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  “Class is dismissed. Miss Marshall, please stay behind for just a moment.”

  I closed my eyes and leaned my head back. And in my mind, I told Gregory Fitzgerald to just shut the hell up.

  I heard, but didn’t see, as the rest of the class filed out. Finally I opened my eyes, just in time to see Nathan looking toward me from near the door. His face was oddly fixed, as if he were trying to restrain emotions too big to express.

  “Mr. Connors, is there something you need?” Fitzgerald asked.

  Nathan looked at him, anger washing over his face. “No. Nothing. Sir.” His limbs tense, he turned and walked out of the room. I sighed a little. I couldn’t put off talking with Nathan for too long, because my refusal to talk now was hurting one of my closest friends.

  I wiped thoughts of Nathan from my mind. I could only deal with one crisis at a time, and at the moment, Mr. Fitzgerald appeared to demand my attention. He was approaching me now, with what appeared to be my paper in his hands.

  “Miss Marshall. I’ve been considering our discussion from Monday.” He looked uncomfortable. Tense. His eyes swept over me, then away, then back to me again. Then he said, “You are correct. Perhaps I’ve been too hard on you. I see a great deal of talent in you, the potential for … for greatness. I see now that I’ve pushed too hard. Your paper, in fact, met all of the requirements which were assigned.”

  He set the paper down in front of me. The F was crossed out, replaced with a B+. I narrowed my eyes. It was an A paper. I waited, not saying anything, wondering if he intended to explain himself.

  It seemed that he did. “I told you the first week of class that before you break the rules, you must thoroughly understand them. Therefore I’m still counting off one letter grade for the extraneous material in your paper. That said,” he took a deep breath and looked away from me, “it was quite brilliant.”

  Brilliant? My head was swimming. I went from an F to brilliant? I stood up and tucked the paper in my bag. Unaccountably, I wanted to cry. I wanted to shout. I wanted to tell him to shove the paper up his ass. I didn’t even know what I felt.

  He gave me a questioning look. What? Did he want me to thank him? For backing down on being an ass? Being wrong? Did he expect me to fall to my knees in gratitude? What the hell did he want from me?

  “Miss Marshall...” he said. His eyes were on me as he said the word, his expression unreadable, his eyes tightly focused. “Savannah…”

  I stepped back, putting another foot of distance between us. He sighed, his expression suddenly hardening. He said in a much softer voice than usual, “I’ll see you in class Friday. Please have your personal affairs in enough order that you can pay attention in class.”

  Adjusting the straps of my backpack on my shoulders, I turned for the exit. In the next breath I was facing him again.

  “Gregory?” My voice shook, but I did my best to ignore it.

  He looked up from his papers, waiting for me to continue, uncertainty on his face. “Yes?” he asked after my silence ran over “normal.”

  “I … never mind. Thank you for fixing the grade.” I sighed and left the room in a hurry, stopping just outside the door to rest against the wall for a minute.

  Just go back to your room, Savannah.

  Gregory

  I left class that day angry with myself. Angry at my lack of self-control. Angry that I’d almost said something to her, which I would surely have regretted. Angry that I couldn’t stop thinking about her, that when I sat down to draw music out of my cello, it was her that I thought of. Angry that when I woke up, I thought of her. Angry that for the two days after our confrontation in my office, I’d found myself continually returning to the argument. Angry at myself that I’d graded her unfairly, and angry that my thoughts kept returning to her reaction.

  Angry that I cared about her reaction.

  For the next three weeks, I mechanically went to teach my classes, to rehearsals, to performances. I met with Robert and his parents twice more, and introduced them to a young cellist, a former student, who agreed to take on teaching the boy. At Karin’s insistence, we went out twice for dinner, and both times she became angry at my inability to pay attention. Because I kept circling around the same thought. The same formless, overwhelming emotion. The same question. Because somehow, despite all my protective armor, despite all my focus on the music and the music alone, I’d become … infatuated. Obsessed. With Savannah Marshall.

