Chapter 1: The Reading
The air in the literature classroom was wrong. It always was, but today it was a thick, sweet poison. Old paper and dust were supposed to be the smells here. Instead, it was vanilla and ozone, the kind of sharp, expensive perfume that cuts through a room and leaves a chemical burn in the back of your throat. My throat was tight. The ten women in the semicircle of honey-toned desks were a blur of focused faces, all turned toward me. The single overhead light felt like a surgical lamp.
I was at the front. My turn to present.
Professor Davies watched from her chair by the window, her posture so straight it looked like her spine had been replaced with a steel rod. Her dark hair was a perfect, severe knot at the nape of her neck. The summer sun streamed in, highlighting the fine lines around her piercing blue eyes. She didn’t blink.
“Mr. Ellis,” she said. Her voice was cool, clear, like water over stone. “We’re waiting.”
I looked down at the text in my hands, my copy of Labyrinths. The words swam. My palms were slick. I opened my mouth, began reciting my analysis of the Liebermann variations, but my own voice sounded distant, tinny. The heat started in my chest, a low, embarrassed burn, and began its inevitable crawl up my neck. I could feel it, the betrayal of my own blood.
“Someone’s blushing,” a voice sang out from the front row.
Bethany. Of course. Her blonde hair was a shiny helmet, her smile a knife. She didn’t look away when my eyes flicked to her. She held the stare, her gaze dropping for a fraction of a second before meeting mine again, her grin widening.
The heat erupted into a full inferno across my face. I stumbled over a sentence.
“Is the text causing you some distress, Mr. Ellis?” Professor Davies asked. There was no concern in it. It was a clinical question, a biologist prodding a specimen.
“N-no. It’s just warm.”
A soft, warmer voice chimed in from the doorway. Professor Moreau. She was leaning against the frame, having slipped in quietly. Psychology was her domain, and she observed every interaction like data. Her auburn hair cascaded over her shoulder, a stark contrast to Davies’ rigid bun. Her smile was kind, but her eyes were everywhere.
“It is quite warm in here,” she said, her tone gentle. “Your face is practically glowing, Daniel. Are you feeling alright?”
The use of my first name was a needle. Davies never used first names. Moreau’s feigned sympathy was worse than Bethany’s mockery. It added a layer of disarming concern that made the scrutiny feel even more intimate, more violating.
“I’m fine,” I managed, my voice cracking.
“He doesn’t look fine,” Bethany murmured to the girl next to her, just loud enough.
I tried to shift my stance, to adjust the fall of my khakis, but any movement felt exaggerated, obvious. The fabric seemed to rasp against my skin. The text in my hands was my only shield, but it was translucent. I knew what they saw. A boy, burning up, fumbling. The more I tried to will it away, the more acute the awareness became, a humiliating feedback loop broadcasted to the entire room.
Davies stood up. The movement was smooth, silent. She walked toward me, her heels clicking a slow, deliberate rhythm on the hardwood. The vanilla and ozone scent intensified. She stopped an arm’s length away. Her blue eyes weren’t on my face anymore. They were fixed on the open book in my hands, which I was holding stiffly, strategically, in front of me.
The room held its breath.
She reached out, not for the book, but with two fingers. She didn’t touch me. She tapped the air, a precise inch from the straining fabric of my pants.
“The physical response to literature is often undervalued,” she stated, her voice carrying in the dead silence. It wasn’t a whisper. It was a lecture. “A visceral, autonomic reaction. Fear, arousal, disgust. The body confessing what the mind attempts to curate.”
My blood turned to ice water. The heat on my face remained, a cruel mask.
“Can you articulate,” she continued, her eyes finally rising to meet mine, “which of Borges’s themes is eliciting this particular… physiological commentary?”
A stifled giggle came from the semicircle. It was choked off instantly, but it echoed. Bethany was leaning forward, her chin in her hand, utterly captivated. Moreau watched from the doorway, her head tilted, that curious, analytic smile still playing on her lips.
I had no words. My mouth was desert-dry. The text was a forgotten artifact in my hands. All cognition had narrowed to a single, screaming point of exposure.
Davies leaned in slightly. For a horrifying, electric second, I thought she was going to say something privately. Instead, she spoke clearly for the class to hear.
“See me after the session, Mr. Ellis. Dismissed.”
The final word wasn’t for me. It was for the class. The spell broke. Chairs scraped, bags were zipped, low conversation bubbled up. The women filed out, each one passing me. Some averted their eyes. Some didn’t. Bethany gave me a long, slow, knowing look as she passed, her bag swinging.
Moreau was the last to leave the doorway. She offered a small, almost sympathetic shrug before turning away, the sound of her footsteps fading down the hall.
Then it was just me, and her, and the humming lights.
Professor Davies had returned to her desk, sorting papers. She didn’t look up. “Close the door.”
I moved like a marionette, my limbs stiff. The click of the latch was horrifically final. The sterile room felt like a sealed chamber.
“Sit,” she said, nodding to the chair facing her desk.
I sat. The worst of the physical reaction was fading, leaving a hollow, shaky nausea in its wake. The shame, however, was a solid, permanent weight.
She finished organizing her papers into a neat stack. She placed her palms flat on the desk and finally looked at me. The severity of her gaze was absolute.
“What you experienced today is not unique,” she began, her tone devoid of any warmth the statement might imply. “It is a biological accident. A misfire of stimulus and response. However, context is everything. This is a classroom. A space of intellectual discipline. Your lack of control became a disruption. It introduced an… unseemly variable.”
“I’m sorry,” I whispered. The words were ash.
“Apologies are the currency of the ill-prepared.” She leaned back in her chair, studying me. “Your analysis of the Borges, before you became distracted, was competent. You have a capable mind, Mr. Ellis. It seems your body is undermining it.”
I had no response. I just stared at the gleaming grain of her mahogany desk.
“This cannot happen again,” she stated. “Not in my classroom. Do you understand?”
I nodded.
“Verbal acknowledgement, please.”
“Yes, Professor Davies.”
“Good.” She paused, her eyes trac