Semesters End

For the next two and a half hours, I said nothing at all to Esha, and next to nothing to my temporary lab partners. I took measurements and kept the workbench clean. I suddenly realized I'd fucked over my regular lab partner for no reason at all.

In a room filled with strangers, it was easy to tell myself Esha had been replaced by a TA who looked just like her. I almost believed if I could avoid eye contact with her for long enough, I wouldn't have to talk to her at all.

No such luck. Maybe because this lab ended right around lunchtime, as soon as the class ended, everyone disappeared within moments of the class ending. I was left in the lab alone. Esha looked like she was avoiding me too, moving from table to table, resetting that week's experiment.

Without a word, I started helping her, passing digital calipers and scales. When we finished, she mumbled a thank-you while barely looking at me out of the corner of her eye.

"Nah," I said, heaving in a big breath. "I shouldn't have skipped this morning. Thanks...for letting me make it up. I owe you."

"It was no problem," Esha replied. "Especially after last week—I..." She looked around, over her shoulder at the empty room. The door was closed. "I didn't feel safe walking home alone. I'm not sure I thanked you for helping me out."

"You did," I said, with a little laugh. "You definitely did. It was no problem."

"I hope not," she said, hesitating. "It's just been such a long semester, and I've had so much work and...ugh. So I kind of owed you one. But that—this—has to be a one-time thing. I can't look after every student who's late."

"Yeah," I nodded. "I understand. No special treatment."

I picked up my backpack and turned to leave the room.

"Listen, Cole—" she said behind me. Esha smoothed down the front of her blouse and clasped her hands. "You're a great student and you've worked hard. Whatever you do, keep at it."

No woman had ever been this confusing to me. Esha was more intelligent than anyone I'd ever been with; she was sexy, exotic, completely out of my league and completely off-limits.

* * *

For as slowly as each step toward campus had dragged behind me in January, in April it seemed as though time was slipping away ahead of me and I had to run to keep up. My whole personal life evaporated. On top of that, as if that weren't enough, I still had to figure out what the fuck I was going to do after graduation.

Come hell or high water, it would all be over by the first weekend in May.

There was one asterisk in this. I kept telling myself that just because I'd aced the lab midterm didn't mean I was out of the woods; I had every excuse to keep talking to Esha, although I had to be careful to keep up a professional camouflage.

The midterm had not gone so well for other students; there was a permanent uptick in wait time at Esha's office hours. Instead, I'd email questions to her, even late at night after studying for hours. Replies always came back pretty quickly, sometimes after midnight, but they were short and stayed on point.

My last, best attempt before conceding defeat was about a month before the final. So many students were coming to office hours that Esha sent an email asking people to sign up for help ahead of time. But the weather was perfect for taking a walk or sitting outside, so I stopped by her office about ten minutes before she was done.

She'd want to get outside, and I'd ask if I could buy her a coffee at the coffee shop while we talked.

As the last student left, Esha started gathering her things and I knocked on the open door and said hi.

"Cole!" She looked over at a white board filled with names and times. "Did you sign up for a meeting?"

"No," I admitted. "But I thought I'd come see if you had a minute afterwards to talk."

"I'm sorry, I wish you'd let me know ahead of time. Right now I'm—"

Someone else stopped and poked his head in from the hallway. "Hey," he said quietly, "Just letting you know I'm right outside. Ready when you are."

"Just finishing up," Esha said to him. She looked back at me and said, "I've really got to go."

Third and long, I said to myself, and there's the interception. Esha asked me to email her about it or sign up for the next week.

I agreed without committing to anything, and walked out and down the stairwell. They came out of the elevator ahead of me and as they walked out of the building, they were talking about lunch. "Jane heard it's supposed to be really authentic," the man said.

"Is she meeting us there?"

I turned the opposite way and walked home. Graduation was a month away, and I had more important things to worry about.

* * *

"Take an exam booklet from the top of the pile and when you have completed it, please hand it in and you are excused. Do your best and have a great summer."

The final was over before I knew it. As I handed over my booklet, Esha whispered a polite thanks. I whispered back, "Let me know how I did. Have a great summer."

And that was it.

* * *

The next day, Friday, was the last day of classes. After that came finals week for all my other classes, but my first one wasn't until Tuesday. At this point, with lab behind me, I wasn't worried about anything.

