A Fractured Lover (Student/Teacher)

Chapter 14

"I had never seen such a captivating, beautiful woman before. And then she opened her mouth and her witty, sarcastic, charming self made its way out and," His eyes found mine and that intense look that I was all too familiar with was entrapped in his gaze. "I knew I was a goner."

My lips parted at his words. Something passed between us in that moment. Staring at this temptingly handsome man sitting next to me, my hand in his, our legs pushed up against each other, I felt something change within me. His words carved their way through my chest and straight to my heart, thrashing around inside of me until there was no possible way to deny it any longer. My heart rate began to increase rapidly as the realization dawned on me in that moment, still fixed in a silent stare down with the man responsible for my internal break down.

Thankfully, just as my realization was taking full effect, Travis spoke up.

"So how old are you anyways? Aren't most teachers, like, in their forties?" he asked with a vile look on his face. Claire and my dad both shot him a look but he didn't seem to notice as he was all too focused on burning a hole through Mr. McCoy's head. Mr. McCoy took a beat to compose himself before he directed his attention to Travis.

"No, actually it varies. I'm 27 though, turning 28 soon," he stated matter of factually while glaring at Travis, challenging him to retort.

Hmm, 5 year age difference. Not too bad. Not too bad at all.

"Wow, so you teach High School?" My mom piped up and saved the day without really knowing what was going on between the two young men in the room.

McCoy stiffened for a moment as did I. He looked down at the food on his plate and replied.

"Yes, photography." He never made eye contact with my mom as he answered, most likely due to the fact that it was a lie.

"Oh, that's nice! Alex is a Fine Art major and loves photography!" My mom beamed over at me across the dinner table. I nodded and shoved some mashed potatoes in my mouth while Nathan answered.

"Yeah, that's just another one of the many things that we have in common," he remarked with a small smile sent in my direction and straight to my heart.

Oh, this is gonna be a long day.

Dinner finished up shortly after the barrage of questions was settled. Mr. McCoy and I cleared the table and he insisted on doing the dishes himself. Even my mom tried to intervene and he scooted her out of the kitchen and proceeded to do them all himself. I couldn't seem to keep the smile off of my face ever since his recalling of our first meeting. Besides a few key details, it was almost verbatim what occurred in that Teachers' Lounge on that fateful day.

Since there wasn't much left to do in terms of helping clean up dinner, I decided to go upstairs to use the restroom and spruce up my appearance a bit.

After doing my business I washed my hands, applied some more lip gloss, and fluffed up my hair some. Before leaving the confines of the bathroom, I found myself face to face with my reflection in the mirror, staring at my blank face and wondering. How was any of this going to work out? My family was involved now. Mr. McCoy said that he wanted a full relationship with me no matter the consequences, but was it worth it? Are having both his and my reputations and his possible job on the line worth the risk?

Taking a deep breath, I pushed all of those thoughts out of my mind until another day. Right now was all about spending time with my family and making sure they bought McCoy and I's story.

I ran a hand through my chestnut colored hair and straightened out my outfit. Giving myself one last look over, I straightened my posture, nodded to myself in the mirror, and opened the bathroom door.