Just Around the Corner

Sophie met her gaze for the first time, obviously caught off guard. “No,” she said slowly.

“Matt told me you were thinking about quitting school—”

“Only for a minute,” Sophie interrupted, her expression earnest. “I’m over that, which is what I tried to tell him yesterday, but he’s got himself all concerned, anyway. He’s like that, you know.”

“Right.” Phyllis watched Sophie closely, trying to read between the lines—and through the bravado.

Perusing the room again, Sophie didn’t seem able to focus her attention on anything.

Phyllis grabbed a bowl of candy from the cabinet behind her, held it out. “Would you like a piece?” she asked.

“No thanks.” Sophie didn’t look at the bowl.

Phyllis put it back. She never ate the stuff herself, but liked to have it handy for her students—and the faculty who often stopped by for a dip in the bowl. She enjoyed the camaraderie of their visits.

“Do you like sweets?” she asked.

“Nah.” Sophie appeared to be studying Phyllis’s degrees hanging on the wall behind her.

“I love them,” Phyllis confessed. “Or I did.”

Sophie glanced at her and then back toward the degrees.

“I graduated from Boston College,” Phyllis said. “And then Harvard for my masters in psychology and Yale for my doctorate.”

“Wow.” Sophie sounded genuinely impressed. “You must be smart.”

Phyllis shrugged. “Or just good at going to school.”

“Yeah, but Harvard and Yale?”

“I know.” Phyllis rolled her eyes. “Pretty impressive, huh?”

“I’ll say.”

“Well, I gotta tell you, impressive as those degrees might be, I still ended up doing something pretty stupid with my life.”

Sophie stared at her, frowning. “Teaching here? That’s not stupid! Montford’s one of the best schools in the country.”

“No. Not professionally, personally.”

“What’d you do?” The girl, leaning back in her chair, skinny legs extended almost straight in front of her, was starting to focus a bit.

“I chose the wrong man to marry, for one.”

Sophie’s eyes clouded. “Bummer.”

“Yeah.”

“So you’re divorced?”

“Yep.”

“How many times?”

An odd question.

“Only once,” Phyllis answered, trying not to appear as carefully observant as she was. “I’d had a couple of pretty serious breakups before that, but only one divorce. It’s all I intend to have.”