  I kept a professional, distant relationship with her. Anything else would have been a tremendous mistake. But sometimes, when she wasn’t looking, my eyes would fall upon her in class. I examined the arch of her eyebrows, the flow of her hair, the curve of her hips and calves. It was disturbing, on far too many levels. She was my student. She was volatile and emotional. She was a disaster waiting to happen. And all of that aside, even if I wanted to throw caution to the wind, even if I was willing to throw away my hard earned discipline, the fact was, she wanted absolutely nothing to do with me.

  Arrogant, I’d heard her mumble. On more than one occasion, especially after we’d gone back and forth in class.

  I found myself inappropriately curious about what had passed between her and Nathan Connors. On the Wednesday after our confrontation, she’d come in the class at the last second, and sat as far away from him as possible. Then, when he left the class, he gave her a look of such longing, such naked devotion, that I was stopped cold for a moment, unable to react. Since then, the two of them continued to sit apart, not speaking, not interacting in any way. The other students noticed, and I’d overheard two of them talking in the hall, just outside the classroom, about a lover’s spat. My stomach clenched at the thought. I wanted to believe her protests that Nathan wasn’t her boyfriend. Even though it was none of my business.

  Two weeks after spring break, I was packing up my things in the office to go home for the day when James knocked on the doorframe.

  “Got time to go grab a drink?”

  I didn’t really. I had planned to go home and play, all night. But the BSO’s season was over, and James wasn’t one to be put off by excuses.

  “Yes,” I replied.

  A few minutes later we slipped into a corner bar several blocks away from the conservatory. James had chosen this bar when we were undergraduates, and we’d been coming here off and on ever since. Dark, smelly, and mostly catering to local residents, it was a place we were highly unlikely to run into faculty or students. He ordered a beer, and I got a gin and tonic, and we sat down in a tiny booth. The table was a little sticky, so I carefully kept my arms away from it.

  For a few minutes, we discussed random happenings from the conservatory, then Robert and his parents. When I told him I’d passed Robert off to a different instructor, James frowned briefly, but then moved on. His look disturbed me. I didn’t understand his expectations. I was in no way equipped to teach any child, much less one who couldn’t see.

  We sat in silence for a few moments, and he gave me a long, serious look. “Talk to me, Gregory.”

  I raised an eyebrow. “About?”

  He took a sip of his beer. “About Savannah Marshall.”

  Very carefully, I kept control of my expression as I took a sip of my drink. “Why is she the topic of the day? She’s in one of my classes. Gifted musician, but undisciplined.”

  “Then why did you freeze in place the moment I mentioned her name?”

  “You’re imagining things, James.”

  James raised one eyebrow as he stared at me. “I’m not imagining that you’ve become the subject of rumors.”

  Rumors. One thing I’d never been was the subject of the gossip that inevitably flowed out of being part of a tiny community like the conservatory. I intentionally kept my personal life, what there was of it, far away from the school. The only concession I’d made on that front in years was dating Karin, which to an extent I only did to keep up appearances.

  “What sort of … rumors?” I tried to keep the warning out of my voice. But
I think some of it slipped through, because he sat back in his seat, giving me a wary look. He sighed then leaned forward again.

  “Here’s what I’m hearing, Gregory. You can take it for what it’s worth, but I’m concerned about you. What the rumors say is: the two of you have been consistently combative in class. Constantly disagreeing, constantly sparring. Two weeks ago you two had a shouting match in your office. The same day, she suddenly stopped hanging out with her longtime boyfriend, and the two of them aren’t even speaking. Since then you’ve cancelled three dates with Karin, who has been quite vocal about it. The rumors say that she stared at you openly in class. And that you’ve been doing plenty of staring of your own. Roughly half of the school thinks she and Nathan split up because you slept with her. Luckily the other half is too wrapped up in their own lives to care.”

  Without thinking, I blurted out, “Nathan Connors was not her boyfriend.”

  James closed his eyes and winced. “That, my friend, was not what I wanted to hear from you.”

