“Yeah, what’s precious about it?” Colin asked.
“This narrow idea of what a liberal arts college should be,” said Safie. “Like it can never evolve.”
“To be honest, I find the whole thing kind of crass, it’s just a moneymaker, these professional degree programs,” said Colin. “This is a liberal arts college, not a trade school. What evenisa master’s in health administration?”
“Lots of these kids”—Safie gestured across the stands and field—“they don’t have to worry about what’s next. Most people don’t have that luxury. Like it or not, there are jobs in health care.”
“Fine, okay,” Colin said. “But there are plenty of places to get that degree. Cleveland State, or Kent. Sawyer can’t be all things to all people.”
I stood. “I’m going to find a bathroom.” Around me, the crowd let out a collective sigh. A missed shot or something. Colin, too—somehow he could issue a defense of elitism and also pay attentionto the game. Before anyone could try to join, I slid from our row, only turning when I started down the steps. “Be right back.”
I walked down the stands and passed a group of students who called out hello—they were from last year, but which class? I waved and kept going, circling to the restrooms. I didn’t actually have to go. I stood around and rinsed my hands. I pulled out my phone—had the crack on the casing gotten bigger? I hadn’t gotten a new phone in … I couldn’t recall. Five years? It was a message from Stephen. I started to check it then put it away—I’ll text him later. I passed a concession stand and stopped for a soda. I sipped at it, sharp and sweet, then tossed most of it in a trash bin.
And then I realized—I was stalling. I wanted to be on my own. Rather than turning left and heading up the stands, I went right, walking the lower ring, above and along the perimeter of the field. I stationed myself at a low wall, before the curve to the other side began.
From here, I had a clear view. The other team had the ball and our players moved in from either side. It was a kind of ballet, beautiful and almost brutal: bodies in total command of themselves and yet completely, wordlessly in sync. Team sports had never been my thing. Or any sport, until I found track in junior high. Even then, I didn’t participate in the relays. I preferred the solitary experience of cross-country; I wanted to feel fleeting, unattached. Suddenly, I spotted Tyler within a cluster of players, closing together then parting. He was easy to follow, the lines of him distinct in the tangle of bodies. He jumped, round calves flashing. He was drenched—the humidity had only increased—his hair swinging in threads as he ran.
I lost him for a moment and then a whistle blew and he broke away, sprinting in my direction. For an absurd moment I thought he was running to me. But he stopped short at the edge of my sightline, below to the right. Someone passed him a water. He drank from it, deep, fast gulps. He handed it back and then, in one quick motion, pulled his dripping jersey up over his head and let it fall to the ground. He was heaving, out of breath, bent at his knees, small swells of his chest rising and falling. He stood and stretched—the bright lines of his ribs. He lifted his thin arms into the air and sniffed at himself, nose dipped close. He grabbed back the water and splashed it across his face, letting it run down the front of him.
Just then, he turned and raised his head. I jerked and looked away, mortified—had I been caught? I waited a moment and glanced back up. Tyler wasn’t watching me—he faced the nearby stands. He’d seen some friends, someone he recognized, and shouted something, laughing. I tried to see who it was and then a buzzer sounded and the commentator announced halftime. The crowd rose, blocking my view, and jostled me out of the way.
The second half dragged on forever. I gave up trying to keep track of anything. A whistle sounded; the crowd cheered. Sawyer had won, two to nothing.
“The next matches are away, but they play here in a few weeks,” Colin said. “We should all go again.” Priya said she was game, and Safie, too.
I shrugged. “I had fun, but I think this was enough for me.”
“I guess we should have expected that,” Safie said. “But we’re glad you gave it a shot.”
Priya had walked from another part of campus and needed to get back to her car. When Safie offered that she and I could dropPriya on our way, Colin cut in, saying Safie lived in his direction, he’d take care of both of them. I felt relieved, and then guilty, but didn’t protest. I was ready for this day to be over.
