Tea with Dr. Ricman

*What are the fucking odds?*

Imogen clomped down the hall in her Doc Marten knock-offs, sheaf of black hair in her eyes, humming something in a minor key. Outside she could hear the party still going strong -- endless talk and laughter over endless grinding dance music.

*Halloween or not, I've got a midterm in six hours, and if I can't make some tea I'll never get to sleep.*

She turned a corner and paused at the window. In the courtyard, four floors below, a girl from her art history class was passed out under a hedge. Drunk as a skunk. Not more than three feet away, a hundred kids danced in little subcircles like a Ven diagram.

*Knock yourselves out. It's good for the curve.*

There was a shuffle close to her. Imogen turned to find Dr. Rickman appear at the opposite end of the hall, walking toward her with exaggerated slow purpose like a deep sea diver.

"Dr. Rickman?"

He was dazed, and white as marble, but he stiffened at her voice. His hair was as black as hers, and looked six weeks overdue for a cut. His eyebrows were too heavy and his nose was too long. He was depressed and absent and profound. And he was older -- too old to be attracted to, though she was, and he knew it, and she knew he knew it.

"Out of the dorm, Miss Moreau?"

His voice passed through her like she'd missed a step and fallen. She shifted -- she was still dressed from her brief party appearance, in a short shirt and skirt that would never pass dress code. The hall was dim, and the party lights picked up the unshaven down on her thighs.

"I was trying to make tea, but the microwave on my hall is broken," she said.

"Oh." He gestured her forward, strangely, too slow. "You can use the teacher's lounge."

"Really?" Imogen passed him, keeping her distance. Keeping up appearances. "Thank you."

One-minute-forty-five-seconds on the microwave and START. It kicked up with a hum and amber glow. Behind her, she heard a hollow click, and she turned to find Dr. Rickman standing by the door. Now closed.

Imogen took a look around, nonchalant. "I've never been in the teacher's lounge before."

"It's not very impressive," he said.

She smiled and dropped her head, sending black bangs into her eyes. "Yeah, I was gonna say."

"It does have one nice feature," said Dr. Rickman, leading her to the windows over the sink. "We get a pretty good view."

Imogen peered out, and he was right -- a nice, straight shot of the whole courtyard. Almost directly under the window, Drunk Art History Girl dragged an equally drunk boy to a stone bench and kissed him hard.

*That's kinda nice. She always had a thing for him.*

She leaned far over the sink to see, and felt cool air on the backs of her thighs.

*Good. Let him look.*

Then she felt him behind her, very close. The soft fabric of his slacks brushed high on her legs.

The microwave completed its cycle with a long BEEP.

He pointed at the sky.

"A good night for stars," he said. "Better than the astronomy lab, sometimes."

"Heh," said Imogen. She began to straighten up, but then a hand landed between her shoulders, holding her in place. It was cold, so cold that even through her shirt it sent a shiver through her whole body. The hairs stood erect on her arms.

He brushed them down with his other hand. Her ears went pink and her heart raced.

"You are my favorite student, Imogen," he said.

Another missed step. "I'm very flattered..."

He took her left hand and put it on the window sill. He took her right hand and put it on top of the left.

Beyond her fingertips, she saw Drunk Girl's head bobbing in Drunk Boy's lap.

"I want you to be more than flattered," he said. He held her wrists on the sill, and the hand on her back suddenly lifted. It reappeared on the back of her knee. She jumped.

"Professor Rickman..." she said, very softly. The hand trailed up the inside of her thigh, lighter than light.

He pulled her toward him, and she could feel his erection press into the curve of her hip. Wrists on the sill, belly on the sink, and naked legs to the air, Imogen suddenly felt very warm.

"You're smart, and you're wise," said Dr. Rickman.

Drunk Boy arched his back, delirious.

"But there's something you don't know. Something I didn't even know until tonight."

The hand between her legs arrived at her white cotton panties. Dr. Rickman sighed, but Imogen couldn't make a sound. The fabric was damp. He petted it a moment, deep in thought.

