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The Lecherous Professor
And
The Lovely Young Math Scholar
By
“Prey4Me”
Epilogue – A
(#3 of Four Parts)
“The police,” Nina had answered.
“Of course. I knew I couldn’t get away with this,” he intoned, as he got behind the wheel. “I’ll change my mind later, I’m sure, but having you—possessing you—still seems worth it, somehow. It’s the damndest thing. I had been admiring you so long, from afar. So chastely. So discretely. I’ve done that with other girls, I’ll admit. But as I said, it’s been different with you. You’re black—brown, actually, I have a thing for precision, it’s common to us math types, but then, you’re a math person, you know—“ and the professor prattled on in an oddly casual tone as he backed the car out and headed for the main road.
“You just raped me, you bastard,” Nina interjected. “Three times!”
“I know, and, well, saying I’m sorry will never, ever be enough. I know that, I really do. I just thought that, well, if you understood how all this happened, it might make some sense and bring some comfort to you. You’re going to need closure, and I don’t know what else to say or do before they put the handcuffs on me.
“Because I am sorry, damned sorry, but I know that will always be insufficient.”
“And I still hurt,” retorted Nina. “You don’t know how I hurt!”
“No, I don’t. I can’t.”
They were approaching the edge of the campus.
“I just want to say, Nina, you are an extraordinary young woman. Extraordinarily bright, of great character, and so very beautiful. You’ll put this behind you, I really think so, and get on with your life. My life will be different. I probably won’t get out of prison until I’m on Social Security!
“But you’re like my wife. You have a lot in common. I guess that’s partly why I was so drawn to you. She’s very strong and resourceful and handles adversity, like you. She’ll have to get along and take care of the kids, somehow. I really messed things up for her. Just as I have for you. And the Math Department. And the University! Damn, damn, damn it all, I’ve really fucked up, haven’t I?”
Mark was getting more emotional, more than she had seen him during the entire sadistic ordeal. He actually started to cry.
“I’ve not only fucked you, I’ve fucked everybody else, haven’t I? I let my obsession for you get out of control; it became crude, brutal lust, and I-I-I raped you, my favorite student—you never knew that, I couldn’t tell you, but you were—and, and, I’ve hurt you beyond forgiveness, and I’ve destroyed my life, my career—I can deal with that, I deserve it, all of it—but it will destroy my wife and ruin my children’s future—oh, damn, damn, damn me, what have I done? What have I done?”
He was sobbing and crying now, the polar opposite of the composed, control sex fiend of the previous five hours.
“And the scandal will just poison the Department! I wouldn’t be surprised if this made the national news…”
The car turned, and the police station came into view.
“We’re here now, Nina. I can only tell you I am so, so sorry. If I could go back to the beginning of this evening….but of course, that’s silly. I knew what I was doing, even if I was powerless to control it, and I know what’s going to happen to me. Probably a minimum of ten years, plus other charges—I guess I’m looking at the next thirty or forty years, huh?”
He pulled into the parking by the police station—the far side. Squad cars were parked all over. A cruiser pulled up to the street, entered traffic, and moved off to patrol. The police station was mostly dark, except for the front steps and office.
He turned off the motor, and they sat in the car. Nina hadn’t said anything since they left the campus. Mark continued his monologue, a self-pitying set of random associations.
“It’s just, just…I had no idea how my love for you had been festering so, all through the school year. I thought I was just kind of admiring you, a secret crush, you know? You know, a lot of white girls get attracted to a mature professor, it’s natural, happens all the time. And—I’ll be honest, I’m ashamed to admit it, but—I’ve, well, indulged in a few. Several, actually.
“But you, Nina—you! You’re brown. Creole, actually? Those green, almond eyes! Bewitching! Yes, you didn’t mean to, but you bewitched me! There must be some Asian, maybe a little streak of East Indian in you? Along with some English? Do you have any family from the Caribbean? You just have such an exotic visage, I can’t explain it. Not to mention I could hardly keep my eyes off that perfect body of yours!”
Nina was stunned into silence. Mark—her rapist!—was saying everything, everything!—she had always wanted a cultured, establishment…white…man to say to her! It was as though they were on a date in a quiet, dark bistro. The car radio was playing classical music, Mozart or Handel or somebody.
Neither one reached for a door handle. Mark continued.
“So what was going in me was more subtle but more powerful than I knew. Perhaps I subconsciously was trying to force a resolution to my feelings for you when I gave you the ‘87’ on that exam. You deserved higher, I knew. And then you wanted to meet me alone, in private, in my office. And when you showed up wearing that silk blouse and blue skirt, and you were so sophisticated and lady-like, and—I—I—I just lost control of everything.
“Everything!
“My professionalism, my morality, my marriage, my career—everything! I guess you could say the Mr. Hyde in me just took over the good Dr. Jekyll, Nina. And it’s my fault, I know, I let it! But it’s not me, not the real me, please understand! I’m not really this kind of sex fiend—I’ve never done anything like this before, I swear, I swear! I’ve had a few indiscretions, but never, ever, have I forced myself on a girl, I swear it!”
He was crying again.
