He was pacing now, one hand in his pocket, the other gesturing as he spoke about revolutions and the reordering of power. His voice was measured, low and captivating, filling the auditorium without ever needing to rise. I could see why they were all so spellbound.
And then, mid-sentence, his eyes lifted and found mine.
It was instantaneous, the way everything else in the room disappeared. He froze, chalk suspended just above the board. For a moment, neither of us moved. His stare held mine hostage across the sea of faces, pupils deepening and darkening, the space between us thick with everything unsaid, everythingunacknowledged. My breath caught, the air suddenly toointoxicatinglythin.
I felt it ripple outward—first the girl in front of me squinting back, then a couple of guys two sections up, heads swiveling like they could physically locate the reason their usually composed professor had just forgotten how to operate. A few more turned. I was abruptly aware of every unglamorous bodily function I possessed—my stomach digesting, my lungs pumping, my heart staging a small coup in my chest.
A second passed. Then another.
He blinked, the smallest shift, and cleared his throat, glancing away like he hadn’t just been gawking at me in front of four hundred students. His gaze darted anywhere but my row, as if the sight of me had short-circuited a neuron he needed for public speaking. “As I was saying,” he said, his tone a shade rougher now, “the twentieth century marked not just political transformation, but, um, personal ones as well...”
A current of laughter moved through the class, though I wasn’t sure why—did I miss some dry joke only history nerds could understand?Maybe it was the way his voice had changed, the flustered hesitation they weren’t used to hearing.
But I could see it—the faint tension in his shoulders, the painstaking way he avoided looking back up to where I sat. And I couldn’t look away.
The takeout rested heavily in my lap, the words I’d planned—I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it, I just want things to be easy again—evaporated before they ever reached my lips. Because maybe there was no going back. Maybe something had changed last night, and again just now, in that single glance.
And as his voice drifted through the room again, steady but not quite the same, I knew he felt it too.
Chapter Fourteen
WHEN THE LECTURE ENDED, the room erupted in the type of chatter that always followed admiration. Students crowded toward the front, questions and flattery tangled in their voices. I stayed where I was, watching as he gathered his papers without once peeking my way.
It stung more than I wanted to admit.
By the time I finally stood, the food had gone lukewarm in my hands. I made my way through the echoing hallways until I found his office—his name neatly engraved on the small brass plate by the door:Dr. Khalifa Nasser.
The lock clicked open easily.
What kind of professor doesn’t lock his office?
I stepped inside, the door closing behind me. It smelled faintly like cedar and old books—warm, masculine, familiar. I set the lunch on his desk and turned to leave before he came back, before I did something foolish like try to explain myself, when I noticed the small wastebasket tucked near the bookshelf that was overflowing with chocolate wrappers.
I blinked, almost laughing. Khalifa Nasser, scholar of history, collector of cufflinks and moral restraint, had the audacity to judge my sweet tooth when the man himself apparently had a sugar problem.
“Guilty pleasure,” I murmured under my breath. There was a strange tenderness in discovering this hidden softness of his, this tiny rebellion against his own discipline. It felt like findinga secret—one he hadn’t meant to share, but had left behind anyway, a confession wrapped in foil.
I turned back toward his desk, the smile fading when I saw something else. A picture frame, angled in front of his chair.
One of our wedding photos.
I hadn’t seen them since the day they were taken. The whole thing had been too stiff, too formal—two strangers pressed into vows, pretending at permanence, trying to look like a love story that made sense. I’d avoided even glancing at the album when the photographer mailed it to me, but now, looking closer, I froze.
I was glaring at the camera, my jaw set in defiance, refusing to give him the satisfaction of a smile. But he...he wasn’t looking at the camera. He was looking atme, candidly, timidly. His expression wasn’t blank or unreadable the way I’d always told myself it was. It was something else entirely—something caught between amusement and wonder, like he was trying to understand me and had momentarily forgotten to hide it.
The room seemed to lean in like it was conspiring to dump all the feelings I’d been dodging straight onto me.
I set the frame down, my fingers trembling slightly, and let my gaze drift around the space. His walls were lined with framed degrees, awards, and certificates, each one a reminder of how balanced and tranquil his life had been before I stumbled into it like a misstep.
My eyes caught on the bookshelf, rows and rows of texts, neat and colorless, the spines worn but dignified. I traced the titles absently until one stopped me cold.
Continuity and Change: State Formation and Social Development in Canadian History
His name was printed clean and proud beneath the title.
A book.Hisbook.
I pulled it out, stroking the embossed letters. How had I not known he’d been published? How had he never mentioned it?
