The presentations continued, each student showcasing their unique talents and styles. Gideon remained outwardly engaged, offering praise and taking notes with constructive criticism for their assessment. But inside, he was attuned to only one frequency.
Each time Megs tucked her hair behind her ear or closed her eyes to listen, Gideon noticed.It’s torture, Hales.Had Megs been feeling this all semester? How had she possibly focused or learned anything in his class?
Annoyance scraped at his midsection. This wasn’t his fault, and it certainly wasn’t hers. Attraction wasn’t a choice. No matter how many times he remindedhimself that he wasn’t supposed to have these thoughts, they didn’t stop coming. They hammered away at all the solid logic he repeated to himself like a mantra, reminding himself why there were rules regarding students and teachers.
Whenever he was with Megs, his world was at a higher bit rate. He was wholeheartedly happy in that tractor. He was even whole happy while he sat listening to conspiracy theories in that car that coated his nostrils with second-hand smoke.
He couldn’t act on this.Not yet. But the struggle didn’t make him a bad professor or Megs a bad student. He hated that their current situation held a cloudy filter over something that they both should be celebrating.
This wasn’t wrong.She wasn’t eighteen, and he wasn’t a creepy professor looking to hook up with one of his students. How long had it been since he’d felt this way about someone? That weekend after Sammy’s, he’d felt like a sixteen year old again, staring at his ceiling and reliving every moment from the second Megs had shown up at his office door.
It’s torture, Hales.
The semester ended December tenth. That was two-and-a-half months away, and though he’d never had a final that same week, he could think about doing it the eleventh and having his grading completed by the twelfth—
Gideon clapped with the rest of the room as another presentation finished, then looked at his clipboard. They were down to the last student. He looked up and cleared his throat. “Last but not least, Megs.”
The moment Megs stepped up to the front of the class, her entire demeanor shifted. She connected her computer and stood with presence and power as she announced her title. She was wearing a simple gray long-sleeved t-shirt with jeans that slouched on her hips. Gideon couldn’t figure out where to look, so he stared at the screen behind her. There was only a single track.
She pressed play, and her voice filled the room. "Sound is not just a backdrop. It's a character in its own right, breathing life into each scene and weaving together the emotions of the actors with the assumptions of the audience."
Megs’ words painted vivid imagery, describing soundtracks and scenes from plays and musicals spanning the past thirty years. When the track finished, it seemed like the entire room drew a collective breath. Then it was Erik who started clapping first.
He didn’t have to announce the end of class. Even though they were ten minutes early, everyone started packing up. Gideon saved his notes, then started organizing his recent downloads so he wouldn’t have to try to say something to Megs before he had himself under control.
"Professor Adams?"
He looked up to Jennifer standing in front of his desk.
She smiled. "I just wanted to ask about the grading for our midterm projects."
He exhaled and closed his laptop. "You'll receive your grades by the end of the week.”
"Okay," Jennifer nodded, obviously hoping for more conversation than he gave her. She turned and walked toward the door. Megs slipped her laptop in her backpack and followed without looking back.
Gideon’s ribcage felt like it had shrunk in the dryer. He stood and shook out his hands, then glanced over at the presentation table and frowned. “Megs, is this your charging cord?” He picked it up off the floor and looked up.
Megs slipped her bag off her shoulder and looked inside. “Yeah. Sorry, I thought I grabbed it.”
Gideon was already walking up the aisle, and when he looked up from the cord in his hands, Megs’ green eyes were fixed on him. In a split second, itfelt like all the oxygen had been sucked from the empty classroom.
“Did you write that?” he asked.
“What?”
“Your presentation. The audio you recorded.”
Megs breathed a laugh. “No, that was a monologue I found.”
Gideon almost asked for her to send the link, then realized he had a copy of her assignment in his teacher portal. But he didn’t want to read the words someone else wrote. He wanted to listen to Megs read them again.
“Thanks for this.” Megs reached out as he handed her the cord. He didn’t mean to let their fingers brush, but when they did, Megs jolted and then the room was plunged into darkness.
She sucked in a breath. “I-I think I hit the light switch.”
Gideon blinked, trying to make anything out in front of him. There weren’t any windows in the room besides the small one in the door that was currently blocked by students walking to their next classes.
Finally his eyes started to adjust. “Here, I know where it is.” Gideon reached past Megs and skimmed the wall for the switch. He would’ve found it had his whole body not lurched to a halt when he felt Megs’ breath against his neck. His brain short-circuited. Megs’ breathing quickened, and he could feel every exhale.What had he been doing?
