Second Comings

Second Comings

Part I: August

Jordan Secord had, like so many professors in this day and age, managed to avoid a tenure tracked position at any reputable university with a breathtaking adroitness that had left his many peers dumbfounded. How could an intellect so curious, a historian and practitioner of American foreign policy of such wide achievement not have been snapped up by a Harvard or a Princeton? It just made no sense at all.

Secord was indeed generally well-regarded wherever he taught, but he was also aggressively shy, and always soon came to be regarded as a pompous and mean-spirited sort, and those academic associates who attempted to penetrate the veil of Secord's resolute intellectual intemperance generally came away from the experience wishing they had never made the attempt. As a result, he generally managed to hang onto academic appointments for a couple of years, then an administrative sort would call him in and advise that his contract would not be up for renewal, and that was that. After a series of such dismissals, Secord did what most self-effacing historians did: he lobbied for and secured a position working in the White House. He prepared the president's daily national security brief, and wrote position papers for speechwriters to use when staging the president's next sound bite. In the immediate post-9/11 political world, Secord's was a busy life indeed.

Still, the cozy confines of academia called, and when The President left office, Secord put out feelers and soon found a quaint college in Vermont with a tenure-tracked position in the offing; he fired off a letter of inquiry and hoped for the best. Things went well, and he accepted a five year appointment to the college after he toured the campus and met the department chair. He was, he noted dryly, to be the liberal college's token conservative, and the thought filled him with uncharacteristic cheer. He loved nothing more than analyzing liberal arguments, then cutting them to shreds. In fact, the prospect seemed more than fun at this stage in life...it would be grand entertainment to expose liberal ideologies for the shams they are!

Far from being a pious man, Secord nevertheless considered himself a moral man, and he had long considered a steadfast moral compass to be the foundation of his classroom principles. Whether discussing John C Calhoun or Jimmy Carter, Secord focused on the moral dilemmas faced by America's leaders when confronting dictators and madmen, and like any historian worth his salt, he always made an attempt to present all sides of the relevant arguments these leaders faced. Even so and in the end, he considered himself staunchly conservative, though he knew he had a hard time hiding this bias; indeed, his 'rightish' leanings had, more often than not, landed him in real trouble. Higher education in America had become, if anything, even more restrictive in it's tolerance of free speech, but he understood the pendulum swings both ways over time, and he simply wanted to take the long view this time around. To that end, he'd decided to avoid situations that might lead to confrontations with left leaning faculty, and to that end he'd decided to keep his opinions to himself. If by some miracle he achieved tenure...? Well, he might let loose then, for if anything Secord thought he'd learned this lesson, and learned it well. He was tired of moving, wanted some stability in his life, and Vermont looked enticing.

Two weeks before the Fall Term began, all new faculty were due on campus. Orientation sessions were scheduled, facility tours given, and much time was dedicated to getting acquainted with all the material the Resource Center had available. A week before first classes were scheduled, a faculty dinner was scheduled at the college president's house, a grand, rambling colonial-era mansion that stood on a bluff overlooking the Connecticut River. Weather permitting, the affair was usually held on the grounds behind the house, and when the anointed day arrived, very warm temperatures and a cloudless sky beckoned.

Secord walked the few blocks to the stately house, and he was really quite impressed with the state of preservation found on the idyllic campus. Most of the college's buildings pre-dated the American Civil War, while more than a few, including the President's House, had been built in Revolutionary War times. Deep red brick, white trim, black shutters on the windows, the houses he saw were simply gorgeous and every property was surrounded by the deepest green lawns he'd ever seen – while an overwhelming number of huge oaks and maples and pines cast deep shadows everywhere he looked.

He had opted to wear an old pale blue seersucker suit and white shirt, and an equally old bow tie. White bucks, of course, rounded out the image he wanted to convey, but it was so warm out he took off his jacket and slung it over his shoulder as he walked along. A Prius hummed by and parked along the street, and he looked on in awe at the long legs that emerged from the Toyota. Shimmering hosiery, very high heels, long dark hair...there was nothing PC looking about the woman who walked ahead of him to the President's house. No, indeed not; this woman seemed as hot as a pistol.

