Let Me Adore You (N.H.)

7

I knew I've crossed a line. Three days later and there was no other reaction than silence. It was the only thing Dr. Horan gave me.

No looks. No words. No punishment.

He didn't interact with me, he ignored me again. I couldn't take this anymore. What could've been so bad that he saw the need to treat me like I was non-existent?

He wasn't there today. I was in my room that evening, not sitting in this classroom with him. He has sent us a short email, telling us he had to attend an important meeting.

What meeting? What could've been more important than his lecture? What could've been more important than his students?

What could've been more important than me? How did I know if he was angry at me? After what I said during our last conversation, any other professor would've thrown me out of his lecture. But he said nothing.

The words he wrote in that email didn't tell me what he felt while writing it. What he could've thought in the process.

He left me in confusion, in fear, in despair. I wanted to see him, talk to him. Apologise. Now I talked with the walls surrounding me. He had cursed me. I would've never done something like this. He made me do it. Waiting for someone. Swallowing my pride. Putting someone over everything else.

He took over it, commanding me from afar. Did he even realise what he had done?

Being apart from him began to make me sick, made me question myself anew. It was worse than it was before. I wanted to do all that's possible to make him see me, to talk to me again.

How could I let this happen? How didn't I sense something was wrong?

This was his punishment. He knew how I reacted, he knew I admired him. But admiring him didn't mean I was allowed to cross borders, to step outside the line. That was his lesson for me. To realise and accept I was nothing more than the others that should've been with me in the room now.

A week later and I knew this is not about me. He was back. He didn't ignore me the way I expected him to. Because ignoring would still mean caring. He didn't care for me.

Yes, I was nothing more than the others, I knew that now. But ignoring me would've been better than letting me suffer like this. He called me to answer questions, commented my answers. Nothing more.

I saw that he looked away as fast as he could, if he looked at me at all. He saw me but didn't see me. I was ashamed of myself for making him so uncomfortable he couldn't even look at me properly.

Was I going mad? Was I imagining things?

I was one in this sea of students. No lighthouse, like he was one to me. I felt abandoned. I was an abandoned puppy. And Dr. Horan didn't send me away anymore, he continued walking passed me, leaving me whimpering and whining.

Concentrating was hard. I tried to work, to read everything there was to read. No words reached my brain. No conversation was interesting for me. There was nothing for me to think about.

I went to my lectures. I went to work. Nothing more I remembered. This didn't feel right. I walked around campus with my heart and my brain in my hands, trying not to let them fall to the ground, let them slip through my fingers. Still I couldn't ask myself if this wasn't a crush.

After two weeks, I gave up to catch his gaze, to stay a little bit longer.

After three weeks, I realised what I did.

I plagued him. Not bewitched him. How could I ever think he would've been interested in me? I was a student. I could've destroyed his career. And I was most definitely not someone worth that.

It was easier for me to continue with my daily routines now. Three weeks without interaction. He could've told me. Could've told me that he wanted me out of his life. If I ever was a part of it. He could've said one last goodbye.

This hurt more than every other rejection.

He knew it. And he couldn't do something about it, because what could he do? He was my professor. My teacher.

I was so stupid to believe those borders weren't there. That we were an exception. I thought I knew him. Or at least had a chance to get to know him. Nobody could. He didn't want it. He wanted to stay a secret. If someone came too close, he cut the ties. Snap. And I kept on weaving them, making more and more ties to connect us.

And I fell. I fell on my hands and knees for him. I thought my heart was made out of plastic or a gooey mass. It didn't beat for him. Not for a split second.

Then why did it hurt? Why wasn't it possible for me to run away? Why wasn't it possible for me to let go? He was in my mind, living there like I prisoner. I could've been the ward to let him go but I somehow lost the key and couldn't find it. I searched for many ways to try and break up the door of his cell with no avail.

After a month I was close to giving up.

Nothing changed and I was this faceless person in his world. I asked myself questions I wish I could've asked him. If this was all in my head, his glances, his sentences, if I had imagined it all to live my fantasy.

Then why did I feel so much?

I couldn't stop to yearn for his touch. I wanted him. He knew how to wrap me around his fingers. He loved how I complimented him, how I watched him with big eyes. Didn't he care anymore? It felt like I woke up from a dream. I wanted to go back to this world again that was so different than the real one. I wanted to go back even or because it could be gone forever. And I feared there would only be pieces left of this dream until it was all forgotten.

The last weeks and months were merely a projection of something I wished for deep inside. But I saw too much. I saw something completely different. Now that I was awake, I was ashamed. How could I think for a second there could've been more?

I searched for love and started to look in the wrong places. I guessed there were always side effects. And the bigger the act, the graver the side effects. It was time for me to dream another dream. One from I'd hopefully awake better.

Still I couldn't stop thinking about him. I needed him. 

Talk to me. Look at me. Please, I am right here.

It didn't get better, it got worse.

He should've never touched me. Talked to me like that. He should've never looked at me the way he did. And now he wanted to just walk away? He was a coward. He couldn't deal with a student so he left.

He looked at me again. In his lectures when nobody paid attention to the person he was looking at. I did. He was aware that I had what he needed. He started to miss it.

It should've never gotten this far. But I had to be close to him. He was my sun, warming me on a cold day. And how can you not like the sun?

Even if you get sunburnt, you still go out every day, taking in the sunshine, the warmth. You are captivated by its colours, in the way it bids you goodbye every evening.

Was there a way to love someone or something, but not as deeply? Could I adore him without getting hurt?

I know I crossed a line.  But he did too.

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Ouch.

That hurt me right where my heart should be.

We knew Dr. Horan has asshole potential but going this far? I'd love to know what's his reason...