She grabs her bra up off the shag carpet as I ash my cigarette into the long neck bottle on her nightstand. "You're welcome to shower" she suggests, twisting at the waist my hands have previously bruised. "But Dr. Prior will be back around seven, so make it quick."
I smile and pretend I don't find it odd she's referred to her husband by his government name. "I think I'll pass, I need to get to the library before they think I'm not coming." Her lips rise at the corners and I know what's coming before she can say it. "You've just laid into his wife and you think you have the balls to sit through one of his student led lectures? You're more of a masochist than I thought" she says the words "student led" with a mocking abbreviation. As if it's something childish, or beneath her.
Rolling my eyes, I rise from the bed and begin the shameful task of retrieving my clothes from the various places they've landed amongst the room. "He asked for my help, I'm not going to stand him up."
Her arms wrap around the back of my waist as I straighten the wrinkles in my shirt. "How is it" she begins, as her lips graze one of my shoulder blades, "that you need all this extra credit for my class but you're Robert's right-hand man?" My body reacts to her petting and I use what little restraint I have left to button my jeans and search for my shoes. "makes me wonder if he's the one keeping you after class to play catch- up."
I pretend to laugh at her vulgar joke and wish it wasn't like this. Wish we could just roll in the sheets and not play her games with what we've done afterwards. I throw my university sweatshirt over my head and make for the door before the irony of this role-reversal etches its way into my guilty conscience any further.
"I'm sure you're not the only one that thinks that on campus. I won his internship fair and square, Heather." I say, changing the subject and hoping she lets me leave with minimal protest to the conversation.
"I know you did, smarty." She looks me in the eyes and pushes the hair off my forehead. Kisses me on the jaw and it's as seductive as it is motherly. I close my eyes and wish she would do it again, reminding myself why I'm here in the first place. "You really will be late if you don't go now."
As I walk out of her house I think of my own, and how foreign it's become during the six months I've been away.
The dorms aren't much. A 15x15 room with two twin beds on either side. I'm used to sharing a room with Soda, but Matt Banis is a different story. His short stature and even shorter temper made for some eventful nights in our Residence Hall. Matt is a Lithuanian Science Major who drinks Hennessey like it keeps him hydrated. He has a sense of humor that matches his dry mouth, and the only filter he ever uses is the one on his cigarettes. He is my best friend... we have nothing in common.
Much like everyone else, Matt was kept in the dark as to where I disappear to every other night. He suspects I have a girl, but he has learned enough of me over the past six months to not question it. Our friendship is not a two-way street. I'm a great listener, but talking had never been my strong suit.
I know what his reaction would be. He would congratulate me as if I had achieved the impossible. Clap me on the back and ask me how I had done it. Throw me one of his Cheshire cat smiles and make a vulgar comment about if she "fucks as well as she teaches".
I know I couldn't handle that.
I could convince myself I would become defensive in her honor but in all honesty, I would be coming to the defense of mine. I am as ashamed as I am stimulated.
"Hey agent Curtis, nice of you to leave your double life behind for fifteen minutes and check in on your old pal", he jokes as if I've been gone for days instead of just the night.
"Saw you hitting it off pretty well with that sorority captain last night, Matt. Just thought I'd be a good friend and leave you two to it for the night." I lie, knowing I'll get away with it. In reality, I had no clue where Mat had been the night before, but estimating him not far from a sorority girl that he'd convinced himself he had a chance with almost always proved me right.
"Nah, man. She split early. I was left here all by my lonesome waiting for my husband to return from war."
War.
My mind leaves our disheveled dorm room and joins my brother overseas. To a convoy in the jungle where he's promised us in letters he's not on the front lines.
"Sorry." Matt turns a shade of red one can only obtain from putting their foot in their mouths so far, they cut off their airway. "I didn't mean to bring that up, man."
"You're fine." I reassure my friend and turn to my desk to grab the deodorant. "I gotta go though. I have that lecture in thirty minutes, and I'd like to sleep on my desk for at least twenty before."
"Just blow it." Matt says like it's the easiest thing in the world. "tell Prior you rocked your girl hard last night and you need to recuperate."
I'm choking on my spit as I make my way to the door. "You know I can't do that. Dr. Prior has done a lot for me. I owe him this much."
"So he paid for your college." He rolls his eyes, and sits up in bed. "That doesn't mean you have to lick his ass for the next four years."
Matt is the only person I have ever told about my home life. He knows how I grew up and he knows that a handout or a scholarship would have been the only way I could end up next to him in this dorm room.
He knows what the Priors' did to get me a scholarship and he knows what they did to keep me here when I blew that scholarship halfway through the first semester.
And while he knows more than my brothers, Matt does not know the full story. So I laugh at his vulgarity, and tell him I'll "see him when I see him" and leave, wishing once again that my college experience was as innocent as the three month bender Matt seems to be on.
Professor Heather Prior and her husband Dr. Robert Prior had taken an interest in me before classes ever even started. Dr. Prior offered a medical research apprenticeship for advanced students within the state the summer after my junior year of high school. Because I had finished my science credits and was struggling to fill up my time slots for the forth coming year, our guidance counselor had called a meeting with Darry.
My options were to take half days to finish out my senior year and obtain credits at the nearest community college, or shadow Dr. Prior at Oklahoma State for the summer and lock down a scholarship following my graduation.
Darry was proud to say the least. All of his hard work had paid off. Mine as well, I guess. 16 years old and graduating high school was something that we could have only hoped to come out of my future.
Darry's expectations of me had certainly dropped over the years. Keeping me alive to the age of 16 became his main goal, instead of ensuring I further my education. However, now that he had reached the unsurpassable, "tiger-mom" Darry was back and more ruthless than ever.
"You'll be making a huge mistake if you don't go." Darry warns. His eyes swimming with hope that I take his advice, I can practically feel him mentally packing my bags and putting me on the next greyhound.
"A full-ride and you already have your foot in the door in the major you're choosing, I'm not really sure why I'm having to convince you." I roll my eyes and pick my battles. Balling my hands in fists at my side as I refrain from reminding him this was the major he chose for me and not my own.
"You're not having to convince me Darry. I haven't said anything about NOT wanting to go, you just haven't shut up since we talked to the counselor." I smile and hope he doesn't take as much offense to my words as I mean them.
He returns the smile and his entire posture becomes gentler. Throwing his keys on the counter, he shuffles past me to the fridge. He pulls out a beer, cracks the top on the linoleum counter and ruffles my hair. "Sorry", he admits sheepishly. "you just got quiet, I thought you were second guessing yourself."
It had been a long time since I had second guessed myself. Realizing my own potential was the best and worst thing to ever happen to me. I knew there would be no "lower class lifestyle" in my future. A sense of responsibility to be better and do better had been placed upon me the second my brothers had given theirs up.
"I just want you to make all the right choices when it comes to this, kid. You're too smart to only take it this far."
Darry's words ring in my ear as I take my seat in the south hall of the library. If he knew what I had done would he still feel that way?
I shake the guilty thoughts from my head to make room for more opposing ones. Dr. Prior opens the lecture with the gusto of a brimstone and fire preacher, and I try not to think about how warm his sheets were when I left his wife in them an hour ago.