Every Wickedness. Susan Thistlethwaite

myself sitting at a desk in a beautiful library made golden by light streaming in from stained glass windows while I did abstract scholarly research. In other words, I wanted to make a clean break from my former life. I’d tried that for a while and it was really boring. Not enough human contact for me. So I’d signed up to be a teaching assistant while I was doing my graduate classwork and I found I liked it. Liked it a lot, but I knew I needed to get better at it. Now, teaching with Hercules, I realized I needed to get a lot better at it. So far I had been taking the ideas from my notes and trying to pass them on to the students to put in their notes. But teachers like Hercules were—I dumped my books and bag on my desk—well, what were they? Soul shapers?

      I shook myself briefly. Nah. Too romantic and sentimental. Well, Hercules was amazing in the classroom, whatever you called it. I checked my watch and could hardly believe the time. Adelaide was waiting for me. I grabbed my keys from among the pile on my desk and quickly locked the door behind me though I knew it wouldn’t do much good since these doors all opened with the same key. But I was still on edge from the events of the fall and I dutifully locked up.

      I hurried down the hall, but slowed down as I passed the coffee machine, tempted by its glorious coffee. But I thought I’d better hurry up. Adelaide’s door was open so I knocked softly on the door jam and looked in.