Professor, Professor || BWAM

the sixteenth.

As I gather up the midterm papers, I feel Adeola's eyes stabbing daggers into my back.

She's staying behind again, why?

The amount of times that I had to wipe my clammy palms inside my pockets during class. She was staring at me the whole time.

Oh, why does she make me so nervous?

She usually just keeps her head down, taking her notes, almost never stopping to glance up at me. She looks at the board more than she's ever looked at me.

Sometimes I think that if I wasn't the professor of this class, she wouldn't even know that I exist.

But today, it was like she was surveying me.

"I can get those." Her voice rings out sweetly.

She's still so nice to me even after the way I treated her in the beginning. I wish I could take it all back now. She's actually been so helpful and hasn't augmented my routine at all, if anything she's made it more efficient.

"That's very kind of you, Miss Adebayo. Thank you."

I hear her chair push back against the floor as she gets up and comes behind me, "It's just part of my job."

The skin of our hands connect for a brief moment as she slowly slides the paper out from between my fingers. Her head tilts back as she scales my upper body then looks at my face.

There it is.

That look.

Those eyes. Deep amber puddles of lust.

No, no. Stop. I'm not doing this again.

But she unravels me so easily. I can't lie, I do enjoy these little games that we play but I can't make any sudden moves. She might shrink away if I'm not careful enough. On top of that, she still makes me so incredibly nervous. I can only give her a well-intentioned nudge.

"Is there something else that you want, Miss Adebayo?"

It's vague, yet open-ended enough for her to do what she wants with it.

But she just shakes her head.

No, I'm losing her.

She continues looking into me, looking all over my face curiously. I suppose it is the first time she's seen me without my mask. Are you disappointed? Am I not what you expected, Adeola? Is it the beard? You don't like it, do you?

A sudden heavy rush of shame washes over me and I feel an innate, almost instinctual, urge to hide away.

I know she's probably disgusted by the fact that I'm so close to her, so I take a couple steps back, "Well, then. You're free to go after you pick up the papers. It's time for me to do my afternoon prayers."

I feel guilty for being dishonest but she makes me so nervous, I need to shut this down before I mess up and say something absolutely ridiculous. The way she lays her eyes upon me stirs up emotions that I can't describe and memories that I wish to forget.

She steps towards me, "Why are you lying to me, Dr. Kazem?"

My heart stops for a moment too long between beats, "What?"

"Yeah..." she looks at the face of her golden watch, "Dhuhr isn't for another couple of hours." Then she looks at my face with her golden eyes.

I don't know how I thought that that would work. I forget how intelligent she is.

She steps even closer to me, "I may not be Muslim but nearly half the population of Nigeria is, so I'm pretty familiar with Islam."

I watch her lips as she forms every word and I can only think about one thing.

"Of course, I apologize. I'm not trying to rush you out of here or anything it's just that...I'm not used to you staying after class. I didn't want you to feel obligated to stick around and talk to me, so I wanted to give you an easy out. But, now I see that that was unnecessary and really silly of me."

She giggles childishly, "No worries. I was afraid that you were trying to run me out."

You want to stay around longer? Oh, Adeola.

༄

After she takes up the papers, she stacks them up on my desk. Organizing them beforehand of course. She does everything before I even ask.

How do you always know what to do?

She gathers up her things and starts to head for the door.

She's leaving... say something!

"Uh...thank you for your help, Miss Adebayo."

"Don't thank me. It's my job."

"Well, you do a great job. I'm going to miss you," she looks at me strangely for a moment.

No! No, no, wait.

"I mean, I'm going to miss you helping me out around the classroom."

Her expression melts into a smile and she nods.

Oh, thank goodness.

"I'm going to miss you too..." she simpers. My heart stops like an unexpected record scratch. What did she just say?

"You know," she chuckled, "I thought you hated me."

No, Adeola. I don't! It was a mistake, it was my fault. It was all my fault. Can't you see me?

"But..." she bites her lip, "Seems like I was all wrong about you."

So, you do see me? You know! Oh, you clever girl.

"See you soon, Kazem," she smirks, then just like that, she's gone.