The success of our programming was essential to his longevity because his position was grant-funded and predicated on outcomes assessment. They were leaders in the making, and it was our job to create opportunities for them to lead the way. We always talked about work, about program planning, about making the greatest impact for the students. The office visits increased, and soon, I found myself wandering into his, just barely lingering in the doorway as if I had somewhere better to be, but what I had to say couldn’t wait and I didn’t have the patience for email. We were supposed to have meetings once a week, but he invented reasons to come into my office at least once a day.

“Can you go to the celebration dinner after training on Friday? Or are you leaving for Indiana right after your presentation?” I knocked on his open door and stepped inside his office.

I sipped down swallows of ice water to cool my body from the inside out. He laughed his shrieking hyena laugh again as if to say, gotcha! “You shouldn’t believe everything you read on Facebook.” His eyes settled on mine until I had to look away, my cheeks burning from what I thought to be the tequila or maybe the humid August evening. He’s obviously not the girlfriend you just mentioned,” I continued. “I mean, your Facebook profile says you’re in a relationship with someone named Ian. He seemed amused by my discomfort, and it intrigued me. He stirred his frozen margarita and ignored the onlookers, even though he watched as my eyes looked around to see who was staring. The laugh broke the din of the neon-lighted restaurant, and patrons at a nearby table looked curiously in our direction. He let out a loud cackle, his boxy beaver teeth revealed between smiling lips. He had been on the job for a week, and aside from a telephone interview, an internet screening, and a brief orientation, I knew very little about him. “So,” I started, dragging the word into multiple syllables to give me time to put my thoughts together before he went on with another story that would fill me with more questions. He had been speaking for ten minutes about a girl named Maureen, whom he also referred to as Mo, also referred to as “my girlfriend.” She was a residence life director in Indiana, he said, and he continued on about something to do with long-distance relationships and how they met and something else that I couldn’t hear over the voice of dissent in my head.

Realizing River City by Melissa Grunow