Around 1:30, wrapping up a review session I didn't need in my last class of the last day, my phone flickered a silent text alert.

Just graded your final. You got a 93. Overall lab grade = A.

I resisted the urge to text back, but I was barely able to sit still with the whole world waiting outside the window. The next twenty minutes slowed almost to a stop...and just when I thought I was going to lose my mind, class ended ten minutes early.

I flew out the doors and into the sunshine. I pulled up Esha's number and texted, Celebrate?

Good idea, she wrote back. Enjoy yourself, I'm still grading.

Dismissing the idea of heading up to her office to interrupt, I decided to go off campus, maybe call some family and hang out until I could hook up with a friend to go out and celebrate. The only place that came to mind was a little coffee shop called the Chai House, across the street from the main gate.

As I walked up, no more than five meters from the door, I got another text message. I'm at the chai house by university if you want to come and say hi.

And there she was, the first face I saw as I walked in the door. She was sipping tea, nose buried in an unbelievable stack of test books. She looked totally engrossed.

As I tried to figure out if I should say hi first or get a drink, Esha looked up and smiled a deep, warm, inviting smile. She was wearing one of the kurti she always wore, a robin's egg blue one I particularly liked, with the all the buttons unbuttoned, down to her cleavage. She'd never worn it this way in class, and even better, she'd slipped her sunglasses there. They pulled the fabric taut against her breasts, making a visible bra line and revealing she didn't have a tee-shirt on underneath.

"Come sit with me," she said. "You can tell me all about why you didn't graduate and how you've decided to switch majors."

She was at least two heads shorter than me, but her total confidence just bowled me over.

"I didn't think I'd be seeing you again," I said. "That is a lot of tests. At least you're almost done, right?"

"No," laughed Esha. "After this, I get back to work. Tomorrow, next week and all summer long."

"No time off for good behavior?"

She smiled and rolled her eyes. "No way," she said, shaking her head. "No time off, good behavior or otherwise."

"I don't know how you do it. I hate getting up that early."

Esha rolled her eyes and laghed. "I am not a morning person by any stretch. Usually I'm hardly out of bed by now." She pulled the hair tie out of her ponytail and ran her fingers through her hair. Glossy black curls fell around her neck, framing her face.

She leaned back in her chair, unconscious of how bending her arms behind her head heaved her breasts and lifted her kurti. "So," she asked. "Want to see your test?"

"Not really," I said. "I'm not sure I believe it."

"Believe it," she said. "It took me all morning to get through the 8 AM section. I just submitted the grades, and now it's on to the next section."

"You sound like you could use a break."

"If I stop now, it'll just take me longer to finish later. Listen, Cole, I've really got to get through this. I have to have it done by tonight." Esha pulled out her phone and stared down at it for a few moments. "Ugh. It's past two already."

"Do you want some help?"

She looked up, surprised. "That's a nice offer, but..."

"Seriously. I'm not busy and I'd be happy to help."

"Let me think about it. Right now, I think you're right. I need a break—I'm starving. Can I take you some place for lunch?"

"Really?"

"My treat. I was just planning to go home and heat up some leftover biryani—but going out to lunch with you sounds more fun."

"What's biryani?"

* * *

Esha's house was shadowy. At every window, sunlight fell on long, colorful tapestries and dozens of potted plants. Just inside the door, Esha paused and pulled off her sandals. I pushed the door shut behind me.

"Shoes, please," Esha said as she padded across bright rugs on the hardwood floor. She dumped her backpack and four stacks of tests onto the short, modern couch. I pulled off my cross-trainers and followed her in. I was glad I had clean socks.

The kitchen had an intoxicating scent. The aroma of whole fresh spices lingered near the cupboards. Hanging in a wire basket, bright yellow fruits shaped like commas drew my full attention.

"What are these?"

"Mangoes," she said. "From India. You've never had a mango?"

"I think so. I'm not sure I've ever seen one, though."

Esha turned in two directions at once, at a loss. "You—? Okay. You have to have a mango but—hang on. Do you want a drink? Coffee, tea...?" She pulled open the fridge, and a few bottles of beer clanked in the door. "Also I think we have some juice."

"Those beers look pretty good, if that's okay."

Esha turned up and looked at me with a raised eyebrow. "Not on the job, you don't. Not just yet."

