Night Shift

03.

I FEEL VINCENT'S eyes on me as I scan the books in front of us.

"Well, what are you in the mood for?" I pluck a few off the shelf—Byron, Wordsworth, Blake—and stack them in the crook of my arm for his approval. "Some poetry by an old white man, or some poetry by an old white man?"

Vincent doesn't laugh at my joke. Instead, he takes the Byron off the top and flips it over to scrutinize the back cover.

My eyes catch on Vincent's hand. It's nearly twice as large as mine and moves with a confidence and agility that is, unfortunately, super fucking hot. If this was a romance novel, Vincent Knight would be the hero. There's no argument. He's tall, broad-shouldered, dark-haired and handsome in the most wicked of ways. He could be the mafia renegade, the alpha of the pack, the cutthroat billionaire—he could scoop me up with his good arm, pin my back to a bookshelf deep in the stacks, and fill me. He'd whisper dirty things to me, too. Not lines out of a bad porno, but poetry. Words of passion.

But this isn't a romance novel. And if the way Vincent is frowning down at Lord Byron's compiled works is any indication, I don't think I should expect any poetry from him.

Stop thinking about sex, you miserable little shit.

"That was a joke, by the way," I say, eager to fill the silence. "Everyone knows the best poets of the nineteenth century are women."

Vincent hands the Byron back to me.

"Do you have anything—" he hesitates, "—simpler than this?"

"I'm afraid Dr. Seuss is twentieth century American."

Vincent cuts me an annoyed look. I tip my chin up, refusing to apologize.

"Look," he grumbles, "I'm sorry. My wrist is killing me, I haven't slept right all week, and I'm way out of my comfort zone with this—this poetry shit." I think there are twin spots of pink blooming on his cheeks, but surely it's only a trick of the light. "English was never my best subject."

I slot the three books back on the shelf.

"A lot of people struggle with it," I admit. "Especially poetry. Which honestly isn't surprising, given the way it's taught."

Vincent snorts bitterly. "I hated high school English. I was shit at it. I almost had to sit out basketball my freshman year because my teacher was going to fail me for not memorizing a Shakespeare poem." He cuts another sideways glance at me. "I got my grades up, obviously. I'm not an idiot."

"Just because poetry never clicked for you doesn't mean you're an idiot. Poetry is—it's almost like another language. It doesn't matter if you can recite every word from memory. Learning a bunch of vocabulary won't do you any good if you don't learn the grammar and cultural context, too."

If Vincent finds my monologue embarrassingly pretentious, he doesn't say anything. His eyes are patient. Locked in. His attentiveness gives me the confidence to keep going. I run my eyes over the rows of books in front of us, then pluck a familiar and very thick tome—Engman's Anthology, Twelfth Edition with Extended Prologue—off the shelf and flick through it until I find the section on Elizabeth Barrett Browning.

"Okay, this one's good," I say, tapping the page with my fingertip.

Vincent shifts closer to read over my shoulder. I hold myself very still, determined neither to flinch away nor lean into the heat of his large body.

"If thou must love me," he reads, warm breath ghosting over my collarbone and the back of my outstretched hand.

"It's a sonnet," I say, pulling my hand into a fist. "Fourteen lines, iambic pentameter. Very easy to spot. The trick with sonnets is usually to watch for a turn towards the end. Sometimes it's in the last couplet—the last two lines—if the rest of the poem is split into three quatrains—"

"That's four lines, right?"

I glance up at Vincent. It's a mistake. He's so close I can see freckles on the bridge of his nose and a little white scar just under his right eyebrow. His eyes aren't on the poem. They're on me.

"Um, yes." I clear my throat and consult the book again. "Four lines. But see, this is a Petrarchan sonnet. One octave and a sestet. So the turn is in the sestet—those last six lines."

"If thous must love me, let it be for nought," Vincent reads the first line.

"Except for love's sake only," I continue. The air around us slows and the world narrows to this one corner of the library. I read the rest of the sonnet out loud, tripping over a few words as I go, but Vincent doesn't snicker or correct me. He's silent. Reverent. It feels sacred, somehow, to read the work of a woman long dead in a chapel built to honor words and their makers.

"...But love me for love's sake, that evermore thou mayst love on, through love's eternity."

There is a moment of silence—a shared breath—after I read the last line.

Then Vincent asks, "So what does it mean, Professor?"

I laugh in a quiet exhale, thankful he's the one who's broken the tension.

"Elizabeth wrote this for her husband. She doesn't want to be loved for reasons that can be damaged by time—like beauty, or intelligence, or even shared experiences. I love her for her smile—her look—her way of speaking gently. She doesn't want that. Those things fade. She wants to be loved for the sake of love. And she doesn't explain what that means—just that she wants a love that isn't subject to any change."

Vincent steps back, the heat of his body lingering for a moment before I'm cold again. I shut the anthology and turn to face him.

"Shit," he says, a genuinely stunned smile tugging at his lips. "You're good."

His words send a flood of heat through my body. I think I'm damp between my legs. It's humiliating—that one silly little compliment can have such a strong effect on me. That one kind word said in a quiet corner of the library can make me feel like I'm on fire.

"That's why they pay me the big bucks," I joke, my voice weak as I shove the book at Vincent. "Well, actually, I make minimum wage. Although we get an extra buck an hour for the night shift, which is pretty sweet."

Vincent weighs Engman's Anthology in his good hand like he's considering something. "How late do you work?"

For the life of me, I can't tell why he's asking.

"Um, I should get out of here before five. I mean, assuming whoever has the morning shift isn't a total dick and actually gets here on time."

Vincent lets out a low whistle. "Jesus. That's rough. How often do you have to work nights?"

"I usually volunteer to take Fridays," I say with a shrug.

"Why would you do that?" he asks, sounding almost affronted. "Everyone knows all the best parties are on Friday."

"I'm not a big fan of parties. I mean, I definitely like drinking with friends, but I'm more low key about it. Crowds make me—I don't know." I shiver at the thought of deafening music and dark rooms packed tight with bodies. "But I have a social life. I party, in my own way. My roommates and I do wine and movie nights every Thursday and boozy brunches on Sundays."

The corner of Vincent's mouth tugs up in a knowing smile.

"So, on Thursdays and Sundays, you party."

"Yep."

He nods. "And on Fridays, you sit behind that front desk reading porn."