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Author's Note: This is my first story, and it was written for someone special and uploaded at their request. Feedback is appreciated.
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The lecture hall was more crowded than it had been for any lecture during the whole term, with many faces that Professor Kelli had never even seen before. As always, the final day's review drew the full complement of students hoping to learn the entire Biology course in just a few hours.
"It really is a shame," thought Professor Kelli, "that all of these students are taking my course to base their entire grade on a two hour review and some PowerPoint slides."
Nevertheless, Professor Kelli worked her way through the presentation that she had prepared; highlighting the key points of the term and letting the students know what topics would be important to study.
"I only wish that they had come to the lectures for these topics rather than trying to learn from the textbook," Kelli lamented as she answered another question that had been covered thoroughly earlier in the term.
Eventually, Professor Kelli could tell that the allotted time for the review session was running out by the sound of many students closing their books and zippering their backpacks. Glancing up at the clock, Kelli noticed that the students were packing up even earlier than usual, probably a byproduct of frustration at listening to the questions of the other students and of the beautiful, early spring weather outside. Kelli realized that she was losing the attention of the students, so she hurried through the last few slides, leaving a few students waving their hands frantically to get their questions answered.
Reaching the final slide, Kelli announced aloud, "Well, that is the end of the review. These slides will be posted online later tonight, and if you have any specific questions, the TAs will both be having extended walk-in hours this afternoon. But remember, they will not explain the entire course to you. You should have attended the lectures if you wanted full explanations of all of the topics. Now, you are all free to go."
As the students made their usual mad rush for the doors, Kelli went over to the podium to pack up her teaching materials. While doing so, she noticed one student leaving much more slowly than the others. He seemed to be indecisive about something, glancing down the aisle toward the front of the lecture hall with every few steps. At the top of the stairs, he paused, turned around and took one single step back towards the front of the room. However, after that single step, he seemed to reconsider, and like the rest of the students, filed out of the doors into the hallway.
Kelli thought about what she had just seen; she recognized the young man as one of the few students that had attended every one of her lectures, so surely he had a firm grasp of the material.
"Why would he of all people be the last one to leave the lecture hall," Kelli thought, "out of all of the students I would think he would want to be one of the first to get out of this boring review."
Those thoughts soon passed, though, and Kelli headed out of the lecture hall to her office. Having TAs cover the office hours prior to the final exam gave her the chance to get away from all of the questions from students who were trying to learn a whole term of material in just a few days and to prepare for the rush of students complain about their grades once the exam had been taken. Kelli needed this time to prepare herself for the desperate students begging for their grades as she loved the subject she taught, and always grew depressed at the end of the term when she saw all of the students giving her class so little attention.
Kelli sat down at her desk, leaned back in her chair, and let out a deep sigh.
"Another term down," Kelli sighed to herself. "I just wish the students would take my course more seriously during the term so they wouldn't stress out so much now."
Kelli was still sitting at her desk, deep in thought, when she heard a gentle knock on her office door. It was so quiet, that at first she was not sure if actually someone had actually knocked. But sure enough, after about a minute there was another knock. It was barely louder, but there was no doubt that there was someone at the door.
This surprised Kelli, as she was not expecting anyone to be looking for her since her TAs were having their office hours down the hall. She expected that it was a student trying to skip the lines to ask her to explain a whole chapter of the book, or to ask her a thousand questions about the content of the exam, so she ignored the knock hoping the person would leave. However, after another minute, there was a ever-so-slightly louder knock.
By now, Kelli was curious to see who was being so persistent in trying to reach her, so she went over to her door and looked between the posted papers on the glass. The person that she saw was not the impatient student clutching her printed slides and a textbook that she expected. Instead, it was the young man who she had noticed at her lecture. By this point, he had taken a few steps back from the door, and was glancing at the door to the stairs down the hallway every few seconds. But rather than walking away, he timidly approached the door again and raised his hand to knock.
Kelli opened the door and addressed him, saying "Out of all the students in my class, Cody, I least expected you to be the one to search me out for help with the exam."
"Oh," he said, "ummm, well I don't really need any help with the exam. Your lectures had all of the information that I think I will need to do well."
"So why are you here then?" said Kelli, who was confused that a student would seek her out for any reason other than help with her class, especially one that had not spoken a word to her for the entire course."
"Well, umm, I just wanted to speak to you about something," Cody said unsurely, "but if you are too busy right now than I understand and will leave."
Kelli saw him shift his feet as though he was preparing to leave, but she was very curious as to what he wanted to speak about, so she said "No, I am not too busy to talk to you right now. Please come in and have a seat."
She returned behind her desk and sat down, and as she did so he cautiously entered the office and closed the door behind him.
After he took a seat across from her, Kelli asked, "So what would you like to talk to me about? I don't think you have spoken a word to me the entire term, so I was very surprised to see you here now and not asking about the exam."
Cody said, "Well, I really enjoyed your class Professor..."
"Kelli. Please..." she interrupted.