The Handbook Read online

“Someday soon you’ll get yourself a T.A., old man,” I assured myself before diving into the first paper, which was already weak by way of its opening line. “I feel that Shakespeare is in love with a woman and wants the world to know how beautiful she is in Sonnet 18: Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day?” I read out loud before shaking my head. “You,” I started as I glanced up at the top of the paper in order to retrieve the student’s name. “Lucinda Grant, quite clearly must have missed class on Friday or you would have remembered that Sonnet 18 was written about a young man.” Taking a sip of my wine, I instantly wished I’d been more generous in pouring it. “Off to a great start.”

  The next three papers were equally uninspiring. They were just the tip of the iceberg, though. I still had another sixty to read and evaluate. These were the kinds of days when I regretted my decision to enter academia. I was beyond sure I could be just as miserable wearing a suit to the office every day, or maybe the best choice was not being employed at all. Maybe the homeless had it right. Living off the grid, answering to no one and avoiding the IRS altogether. Sounded pretty good to me.

  Of course, there were some students who actually listened during my lecture, and truthfully gave a shit about what they were learning. Some even saw the eternal beauty of the written word. They were the reason I’d chosen to become a professor to begin with. And also the reason I was busting my ass for a less-than-impressive salary. Let’s not even mention that I still hadn’t gotten my teaching assistant even though John Bishop already had. And my tenure outranked his. But the problem wasn’t tenure, or the fact that at age thirty-eight, I was ten years his junior. No, I was the problem.

  Being incorrigibly opinionated made me a misfit. In fact, I couldn’t remember the number of times the dean had visited me personally to tell me to toe the line. Truthfully, it was probably just a matter of months before they let me go. And even that wouldn’t be the worst thing to go wrong in the world, or, more specifically, my world. Maybe it would be a sign that I should just go into the police academy and become just like my father.

  I downed the last few drops of wine and dropped the folder with the less-than-stellar essays on the couch beside me. Then I stood up and stretched, intending to pour myself another glass. That was when my cell phone rang.

  Reaching for it, I glanced at the caller ID and read Rebecca’s name. Rebecca was a graduate student of English Literature who was currently trying her damnedest to become my teaching assistant. She was also a stage-five clinger, and, on a side note, completely bat-shit crazy. But, yes, I was guilty of screwing her. Sometimes you have to make concessions, especially when the sex is that good …

  “Rebecca,” I said in greeting.

  “What are you doing?” she asked. She always had a winded, breathy way of speaking. The first time I met her, her husky voice along with her dark, Italian sensuousness sent me into a tailspin. However, that was before I learned about the clingy, bat-shit crazy stuff. Now she sent me into another sort of tailspin, this one of the escapism variety.

  “I’m grading papers,” I answered as I eyed the intimidating pile and sighed. “What are you doing?”

  “Well,” she started, and I knew she was curling a tendril of hair around her finger like she always did when she was trying to be sexy. It was beyond fake, and bordered on downright annoying. “I was thinking about that huge monster you have hidden beneath your pants.”

  “That huge monster I have hidden beneath my pants?” I repeated with a chuckle because she sounded ridiculous.

  “Yes!” she hissed, again trying too hard to sound sexy. I had to ask myself why I even put up with her obvious antics. Oh, yes, that’s right. For the crazy-screams-and-nails-that-rake-my-back sex. I really couldn’t think of one man I knew who wouldn’t put up with a little cray-cray to get a wild romp in the hay-hay.

  “So are you asking if you can come over?” I asked, figuring the papers could wait a few hours.

  “Yep, you read my mind,” she answered. “I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you today.”

  “Is that so?” I asked, not really sure what else to say on the subject. I only thought about her when she called me or when I was horny.

  “Yep, I overheard a group of girls in the student union who were all giggling about ‘how hot Professor Anderson is.’ I had to smile secretly because they don’t have the slightest clue how hot you are in bed or how gorgeous your dick is.”

  I laughed. “Well, thanks for that. And, as it happens, I have a brief break in my schedule. Why don’t you come over to the house and amuse me for a few hours?”

