Summer is the slowest time of the year. Even when I'm teaching, time passes at a snails pace.
The first summer session had just ended and I was working hard trying to get my grades done. It was Monday and I had two days to get them in before the registrars office started harassing me. At the same time, I had a couple of manuscripts out, one of which had been kicked back for revisions. Those had to be done by Friday. I'd toyed at the revisions, but had put them aside so I could plow through grading.
Typically, the building was quiet after 1:30. That's when I could plan on working without distraction. Well, that and when I'd come in really early. I can be scattered when distractions are present, so I like to come in and work when there are the fewest number of distractions.
It was almost 3 PM and I'd been in a zone. I had gotten through just over half of the final projects when my work was interrupted by a loud bang and crash from somewhere down the hall. I tried to re-focus and get back into grading, but the crash turned into laughter then music. Some kind of alternative punk rock crap. I took that as a sign I needed a break, assuming it was the student group down the hall who'd been given an office doing their bi-weekly rearranging.
I stepped around the corner to the department office and walked into the kitchen to grab a coke and root around the freezer for one of my frozen lunches.
"You're still here?" Sharron, the department secretary asked in a sarcastic tone.
"I need to get things done," I responded as I grabbed a Lean Cuisine and popped it into the microwave. "But the kids down the hall are being noisy as hell, so I think I'm going to have to call it quits." The microwave beeped, I grabbed my late lunch, and walked out of the office.
"Oh, sorry, I didn't know anyone else was around," said the woman standing in the entryway of the department office, next to Sharron's desk. "Was I being too loud?" she asked apologetically.
"Don't mind Kyle," Sharron said, "he gets cranky when grades are about due, especially if he hasn't had enough coffee. Kyle, this is Natalia. She's a the new visiting professor."
"Hi," she said, extending her hand. I set my lunch down, took a step towards her, and gently shook her hand. My blood sugar must have been low, but as I focused my attention on her, I don't know how I didn't instantly notice how gorgeous she was. Not in a traditional model-tv-magazine way, but in a geek-cool kind of way. "Natalia Avinbruch, nice to meet you."
"Kyle. Kyle Goodman. Nice to meet you as well, Natalia."
Natalia was about 5'9", must have weighed no more than 125, and was wearing a pair of well-worn and well-fitting Levis and a loose fitting red short sleeve shirt. Her hair was pulled back and covered by a pink and green scarf with strands of jet black hair escaping and falling intermittently across her forehead. Her skin was amazing. She was fair, but very olive-toned. A cross between a light skinned Arab and someone who is maybe Italian or maybe from southern Span. She didn't look any older than 23 or 24, and I not just been introduced to her as another faculty, I'd have assumed she was an undergrad or maybe a first year masters student.
We made small talk about the class I was wrapping up, her fall classes, and town and I excused myself to finish grading. "I'll try to keep the music down and not drop anything else," Natalia said playfully.
I finished grading and slid into writing. Next thing I knew, my phone beeped. I had a text message from my mom reminding me to double-check my flight info for a family trip next month. I looked up and saw that it was almost 7PM. "Shit," I muttered to myself, "I need to get something to eat." I got up, grabbed my laptop, notebook, a few folders, shoved them in my bag, and headed for the door.
As I absent-mindedly walked out of my office, I ran right into Natalia. "Shit, I'm sorry..." I spit out. "What are you still doing here? All set up?"
"Yeah," she said, almost a little too excited about it, "wanna see?"
"Sure," I said, following her to her office, one office down from mine. She stepped in and pushed the door all the way open. My eyes lingered a little to long on her ass, but when I broke contact and looked around the little office, all I could say was wow. "You are a cross between the most organized person I now know and an interior decorator." Everything was organized, many things were labeled, and in all the spaces not occupied by books or notebooks, she had amazing photographs of places, people, and lots of flowers.
She laughed a rich, but very cute, laugh and looked down. "I like to be set up before school starts. And I wanted to feel... at home," she said, smiling at her shoes.
Natalia had the cutest dimples. I now noticed that she had very beautiful freckles. They seemed to spawn from her nose across her cheeks, up her forehead, and down her neck. Aside from the ones on her nose, however, they were very faint. "You have a cute laugh... sorry... I don't mean to seem inappropriate..." I said, almost forgetting that she was a colleague and not someone I'd met at a bar or conference or something. "So, yeah, what are you still doing here?"
"Don't worry about being inappropriate. Sharron already warned me about you," she said mockingly. "And thanks. I meant to leave at 6:45, but missed the bus. So I figured I'd stay until 7:45, probably miss that bus, and end up walking."