by Writing Shark
HUMINT
What am I doing here, Felicia asks herself as she rushes through the hallways of the school as fast as her high heels allow. But she finds no answer to her question. Unlike Miss Hayworth, the students who populate the hallways make no room for her. Actually, she likes the fact that the girls, Hayworth’s little angels, see her more as a friend than a teacher. Felicia has always found it difficult to be respectful or to assert herself to other people. She has always compensated with a friendly demeanor and a good sense of humor, but now neither kind words nor clever jokes help her get through the crowd of girls as quickly as possible. When she doesn’t return the greetings of one of her favorite students, but simply hurries past her and her friends, the young woman realizes how different she is acting. She slows her pace briefly. In her twenty-six years it had not often happened that someone had managed to make her change like that, but the professor had done it with a few words and glances. At the idea of his stern face, Felicia starts moving again. Her feet ache in her shoes and a bead of sweat runs down her temple, which she hastily wipes away with her arm.
The professor. Again she wonders if and what is wrong with her. She had acted like a little child when she had seen him. More embarrassed and inexperienced than any of her students. Again, her face turns bright red as she thinks of the embarrassment she has caused herself in front of her supervisor, her friend, the other teachers… and the professor. She is already used to Miss Hayworth looking at her disparagingly, including the other older women. Felicia is not the kind of person who is looked upon favorably at the Academy. It is only through her outstanding abilities that she has managed to make up for the deficiencies in her character and secure a teaching position at the most prestigious school in the country. The decision to subordinate herself to the school was easy for her. But still, Professor Clark is the first man at Hayworth, something Felicia never thought she would experience. He’s young for a man of his education level, well-trained…and his looks.
The click of heels dies away and Felicia stops in the middle of the hallway, just a few feet from the school’s large front door. It was his gaze, she now realizes in awe. She has spent her life working toward this position, laboring and sacrificing everything, denying herself in the pursuit of getting to where the professor now stands, just minutes after his arrival at Hayworth. She envies him, fervently. And she is afraid of him. He, as a man, should never have been admitted to the all-girls school in the first place. What credentials, testimonials, and advocates must he have for him, a man, to get where Felicia will probably never be? Everything she has has been eclipsed by him in just a few minutes, simply because he… exists. The young trainee teacher shudders and she feels something she has never felt before, she doesn’t know what it is. And it scares her, just as the professor scares her. Is that why she didn’t object when he assigned her to a common task? After all, she is not his secretary. But then a gentle hand rests on her shoulder.
“Miss Combton, is everything all right?” Felicia turns around. Sarah Laval is standing in front of her. Apparently, her favorite student has run after the teacher. As always, the girl is neatly dressed and her school uniform fits perfectly, not unlike her friends who are looking over at the two of them a few feet away. Sarah looks at Felicia with concern. “Miss Combton?” The trainee teacher shakes her head in a daze, but still has the professor’s iron gaze in front of her and is only blurry in her perception of Sarah.
“Y-yes, everything is fine Sarah. Go back to your friends.” With these words she turns around again and hurries out of the building leaving a confused student behind her.
She doesn’t have to look far in the parking lot. The steel-blue sports car stands out among the other teachers’ small cars like a unicorn. With slightly sweaty hands, Felicia presses the key and is amazed when the driver’s door opens automatically. She quickly looks around, but there is no one in the parking lot and the students are all in the schoolyard behind the building. What kind of man drives a car like this, the young woman asks herself and continues to look at the car. She doubts that a professor of history and politics can afford such a car, but she also knows too little about the world outside Hayworth to answer her question. It doesn’t help, Felicia simply knows too little and what she knows is simply negated by the professor. The woman swallows hard and then leans into the interior of the car. Carefully she kneels down on the seat and looks for the documents of the man she is supposed to work under from now on. Why did he pick me, she asks herself instead of searching. But she already knows the answer. He wants to make fun of me. Sadly, it doesn’t enrage Felicia; that’s her daily routine at Hayworth. But it saddens her to think the professor would have a bad opinion of her. Leaning over, her backside sticking out of the car, she realizes that she wishes she had found someone like her in the professor. But she can forget that thought right away when she thinks about what he must have done to be accepted as a man here.
“What a shit…” she mumbles in the remoteness of the car, shakes her head and continues searching. “If I don’t find these fucking papers soon then…”
“In my car, I’m the only one allowed to curse” suddenly sounds the cold voice behind her. As Felicia shrieks in surprise and tumbles backwards out of the car, her body temperature drops several degrees. Roughly and clumsily, she lands on her rear end in the bright gravel of the parking lot and looks up wide-eyed at the man above her. His shadow falls on her, making her feel even smaller and less important.
“E-excuse me professor,” Felicia stammers. “I…”
“You sure take your time with your duties Miss Combton” says the professor with cold neutrality and nods to his cart. He makes no move to help her up. “Found anything yet?”
“I… no, but…” The man leans over her and reaches into the cart, getting close to Felicia. School rules forbid such advances but somehow she doubts the professor cares about such things. Instead, she breathes in his scent. She has never smelled the scent of his perfume before. But shortly after she closes her eyes to savor it, the moment is gone.
“Chevrolet Camaros aren’t built to carry much, young lady,” the professor explains, giving his subordinate a sting as he addresses her as Miss Hayworth does. He then dangles his backpack, decorated in a military camouflage pattern, before her eyes. With a grimy grin, he straightens back up and extends his hand to the woman. “Here.”