“And I’ll never do it again, I swear that too!” He turned and forced a near-comical smile through his tears. “Of course not, not where I’m going to be spending the rest of my life.”
They sat in the car in silence. Nina stared straight ahead. Mark continued to sob.
“Before we go in, and I get what’s coming to me, I want to tell you one thing. It’s a stupid thing, and it’s way, way, too late, and it’s so very very wrong, but I have to—have to—tell you this, Nina.”
“What.”
“I love you.”
Those three words—the “three magic words” in most any other situation—chilled Nina, right to her spine.. She was dumbfounded. Every beautiful word she had wanted to hear from a classy, mature, establishment white man had now, absolutely, been said to her.
By a man who had just brutally raped her.
Three times.
Mark sat at the wheel, and simmered down. He wiped the tears from his eyes.
“There. I’ve said it. I wish I could have said it under other circumstances. It’s just so sad that I messed things up, huh? In a different universe, maybe things would have been different, better? You deserve so much better, and I hope you’ll get it. You’re so gifted and special, Nina, I’m sure you’ll make out all right.”
The car went quiet for another couple of minutes. Then Mark turned to her, and said, “Well? Shall we go?”
Nina remained utterly still and quiet.
Mark turned and faced forward, and looked out the front. He finally had nothing more to say.
Three or four stone-cold minutes passed. Finally, Nina inhaled deeply, and spoke.
“Take me home, Mark. To my dorm.”
He breathed out relief like a tire with the valve pulled.
“You sure?”
“Yes. Take me home.
“Now.”
He started the car, and eased it out of the police parking lot.
“You’ll never regret this, Nina, I promise,” he said, after a few minutes’ pause. “I know I hurt you, but I’ll make it up to you, I promise. I’ll do whatever it takes, whatever you need, for however long—anything, everything!” With the change in Nina’s decision, he returned to his stream-of-consciousness prattle, as all sorts of bright ideas, promises, and good intentions poured into his over-active mind.
“If you need counseling, I can arrange it. Maybe some religious support, too. You’re a religious girl, aren’t you?” It struck her as odd that if he “loved” her, he didn’t know the first thing about her spiritual beliefs. “I can steer you around the Math Department and make sure that all the professors make sure you succeed and, and, and—well, there’s something else I’m going to do for you, something really special.”
Nina didn’t respond, but he told her anyway.
“I’m working on a major academic article. You can join in—I’ll list you as coauthor! You’re just a freshman. Do you know what it can do for your career to be co-listed on an original article in the Journal of Modern Mathematics? It will make your career—you’ll have your pick of grad schools!”
Back on campus, Nina wordlessly pointed at which turns to make to reach her dormitory. Upon approaching it, Mark drove around to the back. “Can you get in this way?” he asked. “I mean, look how you’re dressed—we don’t want you drawing attention to yourself.”
She nodded yes.
“It’s not raining,eh?” he chuckled.
She tightened the raincoat around herself. He got out of the car, went around, and opened her door. “Does your floor have one of those Jacuzzis?”
She nodded yes.
“Why don’t you go have a good long soak in it, and let those bubbles get all that stress out of your body, Nina. Then sleep late. Next week, you’ll feel better, and I’ll get started on all those things I’ve promised you. And I mean it, I’m going to take care of you. Don’t worry about getting pregnant; I’ll take care of that if we have to. I know I’ve hurt you, and I’m going to do everything I can to make it up to you, I promise!”
He walked her to the back door. A single, meager light illuminated the rear of the building. A few feet away, a big dumpster stood like a hulk, emitting a foul odor. Boxes of cafeteria provisions were piled on a dock, awaiting the arrival of the morning food crew. Nina took out her college ID, and swiped the door lock, releasing it.
She felt peculiar, profound, empty and so very confused. Thousands of contradictory feelings and thoughts criss-crossed her soul. She had just lost something priceless, her virginity to a man she had so admired—and loved?—but he turned out to be a sex fiend. Yet a fiend with feelings, a life, a career and standing, a wife, and apparently a regret so intense if dripped with self-loathing. Would anything be accomplished by ruining him? No, she had decided. But still, was this the right thing to do?
He propped the door open with his foot. They stood facing each other. Then he gently held her by her shoulders, and pulled her close to him. He pressed his face to her temple, and kissed her there.
Gently. Softly.
There, amidst the deliveries, the trash, and odd cafeteria stuff, he kissed her, as though it were the conclusion of a first date. After hours of vulgar, wet, deep-tongue kisses that violated her romantic nature, he proffered a genteel, discrete kiss!
She just didn’t know if she was doing the right thing. Later, she computed her ordeal to have lasted about eight hours: eight hours of rape, abuse, humiliation, violation, rape, and more rape! All nested in a tangle of contradictory feelings of loathing, guilt, hatred, self-doubt, and all-over misery.
Nina just wanted everything to be over and done with.
A long soak in the Jacuzzi—that would be nice. She felt dirty and defiled. Her vagina was sore, her loins ached, sending shoots of pain up into belly, down her thighs, and deep into her hips and buttocks.
Yes, a long soak in the Jacuzzi, with jets of water to clean her to the deep.
