A Tutor for Samuel

Sam Morrison stood next to his bed, examining the clothes he had set out. His travel bag, bought just for this trip and giving off a strong smell of new leather, was open on the floor and ready to be stuffed full.

"Then to the airport and after that Fort Lauderdale is going to catch hell," he said under his breath, mouth splitting into a feral grin.

The cellphone in his pocket buzzed, and he whipped it out, chuckling at the message from his friends. They were just as excited as he was to get this spring break off to a suitably wild and crazy start.

He paused to consider his reply when a loud voice from the other room made him wince.

"Samuel Morrison! Get your ass in here!"

Sam slipped the phone back into this pocket and hurried out the door. No one kept Thomas Morrison waiting if they valued their skin.

The door to his dad's study was open, Thomas Morrison Sr. seated at his wide oak desk with an unhappy expression plastered to his well-lined face.

"Hey, Dad. You called?"

"Step in here, Sam. Close the door."

Sam's felt a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach and did as he was told.

The elder Morrison was wearing a pair of thick-rimmed glasses, and he slipped them off, fixing his son with a stare reminiscent of an old buzzard contemplating a decaying carcass. Sam couldn't meet his father's gaze and instead began a very detailed examination of his shoelaces.

"Did you think I wouldn't find out, and you could just slip away unnoticed?"

"I'm not sure what you're talking about, Dad," lied Sam, knowing he was merely delaying the inevitable and likely making things even worse by pretending ignorance.

"Right. What do you say we cut the crap and put our cards on the table, Sam? I just got off the phone with the fine folks over at Hampton College. Care to hazard a guess at the topic of conversation?"

"My grades?" opined Sam quietly.

"Your grades. Didn't have to think about it for very long, did you? Yes, Sam. Your grades."

His dad slid back the chair he was sitting in and rose to his somewhat intimidating six-foot-four-inch-height towering over his son, who was four inches short of that mark.

"When were you going to mention you were failing Astronomy?"

"I was hoping to bring my grade up in the time before finals and put things over the top with a good score on the test," said Sam.

"Over the top? From what I'm told, you can barely see the bar."

"It will be okay. As soon as I get back from Fort Lauderdale, I'll knuckle down and get my grade up."

"I know as a business major; you don't put much stock in the sciences, Son, but everybody has to take one as a prerequisite. Why didn't you pick something simple? A general science class would have been fine."

"I thought Astronomy was going to be simple! You know. Look at stars through a telescope. Sit in the planetarium and gaze at a bunch of colorful slides while they talk about eclipses or something."

"Clearly, you had no idea what you were getting into."

"Yeah. I guess not. It was way more math oriented than I was anticipating. It was also a lot more boring," admitted Sam.

"Boring or not, you can't afford to fail if you want to transfer to Whitmore next year."

Whitmore...If Sam had to hear one more time about his Dad's prestigious alma mater, he would throw up. Sam's high school grades had been good, but not good enough to get him into the school his father valued most. Instead, he had applied and been accepted at Hampton. Sure, it was a big step down from Whitmore in the collegiate pecking order, and it had a reputation as a "party school," something his dad had frowned at, but he had met some cool people there and was enjoying the more relaxed atmosphere. The plan his dad had accepted was that Sam would go there for a year to get his basic courses out of the way and build up his transcript with positive grades, then try again at Whitmore the following year. Sam's grades were good, and he had been doing pretty well at Hampton until this little science debacle.

"As I said, Dad. I'll throw myself full tilt into Astronomy when I get back."

"Back? You only have eight weeks to turn things around, and given where you're starting from. You need to begin sooner rather than later."

"What are you saying?"

"I'm saying you can forget Fort Lauderdale. Your spring break is off, Son."

"Dad! You can't do this all my friends are going! We've been planning this for weeks!"

"If you had worked as hard at astronomy as you did planning a week of debauchery in Florida, you'd still be going I'll wager."

"Please, Dad! I promise I'll kick this thing in the ass when I get back, but don't take this from me!"

Thomas shook his head, "I'm sorry, Kid, but you'll thank me one day for keeping you focused on your education. This time in your life is more important than you realize. You can't afford to waste it."

