Hot For Teacher(137)
“You ready for the debate, Simon?” Mallory asks, sitting a few seats down.
I nod and chomp down on my salad. “Sure.”
“What stance will you be taking on it?” she pries.
Shit, I don’t even know what the debate is about. I shrug.
“Let me guess: It’s a no-brainer?” she laughs.
“Right,” I say distractedly, watching Arleen enter the room. She sits on the opposite side of the room from me, and she looks distraught. Her hair is messy and her eyes look puffy.
She looks at everything and nothing as she contemplates something inside of her. Her eyes close, and her forehead creases as she shakes her head. To watch her struggling grabs hold of my beating heart and squashes it.
I rise from my chair, leaving my plate behind. Moving toward Arleen, I pass by Miss Shields holding a plate full of food, but ignore her. I’m a few steps away from Arleen when she finally sees me.
Our eyes lock.
The room empties.
And I offer her my hand to leave.
She takes hold, and I escort her out of the convention hall. We make it to the elevator and the doors close. Knowing I might not get an opportunity to speak with her alone this weekend, I jump at the chance.
“Arleen, I—”
“Simon, don’t.”
“But if you’d just—”
“What? Listen to your explanation? You really think anything you say could make a difference? What would I do with that, huh? It was bad enough that you fucked anything with a vagina within a mile radius, but to try to explain to me what I saw on your computer? Sorry, but there’s nothing that you could say that would make me think you’re a good person. No matter how much I may have wanted to believe it.”
“Is that why you came with me just now? If you didn’t want to talk to me then why are you here? You want to believe me because deep down you know that with you it’s different. I’m different.”
The elevator dings as we arrive on my floor. I take out my keycard and walk to my room.
“Where are you going?” Arleen calls behind me, hovering close to the elevator.
I swipe the card and grab my bags before the door can close again. I’m out of the room and walking back toward Arleen within seconds. “I’m going wherever you go.”
“What? You can’t.”
“Listen to me, Arleen.” I walk back into the elevator and motion for her to punch the button to her floor. The doors close and I plop my bags down. “First, there’s no way I’m sleeping in that room tonight. I don’t care if I have to sleep on the street outside. So just drop it. Second, you and I have things we need to talk about, so I suggest we go back to your room and discuss them.”
She rolls her eyes and stares at the ceiling of the elevator. “Simon. I have a roommate. You can’t just go wherever you want. Besides, there are rules. We’re not supposed to have co-ed rooms.”
The elevator doors open and I walk out into the hall. Arleen follows me.
“Fuck the rules. Besides, I think both you and I know I won’t be laying a hand on you tonight, so the rules don’t apply. We’ll just give your roommate my keycard and let her know that the rooming assignments have changed.”
“But aren’t you rooming with another guy?”
I hesitate. “No. It’s fine. I promise.”
She narrows her eyes and I know she knows I’m keeping something from her.
“I’ll explain everything. Where’s your room?”
***
It turns out Mallory was Arleen’s roommate. I hid in the bathroom when Mallory came back, and I could hear Arleen tell her about the rooming arrangements. She seemed to be content with Arleen’s explanation.
I laugh to myself when I picture Miss Shields’s face when she comes back from dinner to discover Mallory in the room next to hers. Quite a different weekend from the one she had envisioned, I’m sure.
After I hear the door click, I walk from the bathroom and Arleen is sitting on the bed.
“Talk, Simon.”
I look around the room. It’s small compared to the suite Miss Shields has. But there is a small chair in the corner, and I pull it close to the bed to sit down. “Let me first start by saying that everything I’m about to tell you is going to sound like the most ludicrous thing you’ve ever heard. But I promise you, it’s the truth.”
She nods, and I continue.
“When I was eleven, my parents left. Not in the same way yours did. But they decided that traveling around the world was more important to them than raising their son.” I shrug, trying to show her that I know it’s nothing compared to what she’s been through, but I can’t pretend like the abandonment didn’t affect me. “When I got into high school, things went from bad to worse. My grades had always been good, but I started failing tests, I didn’t have a lot of friends, and I didn’t really have anyone I could talk to.”