© Christina Hadfield
JUNIOR YEAR
Once again, Tess and Dr. Morgan found themselves parked several blocks from the edge of campus. Dr. Morgan drummed her fingers against the steering wheel of her car. Tess looked out the window, stalling, refusing to leave. She had already protested the distance, had already been met with a snippy remark, and she already wanted to be back in bed with the other woman.
Dr. Morgan was in deep contemplation. She only ever had three rules when it came to sex and relationships. One, she only ever did one-night stands. It was less messy that way, easier to cut things off when there was such little attachment. Two, she never let anyone touch her. She was the bringer of pleasure, she liked being fully, one hundred percent, in control at all times. And three, she didn’t cuddle. There was merit to what Tess had said. Cuddling was a large part of sex with a woman, just for the intimacy. But intimacy… that was something she wanted to avoid.
However, then Tess barged into her life, being obstinate and refusing to listen, and she smashed right through all three of Dr. Morgan’s rules in a week flat.
“We should do this regularly.”
Dr. Morgan slowly turned, looking to Tess. The girl was confident in her claim, but there was an edge of vulnerability to her expression. Before, that was something Dr. Morgan would have loved, to crush a girl’s heart, having such power over another person’s feelings. Now, the very thought made the woman slightly sick.
“We most certainly can’t,” she answered.
“I know you only do one-night stands,” Tess continued, “but I can’t just… stop. I… well this is going to go straight to your head, but I feel I should say it anyway… being with you is… the best sex I’ve ever had. No one else is ever going to compare, and frankly, I can’t even do it justice myself! You’ve ruined me!”
Dr. Morgan swallowed roughly. “I’m loath to admit this,” she muttered, and Tess leaned towards her to hear better, “but you are… very much adequate in the bedroom yourself.” Tess smirked and Dr. Morgan let out a huff. “Don’t let that go to your head either, Miss Stanford.”
“Then if you’re enjoying yourself as much as I am, I don’t see why we should stop,” Tess declared boldly.
“Do you know why I only do one-night stands? It’s because I don’t do relationships, I don’t do feelings, and repeat offenses are—”
“I don’t want a relationship either,” Tess cut the woman off. “I just want sex.”
Dr. Morgan worked her jaw. She could feel a heat building deep inside her and it made her shift uncomfortably in her seat. She looked away from the girl, no longer able to meet her gaze.
“I’m thinking every Friday, just as we’ve been doing,” Tess continued. “I can come to your office after the TA meeting, and you can take me home from there.”
“And suppose I’m still working?”
Tess rolled her eyes, though Dr. Morgan still looked away from her and couldn’t see. “Fine, then I’ll wait around in your office and do homework until you decide it’s time to leave. Happy?”
Dr. Morgan turned back. “Every week?” she questioned.
“Unless you’d like more often,” Tess stated, smirking.
Dr. Morgan’s eyes narrowed, her gaze quickly turning predatory. “You know that smirk drives me crazy,” she practically growled.
“Then do something about it.”
Dr. Morgan grabbed the girl from across the console, tugging her close and attaching their lips with a fury. Tess melted into the harshness and yelped roughly when Dr. Morgan jerked her over into her lap. Minutes later they parted, both panting, their hips canting into each other against their own volition.
Tess was the first to find her voice. “If you keep kissing me like that, I’m not going to make it to Friday.”
Dr. Morgan moved, popping open her car door before she unceremoniously shoved Tess out. The girl stumbled, barely managing to land on her feet. Dr. Morgan turned then, collecting Tess's things from the passenger seat, before throwing them out the door after the girl.
“Friday,” the woman stated, “but you aren’t spending the night.”
“Of course I’m not,” Tess answered, “just like I didn’t the last two times.”
Dr. Morgan slammed her door shut, eyeing Tess with fake animosity. Tess simply burst out laughing on the sidewalk before she headed back to her apartment.
This time, she brought her keys with her, so she unlocked the door and slipped inside. There was no Kai to great her, not that it wasn’t a normal occurrence for Kai to crash at their apartment. Kai had roommates that were rather nightmares, and she liked to avoid her living space as much as possible. Instead though, Tess found Elle sitting at the table eating a bowl of cereal.