"If you die on Halloween," he said, "the Devil lets you do one last thing before you go to hell."

Imogen noticed for the first time the leak of red from the ghostly white wrist holding hers on the sill.

She whirled to look at him, astonished. In that moment, the hand on her panties slipped a finger around the border and discovered a lake of fire. Despite herself, she groaned.

He leaned into her ear, breathing into her hair. His cock pulsed against her.

"Please don't be afraid," he said. "I couldn't stand it if you were afraid. But I have to. Please. I have to."

Imogen shook all over. She gazed down at the couple on the stone bench. The girl pushed the boy onto his back and straddled him, and a hand vanished under her dress, guiding him inside...

The hand between Imogen's legs lifted. The first still had its grip firm on her wrists on the window sill, but the second reached around her to open a drawer.

There was a pair of kitchen shears in it.

Imogen's knees buckled. "No..."

"Shh..." said Dr. Rickman. Shears in hand, he tapped one of her boots with his foot. Instinctively, she straightened her legs. He tapped again, and she stepped them apart. The air chilled the wet fabric of her underwear.

"Shh..." Gentle as a breeze, he slipped the blade of the kitchen shears under one side of the panties. *Snip*. And then the other. *Snip*. With no further encouragement, they puddled at her feet.

The strange air dusted her skin and made her shiver. Dr. Rickman stepped behind her, still holding her wrists with a freezing, irresistible grip. They made a pair of graceful question marks over the sink.

He dressed her hair to the side and breathed onto her neck. His erection, still concealed, stabbed into one buttock. It felt urgent, desperate for her... *Please*...

"Shh..." The cold hand appeared again, this time at the front of her knee, and traced its way upward.

Drunk Boy yelled in rapture, but the music all but drowned him out.

Dr. Rickman's fingers rocked against her sex like a pendulum, cold but gentle, steady, building an ache in her. Imogen's breath fell shallow.

"So wise, so beautiful," he whispered. He shifted and drove against her, so that through his pants the tip of his cock strained her hymen.

Imogen groaned. There was no fear in it, but a hunger.

He slowed his hand, sensing it. She closed in, he slowed down. Her legs buckled again.

The boy below them was shouting in rhythm now, reckless, sure he couldn't be heard.

"Hold on, Imogen. Hold on..."

He withdrew his hand from her suddenly. She went rigid, uncertain... Then the quick rip of a zipper behind her told her what was coming.

"Did you love me, Imogen?" he asked.

*Oh God*...

"Did you love me?"

"YES!" she shouted. Then he was all at once inside her, and she was ready. No pain, no resistance, just an endless shaft of impossible thick and heat yes, it's hot, it's burning inside her, driving like an ox.

His hand returned to her sex from the front and he felt like he was everywhere, unstoppable, and the pleasure was a brush fire all over her body.

She stood on her toes to receive him, arching, clawing at the window. She shouted out loud.

It built like an orchestra, his pulse his hand the constant rushing ecstasy of him inside her in and out and then it was everywhere and then he bit down on the back of her neck like a lion and it was like a gunshot down her spine as she came and came, shivering and screaming, her thighs slack and her knees banging into the kitchen cabinets.

"Imogen..." he groaned, and he seemed to swell and throb inside her, and she shuddered to her conclusion as he exploded in awesome rinsing gobbets, inside, outside, everywhere, uncontrollable.

He collapsed on top of her, spent, breathless, and Imogen pressed her damp forehead to window, still twitching in every muscle.

The boy below her had stopped shouting, apparently finished as well. The music wound down. Students chatted off in every direction, and Imogen could hear the first returning footfalls in the hall.

Suddenly there was screaming -- a boy's screaming under the window. Confused at first, and then hysterical.

A crowd gathered. Imogen looked down to find the boy on the bench holding a lifeless girl in his arms.

Her blood went cold.

Behind her, the dead Dr. Rickman slipped in one sinuous movement to the floor.