"I can't fucking believe this!"

"Watch your tone with me, young man!" snapped his dad, cowing Sam instantly.

Thomas Morrison was not known for his patience, and the last thing you wanted to do was bring out his temper, which was even worse.

"Look," said his dad, softening his voice a little, "I know you're disappointed, but if you turn this thing around now, we could look at a trip for you this summer. Naples, maybe?"

Sam nodded grudgingly, admitting to himself that a European trip would beat Fort Lauderdale.

"I've got some good news for you. I found a tutor to help you with your studies."

"A tutor?" echoed Sam incredulously.

"Yep, and even better, you won't have to go very far to avail yourself of their expertise. They live right behind us."

Sam wrinkled his brow, "Miss Siler? You hired our neighbor to tutor me?"

"Sure. She came cheap, and she's been an amateur astronomer since she was a teen, as well as having a degree in Astrophysics from Whitmore. I can't think of anyone more qualified."

"The Frump?" he said in disbelief.

"I never cared for that nickname," said Thomas grumpily.

Frumpy Miss Siler, that's what the neighborhood kids had called her for years in honor of the shapeless t-shirts and jeans she usually wore. Sam and his family had known her since she moved into the single-story house behind them nine years earlier. Linda Siler had been friendly if a little shy, and Sam had seen her off and on usually sitting in a chair at night in front of a big white telescope. The twelve-inch monster had fascinated him when he was a kid, and she had invited him over on occasion to look at the moon and the planets. The novelty had eventually worn off, and Sam hadn't actively spoken to her in years.

"You start this evening. Be there promptly at eight, and don't keep Miss Siler waiting," instructed his father.

Sam could tell he was being dismissed, and he backed toward the door, trying to hide the scowl that threatened to break out all over his face. He shut the door behind him as he left, flipping the bird at where he imagined his father to be on the other side.

"I can't believe this, no spring break, and now consigned to studying at the feet of my weird next-door neighbor! Just wonderful..."

The bad news traveled fast once he had texted his friends, and Sam was soon receiving condolence messages and even a few calls. The worst moment had come when Jennifer Masterson had called him. He had met the tall, leggy-blond in his economics class and had been looking forward to seeing her in a bikini on the beach.

"I heard you're not going to be coming out to Fort Lauderdale for spring break," she said, sounding disappointed.

"Yeah. My dad won't let me go because of this bullshit astronomy class I'm currently failing."

"Wow, that sucks. I was looking forward to seeing you. I bought this new bikini just for the trip."

Sam groaned at the thought of missing Jennifer modeling it for him. Given her banging body with its firm breasts and tight ass, he could only imagine how hot she would have looked in that outfit.

"Sorry...maybe next time," said Sam, sadly.

After she hung up, he nearly tossed his cellphone across the room but held back, knowing his dad wouldn't get him another if he willfully destroyed this one. Taking out his frustrations amounted to yelling into his pillow, which wasn't nearly as satisfying.

In the end, there was nothing for it but to suck it up and do as he was told, so after a dinner alone with his dad that was mostly absent of conversation, Sam took a shower and got ready to go.

The steam drifted around his bathroom while he cleaned the fog from the mirror with a towel. Sam's blond hair was slicked back on his head, still damp after exiting the powerful jets that had lashed his young body clean. An interesting mix of his mother and father, Sam had the broad-shoulders and athletic build of the latter combined with the swarthy skin and dark features more prevalent in his mother. His hair was the same color as the senior Morrison, but he had dark eyebrows and even darker eyes, a deep shade of brown. Quickly brushing the water from his hairy chest and shivering a bit in the cooler air, Sam shaved and went to dress.

In the past, his mother would often have put out things for him to wear, but her death from cancer when he was still in high school had put an end to that. Now, he was on his own, but generally speaking, he had a good eye for fashion and rarely embarrassed himself. He choose an outfit that would be comfortable in the crisp night air if Miss Siler decided that she wanted to show him the sky while being suitable for lounging if they remained indoors. The cotton slacks clung nicely to his tight rear-end, one that more than a few women had whistled at in the past. A splash of cologne completed the process, and Sam was on his way.

