'Of course,' Cassy said. She turned her attention back to the stony students and cleared her throat. 'Jonathan Sellers,' she called out. 'Perhaps you could start the discussion.'
'Sure,' Jonathan said agreeably.
Cassy let out an imperceptible sigh of relief.
'William Faulkner was a major American writer,' Jonathan said, trying to sound extemporaneous.
Cassy could tell he was reading off his LCD screen, but she didn't care. In fact, she was grateful for his resourcefulness.
'He's known for his vivid characterizations and, like, his convoluted style ... '
Tim Appleton sitting across from Jonathan tried vainly to suppress a laugh since he knew what Jonathan was doing.
'Okay,' Cassy said. 'Let's see how that applies to the story you all were asked to read for today.' She turned to the blackboard and wrote 'vivid characters' and next to it 'complex story structure.' Then she heard the door to the hall open and close. Glancing over she was relieved to see that gloomy Partridge had already departed.
Facing the class again she was pleased to see several hands up of people willing to get involved in a discussion. Before she called on one of them, Cassy gave Jonathan a tiny but grateful smile. She wasn't sure but she thought she caught a blush before the boy looked back down at his laptop.
3
11:15 A.M.
Olgavee Hall was one of the largest tiered lecture halls in the business school. Although not a graduate student, Beau had been given special permission to take an advanced marketing course that was extremely popular with the business school students. In fact, it was so popular it needed the seating capacity of Olgavee. The lectures were exciting and stimulating. The course was taught in an interactive style with a different professor each week. The downside was that each class required a lot of preparation. One had to be prepared to be called on at any moment.
But Beau was finding it uncharacteristically hard to concentrate at today's lecture. It wasn't the professor's fault. It was Beau's. To the dismay of his immediate neighbors as well as himself, he couldn't stop fidgeting in his seat. He'd developed uncomfortable aches in his muscles that made it impossible to get comfortable. On top of that he had a dull headache behind his eyes. What made everything worse was that he was sitting in the center of the hall four rows back and directly in the line of sight of the lecturer. Beau always made it a point to get to lecture early to get the best seat.
Beau could tell that the speaker was getting annoyed, but he didn't know what to do.
It had started on his way to Olgavee Hall. The first symptom had been a stinging sensation somewhere up inside his nose causing a wave of violent sneezes. It wasn't long before he was blowing his nose on a regular basis. Initially he'd thought he'd caught a cold. But now he had to admit that it had to be more. The irritation rapidly progressed from his sinuses into his throat, which was now sore, especially when he swallowed. To make matters worse, he began to cough repeatedly, which hurt his throat as much as swallowing.
The person sitting directly in front of Beau turned and gave him a dirty look after Beau let out a particularly explosive cough.
As time dragged on, Beau became particularly bothered by a stiff neck. He tried to rub his muscles, but it didn't help. Even the lapel of his jacket seemed to be exacerbating the discomfort. Thinking that the leadlike object in his pocket might be contributing, Beau took it out and put it on the desk in front of him. It looked odd, sitting on his notes. Its perfectly round shape and exquisite symmetry suggested it was a manufactured piece, yet Beau had no idea if it was. For a moment he thought that perhaps it could have been a futuristic paperweight, but he dismissed the idea as too prosaic. More probable was that it was a tiny sculpture, but he truly wasn't sure. Vaguely he wondered if he should take it over to the geology department to inquire if it could be the result of a natural phenomenon like a geode.
Musing about the object made Beau examine the minute wound on the tip of his index finger. It was now a red dot in the center of a few millimeters of pale, bluish skin. Surrounding that was a two-millimeter halo of redness. To the touch it was mildly sore. It felt like a doctor had poked him with one of those strange little lancets they used to get a small blood sample.
A shaking chill interrupted Beau's thoughts. The chill was followed by a sustained bout of coughing. When he finally got his breath, he acknowledged the futility of attempting to last through the lecture. He wasn't getting anything out of it, and on top of that he was bothering his fellow students and the lecturer.
Beau gathered his papers, slipped his putative mini-sculpture back into his pocket, and stood up. He had to excuse himself multiple times to move laterally along the row. Because of the narrow space his exit caused a significant commotion. One student even dropped his looseleaf notebook which opened and sent its contents wafting down into the pit.
When Beau finally got to the aisle, he caught a glimpse of the lecturer shielding his eyes so as to see who was making all the fuss. He was one person Beau wasn't going to ask for a letter of recommendation.
Feeling emotionally as well as physically exhausted at the end of the school day, Cassy made her way down the main stairs of the high school and exited out into the horseshoe drive in front. It was pretty clear to her that from a teaching standpoint she liked elementary school much better than high school. From her perspective high- schoolers generally seemed too self-centered and too interested in constantly challenging their boundaries. She even thought a number of them were downright mean. Give me an innocent, eager third-grader any day, Cassy reflected.
The afternoon sun felt warm on Cassy's face. Shielding her eyes with her hand, she scanned the multitude of vehicles in the drive. She was looking for Beau's 4X4. He insisted on picking her up each afternoon, and was usually waiting for her. Obviously today was different.
Looking for a place to sit, Cassy saw a familiar face waiting nearby. It was Jonathan Sellers from Mrs. Edelman's English class. Cassy walked over and said hello.
'Oh, hi,' Jonathan stammered. He nervously glanced around, hoping he wasn't being observed by any classmates. He could feel his face blush. The fact of the matter was, he thought Cassy was the best-looking teacher they'd ever had and had told Tim as much after class.
'Thanks for breaking the ice this morning,' Cassy said.
'It was a big help. For a moment I was afraid I was at a funeral, my funeral.'
'It was just lucky I'd tried to see what it said about Faulkner in my laptop.'
'I still think it took a bit of courage on your part to say something,' Cassy said. 'I appreciated it. It certainly got the ball rolling. I was afraid no one would speak.'
'My friends can be jerks at times,' Jonathan admitted.
A dark blue minivan pulled up to the curb. Nancy Sellers leaned across the front seat and popped open the passenger-side door.
'Hi, Mom,' Jonathan voiced with a little self-conscious wave.
Nancy Sellers's bright, intelligent eyes jumped back and forth between her seventeen-year-old son and this rather sexy college-age woman. She knew his interest in girls had suddenly mushroomed, but this situation seemed a wee bit inappropriate.
'Are you going to introduce me to your friend?' Nancy asked.
'Yeah, sure,' Jonathan said, eyeing the crack in the sidewalk. 'This is Miss Winthrope.'
Cassy leaned forward and stuck out her hand. 'Nice to meet you, Mrs. Sellers. You can call me Cassy.'
'Cassy it is then,' Nancy replied. She shook Cassy's outstretched hand. There was a short but awkward pause before Nancy asked how long Cassy and Jonathan had known each other.
'Mommmm!' Jonathan moaned. He knew instantly what she was implying, and felt mortified. 'Miss Winthrope is a student teacher in English class.'
'Oh, I see,' Nancy remarked with mild relief.
'My mom is a research virologist,' Jonathan said to change the subject and help explain how she could say something so stupid.
'Really,' Cassy said. 'That's certainly an interesting and important field in today's world. Are you at the University Med Center?'
