Author's note - this is my first attempt at erotica, and is potentially the first in a series. So if you like it, or see ways it could be improved, please leave me a comment!
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If I told you I was an experimental quantum physicist who once spent four years living in a deep coal mine, likes to live off Cheetos and has never been near a gym, you wouldn't believe me. I mean, here I am: bronzed skin, expensively but not too ostentatiously dressed, muscular without an ounce of fat on my body. Oh, and then there's the pricey wrist watch, the chauffeur, the enormous house... and more. Much more, but I'll get to that.
Now, of course there are many physicists who have made serious money. Move out of funded research, put on a suit, and pick up a position manipulating the stock market or working for some vaguely sinister social media company -- I've seen many of my colleagues go down that route, and, what can I say? Except that not one of them seems happy. Me, I find suits itchy, regular office hours, and reports boring. And while you might criticise my ethics in my personal life (feel free!), there's something about helping obscenely rich people screw the poor or Mark Zuckerberg get files on the last ten per cent of humanity he doesn't already have in his gigadatabase that just doesn't sit right with me.
No, I was quite happy with my life as a researcher. While others might be earning more money, I was on the verge of contributing quite seriously to humanity's understanding of quantum entanglement. Experiments in delayed-choice entanglement swapping over the past decade verified that Bell's inequality violation occurs, and I led several of the teams working in that area. Indeed, I was the lead author on the first experiment to prove loophole-free Bell inequality violation using electron spins in laboratories separated by 10+ kilometres... but, look, don't rush to Wikipedia, you won't find me there. It's one of the downsides of my decisions, that I now have to watch as others carry out my work and get the credit for it. I do sometimes toy with the idea of setting up a lab and getting back to work, but honestly I can feel that my mind's got a bit lazier, given that for the past year I've been pursuing quite different goals.
What goals? Ah, we'll get to that.
It all started with Jennifer. My standards are a bit higher these days, but back then she looked like a goddess. I don't want to feed any stereotypes, and there were definitely some very nice-looking ladies in my team at the university, but female physicists just didn't do it for me. Maybe this says something bad about me -- no, scrub that, it definitely says something bad about me -- but I do tend to separate women I respect intellectually and women I want to sleep with. If a woman knows as much as I do about my field, I engage with her on that level and usually don't notice her physical presence after a few minutes. That might have been the reason that since my undergraduate days I'd not had a girlfriend or even asked anyone out.
But Jennifer... Jennifer was different. Our old receptionist, Luana, had gone away on maternity leave, and when Jennifer came in to replace her it was like she lit up the whole department. Twenty one years old, she was a student from the School of Dance doing a little light temp work to get her through the last year at university. She was also half-Mexican, half-Portuguese, a mixture that gave her smoky black eyes and beautifully full lips. Being a dancer, she was naturally proud of her petite, athletic body, and wore clothing that accentuated her curves and in particular her shapely little backside. While her clothing was never unprofessional, she went in for high heels, low cut blouses, and short skirts that let any observer take in both the butterfly tattoo on her ankle and the other more mysterious tattoo that led up her inner left thigh -- what it was, you could never quite tell. Plus, I was trying really hard not to be a total creep, so I never allowed my eyes to stray in that direction for more than a second or two.
Again, I looked very different back then to the me you see today. Yes, I was at the top of my field, and a well-respected scientist, but it was noticeable that the head of our department always spent a long time getting me ready before I was allowed to represent the university at any kind of official event. They'd get me to take off my T-shirt, bring out a shirt in my size (extra extra extra large), clean crumbs out of my beard, and brush my hair. However that didn't seem to make much of a difference to the generally slobby impression I gave off, particularly as my shirt would inevitably come untucked and my glasses would have oil smear all over them within an hour. Looking back on it, I can't tell you how ashamed I am of that portion of my past, but back then I barely thought about things like personal grooming, so consumed was I by my work. Insights from string theory were coming thick and fast, aided by extraordinary advances being made by my colleagues in the computer sciences. Their work in quantum computing was moving much faster than anyone could have predicted, aided by my own work on what I called pluriversal resonance. It was an exciting time intellectually, and as a thirty year old full professor I was right in the heart of the excitement.
Now, I could describe this in detail, but that would take all night and I'd require several whiteboards and pens. And while I don't want to be insulting, you really wouldn't be able to follow the mathematics. What you need to know is that our paymasters, a major IT company you definitely would have heard of, were paying us to come up with a stable and reliable nuclear magnetic resonance quantum computer. It was a model that had defeated previous teams, but the rewards of successfully solving the issue of quantum decoherence were so great -- essentially, the product would be by far the fastest computer ever made, able to solve equations and resolve probabilities previously thought impossible -- that by that stage funders were willing to try anything.
Let me get you another drink, by the way. I have to warn you, we've only just started.
I was on the verge of contributing to the greatest scientific breakthrough for decades, but Jennifer was proving an immense distraction. Every day when I came into the department, there she was, skin glowing and her dark eyes staring up at me, framed by her dark and lustrous hair, as I checked my mail. I wasn't actually shy around other people, even given my geekiness and just by dint of not treating her like dirt I probably seemed a lot nicer than many of my colleagues. In fact, as time went on, I began to sense that there might actually be more than that, just a hint of connection.
"Morning Professor Kellerman!" she'd say, brightly. I'd reply "How's your life?" and she'd look up at me, wink, and say something like "All the brighter for seeing you!" I made a few jokes about her Spanish and Portuguese sides getting into wars, and she'd laugh. I'd ask her to check if there was any post for me, and she'd turn around, stretch herself to her full height and put her hand in the pigeonhole, with her skirt tremulously creeping up her thighs but always coming to a stop tantalisingly close to revealing that tattoo. It was a beautiful way to start the day, even if it then took me an extra fifteen minutes to gather my thoughts before I began work.
In fact, it became such a pleasant routine that I started to wonder if there might be something more there. Was it possible that this pretty and vivacious girl might actually be interested in becoming more than just casual acquaintances? I knew that looks-wise we weren't much of a match, but then again girls always seem to say that a good personality is more important, and if I was making her laugh day after day maybe she was starting to see me as someone with a personality that matched hers?
So, one Friday morning, quite abruptly and without really planning what I was going to say, I asked her out. Given subsequent events, I can laugh about it now, so here for your enjoyment is the entire exchange.
Jennifer: Good morning Professor Kellerman!
Me: Good morning, Jennifer! And how are we today?
Jennifer: Oh, as always my day is so much better now you're here! Do you want me to check the mail?
Me: Actually, Jennifer, could I ask you something first?
Jennifer: Of course, Professor!
Me: Um, you could call me Iain, if you prefer.
Jennifer: Iain! Is that your name? I always thought it sounded quite cool, being "I. Kellerman." You know, like that old film "I, Robot"? OK, so, "Iain," what did you want to ask?