Tess greeted her and moved to head to her bedroom, but Elle called out, stopping her.
“Woah, woah,” Elle stated, “I wanna hear the tea.”
“What tea?” Tess asked, sitting down at the table.
“Well Kai stopped by last night—because Friday’s are our game tournament nights—and she said you dove out of the TA meeting, pulling Dr. Morgan down to her office on a leash, and never came back. And… you were gone all night, just now slipping back in. I’m not good at math but I’m pretty sure two plus two equals you slept with Dr. Morgan again.”
Tess shrugged. “Yeah, so?”
Elle practically choked on her food, taking a minute to regain her breathing. “So? My roommate is bedding the school’s devil! I hardly think that’s nothing.”
“She’s hot. We’re both horny and good in bed. I hardly understand the problem.”
“Yeah, but like… is this going to be a regular thing now? When you don’t come home at night can I just tell the RA, yeah, she’s out getting pounded, or do I need to report you as a missing person?”
“We’ve agreed to every Friday, so I’m not going to be around Fridays anymore, if that answers your question.”
“What, agreed to? Fridays? Every Friday? Oh my gosh, Tess. Are you in a friends-with-benefits with Dr. Morgan?”
“Sure, I guess.”
“I never thought I’d live to see the day.”
“So… what’s the deal with this text message, Margaret?”
Dr. Morgan looked over at Dr. Greenwood from overtop her brunch mimosa. She shrugged slightly, looking down at the menu with interest. “I don’t know, Amy, what’s the deal with Sunday morning brunch?”
“The brunch is because you blew me off Friday, and I needed an explanation before Monday, otherwise I’d coming busting down your door in the biology building,” Dr. Greenwood stated. “And besides, I need the alcohol.”
“I was busy Friday, as I said in the text message,” Dr. Morgan answered with a shrug. “You’re an English professor, I figured you could read.”
“Hilarious, Margaret. Let me just read you this message again, hang on.” Dr. Greenwood pulled out her phone, tapping around for a moment before pulling up the conversation. “You said, ‘Can’t meet up tonight. Something urgent requiring my immediate attention just popped up.’ And then I said, ‘What’s wrong? I hope nothing too serious.’ You said, ‘Will be fine, can’t text now, tell you later.’ And then you just… never responded again.”
“I was… busy,” Dr. Morgan answered cryptically.
“All night?”
“Yes.”
“All of Saturday morning too?”
“Yes.”
“Busy with what?”
“An urgent… issue, but I… took care of it.” Dr. Morgan paused, remembering Tess sucking on her lip in her car Saturday morning. “Well… it might be a reoccurring issue now, actually. I’m afraid I won’t be able to meet up with you Fridays anymore. But I can do Sunday brunches if you want to make this our new thing!”
“You’re blowing me off for whatever this is, and you aren’t even going to tell me about it?” Dr. Greenwood snapped. “How do you know it’s going to be a reoccurring problem every Friday? If you just need some alone time, you can just tell me, you know. I know I’ve been an awful lot ever since—well you know, and if you want me to back off—”
“No, no, Amy,” Dr. Morgan interrupted. She reached out and took her friend’s hands in her own. “It’s nothing about you, I swear. I rather quite enjoy having you back in my life, I really do. I just… well there’s something going on right now and I’m not entirely sure how I feel about it, but well…”
“Tell me about it? We’re friends. Maybe I can help you think it through.”
“Well… do you remember that one student who was giving me quite the headache? The one that I—”
“Kissed? Yes, I remember,” Dr. Greenwood dead-panned.
Dr. Morgan pursed her lips. “Yes, well, I… slept with her.”
Dr. Greenwood spit her drink across the table, right into Dr. Morgan’s face.
“Amy!” Dr. Morgan shouted.
“Oh my god!” Dr. Greenwood snapped. “You can’t just drop that on me so nonchalantly! No wonder you were so busy Friday.”
“No, this happened a week ago,” Dr. Morgan stated.
“Oh, well then what kept you this Friday?”
“I slept with her again.”
Dr. Greenwood stared at her friend in pure disbelief. Finally, after several moments of silence in which Dr. Morgan did not further elaborate, Dr. Greenwood stated, “The last woman you slept with more than once was me, and that was twenty years ago. Are you okay?”