  “Mmm, I would love nothing more,” she cooed back, and I wondered how hard it would be to get rid of her after I’d had my fill of her services.

  THREE

  NIKKI

  Two Weeks Later

  I wore faded sweats and an oversized sweatshirt, with my hair tied up in a bandana and no makeup … Yep, that was how I’d been presenting myself following the devastating period that soon became known as the breakup of NikBrand.

  Okay, so it was true that Brandon (who from here onward will be referred to only as: “He who will not be named” or HWWNBN for short) wasn’t the first breakup I’d ever had. But I couldn’t really recall the specifics about anyone prior to HWWNBN.

  He was the first guy who dumped me whom I really cared about. Yes, we didn’t have the greatest sex but how important was sex to a relationship really? I’d heard people stopped having sex once they got married anyway...

  “Dude, I think you need to eat something,” Dani said. She eyed me from across the bedroom with an expression of pity. “You’re starting to look like the abused dogs they keep showing on those ASPCA commercials.”

  “I can’t,” I retorted while shaking my head. I pulled the duvet cover up to my chin, as the idea of food nearly made me barf. “I have no appetite.”

  “Hmm,” Dani said as she bit her lower lip. “I just read this story about some old lady whose hubby died; she was so bummed out that she decided it was her time to go and she starved herself until she died. She wanted to be reunited with him in the forever after.”

  “Okay,” I frowned as I wondered what the hell she was talking about. “What’s your point?”

  “Well, I was just thinking that maybe you could do that too?” she answered with a huge smile and ostensibly feigned excitement. “You know, just starve yourself until you kick it, and then it’ll be too late to feel sorry for yourself.”

  “You forgot one pertinent part of that equation,” I grumbled, watching her turn toward our closet with a sigh of exasperation. That was probably because her side of the closet was way beyond packed. It was just a matter of time before she’d be asking to invade some of my closet space.

  “What did I forget?” she asked as she faced me again. Her shoulder-length, black hair was neatly pulled behind her ears. With her bright green eyes, upturned nose, and slender body, she reminded me of a woodland sprite. Of course, that was until she opened her mouth, and then she sounded more like a truck driver.

  “HWWNBN would still be alive,” I started.

  “That’s too much of a tongue twister,” Dani pointed out as she shook her head. “He needs a new name.”

  “True,” I answered with a quick nod. “How about Dickhead or Asshole or Fuckface?”

  “Any would work,” Dani answered with a shrug. “Though I quite like the way Fuckface rolls off the tongue.”

  “Anyway, back to my point,” I started. “With Fuckface still alive, that would mean I’d be equally bummed that he dumped me except I’d also be dead. So I could hang out on a cloud all day, watching everything he was doing. Yeah, that sounds like loads of fun.”

  “Ugh, you’re the worst!” Dani said, throwing her hands up in frustration. “Trying to get you to crack a smile is impossible!”

  The truth was I gave no fucks about mundane items like feeding myself or the usual daily hygiene stuff. In fact, I was more than sure I probably smelled every bit as bad as I
looked. Poor Dani.

  Were it not for her constant prodding, I probably never would have gotten out of bed once I found refuge there. Dani had been the one to force-feed me and the one to make sure I got to campus for my finals. Speaking of finals, they were another interesting topic. Normally, I was Molly-Straight-A-Student, but Molly had been introduced to Holly-I-Don’t-Give-A-Shit-And-The-World-Can-Kiss-My-Ass. The result wasn’t great for my GPA. In fact, if I continued down this path, I’d be close to being kicked out of ZTS. And that would be really bad for me because it was cheap ass rent!

  “You gotta snap out of this, Nicole Sloan,” Dani coached me as she shook her head. “Do you realize I had to reassign all your duties to prepare for the Panhellenic Council’s visit? I asked everyone to pitch in. On a side note, they’re all convinced you’re having a mental breakdown!”

  “Is that what they’re saying?” I asked with sudden interest. I sat up and watched her throw two bags from her recent shopping trip onto her unmade bed.

