enmity with emilio

the seminar.

It was a Tuesday morning, and the sun was covered by a foggy haze.  Emilio had arrived early (of course he did) with a black suit flung over his shoulder and his white dress shirt freshly ironed.  Annie, being the punctual queen she was, had rolled out of bed five minutes previous, but had still managed to pull herself together in a classy black pantsuit of her own. As they sat in the lecture hall, anxiously awaiting the heated discussion that would ensue, they made eye contact. Emilio's eyes turned dark, and his stiff mouth turned up at the corners, into a sneering smirk. Annie stared right back, eyes staying neutral, but internally burning to a crisp. God, she hated him. Everything she seemed to do was one-upped sooner or later by him and his goddamned pretentious suit. At least, he tried to. They were pretty equal intellectually, but passions differed, so certain subjects gave one of them an advantage over the other. Annie loved all things history, science, and literature. Emilio loved beating Annie.

As the rest of the class filed in, filling the hall, they pretended as if they didn't know each other. They certainly pretended as if he wasn't in her bed the night before. It was a benign night in the library, but they were both stressed and had had too much to drink. Stress turned to desperation, and desperation quickly turned to raw desire.

Before they could too deeply reflect on the night before, the Socratic Seminar commenced. The subject was women's rights.  Annie was nervous about which route this discussion would take.  To her surprise, when the professor tells the students to begin, Emilio started talking immediately.  Emilio seemed to be getting a little heated over this topic and was extremely in favor of women's rights.  Annie thought this was a highly performative stance to take, and it made her hate him even more.  After every statement, he glanced at her, making sure she heard him.  Annie jumped in immediately after he stopped talking and went on her own tangent.  Emilio stared intently at her for the entire duration of her statement. He looked to be in awe. For the rest of the discussion, Emilio and Annie piped in here and there,  but they were more intrigued with what each other looked to be thinking. Each would take a peek at the other, making sure to avoid eye contact. After each peek they made sure to say something, just so the class knew that they were there to discuss, not to look at each other. 

After class, they walked into the arched hallway. He grabbed her, and she pushed him away. She wanted everything except to be associated with him. At least that's what she thought she wanted. He was handsome and intelligent, but also a pretentious motherfucker, and a menace to the school. As she walked back to her apartment, he couldn't help but stare.