Chapter 23

CHAPTER

23

PRESENT

I wake to the sound of the refrigerator opening and closing.

It takes a moment to register where I am. The living room is sideways because I’m lying on the couch. There’s something warm and solid behind me—something that’s breathing —and I turn my head to squint one eye at Teddy. He’s in a surprisingly deep sleep. His muscular arm is slung over my waist, a dead, heavy weight, and while he’s not snoring, his breathing is slow and heavy. I shift, trying to find a way to slip out from beneath his arm without disturbing him.

Bare footsteps slap against the tile floor and Reagan materializes in the doorway between the living room and the kitchen. She leans a shoulder into the doorframe as she pops the tab on a Diet Coke and takes a long, slow glug. “Morning.”

“You’re supposed to be at Nat’s,” I hiss, pressing myself flat against the floral fabric and wriggling out from under Teddy’s arm. We arrived to an empty house last night, so we turned on scary movies, polished off a bottle of wine, and ended up having sex again on the couch, more tender and less hurried. There’s still a lot we need to talk about. The where do we go from here conversation is going to need to happen. But the rest of the night was surprisingly relaxed. Comfortable, even. So much so that—with my head against his chest while we watched From Dusk Till Dawn —the steady beat of his heart lulled me to sleep.

“And boy, am I glad that I’m not.”

I manage to twist free, slinking to the floor. “Keep your voice—”

But it’s already too late. Teddy blinks awake, rubbing a hand over his face. “Good morning,” he mumbles. His eyes are bleary, his hair rumpled, and a strange, warm feeling blooms in my chest. I watch as he goes through the same series of thoughts I went through only seconds before: recalling where he is, what I’m doing there, why there’s someone else in the room. Except at this last step, he squints hard across the living room. I hand him his glasses from the coffee table. He nudges them onto his face and blinks at Reagan before his sleepy gaze falls back to me. “What time is it?”

“Seven thirty,” Reagan cheerfully provides. “Late night, Professor Harrison?”

Teddy scratches his head. “Um.” He looks at me. “I don’t remember what time we fell asleep.”

I shrug, memories of last night flooding back, causing my stomach to swoop. “Late-ish.”

“Right,” Reagan says with a sage nod. “You were probably too busy to look at the clock.”

“Get out, ” I say, grabbing a balled-up napkin from eating nachos last night from the coffee table and chucking it at her head. I miss by about a foot, the napkin sailing over her shoulder into the kitchen. “Go to your room or something.”

“So, does this mean I’m going to get special treatment?” she asks Teddy, ignoring me entirely. “As your future sister-in-law and all that. Because I’d really like an A, but I suppose I could settle for—”

“Out,” I order, pointing down the hall, and she finally obliges, vanishing from the room with an evil cackle. “Sorry about that,” I say once we’re alone again. I push myself off the couch and head to the kitchen, the tile cold beneath my bare feet. “She doesn’t know when to mind her business,” I call over my shoulder. I put on a pot of coffee and open the refrigerator in search of something to eat. “Are you hungry?” I ask. “Closest thing I have to breakfast is an expired carton of eggs, but we could go out and grab something to eat, if you want.”

He enters the kitchen, his hand finding my waist. “Actually, I need to get going.” He pulls me toward him and catches my mouth in a kiss. “But I’d like to take you out for dinner tonight. I think a proper date is about fifteen years overdue.”

He collects his things and I walk him out to the car. We share a long kiss leaned up against the driver side door of the Datsun and then he leaves with a promise that he’ll text me later before picking me up for dinner. I head back inside, butterflies fluttering around my stomach. Reagan is waiting in the kitchen with her arms folded on the counter, a smug smile on her face. “About time.”

I hide my smile by turning my back to her, pouring myself a mug of coffee. I grab a couple sugar cubes from the lemon-shaped sugar dish and drop them in. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Despite the spring in my step all morning, I am determined not to rush into anything with Teddy. We’re both adults, and both practical to a fault; we know that whatever this is, it comes with a little baggage. One of our biggest roadblocks has always been communicating—sure, we’ve mostly said whatever we felt, but there’s also been this persistent pattern of waxing and waning, pulling back whenever it was convenient, but there’s no backing out this time. Our lives are inextricably intertwined.

