One

Six inches. That’s how close he was to jumping off the proverbial ledge.

But only the proverbial one, for now. It had been three days since he’d gotten an email from the chair of the Political Science department inviting him to a meeting in her office at 3:30 PM on Friday afternoon. Garrett knew from the tone that it was more of a mandatory summons than an invitation, not to mention the common knowledge that nothing good—absolutely nothing good—could come from a meeting that late in the day on a Friday.

Now the time had finally come. Garrett closed his laptop with a sense of resolution. In the three days since he received the email, which neglected to divulge the purpose of the meeting, he had stewed about the possible agenda. It could be something good, he kept telling himself. Maybe a new grant or assistantship. Maybe I’m wanted to co-author a research study. Or teach a new class.

But deep in his twisted guts, he knew better. He knew it had to come down to her, the girl who had turned his world upside down that summer. Tucking that fear deep inside, he pressed his size fourteen shoes into the worn carpeting in the hallway of the Political Science department and made his way down to Dr. Tiffany’s office.

Without hesitation, he firmly knocked on the door, which was already ajar. When he heard her grant permission to enter, he pushed it open, plastering a pleasant smile to his face. She did not return it.

Mallory Tiffany was young for an academic department chair. She wasn’t much older than Garrett at forty-ish, and she tried to make up for her youth by projecting mirthless authority onto her pinched-up face. She had bleak gray eyes and dishwater blonde hair that hung limply around her shoulders, and her limbs were long and wiry. Garrett suspected she had never been properly laid, but he certainly had no desire to correct the matter.

“Mr. Stone,” she said formally. She was the only person in the department who insisted on using surnames. Everyone else called her Mallory behind her back, even the administrative assistant, who was the quintessential butt-kisser.

Garrett responded with a nod as he settled himself in one of the leather chairs across from her. He imagined many a student had sat in that very chair having heart palpitations about what would come next. She continued to glare at him until he looked up at her and forced a confident smile, then managed to hold it, even while running his long fingers through his unkempt fiery red hair. His trademark fiery red hair.

“Mr. Stone, two others will be joining us, so we’ll actually be meeting there.” She pointed to the round wooden table and chairs on the other side of her spacious office. The windows overlooked a courtyard where delicate dogwoods blew in the breeze, and one giant magnolia tree loomed, its waxy green leaves falling golden-brown on the lawn to mark the start of fall.

Summer classes ended a few weeks ago, and the fall semester was underway. Garrett was teaching two sections of Poli Sci 101. It was his least favorite course to teach, but as a graduate student, he didn’t get much of a choice. He was near the very bottom rung of the ladder, a rank just above the family of mice that lived in the lower cabinets of the faculty lounge. At least the mice were fed every once in a while.

Two other people? his mind kept repeating. He resituated himself at the table while Dr. Tiffany shuffled through papers in a manila file folder on her desk. She pressed a button on her phone but said nothing, and in a few seconds, two men in suits walked through the door.

The younger man in a gray suit appeared to be Latino and had dark hair and a well-groomed goatee. The other man was older and white, bald with gray around the edges, and wore a navy suit and silver glasses that obscured beady pale green eyes. Garrett knew the older man was Dr. Wilson, the Vice President for Academic Affairs, but he didn’t know the younger man. His palms began to sweat as they took chairs alongside Dr. Tiffany around the table. Though the table was a circle, they somehow managed to make him feel like he was on one side, and they were on the other, facing him with scowls twisting their features.

The suspense had gone on long enough. He could now feel his heartbeat in his throat, even though he made an effort to stay motionless with that same stupid, placid smile painted across his face. He felt like a clown at a circus where everyone hated clowns. Dr. Tiffany looked toward the younger man as if she needed his blessing to continue.

“Garrett,” she finally spoke, now using his first name, “I think you know Dr. Wilson, and this is special counsel for the university, Diego Hernandez.”

Garrett nodded at them but remained silent.

“Do you have any idea why you’ve been called here today?” Dr. Tiffany asked.

He straightened his spine and cleared his throat before answering, “No, ma’am,” as confidently as possible. Why did it feel like he was approaching a firing squad wearing a blindfold?

Mr. Hernandez pulled a thick, stapled stack of papers from a folder in front of him. “You might want to take a look at this.”

