"Remember the coursework's due in on Friday. The deadline's 2pm. I won't be accepting
any
excuses."
I felt my heart sink at my lecturer's words. I'd hardly gathered together enough material to write a 1000 word report, let alone the mammoth 6000 word essay that needed to be submitted. And it definitely needed to be submitted. I was barely scraping through as it was, teetering on the edge of failure. Another unsatisfactory module mark and my chances of progressing on to the second year were looking pretty bleak.
It's not that I couldn't cope with the content of the BA History course I'd joined the previous year in September. I was certainly bright enough. In fact with my A Level grades I'd probably sold myself short in picking my current university. I'd not chosen it on its academic merits or league table rankings though, I'd blindly followed my boyfriend there who'd bagged himself a full sports scholarship playing football whilst studying Sports Science. What I hadn't banked on was finding him in a compromising position with the student coach of the ladies volleyball team only a month into the first semester.
Things had swiftly gone downhill from there. All of a sudden poring over textbooks in the evening was replaced with downing shots in the Students Union bar. I told myself I was having fun, I was only young once, it was just the first term, I had plenty of time to buckle down and better my weak grades after Christmas, but unfortunately my first semester exam marks were a harsh wake up call. If I didn't pull my socks up I'd be out of the course and off campus by the time early summer rolled around. And then Professor Murphy came on to the scene...
Professor Thomas Murphy or Tom as he urged the students to call him was a recent addition to the Faculty staff. Fresh from his PhD studies and eager to teach, he'd fast become a firm favourite amongst both staff and students alike. He was friendly, enthusiastic and always took the time to explain the course content thoroughly. But it wasn't just his engaging teaching style which saw his module fast oversubscribed with keen students. He was drop dead gorgeous, and the flurry of excited whispers that had flowed around the lecture room when he'd stepped up to the lectern to deliver a short introduction on semester two options day had less to do with real excitement for the subject, and more to do with the tightness of his trousers and his piercing blue eyes. You could practically hear the collective sigh from most of the females in the room... and a few of the males too.
And now here I was, three weeks into the term, my self-made promises of turning over a new leaf looking more and more like empty vows as night after night I ventured out rather than taking my studies seriously. Not even the thought of impressing my attractive new Professor was enough to tempt me away from two-for-one cocktails at the Union club nights. In fact he'd been the main reason I'd been out until 2am in the morning the night before.
It had started innocently enough. Loud cheers and cheeky remarks as the usual gang of revellers from my hall of residence had spotted Tom and a male colleague enjoying a quiet early evening pint in the corner of a bar in the town centre. We'd all struck up banter backwards and forwards across the room until Tom had caved and agreed to join us all at the next bar in our planned pub crawl. Pint after pint had been sunk, and soon enough it was impossible to tell exactly who the responsible adult was. We'd all seen another side to Professor Murphy, a fun, reckless, impulsive side which only served to make him all the more attractive. If only I'd not had that last cocktail I probably would have been able to restrain myself.
I cringed internally as I recalled bumping into him as he was coming out of the toilets at the nightclub we'd all ended up at. How I'd grabbed the lapels of his shirt and backed him into the wall of the narrow corridor, showering him with compliments which he'd awkwardly rebuffed. If I'd left it at that I probably could have laughed it off, kept my head down for a few lectures and there would have been no harm done, but I hadn't. Spurred on by my drunken state and my worries about flunking the course, I did something bad. Something I wasn't going to recover from with a flushed face and an awkward apology.
I propositioned him.
One hand against the wall, the other toying with his belt buckle before slipping down to firmly caress between his legs as he looked back at me wide-eyed and disbelievingly.
"So... Sir," I'd slurred, voice thick with inebriation. "Is there
anything
I can do to help me pass your module this semester?"
I'd seen a spark of something in his eyes but it was only fleeting. He'd quickly recovered, firmly pushing me back, hands on my shoulders, spinning me around so I was now the one against the wall.
"Grace... you're drunk," he'd stated. "I'd think very carefully about your next actions if I were you or you're going to get yourself into a situation that's beyond your control."
"Ooh... d'ya like being in control then?" I'd giggled, pouting suggestively, reaching for him again.
He'd grabbed my wrists, hard, his grip firm as he pushed them back against the wall. "I mean it. Don't make me do something I'll regret."
His eyes flashed dangerously, boring into me for a long moment before he pushed himself back from the wall, releasing me and then stepping away, muttering that he was leaving.
I let him go.
It was supposed to be a warning, a show of his authority to deter me, but it didn't have the desired effect. In fact it did the exact opposite, and as I stumbled home and into bed that night all I could think of was his hands on my wrists, pinning me back against the wall. How it would feel if his lips had met mine and his body had pressed against me.
I fell asleep that night full of thoughts of him running through my head and I woke up just hours later, hungover and restless, my head pounding.