“Thank you,” Felicia replies, immediately grabbing the hand greedily. She whimpers in surprise as she is literally yanked upward.
“So you won’t keep grabbing my car,” says the professor without batting an eye, but smirks at his subordinate. Felicia is completely confused but of course she has no time to process the new experience. With a snap of his fingers, the professor starts moving again and waves the young woman along.
Inside the school building, Felicia realizes why the professor was able to get to her so quickly. The bubble that forms around him is even bigger than Miss Hayworth’s, some students even stand with their backs to the wall while the man rushes past them at a marching pace. Felicia draws pitying and curious glances, but can only concentrate on keeping pace with the tall, imposing man. Again they pass the small group of friends Sarah has gathered around her, again the girl wants to greet the woman, but doesn’t get the chance and looks dumbfounded after the woman who can only concentrate on her superior and the play of his shoulder muscles under his thin shirt.
When Felicia stumbles into the professor’s office behind him, she has to catch her breath. As she looks around the room, she is surprised to see some small and some obvious changes. The first thing she notices is the desk, which has obviously been moved so that the door to the office is in view. Now it stands against the wall of the room, a cantilevered comfortable office chair with plenty of padding behind it. In front of the table, facing away from the door, are two uncomfortable-looking wooden chairs. There is still nothing on the walls that suggests a personal aspect of the professor, something that Felicia is burning to know. The rest of the room looks the same as it did a few minutes ago, but then the trainee discovers something new. A framed photo stands on the desk, but unfortunately it is positioned so that Felicia cannot see it. Her eyes twitch past the professor to the photo and her jaw tightens. Maybe there is a connection to the man who seems so similar to her and yet so superior. Like her, a stranger in a world he doesn’t belong in. A man among women like her an inadequate among perfection, a poor among privileged.
“I stand before you young lady” the professor warns icily. Felicia doesn’t even know his name, only the title but of course his warning tone is enough to make her stand at attention. The effort to please him makes him grin. The corners of his mouth curl up in a sneer, but Felicia still takes it as a sign of appreciation.
“Excuse me, Professor,” she murmurs submissively. “I just wanted to…” But the man turns away from her and sits behind the desk. This time her eyes stay fixed on him, realizing with shame and curiosity that he too is looking at the photo on the desk.
“You don’t work very fast, do you?” he asks, turning his steely gaze back to her.
“No I…” He raises his eyebrows and Felicia’s breath catches. “I mean I’m trying to… excuse me.”
“And you apologize a lot,” comes the statement. No room for challenge. But the corners of his mouth continue to go up, and Felicia hopes to please him.
“Yes professor. I do this… because…” Because I want to please you. Because I want us to like each other. Because I don’t know how to deal with you. Because I like you. Because I want you to like me. Felicia is intelligent, she knows it, despite all the efforts of the administration to make her believe otherwise. She knows what the professor is doing to her, at least she knows some things, but not many. But Felicia is also aware of her ignorance. She knows what she wants. But she does not dare to tell the man in front of her. I am happy that you have chosen me. I am afraid of you. But that makes you all the more interesting. Never having learned to say such a thing to anyone, Felicia Combton, 26, does what she does best. “Excuse me.” And sure enough, the professor laughs. Short and dry, but his eyes fix hers and make her knees buckle. Then… he says nothing more, leaving his trainee teacher standing in the room for a few seconds while he rummages around in his backpack. Felicia, now spurred on by her recent successes, tries something she has rarely done before. She takes the initiative.
“I see you only have one picture on your desk,” she says and has to pull herself together not to jump in the air with joy as the professor looks again and focuses on her. He nods. “Your family?” A smirk, different than anything she’s seen from him before.
“You could say that,” he growls.
“May I see?” Felicia is beside herself with delight when he nods and she almost flies over to him, leaning on the table beside him and looking over her shoulder at her superiors. She, too, pays no attention to the school rules while her shirt feels light around her shoulders. Then she raises her eyebrows. There are several dozen men in the photo, all in the same camouflaged uniform, smiling, laughing. Most of them have a weapon in their hands, they are standing close to each other, some are squatting, others are standing on something like boxes, trying to get them all in the picture. They are clearly soldiers. “I didn’t know…” Felicia murmurs, looking down at the professor. His smile is warmer than anything he has given her today.
“My family,” he says, but then shakes his head. “What’s left of it.”
“You mean…”
“Death. Almost all of them.” The answer comes across dry but Felicia’s heart bleeds.
“Mine too…” she mumbles, looking at her superior. Only then does she realize what is happening. She has only talked about it with one person since her parents’ death, her best friend Ariana, and that only after months of friendship and two bottles of wine. But the professor… After only one hour! Felicia is almost horrified, but eyes the professor and freezes as she looks directly into his steely eyes instead of his striking profile.
“Sorry to hear… Felicia” he says, sounding… human. In that moment, Felicia decides she likes this man. They are alike, even if he is superior to her in so many ways, he understands her.
“We have to get to class…” the woman breathes, looking at her boss in awe. The professor glances at the picture one last time, then nods.
“You lead, Felicia.” He points outside and as she hears his heavy but steady footsteps behind her, Felicia’s heart beats to her throat.
Writing Shark 