The Professor She Was Forbidden to Want

Maren's POV "Your funding renewal hinges on this meeting, Ms. Ellison. I hope you understand that." Dr. Preston said it flatly, like he was reading off a grocery list. My stomach dropped anyway. I pressed my palms against the table so nobody would see them shake. "I understand completely." My voice came out steadier than I felt. "That's why I'm here twenty minutes early with three years of data instead of two." A low laugh came from the end of the table. Professor Halstead didn't bother hiding his smile. "She's not wrong, Preston. Give the girl a chance to talk before you scare her off." "I'm not scared," I said, and pulled up my first slide before anyone could argue about it. Eleven minutes. Voter turnout modeling, three election cycles, a methodology section I'd rewritten four times until it stopped sounding like an apology. My mouth went dry twice, but I didn't check my notes once. When Preston fired off two questions that felt more like traps than questions, my pulse kicked hard in my throat and I answered both without flinching. "Solid work," Halstead said, gathering his folders. "Genuinely. You should be proud of that." "I'll be proud of it when the funding actually clears." "Cynic." "Realist. There's a difference." I said. He laughed, and something in my chest loosened for the first time all week. Then he paused at the door, hand on the frame, mouth half-open like there was something else he meant to say. He shut it again without saying anything. I clocked it. Filed it under a question mark and didn't get a chance to ask before he was gone. Toby was waiting in the hallway, slouched against the wall with two coffees, wearing the exact face he got when he already knew how a meeting had gone before I opened my mouth. "You're alive," he said, handing one over. "I had you fifty-fifty on Preston eating you alive in there." "He tried." "And?" "I have better data than he has follow-up questions." I took a sip and made a face. "This is decaf." "It's four in the afternoon. You've had four coffees today." "Three." I corrected "You had one before your nine a.m., I watched you drink it." "That one doesn't count, it was basically water." I said Toby shook his head and started walking, and I fell into step beside him without thinking about it, my feet just knowing where his pace was. "Have you heard the gossip yet?" he asked. "I don't gossip." "You do this gossip. Everybody's gossiping." He dropped his voice like it mattered, even though the hallway was empty. "Corinne cornered me by the printer this morning going off about Marlowe again. Asked to sit in on his grad seminar. He said no. Didn't even give her a reason." I snorted. "She's been trying to get into his orbit since her second year. Not sure why she thought this was the one that'd work." "Because he's Marlowe and everyone wants in his orbit, that's why. Don't take new advice. Doesn't collaborate outside his own circle. Barely shows up to department stuff. It's basically become his whole personality." "That's called having boundaries, Toby. You should try it." I said "I have boundaries. I just don't enforce them because I like people." "That's the opposite of having boundaries." I said "This is why you don't have any friends besides me." He mocked "I have friends." "Name two." He said jokingly I opened my mouth. Nothing came out. Toby grinned like he'd won the lottery. "That's what I thought," he said. "Come on. You look like you're about to fall asleep standing up." He wasn't wrong, and I didn't have the energy to argue it. We split off at the stairwell, him toward the library, me toward my office on the third floor. I sat down at my desk, pulled up my email out of habit more than needed and my stomach dropped for the second time that day before I even read the subject line all the way through. ‘Committee Reassignment: Effective Immediately’ I clicked it open. Read it once. Read it again, slower, like the words might rearrange themselves into something that made more sense the second time. ‘Due to Professor Halstead's medical leave, effective this week, the department has reassigned dissertation committee chairs. Your new committee chair is Professor Julian Marlowe. Please contact his office to schedule an initial meeting as soon as possible.’ Halstead hadn't said a word. Not one. He sat across from me an hour ago, told me I should be proud of my work, hesitated at the door like there was something on the tip of his tongue.. That was it. That was the thing he hadn't said. My phone buzzed. Toby. ‘You good? left the group chat on read for six hours which is a new record even for you’ I stared at Marlowe's name on my screen instead of answering. The man who didn't take advice. Who didn't collaborate. Who'd turned down a grad student over something as small as sitting in on a seminar. He held my entire degree in his hands now. Whether either of us wanted it that way or not. My phone buzzed again. ‘Maren. seriously. Are you good?’ I typed three words, deleted them, and typed four more instead. ‘Call you tonight. Something happened.’ I set the phone face-down on the desk and looked at the email one more time, like it might have changed in the last thirty seconds.