Ashley braced herself as she headed up to Professor Stevens' desk. His note, "See me after class" under the D- she had managed to acquire on her European Literature midterm left her panicking. She had known that she needed to get a good grade on this exam, especially since she hadn't managed to get anything over a C on the other two tests she had already taken. She had driven herself crazy studying for the midterm and thought she had done really well. But as it turns out, she had messed up horribly on two of the essays (both worth twenty points each), and the solemn red D- was a painful reminder of that.
Hesitantly, she inched her way towards his desk, which was at the front of the huge lecture hall that accomodated 120 students at once. She silently cursed herself for blowing this exam as the other students were filing out of the classroom. She knew she would have to try to arrange for extra credit or something, because she was at the university on a full scholarship, which was the only way her parents could possibly afford to pay for such a prestigious university.
"Hi, Professor Stevens." she said nervously as she approached his desk. He was putting away his lecture notes, and looked up at her.
"Hello, Miss Winters," he began. "Glad you could meet with me."
Her heart began to beat loudly in her chest, afraid that he would not be able to offer a solution that would allow her to raise her grade. "I realize that my grades in this class have not been ideal, Professor, but I know that --"
He held his hand up to stop her, and she stopped obediently and looked down, afraid to meet his eyes. "I have my office hours now," he explained, beginning to start putting his things in his shoulder bag. "And there will be another class coming in now that will need to use this room. Do you have a class now, or are you free to discuss your grade at my office? We can work together to think of a way to improve your grade."
Ashley breathed a sigh of relief. "Yes, I'm free." she said, "This is my last class of the day."
So together they walked across the campus to the building where all the professors' offices were located. Outside, it was a cold winter day, and even though it was only 4:30, it was already beginning to get dark. They reached his office, which was a fairly decent sized room, with bookshelves filled with books and a huge oak desk which was covered by papers and lecture notes.
He sat down in his leather desk chair and motioned that she take the other chair in front of the desk, which she did. She removed her heavy winter jacket to reveal the red low-cut v-neck shirt and moderately lengthed black skirt that she had on underneath.
He grinned to himself. He had played this scene out so many times with other female students over the years that he could almost do it in his sleep. "Well," he began his familiar speech, "Your midterm is worth 30% of your final grade, and you already have two C's."
She began to feel nervous again. In order to keep her scholarship and therefore stay at the university, she would need to maintain a 3.0 GPA - and with this literature grade, she would need an A or an A- in her four other classes. That, she realized, was very doubtful. "Is there some kind of extra credit I can do? Like a paper?"
He shook his head. "I'm sorry, Ashley, but I don't give extra credit." he said, pretending to be sad about it.
Ashley stared at him in disbelief. "But, I thought you said we could work out a way to bring up my grade!" she protested.
"Well, there is one way." he said, winking at her.
All at once, she realized what he meant. "Oh my god, that's gross!" she said. "I can't do that."
