” Rob said. At this familiar sobriquet, Indiana Jones rolled his eyes, and Maren had to look away and stifle a laugh.

Rob served his drink, and Maren was surprised when Indie turned without so much as a nod, yet settled himself in a wingback chair across the room. She eyed Helene, who had made it her mission all evening to introduce Maren to every faculty member in attendance. Maren raised her Abita to her lips and whispered to Helene behind it.

“Who is he?”

Helene cut her eyes to the wingback chair to make sure she was not being watched.

“Dr. Vashal. Department prick,” she whispered back.

“He’s not so bad,” Rob mumbled, wiping the bar with a rag and not meeting their eyes. “Just moody.”

Helene looked at Rob like he’d grown horns.

“He’s on my committee,” Rob shrugged by way of explanation.

“No!” Helene, sotto voce, mimed horror.

“He really knows his shit,” Rob defended.

“He’s my TA observer,” Maren cut in, eyeing both of them.

“No!” Helene echoed. Rob scoffed and shook his head.

“Piece of cake. You’ll never see him, I guarantee, especially if you aren’t in one of his classes.” Rob eyed her with question.

Maren shook her head.

“I’m taking St. Martin and MacIntosh’s poetry workshop, Russo’s transcendentalists class, and Dr. Sheridan’s Romantics seminar.”

“Wow, a semester of the sensual and the imagination,” Rob cocked an eyebrow at her. “Who will anchor you down?”

Maren felt an unwelcome blush burn her cheeks.

“I’m sure I’ll manage,” she mumbled. Helene, thankfully, came to her rescue, loudly extolling her course load. Maren pretended to listen, but she didn’t want to encourage Rob to continue his flirting. She had not felt like flirting—or dating, for that matter—all summer. She had Ben to thank for that. But tonight she did not want to think about Ben. Maren stood up from the bar and noticed the empty chair next to Dr. Vashal.

As she approached, she saw that the professor held his drink in one hand and his head in the other as though he had a splitting headache. He didn’t appear to want company. In fact, he looked miserable, and the moment this thought registered, Maren could not bring herself to walk away.

“Are you Dr. Vashal,” she heard herself ask.

“What? Yes!” he blurted, clearly startled, surprise replacing pain in his eyes. He ran his hand through his hair, a wavy mess of chestnut streaked here and there with golden brown, and frowned at her. Maren swallowed. No one
really
wanted to sit alone at a party, right?

No.

“I’m Maren Gardner. I just transferred from Denver,” she said, mustering courage and offering him her hand, which he took after making a show of drying his on the leg of his jeans. In the span of a moment, she felt his hand in hers, wondered at its weight, and felt a poem ignite in her mind. The shock of inspiration, wordless and mysterious as always, was familiar to her, and she knew not to glare at it in her mind’s eye just now, but to nudge it over until she could later beckon it back into focus with pen and paper.

Maren seated herself beside Dr. Vashal, and before she even decided to, she was telling him about her father. And the waiting—the worst kind of waiting—that had nearly taken over her life.

Maren shivered. The bath had grown cold. She stepped out onto the bath mat, toweled herself off, and wrapped up in her lilac bathrobe. She headed for the notebook and pen at her bedside and started a poem about the weight of hands.