Dinner feels less like a date and more like a negotiation. Sitting across from each other at an orange-lit booth beside a faux-brick wall in Lucretia’s, we talk at length about what this is, where we see it going, the numerous reasons it might or might not work.

We work together.

We’re very similar.

Perhaps too similar?

But we’ve known each other long enough to work around that; or at least we should be able to, in theory.

We’ve both wanted this forever.

We have a lot of history.

It’s not clear if this last point belongs in the pros or cons column. I’m well aware that our track record is far from perfect—but then again, we were practically kids when most of it happened. I was twenty-one when I stood outside the Manchester Cathedral, my thumb numb with cold as I pressed the screen to END CALL, effectively shutting down whatever might have been. Our track record ends there. It’s been a whole decade since.

“So we take things slow,” Teddy says. “See whether we can get it right, this time around.”

Julien asks me to swing by his office after my HIST-111 lecture on Monday afternoon. I knock at the frosted glass door and it swings wide.

“Ah. Good. I was wondering whether you got my email. Come on in, have a seat.” He’s already moving over to the bar cart, unscrewing the cap on a bottle of single-cask Macallan. “Care for a glass?”

I settle onto the chair, crossing my legs beneath my breezy skirt. “Please,” I say, because why not? As much as it might offend the very American sensibilities of our colleagues, it’s not technically against campus policy. And you know what else isn’t against policy? Getting romantically involved with visiting faculty. I triple-checked the rules because I’m a little worried that that’s why Julien called me in here today—that he’s somehow found us out. But I’m prepared to stand my ground. My only concern is whether it will reflect poorly on me when it comes time to go before the advisory committee in December, but so long as Julien is on my side, hopefully word won’t spread.

He pours me a finger, placing it on the desk before walking around to his chair. “I wanted to commend you on the success of Saturday’s gala.” He settles into the creaky, worn leather, swirling the amber liquid around his own glass before downing it in a single go. “I’m sorry I couldn’t be there.”

I exhale, some of my tension unraveling. “Thank you. But I can’t take full credit. I couldn’t have done it without the help of the other committee members. And the generosity of all our sponsors.”

He smiles, setting the empty glass on the desk with a dull clink and leaning back in his chair. “Always a good idea to acknowledge the efforts of those around you. Though a word to the wise: when you describe your contributions to the school in your dossier, be sure to take some credit.”

“Of course.”

“Speaking of which,” he continues, “I’ve been meaning to ask how that’s going. Your dossier.”

“Fine,” I say. “Great. I arranged with Lorna for a guest lecture next Friday.”

“I’m glad to hear it.” He squints at me. “A solid application for tenure also requires the recommendation of your colleagues, as I’m sure you’re aware. People who have worked with you on the day-to-day, who have a good sense of your teaching style, whether your methodologies align with the ethos of our institution.”

I take a sip from the crystal highball glass. The scotch is earthy and smoky and burns in my throat. I cough, covering my mouth with the sleeve of my sweater. “Belinda Jones might be willing to write something,” I choke out, my voice hoarse.

“Fantastic. Though I think it would be prudent to get recommendations from tenured faculty, as well. People who have been in your shoes and can speak to whether they feel you deserve to move forward with the process.”

I clear my throat. “I can ask the other members of the scholarship committee. Beyond that, I’ll have to think on it.”

Satisfied with my progress, he dismisses me from his office. I pause in the middle of collecting my messenger bag to toss back the rest of the scotch—waste not—and then I’m out the door.

Whether Julien didn’t know about me and Teddy or simply didn’t care, I didn’t ask. But it doesn’t take long for the rest of the faculty to start suspecting that something is up. I’m not even sure what we’re doing to give them that impression—aside from our Thursday meetings, we’re rarely together on campus, and whenever we are we keep a professional distance. But regardless of our efforts, by the following week, there are two disparate rumors circling: the first being that Teddy and I have been together for years and that’s why he applied for the visiting scholar position in the first place, and the second being that he had to file a Title IX report over the weekend because I’ve been harassing him to go on a date with me.