  I coughed and took another drink. “I assure you, I would never sleep with a student. The whole idea is distasteful.”

  “She’s attractive ... gifted ... it’s not a hard sell.”

  “She’s a disruption to the entire class. Undercuts me any chance she gets. I can barely stand her presence in my classroom.” That wasn’t true though. In fact, all I could think about on the way to class was her being there.

  James rolled his eyes. “It’s not your classroom that concerns me.”

  I leaned forward. I could feel my heart beating in my temples. Anger? Tension? Anxiety? I had no idea. “James. Listen to me. You’re all too aware of my feelings about relationships, about getting involved with someone that might interfere with my music.”

  James leaned forward, keeping his volume low. “If she wasn’t a student, I’d tell you to go for it. She’s a good match from what little I know of her. And … that concerns me.”

  “You’re out of your mind.” I sat back and ran a hand through my hair.

  He grimaced. “Gregory. Be honest with me. We’ve been friends for more than a decade.”

  I gave a large sigh, tossed back the rest of my drink, and waved at the waitress, pointing at the empty glass. Then I leaned forward again and said, “James ... I … she ... nothing has happened. Nothing will. The subject is closed.”

  “Can I suggest, then, that you become a little more circumspect? If these rumors get back to the Dean, you’re going to find yourself answering questions for the administration. And while the conservatory is lucky to have you, I think you know there are plenty on the faculty who are either jealous of your talent or resentful of your attitude. They won’t hesitate to throw you under the bus.”

  “You’re well aware I avoid office politics of any kind.”

  “I know that. You’re above all of it. But don’t think it can’t drag you down into the mud.”

  I sighed. “James, thank you for bringing this to my attention. But in all seriousness, the subject is closed. I refuse to discuss it any more.”

  James shook his head and ordered another beer.

  Savannah

  I stood at the base of the steps to Nathan’s apartment for a long while, debating whether or not I would actually press the buzzer. Rain falling in cold, fat drops rolled down my forehead and balanced on the ends of my eyelashes while I stared at his name next to his doorbell. The last three weeks had been awkward. No, they were awful. After three days of dealing with him ignoring my calls, I stopped calling. I’m sure he was further irritated by my avoiding him in class. Not my finest moment of maturity, sure. But, I was confused. I was reliving our whole friendship in the framework of an entirely different paradigm than the one I’d been operating.

  Buzz.

  I pressed the buzzer, waiting nervously. What if he wouldn’t let me in?

  “Who is it?” Nathan’s tired voice nearly knocked me off balance.

  “Nate, it’s me ...” No one ever called him Nate. Not since we were about thirteen and he deemed it to be childish. But, that’s how I was feeling. Like the thirteen-year-old girl that had a boy best friend who meant the absolute world to her.

  “What do you want, Savannah?” His tone would have seemed cold if I didn’t hear his voice shaking a little.

  “We need to talk.”

  There was a dreadful silence before a sigh.

  I rolled my eyes, annoyed to be having this conversation through a speaker. “Please, Nathan. I … look, it’s cold and raining out here, are you gonna let me in or not?”

  “Shit, sorry,” he mumbled before I heard another buzz, and the door click, allowing me access.

  Shaking raindrops from my coat as I walked to his second floor apartment, I saw his door pop open. Walking through, I found Nathan leaning back against his kitchen counter with his arms crossed over his chest. I tossed my coat on the table by the door and ran my fingers through my hair a few times, trying to dry it out a bit.

  “Oh for Christ’s sake, Savannah, you’re all wet,” Nathan huffed, walking toward his bathroom. He returned with a towel that he held out in front of him.

  I felt his eyes on me as I ran the towel over my hair. “Thank you.” I sighed as I set the towel on top of my jacket and made my way to the couch.

  “So,” he shrugged, “what do you want to talk about?”

  Tilting my head to the side, I spoke gently. “Come on, Nathan, sit.”

  He stared at the space next to me for several seconds, a battle playing across his eyes, before he sighed and sank next to me.

