The 'A' In Romance

Psychology ~ Chapter One

 Sitting in my college psychology class, I watched my new professor as he explained a concept on the board. I raised my slender hand to brush my dark hair from my eyes, then looked down to take notes. I wrote every detail as quickly as I could. I’m going to do so well this year…. When I glanced up again, the slide had changed. I wasn't finished. But I need those notes!

  Taking the class notes more furiously, I scarcely had a moment to take a note of the man in the front of the room. I could hear only his voice in those moments, yet suddenly I was not anxious about the few sentences of notes I had missed, for the voice I heard felt to my ears as a silky fabric on my skin. Smooth, and accented somehow. Albanian? Hispanic? I couldn't tell, but the steady drawl caressed my ears and forced me to look up. That voice...was a hand on my chin, urging me to look at the one who was making it. 

 The professor. He was speaking only just in my range of hearing. My breath was baited in my lungs. I hung on the edge of my seat, helplessly drawn in. I took a deep breath as the dark-haired man explained a diagram on a slide. My pencil slipped out of my hand. My fingers snapped across the desk to catch it, but it rolled off the wood and onto the floor. Its little -clunk- and rolling sounds crashed through the silky quiet voice of my professor. I was mortified. 

  Frozen, I watched the pencil roll and hit his shiny black shoe. He bent to pick it up. As his strong hand reached for the little yellow pencil, I watched the unmistakable ripple of smooth muscles through his pressed gray collared shirt. Then a small smile played across his lusciously defined lips; a smile aimed at me, dark eyes delving into mine and stirring me into speechless ecstasy. He handed me the pencil and then he...winked...so quickly. His eyes were warm. I smiled and gave a breathless “thank you, sir.”

   With a nod that implied, “no problem,” he stepped back to the board.

  “Back to what I was saying, Sigmund Freud….” I scurried to my note-taking until we were dismissed. Packing up my books, I remembered that I had not copied down all of the notes from the first slide. Thinking of impending tests, I stayed after class to ask if I could copy it then. 

  I was about to ask my question, but as I approached the professor's desk, weaving in between the other students, I became fixated on the man's hands. He was stacking papers, presumably for his next class. He picked the papers up so gently, then tapped them firmly on the desk. I watched three stacks of white paper be slid into folders before I realized the room had almost emptied. I stepped up to the desk.

  “Excuse me, Dr. Paup?”

  He looked up from his papers and smiled more .

   “Yes?”

   “I…didn’t get a few notes from the first slide. Could I copy them down now?”

   “Of course you may; I’ll pull them up on the computer.” He reached to his laptop and scrolled to bring the Powerpoint onto the screen. I set my paper on his desk and he turned the screen so I could see it. As I wrote quickly, he asked,

   “Are you Abigail Wilbur?”

   Finishing the note, I turned to look into his ebony eyes. “Yes, sir.”

   “Ah, I’ve heard about you from your other teachers: very studious, very bright, they’ve told me.”

   I blushed and gave a small smile. I noticed he was wearing a delicious cologne.

   “I apologize. I didn’t mean to embarrass you,” he teased.

   I laughed, mostly to hide my oddly ragged breathing, “It’s completely fine. I’m not embarrassed.” His face is so genuine…is that amusement, or interest? 

   Glancing at the clock in the back of the room, he said, “Miss Wilbur, it’s going to be a great year.”

“Thank you, Dr. Paup,” I said brightly, realizing he must have another class soon.

“It’s no trouble at all,” he answered encouragingly. 

It took tremendous effort to tear my eyes away from his and leave the room.