With sweaty palms, Garrett took the document and began to run his eyes over the small black font. The first words to strike him were “dismissal” and “sexual harassment.” Then he saw the “victim’s” name as though it appeared in bold: Mara Atkins. But it was in the same weight font as every other word.

The lump in his throat closed off his larynx as he struggled for a response. The color drained away from his face, and he felt like he’d fallen overboard and was struggling back to the surface for his next breath, for salvation. Voices were murky, colors muted; actions faded into the fluid realm of his trance-like, drowning state.

Thirty minutes later, he was escorted from the building with the contents of his tiny, closet-like office crammed into a cardboard box. Later, he didn’t even remember driving home.

Sunlight was already creeping past the blinds when Garrett awoke the next morning. The empty bottle of vodka lying on its side at the foot of the bed was the only clue he needed to know what had transpired the night before. His head was stuffed with cotton balls, yet still managed to pound against his temples like a rat desperate to escape from a cage. Beyond the relentless pounding were faint echoes of the last words he’d heard, which were of the university’s allegations against him, along with his dismissal from his position and a lifetime ban from the campus.

Mara Atkins.

Thoughts of her without an accompanying image were impossible. She had long honey-brown hair with golden highlights and the warmest, most expressive eyes he’d ever seen. Her skin was that naturally bronze type, the kind that stays tan even in the winter. Everything about her was like warming up by the fireplace after the first hard frost of the season. She was toasted marshmallows and pumpkin spice lattes, sleeping in on a Sunday morning, and walking through autumn forests where leaves rain down in amber flurries.

She was a crisp fall day in the blazing heat of summer, and when she first breezed into his classroom in June, he’d felt the whirlwind of change she brought with her.

She was twenty, staying on campus for the summer for the first time ever. She had a maturity about her, though intermingled with a naïve enthusiasm for her recently granted freedom. It was clear on her freshly scrubbed face. Only the seasoned understood summer stretched like an endless highway before the solstice. But after Independence Day, it never felt quite as free again. Ah, the irony.

She had stayed after class to talk to Professor Stone, as she’d called him with a gleam in her eye. She had a conflict for the following Friday’s class, and she wanted to beg for an excused absence. The sincerity in her eyes gripped ahold of Garrett. He’d heard plenty of sketchy sob stories from students in his years of teaching, but this one seemed legitimate.

“My grandmother is having a surprise 75^th birthday party on Saturday,” she’d told him. She wasn’t afraid to pierce into his eyes with her own. “She’s like my very favorite person in the whole wide world, so I really want to be there. But to do that, I’d need to leave early Friday morning to drive home.”

If a student was making stuff up, it was invariably a sick or dead grandparent, never one in good health. “Where are you from?” he’d asked her, not really caring, but something about the vibe she projected made him want to keep the conversation going.

“Michigan.” She flipped her long hair behind her shoulder and gave him a smile that revealed a tiny glimpse of pearly white teeth. Then, as he mulled her request over in his mind, her tongue darted out to lick her bottom lip before her top row of teeth sank into it anxiously.

“You know summer classes are quite rigorous due to the condensed schedule, and we have an exam the following Monday, yes? Friday is the review day, and you would be missing it.”

Her eyes floated up from the floor to his again as her smile widened, spreading her cheeks as they flushed with a peachy-pink hue. “I do understand that, Professor Stone. I guess that is a risk I will have to take. But my family is very important to me, and my grandmother would be devastated if I weren’t there.”

Garrett’s face softened. Hearing the title “professor” come off her lips made him hard. Or maybe it was the smattering of freckles on her nose or the shiny rose gold hoops hanging from her petite ears. She wore a tiny pair of cut-off shorts from which thick, shapely thighs unapologetically curved toward her knees. It was the whole package, he realized as she bounced from one foot to the other, eagerly awaiting his blessing. He could tell by the glint in her eyes that she knew she’d won him over.

“What time are you leaving on Friday?” he asked, still not wanting the interaction to end.

“Uh, early, probably...it’s a twelve-hour drive.”

“Would you be available for a review session on Thursday night?”

“Oh!” she gasped. “You don’t have to move the review session on my account.” Though she tried to appear taken aback, Garrett saw something else too. She actually moved closer to him, leaned forward, far enough he could see her pert breasts pushing against her salmon-colored, lace-trimmed cami.