  “Look,” I started before he could, “we’ve been friends for ten years. You’ve always made me feel safe, protected …” I trailed off, watching his face.

  He swallowed hard but didn’t quite look at me.

  “Anyway,” I continued, “I need you to understand that I’m not upset that you’re not gay. That’s ridiculous. I just … it’s just that I shared some things with you that, honestly, I wouldn’t have told you if I thought—”

  “If you thought I was straight?” His tone was clipped. Irritated.

  “It’s not just that, Nathan.” I wrapped my hand around his, but he didn’t respond. It sat flat in my palm. “If I thought that you liked me … I wouldn’t have ever gone on about the boys, the kisses, the breakups.”

  “But I wanted you to, Savannah.” Nathan grumbled a little as he ran his hand over his face.

  “Okay, but if you liked me …”

  “I still wanted to be your friend, okay? I figured out pretty quickly that you didn’t feel the same way about me. I just didn’t realize it was because you thought I was gay. Did you not feel that way about me because you thought I was gay, or …”

  Christ, he really wanted an answer. I had to go back and search some pretty early memories of Nathan to figure out when it was I thought he was gay. And how I felt before that.

  “Well, I obviously had a crush on you the second I saw you. I was ten, for God’s sake.” I laughed a little, but he didn’t. “I don’t know, Nathan, that’s asking me to forget the last ten years and pretend I’m seeing you again for the first time. I can’t do that.” Suddenly, I felt tears stinging my eyes. I could see on his face that this was breaking his heart, and that’s not what I came here to do. “I’m sorry,” I whispered.

  That’s all I could say. There was too damn much to sort through if we really wanted to. But, I didn’t. He was my friend and I wanted to keep that relationship, if I could.

  “Don’t be sorry, Savannah,” Nathan sighed as he pulled me into a hug. “I had years of chances to come clean with you about my feelings. I didn’t. That’s not your fault.”

  “Wow, we’re a mess.” I sniffed and chuckled.

  He laughed, too, this time.

  “I still love you, though, okay? I don’t ever want to see you get hurt. Especially by Fitzgerald.”

  I tensed instantly and pulled away from Nathan’s body. “What are you talking about?”

  “Savann
ah …” He rolled his eyes and looked exasperated.

  “Nathan,” I arched my eyebrow, “I told you—I’m not in love with him.”

  “Yeah? And how long are you going to tell yourself that?

  I stood, holding out my arms. “What the hell is your problem all of a sudden? He’s our professor. I see him three times a week for an hour. And, he’s a pompous ass.”

  Nathan shook his head at me then spoke in a low, urgent tone. “Everyone’s been talking about it, Savannah. Everyone has seen how you two interact.” His eyes narrowed at me as he spoke.

  I dropped my jaw. “Are you standing here, right now, insinuating that I’m having an affair with my professor?”

  “Well, if you’re not, I suggest you figure out what it is, exactly, that you want from him. Before not dealing with your feelings at all leads one of you to make a huge mistake.”

  Silence.

  My cheeks betrayed me as they heated under Nathan’s words. Slowly looking up at his face, I saw him wince a little. Maybe at what he said. Maybe at my reaction.

  Either way, he took a slow step toward me and placed a hand on my shoulder.

  Softly, he said, “I don’t want you to get hurt, Savannah.”

  I stepped out of his touch. “You’ve mentioned that, Nathan. But you’re the only one who’s managed to hurt me lately. Despite everything we’ve already talked about, you claim to know my feelings better than I know them, and demand action from me.”

  “That’s not what—”

  “That’s exactly what you’re doing, Nathan, and it’s not fair. Being my friend doesn’t mean you’re director of my feelings. I … I need to go. Look,” I took a deep breath as I paced toward my coat, “I don’t want to put all kinds of stress on you before your recital in a couple of weeks. Just … we’re fine, right?” I made myself sound convincing enough.

  I knew how emotional Nathan could get, and his performance nerves were always all over the place. I cared about him enough in that moment to want him not to blow his final task in school.