At home, the night drew itself around me in slow, tedious loops. I tossed in bed, flipping onto my back and over again. I ripped back the stifling sheets, itchy on my skin. I couldn’t shake the image of Tyler from my mind. The labor of the game visible across him: his breath in quick gasps, skin slicked with sweat. I retraced the lines of his body, the tendons and angles, the stretch of him. I felt a surprising kind of grief—I can think of no other word for it—that the stolen glimpses of his body, taut with its wires, were all I would ever get. In my recollection, everyone else disappeared. There was only Tyler, solitary in the field, burning pale and hot. Why had this hold come over me? There was something in the unself-consciousness of the gesture as he stripped, the lack of either pretense or shame. And smelling himself, that animal impulse.
I lifted my own arm and inhaled. A faint musk. I wondered if we smelled anything alike and, at the thought, I got hard. I hesitated, then pushed my nose into my armpit, deeper this time, searching out the scent beneath my deodorant, imagining it was Tyler’s, his skin damp across my face. I reached down and took hold of myself. My cock was thrumming, already wet. I pulled at it, rubbing my thumb along the head and down. I moved slowly at first, tentative, and then quickly, with an urgency I couldn’t pull back. My body tensed and I came, spilling across my stomach. I lay awake in the dark, heart pounding, breath in shallow gulps, the sour taste of myself lingering on my tongue.
CHAPTER 3
The whole next morning, a vague shame stuck to me. I reasoned with myself it was nothing—just sex. Not even sex—the thought of sex. Still, I couldn’t shake the sense that I’d done something wrong, crossed a line I shouldn’t have.
And I surprised myself. I never thought of students like that. Before coming to Sawyer, when I was teaching adjunct classes across the city, I got questions about it all the time—from dates, or guys in bars trying to flirt. Had I slept with students? Did I want to? Did they try to sleep with me? At first, I was caught off guard by the curiosity—I found nothing sexy or titillating about my job. But the questions came so regularly I realized they really had nothing to do with me. I was the occasion for a fantasy of—something. Power, youth, transgression? Whatever it was, I’d thought I was immune.
I felt disjointed and irritable all through my Composition class—the students seemed extra needy. As my next class drew nearer, and, with it, the fact of seeing Tyler, I felt increasingly anxious, like he would be able to tell just by looking at me. (Just by looking at me—an old fear from childhood, harder to shed than I wanted to admit.) And with that anxiety, my irritation at him not showing up to my office grew. If anything, that was the infraction. Tyler had actually done something wrong—blowing off our appointment like it was nothing—whereas I had onlythoughtsomething. Some part of me understood that I was stoking my anger at him asa cover for myself—what a therapist I briefly saw in New York called compensatory something or other. Whatever it was, my anxiety and upset fed off each other, so by the time I was headed to Taft for our class, I was a jittery mess.
When I arrived at the classroom, students were streaming in and I saw, at the tail end of a group, Kennedy and Tyler. I stopped, waiting for them to go in, and then Tyler saw me and waved. “Hi, Professor Lausson.”
The rest of the group went in as Tyler waited. I couldn’t just stand there, pretending I hadn’t seen him. I smiled hello and approached. He started talking immediately—he’d gotten up really early to finish the book—he couldn’t put it down. He’d discovered Highsmith had written a whole series and wanted to read the rest. I was nodding along, half listening, waiting for the part where he apologized for the other night, and then realized—the apology wasn’t coming.
“I’m glad you liked the reading,” I said, “but you know—I was surprised you didn’t show up for our meeting on Tuesday.”
“Our meeting?”
“Office hours. You said you were coming by after practice?” Did he really not remember?
“Oh, right.” Something passed over his face, an indiscernible wave, and then it was gone. “I’m really sorry. Coach kept us so late, and then I got caught in the rain and had to go back to the dorms to change. I figured you wouldn’t still be there.”
“Oh—I see.”
“You didn’t wait for me, did you?”