  “Yep, that seems to be the consensus.”

  “Hmm,” I said as I thought about it. “Am I?”

  “Oh, my God!” Dani exclaimed. She looked up from removing the tag from a miniskirt and rolled her eyes at me. “You aren’t having a mental breakdown, Nik! You just got dumped by an asshole and that’s it! You need to pull up your big-girl panties and get the hell over it already!” She took a deep breath. “Besides, how many times did you tell me that Brandon was the worst in bed?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe like three hundred times?”

  “Four hundred but who’s counting?” Dani frowned back at me. “The point is that you’re acting like this because your ego is hurt. If you really think about it, Brandon did you a favor. So, again, I invite you to snap the fuck out of it.”

  “Thanks for the pep talk.”

  “Because if you don’t,” Dani continued as she made her way over to me, leaning over me and holding her index finger right in front of my nose, “and if I have to deal with Stacy-fucking-Johnson asking me one more time how you’re doing, I swear, I’ll kill you myself! And then I’ll kill her.”

  “Good thing your major doesn’t require you to possess a good bedside manner,” I grumbled.

  “Dude, this is exactly the kind of pep talk you need. With spring break already here and all the partying we should be doing, you need to get over this like … yesterday.”

  Yes, it was true. Spring break was here and the Zeta Tau Sigma girls, known to those outside the sorority as “Zits,” were busy making tenuous plans to go back home, or vacation to faraway beaches, where there would be plenty of scandal in the sunshine. “I can’t even think about stupid spring break.”

  “Okay, Donna Downer, here’s the plan,” Dani persisted, obviously ignoring my last comment. “You and I are gonna party at my parents’ beach house. I already talked to my mom, and she’ll take care of convincing my dad. Then we’ll come back here a few days before next semester starts. That’s just so we can get things ready for the new girls who will be moving in.

  She drummed her fingers against her plump lips. “Just think, Nik, about how much penis we’ll get! Think about all that tanned, hot, muscular, engorged man meat that’s just waiting to meet your va-jay-jay.”

  “Really, Dani?” I asked as my mouth dropped open because sometimes the shit that came out of her mouth amazed even me.

  “Yeah, really,” she smiled as I shook my head.

  “The last thing I want to think about right now is penis,” I replied.

  “Okay, that’s it,” Dani announced with a curt nod. “I have to do it.”

  “Do what?”

  “I have to pull the plug on you. This is no way to live.”

  “Blah,” I said, sticking my tongue out at her.

  “Well, even though you’ve become the Grinch, you still have good fashion taste; so tell me which one you like better?” Dani asked. She reached into one of the plastic bags and produced two bikinis. One was fire-engine-red and the other was striped blue and yellow.

  With a heavy sigh, I pointed to the red one.

  “Yeah, that’s what I was thinking too. The red should contrast with this pasty-ass skin of mine perfectly,” she said as she glanced down at her pale skin. “Maybe one of these damn days, I’ll actually get a tan.”

  I wasn’t sure why, whether it was Dani’s lack of pigment, or because I was watching her unpack more shit that she had nowhere to hang, but I suddenly felt joyously happy to know she was here with me. Without her company, I had no clue what I’d be doing. “Hey, Dani?” I started.

  “Yeah, what’s up?” she answered. She was facing the closet, her left arm burdened with new clothes that had nowhere to hang.

  “Thanks,” I mumbled.

  “For what?” she asked. She stood up on her tiptoes to push a box to the side that was sitting at the top of her half of the closet.

  “Thanks for putting up with my shit, and getting me to my finals, and forcing me to eat and all the other stuff you’ve done for me.”

  “Ahhh … that’s what best bitches are for,” she answered. Pushing something else out of the way caused a bunch of crap to crash down from the top shelf, landing beside her. I couldn’t help laughing because it was pretty freaking comical to watch. “Wait, what was that?” Dani asked as she turned to face me. “Was that a laugh from Debbie Doomsday?”

  “Why do all your names for me start with a D?”

