He needed this job so he could teach and live near his family. She needed it because it was where she had found hers. Neither of them should have to give that up, and isn’t that what would happen if they tried this and it didn’t work?He’s not Evan, she reminded herself. That much had been clear when he apologized outside the pall. Evan would never admit he was wrong, not even over small things. But she was still Maggie.
No, she couldn’t do that to him. And if that meant she had to suck it up and see Arthur Taliesin in a faculty meeting once a month without remembering the way he made her feel treasured, perfect—she could do it. She could. It didn’t matter if she loved him, and, gods below, she did.
“You can’t sweep away the summer, babe,” Dahlia said as Maggie swept at the same spot on the floor for the third time.
Maggie glared at her and Dahlia shrugged, turning the page in her book. “Maybe I need a mop.”
“I don’t think that’s what you need either.” Dahlia rested her book on the back of the fainting couch, and Maggie winced, knowing that her friend was about to pick holes in all of her arguments for why she couldn’t tell Arthur Taliesin the truth.
A knock interrupted them, and Maggie looked at the door with her heart beating ferociously as she said, “Come in.” She wanted to see his dark hair with the shots of gray, his honey eyes, and his broad shoulders, but she deflated when Dean Clearwater opened the door.
“Maggie, I need to speak with you.” He looked pointedly at Dahlia.
“I’m gonna go get you that mop,” Dahlia said, giving Maggie’s shoulder a squeeze as she scooted past the dean.
Maggie gestured to the spot on the couch that Dahlia had vacated, and he sat down. He didn’t wait for Maggie to get settled before he said, “What happened? When we spoke, you promised me there was nothing I needed to know.”
Maggie suddenly felt faint. She didn’t know what the dean was talking about. “I—what—what do you mean?”
“What happened?” he repeated.
“All that has happened since we spoke is that Ar—Dr. Taliesin and I dissipated the pall,” Maggie said, treading carefully. Until she knew exactly why the dean was upset, she didn’t want to incriminate herself.
“Then why did Dr. Taliesin turn in his resignation this morning?”
“What?” Did Maggie hear him properly? “What do you mean?”
The dean held out the piece of paper he’d scrunched in his fist. She took it gingerly and opened the letter, recognizing the loopyAandTin Arthur’s signature. She managed to read only the first line before the words began to swim.
This letter serves as notification that I, Arthur Taliesin, am resigning my position at Hawthorn College, effective immediately…
Maggie sat down in her desk chair, letting it slide back against the bookshelf with a small thud. “This leaves us in a veryprecarious position. Who is going to teach his Materials Alchemy courses? The term starts in a few weeks!”
“I had no idea.” Maggie looked away from the dean, biting her lip.
“Was there some sort of problem? Does this have anything to do with the grant?”
“No. There was no problem,” she said quickly, knowing it wasn’t true. This was what she had tried so desperately to avoid, and it was happening anyway.
She stared at the letter, sentences jumping out at her.
I apologize for the short notice. Please let me know if there is anything I can do to help fill the position. I have several former grad students who would be great additions to the Hawthorn faculty that I’d be pleased to recommend…
She needed to do something. She couldn’t let him throw away his chance to have the exact career he wanted near his family. And if he left Hawthorn…At least, if they were colleagues, she would still get to see him, even if it hurt. That was better than never seeing him again. When she thought about that possibility, the pressure in her chest became unbearable and she couldn’t breathe.
“I’ll fix this,” Maggie said to the dean, ripping Arthur’s resignation letter in half before throwing it in the trash. She looked over at the clock. “Is he still on campus?”
“He dropped this off an hour ago. He told me he’d be helping the custodial staff clear out the pall remnants on the third floor. Check there—”
Maggie didn’t wait for Dean Clearwater to finish talking. She left her office and sprinted up the stairs.
—
Maggie should havewalked, because she was out of breath by the time she made it to the alchemy labs. The third floor of Ilex Hall was still covered in pall slime, sludge, and dust. Equipment was still strewn everywhere, and there were student and teacher belongings that still needed to be claimed on every table. This floor had been a flurry of activity as custodial staff, faculty volunteers, and the tech team worked to clear it out and salvage equipment, but now the only sound was coming from Arthur’s alchemy lab.
She tried to catch her breath. They hadn’t seen each other since they dissipated the pall. Long days of silence, of picking up her phone and putting it down without sending him a message, of trying to figure out a way to take it all back before convincing herself it had been the right thing to do. But now that he was almost in front of her, she could admit how much she missed him.
She caught a glimpse of him through the door into his lab. He stood on a ladder, his sleeves pushed up to his elbows, and dipped a sponge in a bucket of water. As he cleaned the window, streaks of sunlight came through the now-clear glass and hit his hair, highlighting the shots of silvery gray. He was covered in dust and pall slime, but he was still so stupidly handsome. Maggie wanted to call out to him, but her voice was stuck in her throat. She wanted to take a step forward into the lab, but she couldn’t do it.
