Count to three: My affair with my dynamics professor (teacher x student)

Chapter 33

The sharp burn in my abs was starting to fade as I lay flat against the mat, arms spread out beside me. My breath came in short, ragged bursts, and the soft hum of music in my earphones was the only thing keeping me grounded. I could feel my muscles protesting — but I wasn't stopping.

I took a moment to catch my breath, staring up at the ceiling. The light was soft in the room, and I felt that strange balance between exhaustion and peace. The kind of stillness that comes when your body's been pushed but hasn't quite reached its limit.

The next set was coming up, but as I took another deep breath, the music in my earphones suddenly cut out. Silence.

I frowned, trying to adjust the connection, but then I heard the faint buzz of my phone vibrating on the floor next to me. I blinked, disoriented, and twisted my neck to glance over. The incoming call was flashing across the screen — "Karimov."

I froze.

Inés?

I couldn't breathe for a second. Not because I had just been doing V-ups and my body was halfway to a heart attack anyway — but because I couldn't wrap my mind around it. Inés was calling me. At 6 pm on a Thursday.

I blinked again, my mind scrambling for something to latch onto. Maybe I was still half-dreaming. Maybe it was a mistake, a wrong number. But the name was still there — Karimov.

I sat up in a hurry, my heart racing in a completely new way, and quickly swiped to accept the call. My fingers were shaky.

It didn't matter how many times I had daydreamed about this, or fantasized about what it would be like if Inés ever called me — this wasn't it. This was real, and suddenly everything I had thought I'd been ready for felt like it was collapsing in on me.

The phone clicked, and then there was silence on the other end, my own breathing still loud in my ears.

"Frida?" Her voice — soft, low, and almost surprisingly casual — broke through the silence.

I swallowed hard, trying to catch up with the fact that Inés was actually calling me. I blinked a few more times, my chest tight.

"Yes," I managed to say, probably sounding like I'd just run a marathon. "Yes, it's me. Hi."

"Hi," Inés replied, a small chuckle at the end of her word. "I hope I didn't catch you at a bad time."

I sat there, processing her words, feeling the weight of her on the other end of the line.

"Not at all," I said quickly, my heart still pounding in my chest.

"I wanted to let you know that the university newspaper reached out to us," Inés said, her voice smooth and calm. "They're interested in doing an interview about your success with the case study competition. They thought it would be great to highlight both of us together — your work and, of course, my role as your supervisor."

She paused, probably waiting for me to process this new bit of information.

"We need to set a date for it sometime next week," she continued. "How does Wednesday afternoon look for you? Around 2 PM?"

My thoughts scattered again, crashing against the walls of my brain. Wednesday? I couldn't even concentrate enough to check my calendar. I was still stuck on the fact that Inés was calling me, speaking so naturally, like it was just another thing she did. My mind raced to catch up, but all I could manage was a weak, disjointed response.

"Wednesday... uh, unfortunately, won't work," I said, forcing the words out. I felt completely out of breath again, though it had nothing to do with the exercise. "But Tuesday would be good. Is that alright?"