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irwinwe

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My alarm clock went off early the next morning.  I had forgotten to turn it off the night before, so it woke me up as if I was supposed to be attending another day of classes.  I reached blindly for it, knocking my In Style magazine off the nightstand in the process.  I uttered a curse as I opened an eye, and then I slowly sat up so that my body was illuminated in one of the sun rays leaking in through the window.  I felt revealed and disoriented as the dark outline of my body became clearly dicipherable against the light that painted the opposite wall, just as clandestine dust becomes shamefully visible on a sun-lighted window sill.  I looked down.  Why was I naked?  I froze.  Had something happened the night before...?

Suddenly my eyes shot open fully and I gripped the sheets, memory of the night before flashing before me all at once and in its entirety.  Iain's intrepid kiss, my professor's look of jealous seduction, the sensual and hazy danger of the pub, the protection of the cold city streets, the justification of my unorthodox thoughts, the knocking on my professor's door, the passion we had shared, which had formerly only been hidden beneath the surface.  But the levy had broken.  

Disbelief anchored me to the bed, mouth agape.  What would we do now?  What was he thinking?  After this, how could we possibly go back to how things had been, to act as if nothing had happened?  For weeks we had communicated secretly with our eyes and with circuitous sentences that comprised a language only the two of us understood.  But now, it couldn't be just eyes and circuitous language, could it?  He had branded me with his soul that I felt in his touch, and now it would be his touch that I would want.  I looked to my chalcedony stone for guidance, but remembered that it was not there.  Ironic, I thought, that it was gone as I sat in a mixed puddle of shame and lust.  I briefly wondered if it had slipped from my finger during our passionate embrace, along with my research book and highlighter.  Damn, I thought to myself, I left those things over there.  

Rachel's knock on my door jolted me back to reality.  I gasped quickly, and then leapt out from beneath my covers, scrambling to find clothes, and to find some sort of excuse to get out of the house, and away from her interrogation.  She knocked on the door again.

"Hey you!" I heard her say, "Wha' happened last night? I came back down for water a bit later and ye werena' here."

"Uh...I um..." I called out in reply, searching around my room frantically.  I almost slept with my professor?  I thought to myself, and then huffed in near hysterics.  How could I diffuse such an admission?  It would sound scandalous no matter the way it was put.  Last night's justification had suddenly been replaced by retrospective doubt.  I spotted my spandex running attire in one of the sun shadowed corners, and dressed quickly, tripping slightly on a pant-leg.  I could certainly stand for a run.  Managing to slip on my already-tied tennis shoes quickly was not so easy a task, and I remonstrated with them by calling them every bad name in existence.  By the time I looked at my reflection in the mirror, my cheeks were flushed, as if to add to make even more evident my guilty conscience.  To make things worse, I had sex hair.  It practically stood out on end, and it fell in wild waves over my shoulders and down my back.  

"Oh God help me" I muttered to myself.

"I'm waiting" Rachel called from the other side of the door.  

I grabbed a rubber band from above my dresser and quickly confined my temperamental hair as best as I could.  My eyeliner and mascara were still on my eyes, and I wiped away the smudgy areas, hoping I could avoid the quirked eyebrow that would surely accuse me of being a "walk of shamer."  I took a final look at myself, quirked my own eyebrow, and then grabbed my keys and set out for the door.

"Ye dinna go tae his apartment did ye?" she yelled through the door, just as I was about to open it.  My face cringed, and my fingers tensed on the door handle.  There would be no way around this.  I would just have to admit it and hope like mad she wouldn't spread anything around.  I opened the door.  

"I knew ye'd gae as soon as I left" she said as soon as she saw me, "ye did dinna ye?"

"YES!" I nearly screamed in her face.  Her eyes grew in surprise.  After that I controlled my voice, but I did not adopt the aura of a shamefaced fool.  In fact, I raised my chin a bit in defiance of anyone who sought to shoot disdain at my unorthodox situation.  "Yes, okay?  I did go there.  And ye we did make out.  But it was only that, so don't start chastizing me about anything."  My hand rested on my hip for emphasis.  

To my surprise, she did not squabble with me, but instead smiled broadly.  "Och I wouldna chastise ye, Ellen.  I would just 'ave tae say...it's about time ye made a move one way or another."  She paused, but I knew she wasn't finished when I saw her lip curl and her eyes squint wickedly.  "Are ye sure all ye did was kiss?  Ye were gone for an awfully long time..."

I hit her lightly.  "Do I strike you as someone who lies, or who has ever lied to get herself out of something?"

"No" she said matter-of-factly, "in fact, ye used tae strike me as someone who ran away from questionable circumstances altogether, but now, I amna so sure."

"I merely went out on a limb, that's all.  I didn't cross any ravine.  Not yet, at least."

She smiled widely, "Ah, but ye will now.  I am confident."

"Well in the mean time" I said as I pushed my way around her and began to walk to the door, "I am going to run."

"Run? Or run away?" she inquired after me.

I paused.  Was I running away from my issues in this case?  I had initially thought so, but now that I'd admitted it already, I wasn't so sure.  The more I thought about it, the more I was beginning to not regret what I had done.  Maybe I did not want to run away from my situations as much as I wanted to run as a way of reveling in them.  I turned my head so that she could see my side profile, and I quirked my lips as I muttered again, "I am going to run."

***

Though there had been snow the night before, the weather that morning was surprisingly warm.  The sun smiled on my skin as I ran vigorously against a fitful breeze, and I inhaled a musky scent of fertility in every still, stagnant moment when that breeze would falter.  Only a few white mounds were left, as the shallower areas had melted into green grass that had long been in hiding.  It was rare in Scotland for warm weather to visit earlier than summer, so I considered the warm spring day a blessing.  More than that, however, it seemed as an awakening.  I felt as if a new part of me had come alive, although I did not know how to explain it.  Professor Kane had made me leave the night before, and he had been harsh about it, but I knew he had not wanted in his heart to do what he had done.  I knew he wanted me.  And I knew I wanted him.  What stood between us were standards the size of brick walls, wanted merely a force large enough to crumble them.  For now, I was strangely at peace with this conclusion.  

I slowed to a walk so that I could catch my breath, and I was intrigued by a set of paw prints I saw engrained in the last bits of snow.  They looked to be the paw prints of a rabbit or a squirrel, and they led to the pine whose branches were still covered in melting crystal.  Suddenly, from within one of the pine branches, a figure in the distance caught my eye.  I squinted and looked more closely, stretching my arms.  It was another runner, a male runner, and he was coming towards me.  He wore a red long-sleeved t-shirt and black jersey shorts that ended just at his knees.  His hair was dark, and he ran easily and boldly, as if he was an 18th century highland clansman off to face the enemy redcoats...