I don’t even fight my impulse to text Lewis a picture. It’s only been a few hours since we saw each other at the conference, but I don’t want to waste any time we still have together.Want to come over and tell me how it went with Ben?
As disconcerting as the butterflies in my stomach are, they’re better company than the nervous turmoil that arises whenever I remember our charade is this close to blowing up in our faces.
Lewis’s reply blinks on my phone a half hour later.On my way. He appears on my doorstep another thirty minuteslater, hair tousled like he’s run his fingers through it. I drag two cushions and a blanket out to the fire escape, and we share the peanut butter chocolate chip ice cream, avoiding any mention of the notebook. I can tell we both need to get it out of our minds for a while. Instead, Lewis tells me about his evening; the stilted conversation at dinner that flowed smoother the more wine he and Ben had. At some point, Lewis licks the last of the ice cream off my lips and curls his fingers into the hem of my shirt—his college tee that I’ve been wearing every night to sleep since he lent it to me last Tuesday.
“I was wondering when you’d give this back to me,” he murmurs into my shoulder.
“I’ve gotten kind of attached,” I tell him. “You better take it off before it’s too late.”
We stumble inside, and he pulls off the shirt, making us forget all about our worries, if only for an evening.
They’re back in full force the next day, though. Notebook still nowhere to be found, we make it through the morning lectures, jittery and tense, until the break when Lewis leaves to check with central campus security. As I join the line for lunch, I survey the room and can’t help but question everyone’s glances.
Someone says my name and I find Vivienne two steps ahead, throwing me a worried look as she grabs a clean plate. She’s wearing a cream silk blouse and black slacks today, her hair pinned back with a golden clip.
“Sorry. What?”
“Is everything okay?” She picks up a napkin. The woman ahead of me motions me forward, and I slide in next to Vivienne. “You seem distracted.”
“I guess I am a little,” I admit, tongue thick in my mouth. I could be wrong, but she strikes me as the type of person who’d come right out with it if she found the notebook. Still,it feels like it’s only a matter of time before somebody uncovers our act.
“What’s going on?”
“Nothing, just…” I trail off.
Just what?
Just the potential of my career imploding right here because I panicked and confirmed her misconception that I was dating Lewis? Just the at-once nauseating and exhilarating feeling of falling for a person I shouldn’t even be considering, especially not now as my future is so out in the open? Just the confidence-shaking news of a failed grant?
Take your pick.
I go for the last one. I shouldn’t—not if I want Jacob to continue living under the illusion that I have my life together, but at this point, what I want even less is to end up unemployed once my funding expires.
“I had another grant rejected. I got the news this past Friday.”
“That’s terrible.” Vivienne’s eyebrows draw together in empathy. “The worst kind of feeling, really. I’m sorry.”
“Yeah, it’s been hard,” I admit with a sigh.
She touches my forearm and offers me a small smile. “Those teaching positions I told you about—they’re still available. If that helps.”
A teaching position might be able to tide me over to whatever is next, but it’s not ideal. Not only would my research have to take a step back, but I’d have to move all the way here and then to wherever I found a job next. Still, it’s nice of her to want to help.
“Thank you.”
“I’ll let you know if I hear anything else,” she says, and I’m racking my head for a way to kindly and not condescendingly recommend her to make an application herself so she doesn’t have to rely on Jacob’s funding anymore when I remember.Amidst the debacle with the notebook, I forgot about my lunch meeting with Rosanna Alderkamp.
Shit.
“I’m so sorry, but I completely forgot I’ve got to run. Thank you, though!” I toss my paper plate onto the table and race outside, where Rosanna is wrapping up a phone call and doesn’t seem bothered about my lateness.
All throughout lunch at a coffee place on Broadway, Rosanna asks questions about the virtual environment I run my experiments in, and seeing her this invested makes me hopeful.
But hopeful doesn’t pay the bills.
As she empties three sachets of sugar into her latte, I watch the tiny crystals melt into the foam in her mug and wait until she picks up her spoon.
“I’m glad you’re so interested in my code, and that you see potential for applications in it. The thing is,” I say, then pause. I don’t want to outright beg for a position in her lab, but I also need her to knowhowavailable I am. Rosanna guides her cup to her lips and nods for me to go on. “My funding runs out at the beginning of October.”
