128 pens later, I am still excruciatingly bored.
I drum with them: on the edges of desks, on walls, on textbooks. Anywhere. I'm sure I drive my students insane when I do it during the exams I proctor. The smart one's have taken to sitting in the back, not only because the sound carries less, but also because they're safe from the ink that splatters everywhere when the pen breaks.
They call me Professor Pen-Killer behind my back. They think I don't pay attention but I always do. I always pay attention; I'm always at attention, with nervous energy jittering from my stomach to my hands, which quake if I'm still for long enough. I hate to see it, so I just don't stay still.
My phone buzzes on my desk, making me jump a little bit. I've gotten used to the sound. Almost. I turn it over to see a text message lighting up the screen.
GAI: Lunch?
I type back my declination automatically, which makes this the fourteenth time in a row that I have turned down plans with my ardent friend - excuse me - rival, as he likes to call himself.
But of course, because he knows when something is wrong with me, I get another text message.
GAI: Bad day, rival?
KAKASHI: bored. meeting student during lunch hour tho. sorry
I should be grading papers, but Gai's right. It's been a bad day. Ever since being discharged, it's been a series of bad days and less bad days. I sigh and adjust my surgical mask back over my face, tricking myself into believing I have a gas mask on. It makes me feel safer. A glance at the clocks shows that I have three hours to kill.
Instead of being responsible, I lean back in my chair and, against my better judgement, go to sleep.
And plunge straight into a nightmare. A familiar one. Mud and blood. Screaming. I need to find my squad. Need to fix them. Gun going off right next to me when someone jumps into my trench so I point my rifle at his guts and blow his intestines out but not before he reaches forward with a flash of a knife and it hurts, it hurts, my eye-
"Professor."
I punch straight and catch him in the shoulder but before I can get him again, he leaps away, his hands up. I've seen that sign before and how easy it is to grab a gun and shoot, so I step towards him, needing to subdue him when he kneels, hands still over his head.
That is my qualification of a universal sign of surrender.
"Professor, it is September 14 and we are in Waterford School of Medicine," he recites calmly, looking straight into my eyes. His arms don't even shake. "This is not a war zone. You are safe. I have no weapons. I am a student." The only sound in the room after that is my harsh breathing, muffled by my surgical mask. "It's alright, Professor. You're safe."
I can feel the sweat running down my face. I glance to the left, quickly, and see the bookcases that line my office, not dirt and broken bodies. When I realize my hands are curled in the air, holding a gun only I can see, I take a deep breath and drop my arms.
"Ex-military?" the student asks, still crouched on the floor.
"Why are you here?" I respond, collapsing backwards into my chair. I resist the urge to pull my mask down. I don't want the stranger to see the scar. "Get up."
He does so, lowering his hands.
"I had an appointment with you. You wanted to ask me why I wasn't handing in any of my homework."
"So why aren't you handing in any of your homework?"
"Because as long as I do well on the exams, I don't need to hand in homework."
"All right, then. You're dismissed."
But he doesn't leave. Instead, he walks forward and sits in a chair across from me.
"You don't really care, do you? Whether I hand in my homework or not."
"Policy makes me ask, not compassion. What you decide to do with your homework doesn't concern me."
"You look like you need some water, professor."
"I need something a lot more alcoholic than water," I snap and immediately regret it. I try to make my voice more regretful, even though he doesn't look the least bit offended, "Sorry I hit you."
"I can take a punch." He looks around the room, dark eyes taking in the sparse furniture and empty walls.
I remember how he dropped to the floor immediately, without thinking. That's muscle memory speaking, not rational decision-making. He's done this, on many occasions, if his reaction time says anything.
"You've seen PTSD before." It's a statement, and it comes out more accusatory than I meant it to be.
"I had to volunteer at hospitals," he focuses back on me. "I've worked with war veterans."
"Not a war veteran," I respond curtly. "Don't call me that. I didn't outlive the war. It kicked my ass and I got sent home."
"But you still survived."
"And that's all I'm doing. Surviving."
"Don't you think surviving is a talent?" There's a strange expression arranged on his face; it looks like a cross between curiosity and thoughtfulness.
I don't answer. I don't even know what he means.
"If you're done asking me questions, get out."
"Are you getting help, Professor?"
"My, my. Nosy brat," I drawl and he smiles, white teeth opposite to his dark hair. "Don't need help."
His mouth twitches, but he doesn't say anything. Instead, his pupils zero in on the scar that slashes my left eye, then flickers to my mask. But in the next second, he smiles again and stands up.
"Have a nice day, Professor."
I pick up my most recent pens and start tapping as he moves out. At the doorway, he stops. I almost expect him to say something when he continues out into the hall.