I don’t have much time to worry about correcting either rumor, though, because today is the day that Dr. Lorna Foster is coming to campus for her guest lecture. I meet the Uber outside the Britteridge Center, right on schedule. Dr. Foster steps out of a black suburban wearing a houndstooth blazer and white slacks that swish when she walks. “You must be Clara,” she says, her Doric accent making my name sound more lyrical than normal, at least to my ears. Her white hair is pin-straight and blunt around her shoulders and she’s wearing a stern-looking pair of cat-eye glasses, but her smile is warm. “Glad to meet you.”

We shake hands and then I lead the way. “It’s just inside.” I glance over my shoulder. “Do you need anything before getting started? Some water, somebody to set up the projector?”

“A dram and a willing audience.”

“You’ll have to see your friend Julien about the first one,” I say with a wry smile, “but the second is taken care of.”

“I read your paper,” she says as we walk. “On the first marriage of Lady Margaret Beaufort. Riveting stuff.” Were she not an archeologist herself, I might’ve thought she was being sarcastic. Only someone who has a genuine passion for history would ever call a paper on a six-hundred-year-old annulment riveting and actually mean it. “I don’t know whether you’ve any interest in Margaret Tudor, but if you do, University of Edinburgh would be just the place.”

I smile. “I’ll keep it in mind. Though I’m actually in the middle of trying to get tenure here, so I’m not sure I’ll be traveling any time soon.”

“Well, feel free to reach out, if you’re ever considering it. I’d be happy to vouch for the quality of your work. We’ve quite a robust program for visiting researchers.”

“Thank you,” I say, a little taken aback.

The turnout for the guest lecture is good for what it is. Various members of the history and anthropology faculty were persuaded to offer their students extra credit for attending, so the folding auditorium seats are dotted with note-takers, with stragglers filtering in and ducking down the aisles. After a few minutes of chitchat, Dr. Foster pulls up a PowerPoint. She kicks off her lecture with an anecdote about an excavation on a Pictish hillfort at Knockfarrel. I climb the stairs to a dark row toward the back of the hall, where Teddy waits in one of the aisle seats.

He leans over to whisper in my ear. “How’d it go?”

“Fine, I think.” I jiggle my leg, a little nervous, though there’s nothing left to be nervous about. Julien set up all the dominoes for this; I was just responsible for giving them a little nudge.

His hand settles on my thigh, stilling it. “Hey, you did great. You got her here in one piece, right?”

I incline my head, because yes, I did, but then again, that’s not much of an achievement. A few rows down, a professor from the English Department swivels to stare at us. We’re not being especially loud, but I don’t think she turned because she heard us, anyway. She leans and whispers something to the person seated beside her. You really would think that a bunch of academics would have more interesting things to talk about than who’s sleeping with whom, but alas. At least Teddy sitting next to me should put the harassment rumors to rest.

“What happened to people minding their own business?” I whisper, glancing up at the ceiling. The recessed lighting is dimmed, only a cluster of lights pointed at Dr. Foster in front of the projector screen. Julien watches her from the shadowy wings, his hands clasped in front of him.

“We could give them something to talk about,” Teddy growls, his breath warm against my ear.

I nudge him with an elbow, holding back a smile, torn between professionalism and the very un professional thoughts his suggestion inspires in me. Dr. Foster uses a clicker to change slides, and a picture of a large, jagged boulder with a serpentine inscription slides on-screen. Brandsbutt Stone, the header on the slide reads, inspiring a slew of stifled giggles from students.

“So, I know we said we’re going to take things slow,” Teddy continues in a low voice, angled toward me even as we’re both pretending to pay attention to the lecture, “but I was thinking maybe we could spend Thanksgiving together. If you’re interested.”

I draw back a little to look at him. In all the years we’ve known each other, I have countless memories of all the holidays we spent apart—mailed birthday gifts and phone calls from different time zones—but we’ve never actually spent a holiday together. Maybe this could be good for us. A sort of reset button. I hadn’t really reflected on it, but now that he’s brought it up, the thought of spending another holiday apart is anticlimactic. Like we’d be doing things the same way we always did.

“Reagan and I are planning to drive to our parents’ place in Cambridge,” I say, tentative.

“I wouldn’t mind that.” His dark eyes search my face. “Assuming you want me there. And assuming your parents don’t completely hate me.”

I laugh under my breath. “They don’t hate you.” Though he might be in the hot seat for the first hour or so, but I’m not about to tell him that.