He could have just jumped the fence, but that hardly seemed like the right way to start a professional relationship, so instead, he took a leisurely walk around the block stopping in front of 3434 Wallace Street. A knock on the door brought the sounds of someone scurrying around inside like Sam had kicked the cage of a sleeping hamster. When the door swung back, he did his level-headed best not to laugh.

Linda Siler was standing before him in her usual outfit, a t-shirt that looked three sizes too big for her, cotton sweat pants, and tennis shoes. Tonight, she also had on a pair of glasses with rims so wide they gave her eyes the appearance of a surprised barn owl. Her brown hair was pulled back into a makeshift pony-tail held together with a rubber band while her unadorned face was pale and washed out from lack of time spent in the sun.

"Oh! Samuel! Is it time already? Sorry, I dozed off in my reading chair," she said hastily.

The older woman stepped back from the door to allow him entrance, and Sam went inside, looking around.

He had always thought that women were supposed to be the more organized and meticulous ones, but Miss Siler seemed to be bucking that trend. The inside of her house looked like a library that had been hit by an earthquake with stacks of books in every available corner as well as scattered randomly around the room. There were bookcases along several walls, but the shelves were crammed full with books sitting sideways on top of the rows of more organized ones and loose papers shoved in between. There were several telescopes of various lengths and sizes standing near the sliding glass doors leading to the back yard with another one disassembled on what he assumed was her dining room table. As he walked further into the space with Miss Siler on his heels, he caught glimpses of other rooms that appeared to be just as buried in books as her living room.

"You do realize you can get most books on Kindle, right?" he asked, amused.

"Kindle? Huh...well, I'm more comfortable holding a book in my hands. Besides, many of these volumes are very old and very hard to find."

Sam picked one up from her coffee table that sat in front of an antique-looking couch, "'The Universe as We Know It' by Harmon Bradfield."

The inside of the cover showed a publication date of 1936.

"I'm guessing they didn't know the Universe too well back then," he commented.

Linda took the book from his hand, frowning slightly and putting it back down, "To understand where you are, it helps to know where you came from."

Sam shook his head, not quite understanding.

"Why don't you have a seat, Samuel, and we can talk about how I can help you. Just...move that stuff aside."

He shifted a stack of notebooks from one cushion on the couch and sat down.

"You can call me Sam, Miss Siler. You use to when I was a kid."

"Oh, yes, that's right. I haven't seen you much since you started high school. You looked so grown up now I just thought your full name might sit better on you. In any case, since we are going to be spending so much time together, why don't you just call me Linda."

"Linda," he echoed, turning the name over in his mouth and trying it out. It felt a bit strange to address her that way, but then again, they were embarking on a new journey.

She had settled into a chair across from him, removing her glasses and setting them on and end table next to her arm.

"I just use them for reading. I'm not that old yet!" she joked.

Sam had heard his parents talking about Linda Siler when she moved in nine years before, and he knew that she had been twenty-eight then and recently divorced, so doing the math she was no more than thirty-seven now even if her mode of dress made her appear far older. She blinked at him as her eyes adjusted, and he noted that those same eyes were a very pleasing shade of green. It was about the only attractive thing he had noticed about her so far.

"So. Your father tells me you're struggling with your basic astronomy course. Which part exactly? Wien's Displacement Law? The Tully-Fisher Relation? The Stefan-Boltzman Constant?"

Sam looked embarrassed and shifted on the couch.

"Pretty much the part in my textbook after, 'Welcome to Astronomy 101.'"

"I see. Why don't you tell me what you did cover that you feel reasonably confident you understood, so I know where to start. I'm guessing you covered Kepler's laws of motion and their relation to Newton's?"

"Yeah, sort of, I might have missed some classes," he admitted.

This was an understatement. Sam had found the course so dull he had ducked out on more than one occasion to hang with his friends.

"Missed some classes? Were you sick or something?" she asked in a tone that said she couldn't imagine why anyone would ever willing miss an opportunity to study astronomy.

"No...It was just that things could get really...well...boring."

"Boring! Studying the vastness of the universe and our place in it boring! Sam! How can you say that?"

Sam started to answer, but she cut him off.