She put on a kettle and began to boil water for tea. "There!" she said with an excited little grin as she flicked the switch. "Good Indian hostess. Now, you have to try this mango before we have lunch."

Esha put on some jingling, quavering old Bollywood music and occasionally sang along. She washed her hands and pulled down one of the mangoes and began to deseed it. Cutting into it lengthwise, she cut off the top half of the fruit and turned it over.

"A lot of people cut it apart inside the skin, but I don't have the patience. I just use my fingers."

She pressed her fingers between the fruit and the skin, and in one motion pulled the fragrant yellow pulp away. She turned to me, leaning against the counter, and held it up to me. "See? Try it."

As I stepped toward her, I said, "Remember when I first came to you for advice, and you told me not to worry? I remember exactly what you told me; you said, 'Act on what's in front of you.'"

On impulse, I reached out and touched her arm. She lifted the fruit to my lips and let me eat from her fingers. I put my hand behind her back. A sweet, wonderful taste filled my senses, unlike anything I'd eaten before.

I leaned down and simply kissed her. After a moment of hesitation, her warm full lips embraced me and her whole body melted into me, impossibly soft and tender. Her hair felt like silk rustling over my arm as I drew her inward.

"I shouldn't be doing this," she whispered.

"Why not?"

She licked her lips and kissed the side of my mouth. "You're my student."

"Not any more. I'm out. You're done with me."

"Not by a wide margin." She kissed me again.

"I want you," I said. "I've crushed on you for months."

"Oh yeah?" she whispered.

"First chance I got, I did this." I slipped my hand beneath her kurti and felt all the little hairs on the small of her back rise up. Our tongues met in a long kiss with the aroma of mango on our lips. Esha's hands pulled my button-up shirt away from my abdomen and her small fingers played over my muscles.

"Mm, nice," she said.

Her breasts were now pushed deeply into my chest. Her breathing was warm on my cheek; her lips were parted as she began to nuzzle my chest and her eyes batted shut.

I cradled her head and caressed her hair and she kissed my biceps, and whispered so quietly I could hardly hear her. "We have to stop."

"It's okay," I said. "The class is over. It's just you and me."

"And fifty more finals," she said. "Come on. You said you'd help; well, work first." She grinned. "Then play."

Reluctantly, I followed her into the living room. We divided up the tests. She assigned me a few of the more straightforward sections to check. I spread my stack out on the floor and lay on my stomach. Esha put her hair into a ponytail and curled up on the couch with a stack in her lap, frowning over longer questions. There was something very intimate about working together in quiet.

Slow Bollywood love songs played in the background. Now and then Esha lost herself and sang snatches of lyrics, fading into humming and quiet again as something on a test caught her eye and her red pen began to move.

We worked for almost an hour this way. After the fifth or sixth time I interrupted with a stupid question, Esha set aside her stack and picked her way delicately over to stand behind me, flexing her back and limbering up her stiff arms.

"Sorry about all the dumb questions," I said.

"No way," she said. "I like how careful you're being."

Her knees touched the rug astride my waist and she sat gently on my legs. Esha rubbed my back all the way up to my shoulders and then stretched her whole body out over my back. Then she kissed my neck, put her lips to my ear and whispered, "Besides...I like it when a big strong man does what I say."

"Yes ma'am," I laughed. In one swift motion, I rolled her off of my back and she sprawled out over the piles of tests in front of me. She squealed and grabbed hold of my back, arm in arm with me. With her other hand she laced fingers with mine, and things became a blur as we started to kiss.

I was between her legs, kissing her and gripping the small of her back, pulling her toward me.

"Mm, Cole, Cole," she said between kisses. I kissed her cheek and her earlobes. Her pony tail had come loose and she lay before me almost exactly as I'd pictured her—breasts swelling, hair splayed out over graded exams, looking up at me with hunger in her glittering black eyes. Her beautiful brown lips pronounced my name:

"Cole...let's go inside."

She led me down a short hall and turned around to pull me into her room by the hem of my shirt. I caught her by the wrist as she searched for the door handle behind her, and put her arm over my shoulder. Sweeping her suddenly into my arms, I turned the latch and carried her into the room and moments later threw her onto the bed.

