Hearts On Campus - Flora Ferrari Page 0,3

it.

What happened? It’s like twenty years of my life since the accident just vanished.

A couple of colleges later, promotions sure. I’ve got nothing but job and financial security, but it feels like nothing’s really changed.

Nothing’s changed around me.

I’m still a bachelor and a shooting pain in my back isn’t the only one I get.

I get it in my heart too sometimes.

The pain of longing.

How ironic, Coach Heart can’t find a girl.

I keep in shape, not too shabby for my age. But only when my back allows and this week it’s been giving me hell.

I need someone or something strong enough, big enough to pick me up by the heels and jerk my spine back into place.

But that’s wishful thinking.

Like finishing my budget request on time if I don’t make a move, I tell myself.

Making my way across campus, I only meet one other staffer, a campus security guard.

He eyes me with a look.

“Help you with something?” he asks, I explain the situation and ask him if he knows a Katelyn Webster, staying over the weekend in the girl’s science dorm.

Checking his clipboard he confirms it’s just the one student staying and it’s her, he takes a moment to call her from his cell and see if she’s in.

“It’s a girl’s only dorm, sir,” he informs me knowingly.

I nod my head in silent agreement as he listens to the call ringing out.

“Hm. No answer. I’d head over there with you, but I’m due back at the office. Change over,” he remarks.

“I think I’ll manage,” I tell him. “Her professor told her to expect me,” I lie, wanting to be free of this guy and closer to having my computer fixed than anything else right now.

I’m half-tempted to just ask for her number, call her up myself. But I know it doesn’t work like that.

Boundaries.

He takes my name and makes sure I see him taking note of our conversation.

I crease a smile as he leaves, grateful though that there’s some security on campus. I’ve never needed them since living on campus and hopefully never will.

Although, I’m more inclined to take care of my own problems if I ever have any.

“Oh!” he calls over his shoulder as he walks away. “She’s in the only single room in the dorm, 1E.”

I hold a hand up in thanks and keep moving.

Being the men’s gymnastics coach, I’ve never had cause to venture into a female dorm before.

The past twenty years I’ve been so busy with work I haven’t ventured into anything female.

Once I find her dorm, and then her door, I feel a funny flutter in my chest though, not because she’s a girl in a girl’s dorm.

Just a funny feeling comes over me like I’m close to something I know is gonna change everything somehow.

Hard to explain, even to myself. But once I realize nobody’s home I feel my shoulders sink as I turn on my heel, trudging back to my computer problem that hasn’t changed.

I’m halfway back down the hall when I hear the door click open, I would turn but she says something about it being a girl’s only dorm.

Maybe I should have worn my ‘coach’ shirt with a sign that explains it’s okay, I work here.

I have a dozen remarks I could make, but when I do turn to face her…

Those boundaries I just mentioned?

I kinda feel them crumble inside me.

The empty space in my chest that aches is suddenly flushed with warmth. The same kind that’s pulsing down to my groin, which I feel thicken as I take her in from a distance.

For twenty years I’ve worked and taught in colleges. Never looked at a student like this.

Never even considered it.

Never met the right one, I guess.

I know that now.

Fuck, she’s perfect.

My bravado only lasts so long and I have to stand my ground. That swelling in my track pants isn’t the kind to take for walks.

I must have the wrong room, nobody this perfect could have been walking around campus without me knowing. Without somebody mentioning it.

She’s so fucking perfect.

Short, but everyone is when you’re my height. Blond hair tied back in a neat ponytail that highlights her powder-soft, round face.

Her eyes are made bigger by her glasses, but it only makes the blue stand out more.

Her teeth are straight and square. I know that because she’s started to gnaw at her lower lip, betraying the mood of her opening argument about this being a girl’s only dorm.

Surely there’s room for one man here, just for a little bit?

I try