"Boring...There are so many fascinating things out there in the dark, Sam. Worlds that we can barely imagine that exist in solar systems so far away they are invisible to the naked eye. Planets bigger than anything in our neck of the woods, worlds so compressed by the pressures that gave birth to them they float in space as impossibly large diamonds, worlds that spin with one side in perpetual night and the other boiling in the blazing heat of its sun. Clusters of stars so dense they look like crushed ice in the eyepiece! Could you imagine living on a planet there with the starfield so packed in the sky you would never know a real night time?"

Sam sat taken aback by her sheer enthusiasm. The subject had suddenly brought Linda Siler to life, her face lighting up and becoming flushed with excitement. The light that danced in her eyes made them even more attractive, and her flushed skin showed off just how flawless it was, pale, but unblemished. It made Sam wonder how much prettier she would be if she just put in a little effort.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to sound like I was criticizing your passion," he said contritely.

Linda caught herself, clearly embarrassed at her outburst, and sat back in her chair.

"Of course, astronomy isn't for everyone, but since you started yourself down this road, we just need to make sure you get to the end of it in one piece."

"How do we do that?"

Linda got up and went over to one of the overflowing bookshelves, choosing a volume. She returned and cleared a spot to sit next to Sam on the couch. He noted that she smelled rather lovely, like wildflowers, as she opened the weighty tome to the first page.

"We start at the beginning with an ancient astronomer named Ptolemy."

To his surprise, the next two hours flew by. Unlike his stuffy professors at the university, Linda Siler had a way of bringing the subject to life without putting him to sleep. They talked about the birth of astronomy and the great thinkers who had taken it from a science dominated and held back by the religious doctrines of the time to one that forced the truths of the universe on an unsuspecting world.

"Heck, the observations of many of these early explorers were done without telescopes since those weren't invented until Galileo came along. Can you imagine trying to work out the intricacies of orbital mechanics with nothing but your eyes?"

"It's s good thing they did invent telescopes, or you would have nothing to decorate your house with," observed Sam laughing.

Linda blushed but took the ribbing good-naturedly laughing along with him.

"I remember you being quite fascinated with the view through my telescopes. It's been a while since you jumped the fence to look."

"I guess I got side-tracked on other things."

"I was a teenager once. I know how things are in high school and college."

Sam tried to picture Linda at a party drinking and dancing with the crowd and failed miserably.

"I think we've studied enough. It's a quarter moon out tonight. The view along the terminator should be spectacular."

He wasn't entirely sure what she was talking about. He thought "The Terminator" was a movie about a killer robot, but he followed her out into the backyard anyway.

As a boy, he had spent a few nights out here, and things hadn't changed much in the intervening years. Linda's backyard was made up of a short wood deck that ended in some stairs which dropped you down onto the grassy lawn. One of her telescopes, a big one nearly as tall as she was perhaps five-foot-six-inches or more, stood on a thick base in the middle of the yard. They descended the stairs, Linda wobbling when the railing shook loosely in her grip. Sam steadied her feeling a surprisingly muscular arm through all that loose t-shirt material.

"Easy there!" he said.

"Sorry. This old deck has seen better days. I keep meaning to call a carpenter to fix the railing."

Linda led Sam over to the large telescope, removing the cover from the tube and adjusting it to point toward the moon. In the years since he had viewed it last, Sam had forgotten how bright the moon looked even with a filter in place to dampen the effect. The telescope was zoomed in on a series of craters right along the line where the sunlight met the shadows, giving a gorgeous contrast to the landscape and making the craters leap out at you as if they were in three-dimensions.

"Wow! That is something..." said Sam in awe.

"My turn! Don't hog the scope!" said Linda with a chuckle.

When she went to step past him, Sam brushed up against her. His chest was like a solid wall, and she put out a hand without thinking briefly feeling the rippling muscles under his shirt. She tried to smile and dismiss the moment, but a small thrill passed through her just the same. The view of the moon was incredible, but Linda had a hard time enjoying it with her mind suddenly clouded by urges she hadn't experienced in a long time.

"Get a hold of yourself! What's the matter with me? This is Sam for crying out loud," she thought, feeling terrible at reacting this way toward a young man she had known since he used to play ball with his friends in the backyard behind hers.