The front of Esha's light blue kurti lifted up, revealing a small gauge silvery ring in her navel, accentuating all the piercings in her ears. I knelt in front of her and pushed the blouse even farther up. She wriggled beneath my touch and I found her leg draped over my left shoulder.

I kissed her taut abdomen and caressed her sides, from the bottom line of her black lace bra to the elastic waist of her pink cotton underwear now peeking out from beneath the hip of her blue jeans.

Esha's hands caressed my scalp, hugging me toward her pelvis. "Yeah," she moaned. "Yeah, yeah." Her leg flexed back and I pushed her thighs apart. I kissed down from her cute belly ring to the fly of her jeans. I worked open the buttons and found a nice long red stripe, with words in white: Lucky You.

I pulled the fly open and tugged the front of her panties down a bit, and found a thin patch of cornsilk black hair. I nuzzled her and began to kiss. I could smell faint scent of perfume on her body—I couldn't place exactly what it was, but it was a warm scent, with shades of orange peel, vanilla and crème brulée.

Esha sat up and kissed me, cradling my head with her delicate hands. She kissed with full attention, devouring my lips and letting our tongues dart against each other. Then she slid off the bed to kneel in front of me, and she pulled my shirt over my head.

As the shirt came away, her open hand caressed my chest, teased my nipples and she kissed the side of my neck.

"I can't believe you're single," she whispered.

I didn't answer. I pulled her kurti over her head and put her thin arms around my neck. Esha strained upward to kiss my ear and her breath was hot and trembling. Her breasts, just about the size of mangos, pushed against me.

Our skin was in full contact. The lacy bra was a demi-cup, and I could feel its contours on my chest by the contrast with the softness of her body.

Esha's hands were exploring me as we kissed, tracing my shoulder blades, my ribs and the curve of my sides. I reciprocated, feeling the curve of her slender back down over the strap of her bra and pulling her toward me.

I got goosebumps as we kissed, feeling her open herself to me fully. Her lips were quivering as our mouths locked, and her surprisingly strong forearms were made of rebar. Esha's nails were trimmed short, luckily—otherwise she might have drawn blood as her fingers dug into the flesh of my back.

We were locked together. As I stroked her back, I landed on her bra strap and deftly popped it open with a quick snap of my fingers and wrist. The shoulder straps went slack and one fell off her shoulder. I massaged the indented mark where the fit was too tight.

Esha stopped me from pulling the bra loose. I felt every millimeter of her fingertips going down to the small of my back, until suddenly her hand was loose and Esha tore open my favorite belt—worn brown leather and brass.

"Please tell me you're hard," Esha muttered, and continued with something indistinct in Hindi. In a moment, our jeans were open to each other at the front. Esha dove inside my boxers. Her right hand disappeared beneath the charcoal grey plaid (no cartoon boxers today, thank God) and her silver bangles rang like small bells over my zipper as they piled up on her forearm.

Esha's hand turned, cupping my ramrod hard shaft with her palm and gathering my sack under her fingers. The tip freed itself and rested up against her forearm. With one hand on my cock and the other holding her bra to her chest, she pulled away from me, smiling.

Esha gave one of the most evil little laughs I have ever heard. "Vah," she said. "Kya lund. Lie back on the bed for me."

"Yes, ma'am," I said. My head fell onto one of the pillows. I tried to pull Esha up with me, but she resisted, and swiveled to kneel between my legs.

I emptied my pockets and handed her my wallet, keys and finally my cell phone. She reached over—revealing a long curve of her upper breast as she did, and stretching her shoulder strap along her upper arm—and put everything on her night stand.

If she'd opened my wallet, she would've seen a picture of my girlfriend.

"Esha, I..." I began to say, but I trailed off. She smoothed out my jeans with the palms of her hands.

"Yeah," she said. She opened a small cabinet door in the nightstand and revealed two shelves. On top was a small wooden box, painted bright gold and black. Opening this, she found a condom.

Her bra slipped slightly as she took the condom wrapper in her fingers and began to tear it open. Before she did, I blurted out, "Esha, I've got a girlfriend. I'm sorry. I'm the one who shouldn't do this."

"Hmm," said Esha. "Figures." She looked down at my trousers and smiled a nice, crooked smile. She pulled back my boxers to reveal the root of all dumb decisions. Esha kissed, then traced her tongue along, the entire length of my shaft.