Secord found himself mesmerized by the woman's legs, especially the smooth, full lines of her calves as he made his way up the walk behind her. She slowed, let him catch up, then stood aside and let Secord open the door for her! 'Holy Crap!' he said to himself as she passed, 'this sure as hell wasn't a Birkenstock wearing, hairy legged rug muncher!' Now he just had to find out who this dame was!

Cocktails were being served in a large lanai off the house's grand reception hall, and Secord found himself a decent scotch and water and walked over to a buffet table where an array of cheese and fruit lay artfully arranged. He picked up a plate and put some cubed swiss on it, added a few fresh looking strawberries for good measure, then walked outside and found his name on one of the tables set amongst the trees. He saw place holders for his department chair to the left, and someone named Michele Lansing on his right. Oh well, he sighed, it might be a long evening. He took a long pull on his scotch and loosened his tie.

"Jordan!"

He turned, saw Dennis Hastings, the Chairman of the History Department ambling his way, then he looked down at the man's hairy legs. Secord recoiled from the plaid madras shorts and lime green polo shirt he saw, and grimaced at the terra cotta colored Birkenstocks – replete with gray argyle knee socks – Hastings had on.

"Dennis! By golly, I wish I'd worn shorts! It's beastly bot out here...worse than D.C.! So! Is this your wife?"

The woman by Hasting's side was well endowed and seemed cast in stone of simmering anger, yet somehow she exuded a very refined appearance, yet it was her eyes that caught Secord's, for they were luscious. Deep blue pools set inside a gracefully aging wilderness...he found her face enchanting – and now found himself staring at Sharon Hastings as her husband made introductions. Secord guessed she was Harvard or Princeton, definitely not a Yalie, simply by the way she held herself...and by the pained look she expressed for her husband's attire. He felt for her, if only because Hastings looked like he'd just stepped out of a ratty old motorhome and counted on embarrassing his wife.

Then she came right for him and shook his hand, and dove right in.

"You're coming from the White House, aren't you?" she asked, and he was acutely aware she hadn't let go of his hand – yet.

"That's about the size of it, Sharon."

Dennis interrupted. "You want your usual, baby-doll?"

Sharon rolled her eyes. "Better make it a double, sweet-cheeks!" Dennis walked away, blushing. "That'll teach the bastard!" she said, chuckling. "So, what? NSC? Is that what I heard?"

"Yup. Position papers, daily briefs. That kind of stuff."

"Were you there for 9/11?"

"Just after. Interesting times. What do you do?"

"Sabbatical. I teach poli-sci at Holyoke, but I worked in the Clinton White House," she said reproachfully.

"Ah," Secord said. So that's why she asked for a double.

"Where'd you teach before? Did I hear Stanford?"

"Yes, a few years there. Also at USC."

"And you went to Yale?"

"Yes, Dartmouth undergrad. You?"

"Georgetown, then the Fletcher School."

That cleared things up, Secord said to himself as alarm bells went off in his head. Catholic, probably Boston, ties to the Kennedy clan almost a sure bet. Sharp as a scalpel, no doubt. "What are you working on now," he asked.

"Me? Oh, not much. Just whether the case can be made that Bush and Cheney are war criminals."

The hair on the back of Secord's neck stood on end. "I imagine that'll be fun."

Dennis arrived with what looked like a liter sized martini, and he handed it to her. Gin, of course, with a couple of fat green olives doing the backstroke in there; Sharon quaffed it in one long pull, and both men stood by in open-mouthed amazement as she handed the tumbler back to Dennis and said: "Keep 'em coming, sweet meat..."

"You really don't have to do this on my account," Secord said conspiratorially as Dennis walked off. "I can just move to another table..."

"Don't tell me you're a fuckin' gentleman, too! You better not start opening doors for the 'ladyfolk' around here, Secord, or the sororities will camp on your lawn, with pitchforks!"

"He opened mine," a silky, feminine voice shot back. Secord turned to see the legs from the Prius. "And I sure didn't mind."

"And who are you?" Sharon asked, her words pointed barbs of anger.

"Michele, Michele Lansing," the woman replied, holding out her hand.

Sharon ignored the woman, then turned and left the table – apparently looking for her husband. Secord sensed the Lansing woman's wounded chagrin so quickly took her hand and introduced himself.

"Oh, Secord? History department? Did I read you just left the White House?"

