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"But that’s not what happened"

"No"

Suddenly aware of the lack of people bustling around us, I pulled out my phone It o minutes past ten "Crap I’m late"

"Uh-oh Isn’t this the professor who makes an example of you if you’re late?"

I, I pushednow"

His mouth turned up on one side "What kind of university ee you to skip class the last week of the se I have an A I don’t really need the review"

We stared at each other

I angled my head and looked directly into his clear eyes "You don’t have a class?"

"Not until eleven" Not for the first ti over htest possible touch He stopped onslowed as ain"

His eyes darted to ht maybe he didn’t reme a hard ti it from memory My jaw My neck…"

He nodded "And your lips I said I neededthem"

I nodded Good God, what did he not re for ain

My lips tingled froers across the sensation When I wet theet coffee"

I nodded, and without another word, alked toward the student center, the busiest place on calasses, huh?" We’d been sitting at a tiny table, sipping our coffees and enduring a decidedly unco that entered my brain

"Uht But shouldn’t I bring up that night? Shouldn’t we talk about it? Shouldn’t I ask hi me away because he was the class tutor, or because of those scars on his wrists?

"I wear contacts But et tired of them by the end of the day"

Cue thehis door open, the apprehension on his face, the glasses transfor him into someone official while the pajamas produced a contrary effect I cleared lasses I mean, you could wear them all the time, if you wanted to"

"They’re kind of a pain with the motorcycle heline"

We were quiet again, with forty minutes until his class and my rescheduled bass practice tiood reason,into his backpack, withdrawing his sketchpad, and turning to a blank page He took the pencil fro across the table at htened color, he didn’t mention it Without a word, he leaned back in his chair, the pad on his knee, and started drawing, his pencilarches of so His eyes moved from the pad to , watching his face Watching his hands

There was so for someone I’d volunteered as a model once inin drawing skill, I’d ju to consider that I would be sitting on top of a table for an entire class period Giving a classrooed boys free rein to stare at me for an hour was a whole new sort of aard Especially when Jillian’s boyfriend, Zeke, started his portrait withoff his artistic efforts to his tablemates while I flushed and pretended I couldn’t hear his wisecracks about nips and cleavage and hoished I’d just lose the shirt altogether--or at least unbutton it

"Most artists begin with the head," Ms Wachowski said as she looked over his shoulder Zeke and the other boys at the table snorted with laughter while I burned with humiliation and the entire class looked on

"What are you thinking about?"

I wasn’t relaying that story "High school"

The hair falling over his forehead obscured the crease I kneas there, but his lips pressed tight

"What?" I asked, wondering at the change those tords brought

Surrounded by conversations, music and mechanical sounds, the scratch of the lead across the paper was inaudible in the coffee shop I watched the pencil dance in his hand, wondering what part of ht want to sketch What was he like as a sixteen-year-old boy? Did he draw then? Hang out with other boys his age? Had he fallen in love? Had his heart broken by soirl?

Had he already put those scars on his wrists, or was that yet to come?