One of the pens crack in my hand.
129.
He's in my lecture.
I mean, yes, I knew he was in my class, but the next day, I glance up briefly to catch his passing gaze. He nods and smiles. After a moment, I nod back. It happens in the next class, too. And the class after that. He never speaks to me, but only nods and smiles, as if we're sharing the greatest secret in the world. I guess it's partially my fault that he continues the habit; he's the only student I nod back to.
Eventually, like examining the routine of a wild animal, I start to pick up on certain things. He arrives to class early, and always sits in the far left-hand corner, all the way in the front. He takes notes with both hands, that ambidextrous fucker, and manages to spike my jealousy every time he switches hand mid-sentence.
He doesn't seem to have many friends, but seems to be able to make small talk well enough.
I never look up his name, though. I don't know any of their names. They are one innocent, quivering entity of laughing and arguing voices. I never want to associate and he will not be an exception.
So, when he comes to visit a week and a half later during one of my bad days, I'm surprised, unpleasantly surprised.
"Good afternoon, Professor," he says, peeking through my door without knocking.
"Office hours are cancelled - oh, it's you."
"It's me," he agrees, placing a cup of ice coffee in front of me.
"What's this?" I ask, suspicious.
"Coffee. You looked like you were having a rough day."
"If it looked like I was having a rough day, you should have stayed away," I say, words acidic, and don't touch the coffee.
"Are you free for a little bit, Professor?" he continues, in the same even tone of voice. It's soothing, and I decide there's no reason to be difficult.
"Don't have office hours. What do you want?"
"I have something for you. I'll be back, Professor."
Before I can protest, he slips out the door, his footsteps echoing as he walks down the hall. I look down at my fingernails, the blood of three pens staining across my hands in patches. I reach for another pen and then stop, forcing myself to be patient. Waiting is the hardest part. I think the iced coffee agrees, because the ice shifts with a sigh, condensation running down the sides of the plastic cup.
Suddenly, I hear faint jingling. Not bells, but the soft clinking of a chain, accompanied by his footsteps, and... is that clicking? The clicking of something on the floor, but before I can put together why these sounds are vaguely familiar, they walk in together, and I am almost lost in ice-blue eyes as sharp as winter.
"Sit, girl."
She sits, the black parts of her fur glinting in the fluorescent lighting. A bright pink tongue darts out to lick her nose.
"This is Pepsi. She's a Siberian husky. I found her at a kill shelter and I couldn't leave her and, well," he shrugs and unclips her leash. "Say hello, Pepsi."
She lets out a soft woof and pads over to my seat, leaning her head on my knee. I pat her head and scratch behind her ears, all the while staring at those silvery eyes.
"I started training her in basic commands, but she got all of them within a week, so I started her on some simple PTSD service dog training and she's pretty well off into that now, even though I started training her when she was an adult. She can turn on lights, and do nightmare recognition, and give seizure warnings, and a whole bunch of other things, because I didn't have many friends and had too much time on my hands. She's fully vaccinated and I have a list of all her commands and the type of food she eats and her toys are in my car. You can buy her a new bed, but she really will just sleep on your bed, because I can't train her out of that for some reason and... what?" he stops when he glances at my face.
"You're giving her to me?"
"Uh, if you'll take her, yeah." He cocks his head the same time Pepsi cocks hers. "I don't need a service dog anymore."
"Anymore?"
"Anymore," he says firmly, not elaborating.
I turn my eyes back to Pepsi, who is grinning to expose her long, white teeth. I look back to the student and then back at her, hit with an abrupt sense of shame.
"I don't even know your name," I mumble.
"It's Kou Langer," he fills in, trying to bite back his laugh.
"Kou... Langer?" I repeat. "Kou... Lan - Cola?"
"Yeah." His eyes crinkle in the corners when he laughs, until Pepsi barks. "My mom remarried and it just so happened that my new dad's last name was Langer and here I am."
"And here you are," I say, more for myself. "I can't take Pepsi. She's your dog."
"You can and you will," he's still laughing. "I can't keep her in my apartment anymore. The landlady got mad that Pepsi kept chewing up stuff. The space is too small for her. It's better if you keep her and she'll be good for you, too."
"Nosy," I retort, but soon after, I say, "thank you."
When I bring her to my house, Pepsi jumps out of the car, rolls in the grass, and runs barking up the long walkway to the front door. She comes back to me in a heart beat, gently mouthing the handle of my computer case, and walks with it, placing it at the front door and wagging her tail. She stays on my left side, as if understanding that my vision is impaired.
Pepsi howls and that's suits me just fine. It's countryside where I live.
I howl with her.
It's a good day.