"Yes, I think that's me. Where'd you get your intel?"

"Faculty directory, on the web site. Pretty much your whole CV is posted. For all of us."

"Sorry, haven't been there yet. Are you new here this year?"

"Yes, psychology and gender studies. Loyola and Northwestern, and I've been teaching at Reed for a while."

"Oregon?"

"Uh-huh," she said, but the way she spoke that word was seductive in the extreme.

"Could you use a drink," Secord asked.

"Could I! Anything with rum!"

"Fine. I need another myself. Be right back."

When Secord returned, student-waiters were filling water glasses and he saw the Hastings were back too, and Sharon was in the seat next to his. Lansing was talking to a woman in the seat next to her own, so Secord put her drink on the table and sat down just as the college president took to the podium. The microphone clicked and hummed, teachers and spouses turned their attention to the inevitable welcoming speeches, and waiters began bringing food to the tables.

Sharon Hastings was by the time speeches ended into her third tumbler of gin, and had apparently decided to further humiliate her husband, calling him 'sweet cheeks' in a loud, obnoxious voice as she recounted his inadequate sexual prowess more than once. Dennis tried to ignore her, something no one else at the table seemed able to do, and when she asked for a fourth drink he told her she'd had enough. That ought to, Secord thought, set the fireworks off nicely.

Instead he felt Sharon's hand on his thigh, and he tensed as her fingernails began tracing lazy circles up his leg. She hit pay dirt after about a minute, and then pinched the tip of his dick – and Secord jumped enough to rattle glasses on the table. Lansing looked down at Secord's lap, then at the furiously tight expression on his face, and quickly, miraculously, asked him to go fetch her another daiquiri. He stood and left the table; when he returned Lansing had taken his seat and left hers vacant for him.

He whispered 'thanks!' as he sat, and she smiled at him, and held him in her eyes for a moment. A jazz trio had set up and was playing as dishes were cleared, and he asked Michele if she'd like to dance.

"In these heels, on this lawn? Are you kidding?"

"They're nice. Old fashioned, I guess. I take it you don't normally wear heels."

She nodded, smiled, then took a long pull from her daiquiri. "So, you like them?"

"Yes, yes I do. They set off your legs nicely. Which are lovely too, I might add."

A few sidelong glances settled over the table so Secord backed off, turned to the woman next to him and started another polite conversation. He danced with Sharon, and she asked what he knew about 'that Lansing gal'.

"Not much, I guess. Just what she told me at dinner."

She smiled, then moved on to safer ground. "You have a car here? You're not going to want to miss the leaves."

"The leaves?"

"Autumn. Take the back roads to Woodstock, then over to Rutland before heading back. The colors are really impressive."

"Good idea. Maybe you and Dennis would like to ride along, show me the best route?"

"I'd be happy to," she said as she pressed a thigh into his groin, "if we can stop off somewhere and play."

"Are you and Dennis...?"

"In the middle of a long, downhill slide to dissolution."

"Oh, I'm sorry to hear..."

"Don't be, my dear. He's half the man he used to be."

"Well, I'm sure it's none of my business."

"Just fair warning, Jordan. Dennie has developed a taste for boys. A student, as a matter of fact."

Secord looked away at that, not sure what to say or how to change the subject. He looked to their table, saw both Dennis and Michele watching him, and they both seemed rather amused – in a cavalier sort of way. They finished the number, then he helped an unsteady Sharon back to their table, and he was anxious to get away from her as fast as he could. He sat for a while, until it was apparent the party was winding down, then he made his excuses and bid the people at his table good night. He made his way to the president's table, thanked him for the evening, then walked through the mingling crowd for the door.

The evening was decidedly cooler, in fact it was quite nice out now, and as he crossed the street he admired the last faint glows of the sunset. He turned on his street and saw his house ahead – and Lansing's little Prius parked out front.

'This could be interesting,' he said to himself as he walked down the granite sidewalk. It had been a while since he'd had time for sex, but he assumed things hadn't changed all that much in the past couple of years, and he felt a stirring in his groin to go along with the flurry of anticipation he felt. As he approached the little car he was dismayed to see it was empty, but then he saw her sitting on the porch swing beyond his front door.

"Nightcap?" she said as he walked up the steps. She looked sexy as hell, he thought for the umpteenth time that night.