“I wouldn’t move it for the whole class; it would be a session just for you,” he explained, trying to make his voice sound neutral, non-committal. He knew he’d failed when her eyes lit up.

“That’s so generous of you, Professor Stone!”

“I don’t want you to get behind,” he said without looking up from the stack of papers on the lectern.

She scribbled something in her notebook, then ripped out the sheet of paper and laid it on the lectern right beneath his eyes. Her phone number.

And just like that, autumn breezed into his life before summer was even officially underway.

On Thursday when Garrett met Mara at her off-campus apartment, a book was never cracked open. He kept waiting for her roommates to barge in, but the whole place was dark and quiet. When she invited him to relax on the couch, he let his guard down, settling his 6’3” frame into the sinking cushions.

After a mere two minutes of silence, during which Mara was in the kitchen fixing them something to drink, she returned to the small living room. She set the two glasses on the end table, then moved to stand directly in front of Garrett. She wore a short, flouncy, tiered skirt with a floral print and a cropped off-the-shoulder top. He guessed she was either braless or was wearing a strapless bra. As soon as she swung her leg over his hip and planted herself boldly on his lap, he realized he would soon learn which one.

“Is this okay?” she asked with a flippant little giggle, as if she could not imagine a world in which it was not okay.

With his erection straining up through his cargo shorts, seeking the heat of her core, he didn’t feel obligated to reply. He pulled her toward him until their mouths crashed together, their lips and tongues tangling as they set off on an exploratory mission.

It had been a few years since Garrett had two women simultaneously dump him: one, a beautiful sociology professor named Sarah, who taught at College Park; and the other, a pretty young blonde sub he’d met on a fetish site. After that, he swore off romantic relationships. Not to say he had been completely celibate. There had been hook-ups. Mostly men.

Garrett had discovered long ago, when he was a teen, that he was bisexual. His first experience with another boy had been backstage during his high school’s spring musical. Garrett learned not only that he could effortlessly carry a lead role, but also what it felt like to touch a cock and stroke it until it exploded in his hands.

But those memories were far away as Mara’s fingers trailed down his chest until she gripped the hem of his shirt, lifting it toward his head. He helped by pulling it the rest of the way off, then went to work on giving her a matching shirtless look. No bra, that question was handily answered.

He nearly paused to dwell on the curiosity of how Mara knew he was interested. Maybe she just assumed. With a face like hers and a curvy body built for fucking, she was likely not used to rejection. Maybe she had a thing for older men, for seducing professors. In any case, who was he to argue?

She bit down on his earlobe as she fumbled for the button on his pants. He threw her off his lap and onto the soft, squishy cushion beside him as he scrambled out of his shorts, leaving his clothes in a messy heap on the living room floor. He saw a sleek gray cat slink behind the armchair next to the sofa as he sat back down in his original position. He glanced over to Mara, awaiting her reaction when she saw his cock jutting proudly off his body, curving toward his abdomen and reaching nearly to his navel.

When he first came of age, he assumed his gift of massive endowment was meant to make up for losing out in the hair color lottery. He’d been called every red-headed slur in the book, from Ginger to Carrots to worse, much worse. But puberty had been kind to him, and by eighth-grade gym class, he remembered strutting around the locker room like a peacock, not caring in the slightest about the fiery shock lifting from his scalp when he had such a nice-sized tool growing out of his mound of matching red pubic hair.

As if on cue, Mara gasped at the sight of him. Garnering awed gasps and wicked grins since eighth grade, Garrett snickered in his mind as she collapsed between his legs, her breasts pressing against his thighs as she eagerly ran a tongue up his length. Her mouth stretched to accommodate his thick, bulbous head as she tried to choke down a few inches. A tear formed in the corner of her eyes as she struggled to gain more ground. This was a visual that turned him on like no other. There was something unbelievably sexy about watching his partner take on the challenge of sucking his cock. It was so exhilarating, he felt his need surge through him, and he wondered if he would be able to last.

He threaded his fingers through her honey-colored tresses as he urged her on. “Come on, that’s it. Suck my cock, baby.”

Spurred on by his encouragement, her mouth flooding with saliva, she managed to successfully take another inch, all while he thrust his hips toward her. She bobbed up and down a few times, but he could tell cock-sucking was not her forte, and well, she had given it a valiant effort. He preferred having his cock in a man’s mouth anyway. They usually had a much easier time accommodating his girth.

