A low chime called out and the screen on her phone lit up with a notification, twenty minutes until the lecture started, that meant the current class ended in five.
She absentmindedly started gathering some of the things from her desk, so that she could leave more quickly when the class ended. Not that she disliked the class or such, it was an interesting enough subject and a good teacher. Actually, a very good teacher.
Her other teachers were all either young recent graduates with no real teaching experience who barely knew more than her or aged men and women phoning it in when they taught so they could go back to whatever they really wanted to do in academia. Not this one though.
Older than her and the young recent graduates who taught, but not actually old, clearly having experience in both teaching as well as the subject matter. On top of that a clear passion that was infectious to everyone except the really stubbornly lazy or disinterested in the classroom.
Or maybe she was kidding herself, making it more than it really was, and looking for reasons other than thinking he was handsome as to why she thought him a good teacher.
Now that she thought about it, it struck her that there were a higher ratio of girls in this class than in the program she studied. Also that most of the ones not seemingly swept up with the teacher's passion were guys. Or maybe that was just coincidence, who knows, and frankly she didn't really care. What was important was that she liked the classes he held.
As she thought that, his gaze moved across the classroom and seemingly, at least to her, settled on her for a moment before moving on. That thick lustrous hair, that tweed jacket with leather elbow patches, those intense and intelligent eyes of his. Oh, who was she kidding, maybe she did have a little bit of a schoolgirl crush on him?
Blinking back into reality, she realised she had lost herself in thought for a moment and missed the last few sentences of what was said. She peeked over to her deskmate's notes but to her dismay saw only a blank sheet, the girl supposed to write stuff down resting her head on her hands and just listening to the teacher.
She nudged her deskmate slightly and whispered "I missed that last part, what did he say?" but only received a shush and a slight glare as a reply before the girl turned her head back to the teacher.
Well, hopefully it wasn't too important, and he looked to be wrapping up anyway so was probably just some closing remark. He looked over at the classroom clock, single minutes left still, and told the class that was all he had for today but that he would be available a few more minutes if anyone had any questions.
As she packed up her things and got ready to leave she heard his voice say her name and looked up. "Please stay behind for a bit, have something I need to talk with you about." he said before turning back to a student asking him a question.
She tensed up, what was this about, what did he want with her? Nervously she pretended to be looking over the things she had put in her bag, trying to buy some time and look busy.
After very pointlessly opening the bag, moving some things around without actually changing anything, she looked up and saw the classroom empty except for herself and two of her female classmates up by the desk talking to the teacher. She slowly shuffled up there, listening in to the conversation taking place.
It might have started out relating to the class but seemed more like an excuse by the students to talk to the teacher at this point. The teacher stopped the conversation, apologised to the students saying he had to 'take this' and promised they could continue next class. Obviously disappointed, the girls shot her a hostile glare as they unwillingly left the classroom, leaving her now alone with the teacher.
He turned over to the whiteboard and started to wipe it clean for the next class as he asked her "Do you have another class now? Straight after this? What we need to talk about might take a while and best to do it in one session rather than many.".
She, nervously, explained she had a lecture in fifteen minutes and then a short class after that, saying she could stay for maybe five minutes before she had to leave for the next class.
He nodded in understanding and said "Ok, well, that won't be enough time then. This is important though so could you make your way to my office at the end of the day after classes?".
She bemoaned this internally, she didn't really want to stick around at the university after the last class today, the last class would be done by 18 and it was a Friday after all.
Picking up on her silent unwillingness to stick around that late on a Friday he said to her "Look, I know it sucks and all but trust me you want this handled today and not later.".
This whole thing was starting to make her nervous, what the hell was this all about? She tried to get him to give her some clue as to what it was regarding but he refused, simply repeating that it wasn't the kind of thing you wanted to handle in multiple sittings.
Finally she agreed, she would come by his office after classes, and got some directions from him on where it was located before she went to her lecture.
She hurried across campus to the lecture hall, getting there single minutes before it started and sat down at a seat some of her classmates had reserved for her. As she settled in some of them asked why he had kept her after class. Her reply that she didn't really know why but she needed to see him after classes today was full of frustration, explaining she didn't even know if it was good or bad.
Her friends sympathised with her, especially since they were all going out tonight for some fun and this made it unclear if she could participate. Of course they were going to go ahead as before but hopefully she could join up with them when she got free.
The day went by slowly. She felt like it was a bad thing she was being summoned for, if not then why couldn't it wait? And why did it have to happen on a Friday evening and he wouldn't tell her what it was about?
And today of all days, she was meant to go out with her girlfriends, let her hair down and blow off some steam. It had been a while since she broke up with her ex and she felt like cleansing her palette of that jerk. She would prefer to chase after her taste of the month in the presence of her friends so they could warn of any red flags they saw and run support for her, tonight would have been perfect for that.