Theo sat in Dr. Wagner’s office, flip phone at his side, trying to look like he was paying attention to whatever Dr. Wagner was saying. The office was cramped, and it felt even smaller because the walls were lined with books. They made the space smell like moldering cloth and old paper. Dr. Wagner currently had his red, bulbous nose buried in the Riverside Shakespeare; he was looking for a specific passage that he had suddenly decided to add to the lesson plans.
Tell him you’ve got a sister you want to set him up with.
The text was from Howard Cartwright. Cart was a police officer, and he had been partnered with Theo’s husband, Ian, before Ian died in a car accident. In the year since that accident, a lot had changed between Theo and Cart—some of it good, some of it . . . well, Theo couldn’t quite tell. One thing that hadn’t changed was that Cart was a redneck pain in Theo’s ass.
Aren’t you supposed to be working? Theo had gotten pretty good at texting on the flip phone. He still didn’t understand the rush to get a smart phone; he was just barely getting the hang of this one.
I am working.
Really working.
I am really working, dumbass.
“Mr. Stratford,” Dr. Wagner said, lifting himself up from the pages of the Riverside Shakespeare with what looked like a great deal of effort. The booze on his breath when he faced Theo directly was strong enough to overpower the smell of the old books. “It’s lost to me now. I suppose I’ll have to find it later.”
Then he stared at Theo, his head bobbling on his neck, his eyes cloudy with cataracts and drink. Theo wouldn’t be surprised if the horrifying old fossil just dropped dead—the female grad students would probably have a parade out of pure relief.
Wagner was still staring.
“We were going to talk about grading expectations,” Theo said.
“Well,” Dr. Wagner said, his jaw working soundlessly for a moment. “I don’t know if that’s really necessary.”
Tell him you’ve got an eighteen-year-old cousin who will do things to his limp little lizard that Shakespeare never dreamed of.
Theo fought to hold back a smile.
“It was your idea, sir.”
Last year, at this time, Theo had been planning his own class. Last year, Theo had worked out an entire semester’s worth of material exploring adaptations and versions of Lear. Last year, he’d gotten some major work done on his thesis, and he’d also had the highest instructor evaluations in the department—for graduate students and professors. He’d turned some of his course materials into an article that was in the second-round review at Shakespeare Quarterly. This year, though, Theo was a teacher’s assistant. He was going to shuffle papers, sit in on discussion groups, make copies, and scratch his balls. He’d be lucky if he didn’t have to carry Dr. Wagner’s briefcase and mop up his drool every time a co-ed bent over.
“I believe I do have a rubric,” Dr. Wagner said, hoisting himself out of the seat and tottering toward the filing cabinet.
Stop a crime. Shoot up a bank robber. Get in a car chase. Rescue a kitten from a tree if you’ve got nothing better to do than bother me.
Gotta leave the kittens up there or the FD won’t have anything to do.
Theo smiled in spite of himself.
“Here it is,” Dr. Wagner said, holding a yellowed sheet of paper between two fingers. He waved it around and then blew dust off it. “Yes, I remember this. ’59 was an excellent year for rubrics.”
Kill me.
Not until you buy me that burger you owe me.
Mother. Fucker. You are one miserable son of a bitch. I was joking. It wasn’t a real bet.
A bet’s a bet.
“You can take a look at it for yourself, but I think you’ll find it’s perfectly up to snuff. I don’t understand why there’s all this rush to innovate these days. I really don’t. Edwin Markle developed the six-point rubric in 1959, and it’s just as good in 2009.”
“Or 2014,” Theo said.
“I’m very well aware of what year it is, Mr. Stratford. I was waxing poetic.”
That wasn’t all he was waxing.
Ok, I kind of cheated, Cart texted. I already knew you were ticklish.
Bastard.
Can’t help it. You’re just too cute when you laugh.
That one sentence was evidence of how very far things had shifted between them.
“Mr. Stratford, there is something that I think we need to discuss.”
“Yes?”
“I understand that in the past you were found to be having inappropriate relationships with students.”
Theo tried as hard as he could to keep his face smooth. His first year as a graduate student at Wroxall, the evening of the department’s welcoming social, he had watched Dr. Wagner pursue Grace round and round the cheese table. Finally Grace had retreated to the bathroom. Dr. Wagner had followed. Theo had pushed open the door, rapping loudly, asking if anyone was in there. Dr. Wagner had stumbled out, his cheeks almost as red as his nose, smelling like he’d been swimming in a distillery. He’d mumbled something about getting turned around. Grace had been holding a can of pepper gel, so she would have been fine, but Theo hadn’t forgotten.
Now, looking at those cloudy eyes, the glint in them, he realized Dr. Wagner hadn’t forgotten either.
“No,” Theo said.
“Excuse me?”
“I said no. That’s not true. I had a relationship with an undergraduate student who had been my student previously. There was never any suggestion that the relationship had taken place while we were teacher and student.” Theo struggled for a smile. “And relationship is really too strong of a word. We tried something, and it didn’t work.”
Wagner huffed. “Well, that’s certainly not how I heard it.”
“You’re hearing it right now. From me.”
“Yes. Well.”
“And I’m sure you understand how appearances can be misleading.”
Wagner huffed some more. “I certainly hope there won’t be any further misunderstandings, Mr. Stratford. No more misleading appearances. As instructors, we have a sacred trust to shape young minds. We are responsible for their wellbeing. I hope I make myself perfectly clear when I say that nothing less will be tolerated.”
Gin, Theo thought. He couldn’t be sure, because all he was getting was the reek of alcohol, but Theo would have put money on gin being the drink of choice.
“Of course,” Theo said.
“I think that will be all, then.”
Dismissed, Theo limped out of the office, collecting his cane as he went. His knee was much better, and he had been consistent with his exercises even after physical therapy ended. He carried the cane, though, because his knee stiffened after he sat too long, and it still gave out at the weirdest times. And, if he were honest, because he found the cane comforting. You could really mess somebody up with a cane if you needed to.
He was unlocking the door to the office he shared with Grace and Dawson, a cubbyhole of a room at the far end of Liversedge Hall, when his phone buzzed again. He fanned the door back and forth to clear the toxic musk of weed (Dawson) and chai (Grace) from the closed-up room. Another message from Cart.
Have you talked to him?
Just got out of the old fuck’s office.
Theo was just settling in at his desk, cane propped against the window, when the phone buzzed again.
You know that’s not what I meant.
Theo looked at the message for almost a full minute. Then he closed the phone, put it in his pocket, and started up the ancient desktop computer. It was none of Cart’s fucking business if Theo had talked to Auggie yet.