"That sounds like a good idea," he said, smiling, and she stood, followed him inside after he opened the door. He studied her closely as she walked in, and was even more impressed now. She was, perhaps, five-six, five-seven at most, maybe a hundred and ten pounds. Her breasts were decent, neither too big nor too small, but her legs were just perfect, and the bone colored pumps she had on were just perfect, too.

He was still staring at them when he noticed she was staring at him.

"You like what you see, I take it?" she said.

He shook himself back into the here and now, then looked her in the eye. "Few women have the grace and style to dress the way you do, Michele. Fewer still look as sexy as you do right now."

She walked over to the entry and flipped off the lights, then came to him and kissed him hard. She drove her tongue past his lips, and a hand was soon pulling his belt free. His trousers were around his ankles seconds later, and she was on her knees in an instant, his cock in hand as she playfully nibbled his thighs. He wouldn't, he realized, be needing a Viagra that night, either.

She took him in one hungry motion, began swirling her tongue around the head of his cock, pulling him insistently one moment, lightly pinching the shaft with her long fingernails the next. She then took him all the way in one deep motion and began bobbing her head up and down with a ferocity that left him weak-kneed and breathless, and with little build-up or warning he exploded in her mouth.

Maybe he'd expected her to gag and run from the room, but she simply kept her rhythm and he felt her swallowing all he had to give, then she was swirling her tongue around the tip until he felt his legs might buckle and drop out from under him. He was aware of his heartbeat then, and how heavy his breathing had become, and then he realized he was holding her head, running his fingers through her hair.

"Michele...I'm sorry...that just hit me so hard...I had no idea..."

"Jordan, for heaven's sake – don't apologize. What you've given me tonight is the greatest compliment you could have, and you have no idea how much I appreciate..."

He helped her up then, kissed her on the forehead and held her close. After a moment, he kissed her gently on the lips, and he could just make out her eyes in pale moonlight. He could see tears falling, tears he simply could not understand, then she ran her fingers over his face once before running from the house.

He stood just in silence, suddenly completely off balance emotionally.

"What the hell just happened," he said to the emptiness. He fumbled for the light switch, walked into the kitchen and fixed a glass of ice water, then walked back to the front door. She was still out there, her little car still parked out front, and he could just see she was still crying. He flipped on the porch light, and instantly the car slipped into gear and sped off into the night. He went out and sat on the swing for a few minutes, then went inside and got ready for bed, stopping on the way to pick up his laptop.

He settled onto his bed and opened up the college's portal, and went to the faculty listing, found Michele Lansing's entry. Yes, there she was, adjunct prof in psychology, also working in the campus mental health center, specializing in gender identity issues. BA in psych from Loyola Chicago, LCSW and PhD in Clinical Psychology from Northwestern, seven years at Reed College as Michael Thomas Lansing – before completing gender reassignment.

Jordan Secord felt the emotional equivalent of an 7.0 earthquake rumble through his soul, and he ran to the bathroom as bile rushed up his throat. He sat up all night in the living room, almost finishing a bottle of Glenlivet during his journey into deepest despair.

+++++

He was scheduled to teach three classes his first term at the college: a freshman seminar in American History, an American Foreign Policy survey course, and an upper division course covering American foreign policy during the Cold War. He'd have, in total, less that thirty students under his wing, a far cry from the two hundred or so students he'd had at USC – in just one class! He read over the names and backgrounds of all his students, making notes here and there in his attendance book from time to time. He went to the kitchen and made tea, returned to his little office while he worked, and did everything in his power to keep all thought of 'Michele' Lansing from fucking with his head.

He was, he knew, still in a state almost bordering on shock. Disbelief had come and gone, so had revulsion and self-loathing. Still, the one thing he hadn't felt was anger, and that surprised him. Was he really so analytical? So out of touch with his own feelings? He didn't understand what had happened, or why, but anger seemed plausible to him. So, why did he feel so empty now?

And what had she said? That he'd paid her a great complement? Why? What complement? That he'd responded to her as a woman? That she gave great head? That he'd been emotionally available to her, hadn't rejected her out of hand? Well, of course he hadn't! He had no idea what sort of masquerade she'd been playing at, had he? Had she, he, whatever the hell 'it' was, been playing him all along?