Perhaps Professor Smith did know what was best for this horrible situation, after all. Like many victims, Nina unconsciously deferred to the abuser’s agenda.
The door closed, and Nina retreated into the darkness within. She watched Mark as he returned to the car. He reached in, retrieved something, and walked over to the dumpster. He reached in, jostled something, a bag of trash, and shoved the item in. Then he pulled a few bags of trash this way and that, and quietly lowered the dumpster hatch. The professor got back in the car, turned around, and headed out.
The young girl, her body still aching and so very defiled, watched as the car moved off into the early morning dark, and disappeared.
She walked up the back stairs to her floor, swiped her ID to enter her dorm floor, and padded quietly down the hall to her room. Thankfully, her roommate was out of town for the weekend and she’d have the place to herself. She could retreat into quiet and solitude. Oh, how she craved privacy and silence! She reached her door, and fumbled for her room key.
Suddenly, a door opened two rooms down. There was an outcry of laughter and shrieks. Sarah Hanscomb, party girl extroardinaire, blonde, bad student, and oh, so shallow, walked out. Or rather stumbled out, obviously drunk. Another gale of female party laughter burst from the room. Sarah careened against the opposite wall, regained her balance, and turned—to see Nina, standing in the hall, in a man’s raincoat, heels, and nothing else.
Sarah gawked at her and smirked. She staggered up, her shoulder leaning against the wall for balance.
“Well, look who’s coming in at three o’clock in the morning, and look how she’s dressed!” she cackled. “Or undressed? And where have youuuuuuuu been, little-miss-‘I-study-don’t-date?’ And what is this, you’re latest thrift store find? No, I think it’s somebody’s gift, a man’s present!”
Nina tried to fit the key into the lock, but Sarah slid in front of the door. She reeked of alcohol, but she was eyeball to eyeball with Nina. Sarah suddenly became very serious.
“Where in Hell have you been, Nina? Or rather, what the Hell has happened to you?” Nina’s hair was a mess, and her face was streaked with tears, make-up, and a various bruises.
“Never mind.”
“Are you all right? You look, look—what are you doing wearing this?”
“I’m all right, Sarah. Just get out of my way.”
The blonde grabbed the lapel of the raincoat, and pulled at it. Drunk as she was, there was no overlooking the bruises on Nina’s face, throat and chest.
“You’ve been hurt!”
“I’m okay, Sarah. Just let me go!”
Nina unlocked her door, but Sarah blocked entry. “You’ve been hurt, Nina. What happened? Who did this? Missy! Emily! Get out here—Nina’s been hurt!”
“I’m all—I’m—never mind…” In an instant, Nina started crying again, and bumped up against Sarah. The party girl was in no condition to support anybody, and the two of them fell backwards against the doorframe, collapsing into a pile on the floor. Girls suddenly came out of various rooms, to behold Sarah the party girl with her arms around the weeping Nina, so obviously naked under a man’s raincoat.
Hardly a minute had passed before the floor’s entire occupants knew that Nina had been raped! And it took just another minute for the essential detail to have been extracted from the confused and distraught victim.
It was Professor Mark Smith!
“Call the police!” somebody said.
“No,” Nina weakly protested. “I just want to have a bath and go to sleep.”
A bevy of girls’ voices moved to a fast consensus, to call the police.
“We can’t let him get away with this, the jerk!”
“They’ll do a rape test. We’ll nail this creep!”
“Just, just let me be,” protested Nina. “It’s my fault, too. I don’t want to do anything. Just clean up and go to bed.”
“Where are her clothes?”
“Has she been hurt otherwise?”
“Look at her—he beat the shit out of her!”
“That’s his raincoat, Dr. Smith’s. I’ve seen it.”
“We need a lady cop.”
“At this hour? Good luck!”
“Get her to the infirmary.”
“Get her to the hospital!”
“Wait til the cops get here.”
“I saw this thing on CSI…”
“This isn’t television, idiot! Look at the girl!”
“When are the police going to get here?”
“Are you sure somebody did call the cops?”
“Professor Smith raped her? Isn’t he married?”
“Doesn’t matter. He’s fucking all sorts of girls.”
“Why would he rape Nina?”
“I see blue lights outside. They’re here!”
A few sober-minded girls got Nina into a bathrobe and onto her bed. Somebody took custody of the raincoat. Somehow they ferreted out of her that he had thrown something away in the rear dumpster, and before long a volunteer crew had retrieved Nina’s shredded clothes.
“I don’t want to do anything. I’m not going to press charge, I won’t. Just leave me alone,” she murmured over and over.
A certain coed watched discreetly from the periphery. She was Vietnamese, beautiful, slender, and with long black hair. A small squad of officers arrived and moved the girls away, getting control of the situation, interviewing Sarah, taking notes and gathering the clothing. They were quick, discrete, and professional. They stabilized Nina and readied her for the ambulance.
Phenh-Anh made a discrete approach to the stunned and very confused victim.
“Nina.”
“Yes, Phenh-Anh? You-you understand. He’s our teacher. I can’t do this—it will ruin him!”
“Nina.”
“Yes, Phenh-Anh?”
“Nina, he raped me too!”
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