“I treated her exactly how I treat all the girls I sleep with,” Dr. Morgan continued. “She even understood the one-night stand thing. And I thought finally we’d both have it out of our systems, that it would be more than enough scratch to an itch, except the next week, the tension was still there. And I guess the tension just kept building all week, between words exchanged and subtle glances, until Friday she practically dragged me back to my office and jumped me, declaring she needed more, and I just… I caved.”
“So… I’m guessing the sex is pretty good then, if you went back for seconds…”
“And we’ve agreed that we’re going to keep doing it, every Friday, which is unfortunately why I can no longer—”
“Every week!?” Dr. Greenwood gasped. “You’re going to sleep with her, one, singular girl, every week!? Oh my god, this is so much more serious than I ever imagined. Margaret, are you in love with her!?”
“Don’t be absurd!” Dr. Morgan snapped. “This is only physical, alright? There are absolutely no emotions and there is absolute no relationship happening.”
“Your friends-with-benefits is most certainly a relationship that is most certainly happening.”
“There is no friends-with-benefits! I’d have to be friends with the girl first and I most certainly am not!”
“Margaret…” Dr. Greenwood said softly. “She hangs out in your office with you multiple times a week and you just… chat. That’s friendship, try as you do to deny it.”
Dr. Morgan frowned and spitefully took another sip of her mimosa. “I suppose I will admit that she has a rather steady presence in my life.” Dr. Greenwood snorted. “But I am only allowing this because it’s the best sex I’ve ever had.”
Dr. Greenwood eyed Dr. Morgan curiously. “Are you serious?” she questioned. “You, who beds women near constantly, has found the best sex of your life with a college student?” She watched in wonder as a blush crept up her friend’s neck.
“She is… well adept in the anatomy of a female and she is… well versed with her hands… and tongue.”
Dr. Greenwood just stared for a moment until she finally breathed out a heavy, “Damn.”
Dr. Morgan sat up straight. “Anyway, we’re not talking about this anymore,” she declared. “I simply wanted to explain why we can’t meet up Fridays anymore and—”
“I expect regular updates,” Dr. Greenwood stated with a smirk.
“Not happening.”
Restless was perhaps the best way to describe her behavior, Dr. Kemper figured, watching Dr. Morgan fidget in her chair across the table at their co-department meeting. She was… well saying she was in a better mood was pushing it—because it wasn’t that she was being nice or conversationalist—but she wasn’t being a bitter pain in the butt, which on any day was an improvement. In fact, for the first time in all the time Dr. Kemper had known the woman, Dr. Morgan hadn’t said a single thing the entire meeting.
Dr. Kemper leaned towards Dr. Marlow, whispering to the other woman, “Hey, is she alright?”
Dr. Marlow shushed her companion, gesturing subtly to the department chair who was mid-way into a major spiel about something Dr. Kemper didn’t quite care about. When Dr. Marlow wouldn’t humor her though, she forced herself to listen back into the meeting, trying not to dwell on Dr. Morgan’s behavior.
“So, we’re giving the biochemical pharmacology class planning over to Dr. Logan. He spent his post doc years working to discover drugs and did a lot of kinetic calculations, so I think that would be most beneficial,” the chair stated. “Nothing against you, Dr. Morgan, I’m not diminishing your drug discovery work either, it’s just that… well…”
“He has a stronger biology background,” the co-chair stated.
They were both doing their best to let the news out easily and not set off Dr. Morgan. Her silence was unnerving the chair; he shifted his weight and pawed at his hands. Finally, hesitantly, he muttered out, “Thoughts, Margaret?”
“Hmm?” Dr. Morgan questioned. “Oh, yes, very well, that’s fine.”
The entire room was stunned to silence. Dr. Morgan, seemingly oblivious, tapped her pen almost anxiously on the table, her attention on the clock. Dr. Marlow turned to Dr. Kemper, finally realizing what her friend was going on about.
“You… are fine with us giving the class planning over to Dr. Logan?” the chair muttered in disbelief. “The class you’ve spent nearly a year planning? You’re fine with giving him the work you’ve already planned and just… moving on?”
“Sure,” Dr. Morgan stated. “Is that all? If there’s nothing else to cover, I’ve got somewhere I need to be.”