  “Prolly ’cause my name starts with a D,” she replied with a shrug. After facing the closet again, she turned back to me. “How do you feel about donating some of your closet real estate to a very worthy cause?”

  ***

  “I’m done with men,” I announced to Dani. We were sipping our morning cappuccinos in the breakfast nook of her parents’ beach house. Yes, it was spring break and somehow, Dani had managed to convince me to tag along. Nonetheless, I couldn’t say I felt much better than I had a week ago.

  “Hmm, this is big news,” Dani said while reaching across the table for a croissant. I couldn’t eat anything because the coffee was doing a good job of filling me up. “Are you thinking of joining Cindy and Adrienne’s group then?”

  Cindy and Adrienne, so it was rumored, had started a fling of their own under the roof of the ZTS house. Though neither of them had ever openly announced their sexual preference toward members of the same sex, all the signs were there. Everyone simply assumed there was something going on between the two of them, but it remained one of those don’t ask-don’t tell kind of things.

  “I’ve considered it,” I answered, although it was about as far from the truth as it could possibly be. But I was sick of Dani screwing with me, without screwing right back with her.

  “Um, what?” Dani replied, dropping her jaw and giving me the unenviable view of her half-chewed wad of croissant.

  “Yeah, I mean, I’ve always sort of been attracted to women, you know?”

  “Uh, no. I don’t know,” Dani replied as she frowned at me.

  “Come on, Dan, let’s not pretend here,” I persisted, suddenly finding true enjoyment in something. “You know we’ve always … felt something special for each other?”

  “Dude, I don’t swing that way!” she started before swallowing the croissant and gulping down the remains of her coffee. She then looked at me as if I’d sprouted another head.

  “Come on,” I continued, even throwing in a wink.

  “Um, Nik, I love you … I really do, but I just don’t … think of you that way,” she answered, her tone serious.

  “Neither do I, Dani! Jesus!” I railed back at her while adamantly shaking my head. I couldn’t hold back the huge smile that immediately took hold of my face even though I wasn’t sure if I should be more offended that she believed me or that she wasn’t interested.

  “Damn, Nik,” Dani said as she started to shake her head and the look of relief pasted itself across her face. “I totally believed you for like a few seconds.”

  “
You are so freakin’ gullible sometimes.”

  “Hey, I have no idea what to think about you anymore,” she replied, holding her hands up as if to protest her innocence. “You definitely haven’t been acting like the Nik I know and love, ahem, in a totally platonic fashion, by the way.”

  “Well, that doesn’t mean I’ve suddenly become a lesbian!”

  Dani shrugged and reached for another croissant. “Stranger things have happened.”

  “Um, not where I’m concerned.” Then I laughed again as I considered it. “You totally thought I had the hots for you!”

  “To know me is to love me,” she answered with a shrug.

  “I might be messed up right now, but I’m not that desperate,” I laughed.

  “Like you could do better than me,” Dani returned.

  “Hmmm … you’ve got a point,” I said as I eyed her up and down. “I mean, you are intelligent, classy, sexy and sassy. Maybe I should give it some more thought.”

  “Oh, my God! Will you stop it!” Dani released that raucous laugh of hers before her eyes settled on the clock above the couch in the living room. “We gotta get a move-on. The penises will be arriving on the beach anytime now! We still need to get suited up and ready to throw our nets out.”

  “Ugh,” I grumbled, shaking my head. I wasn’t interested in catching anything, least of all stray penises. Nor was I the least bit ready to catch gonorrhea, syphilis, or some other equally enticing social disease.

  ***

  I wasn’t sure how Dani had convinced me, but I found myself lying on the beach, clad in her blue and yellow striped bikini and my big floppy hat. The sun was shining, the birds were singing, the penises were frolicking in the waves, and I wished I could be anywhere but here.

  “That one looks good,” Dani said as she pointed at some muscular guy who was bodysurfing in the waves in front of us. “You see him?” she asked as she turned to face me when I didn’t comment.

  “I don’t care,” I answered as I leaned up on my elbows and tried to find the guy she was talking about. “They all look the same from here. How can you even see his face?”