It was her turn. There was no way he would be able to wrangle that thing inside her without a lot of prep work. He stood up with her still attached to him, her legs clinging to his hips. Then he laid her down on the couch, more or less gently, taking his place on the floor where she had been. He lifted the ruffles of her skirt to expose her smooth, bare pussy, closed up so tightly he could only see a faint line delineating each side of her labia. He knew getting her rosebud to open up its petals would be a fun challenge, and it had been ages since he’d been down on a woman. He gave Mara a devilish smirk before running the tip of his tongue between her folds as she nearly squirmed off the couch.

“Spread your legs, baby,” he commanded, but shoved them apart before the words were even out of his mouth. He licked his finger and stroked it down her sex, parting her lips so he could survey the soft pink flesh concealing her entrance. Not wanting to wait any longer, he held her lips apart with his fingers so he could fuck her hole with his tongue.

She went from gripping the couch cushions to clenching his shoulders so tightly, he thought she might bruise him. His efforts were rewarded by a huge gush of juices that coated his tongue with her sweet taste as he continued to stroke it in and out. Get ready, baby, he thought, because my cock is about a hundred times bigger and harder than this. When she began to whimper with desperation, he replaced his tongue with two of his fingers and went to work on her clit: nibbling, sucking, teasing, working it over with everything he had.

As she grew ever closer to climax, her grip on his shoulders strengthened. He put everything he had into his endeavor of getting her off without sustaining any damage to his musculature. Her hips wildly bucking against him, his chin dripping with her desire, and his lips almost numb from overuse, she finally screamed at the top of her lungs that she was coming. Minutes later he remained frozen between her legs as her spasms continued to throb against his mouth.

An hour later, Mara was begging him to come, just when he felt he was hitting his stride. “Please, please,” she whimpered beneath him. She still wore the skirt, but the rest of her skin was saturated with sweat as their passion had overcome the power of the small window A/C unit some time ago. Her mascara was smeared beneath her eyes, and her lips were dry and cracking from her constant gasps for air, not to mention the shrieks of ecstasy erupting at frequent intervals.

“Please, what?” Garrett growled as he pulled her legs up and threw them over his shoulders. He’d already had her bent over the couch and doggy style. He was considering how he wanted to finish. Pulling out, ripping off the condom, and spurting his load all over her chest was the most appealing option at the moment.

“I’m getting sore, baby. You’re so big. I’m not used to it,” she squeaked out between pants.

“You’ll get used to it,” he assured her as he pulled nearly all the way out and slammed back in, stealing her breath before it could fill her lungs. She couldn’t even muster the volume to answer, so he took pity on her.

His hands buried in the soft flesh of her ample hips, he railed into her. Jaw clenched, veins popping, beads of sweat sliding down his face, he put every ounce of power he had behind his thrusts. Everything went black, black, black until a burst of light cracked the shell, raining fireworks down in his line of vision. His explosion rocketed out, landing all over her creamy golden skin. And a few seconds later, after he regained his bearings, he was pleased to see she had weathered his storm.

“I think you’re going to do well on the test,” he said when he could speak again.

“Me too,” she smiled, stroking her hand down his sweaty, tattooed back. “Me too.”

That first hot June night he’d spent with Mara seemed like a million years ago now that the sun was setting earlier and the winds were blowing in cooler, blustery air. His apartment was cold and damp, and there was nothing in his refrigerator or cabinets. He ran his fingers through his greasy hair, unable to remember his last shower. It had been two days since he was escorted off campus and given orders never to return again. He was banned. Banned. The word itself sounded so final. So damning.

He was supposed to defend his dissertation in the spring. He was supposed to finally get his PhD and prove he had made something of himself.

Not that anyone would care. Not that anyone was left who would care.

He was doing it for himself. He had made something out of nothing, because nothing was what he’d been after he left his hometown at eighteen. Ever since that day, he promised himself he’d show them. He’d show everyone he would rise above.

But now he had been kicked again, banned, and his head hung low with shame. With self-loathing. And for what? He didn’t even know. He didn’t understand how Mara could have said those things about him. They weren’t true. All lies. She had told him she loved him.

He was just unable to say it back.

Where could he go from here? How could he start over yet again?