“Um, yes, I guess that’s all,” the chair declared.
Dr. Morgan stood to leave, but before she left, she turned to Dr. Kemper and Dr. Marlow. “Keep your TA meeting short, would you?” she stated. “Your TA’s have a bad habit of being overly loud and obnoxious, and I’m afraid I need Tess for a task once she’s done. Send her straight to my office once the meeting’s over, will you? Don’t keep me waiting.”
“Alright…” Dr. Kemper muttered.
Once Dr. Morgan was gone, as well as the majority of the other professors, Dr. Marlow turned to Dr. Kemper. “I… am rather confused,” she stated.
“Me too,” Dr. Kemper answered.
Because Dr. Kemper spent the majority of her adult life researching biology, she was tuned into patterns like a sixth sense. Patterns came to her without any effort, as easy as breathing, and she found patterns in everything. Which was why she noticed near instantly the similarly odd behavior of Tess at their TA meeting.
Tess was restless as well. She was wiggling incessantly in her seat, tapping her foot, her fingers, glancing to the clock on the wall almost every minute. She was hardly paying attention, no more than Dr. Morgan had been, and they had to call her name twice to get her attention. This behavior was as odd coming from Tess as it was coming from Dr. Morgan. Tess always loved the TA meetings. There was hardly a day they didn’t have to threaten to separate Kai and Tess, as they were going on and on. Tess and Kai also tended to linger after meeting, just chatting, and would sometimes even walk the professors to their cars as they headed out for the evening and the girls headed back to their apartments.
They had about five minutes left until the hour, when their meeting was officially over, and Tess looked near ready to jump up and run away the second they were done. Dr. Marlow was explaining phloem unloading in plants to the sophomore TA’s that had forgotten the details since the year before, and Kai was muttering about some trivia night with the senior TA.
Dr. Kemper interrupted the entire table when she stated, rather loudly, “Tess, have you got ants in your pants? What’s the matter with you?”
Tess looked up at the woman and Dr. Kemper felt a little bad for the harshness of her words. She hadn’t meant to put the girl on the spot or offend her for her restlessness, she just wanted to know what was going through the girl’s head!
Tess stuttered, momentarily, trying to collect her thoughts. “I have a meeting after this one,” Tess answered finally.
“If you’re worried you might be late, you can leave early,” Dr. Marlow replied, far kinder.
“No, no, I’m just…” Tess stopped, shaking her head. “Dr. Morgan said she wanted to talk to me. I’m just a bit anxious about what exactly.”
“You know what,” Kai scoffed, but her words were drowned out by one of the sophomores.
“Oh my gosh! I’m so sorry! Did you accidently bump into her or mess something up!? Oh, she’s positively going to slaughter you! Dr. Marlow, we can’t let Tess go alone! She’s too at risk!”
“Hardly,” Kai mumbled.
“No, no, I’ll be alright,” Tess answered. “She doesn’t scare me. I’m just trying to figure out what she wants to talk to me about.”
Kai coughed, but Dr. Kemper noticed it was clearly directed at Tess, and there was definitely some inside joke going on between the two.
“I applaud you,” the other sophomore stated. “She scares the living daylights out of me, and I doubt those feelings are ever going to stop.”
“You should probably get going,” Dr. Marlow commented. “You’d hate to keep Dr. Morgan waiting.”
“Yes, I suppose I better,” Tess agreed, grabbing her stuff. “See you all later.”
Kai opened her mouth to say something but quickly yelped when Tess kicked her shin.
Tess had just arrived at Dr. Morgan’s closed office door, unable to knock even, when the door was jerked open in front of her. Dr. Morgan grabbed the front of her shirt by the fist and jerked the girl inside, shutting the door behind her. The woman turned her, attaching their lips as she gently pushed Tess’s backpack off her shoulders and to the ground. Then, she backed the girl up, navigated her around the coffee table, and shoved her down against the couch.
“Dr. Kemper and Dr. Marlow don’t know the meaning of a short and concise meeting,” Dr. Morgan growled against Tess’s neck. Tess moaned under her touch.
“Are you finished with your work for the day?” Tess stated, breathing heavily.
“Yes.”
“Good. Then let’s get out of here.”
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