Page 15 of Proof By Contradiction
Not leaving.
I say it before I can stop myself, because this whole term is eroding the borders: ‘Friday’s lecture was good.’
Haldrey’s hand pauses on the strap of his bag—half a second, then continues, buckling it. ‘Thank you,’ he says, not turning around.
‘The Squeeze Theorem. The way you did it.’
‘Mm.’
Mm.A sound, non-committal. A man refusing to be drawn, or a lecturer being polite to the fresher who answered a question last week and has now decided to hang back and chat about it. I pride myself on reading men, and he’s a closed book with the pages glued.
‘Office hours are Tuesdays,’ he says. The same unhurried voice. He’s slinging the canvas bag over his shoulder now. He still hasn’t looked at me full-on again. ‘If you want to go over the material. Second floor, maths building.’
Office hours.
Tuesdays.
Memorised from the staff page at two in the morning last week. The times and the room. It’s been in my head for days like a password.
But he said it, out loud to me. The same information my two AM laptop dig delivered, and hearing it from his mouth isn’t the same as reading it online. Same calories, different meal entirely.
He said it like a fact, like a departmental arrangement any student could use. If you’ve got questions about the material, and the absence of anything warmer around it hits cold. My stomach clenches like I’ve been dropped into a well I wasn’t allowed to look at.
It’s the most professional sentence a man can say. It’s also the first door he’s left even slightly ajar.
‘Right,’ I say, echoing his own word back at him. ‘Cheers.’
‘Mr…?’
He’s asking my name. Polite. The formal small-talk ritual of every lecturer who has decided to make a note.Mr,so he can fill in the blank.
My mouth is dry.
‘Carrick. Ewan Carrick.’
He nods, once, short. Registered. ‘Mr Carrick.’
Nothing in his voice. Nothing. It’s the flattest and most clinical use of my surname that has ever occurred, and it lights me up like a filament.
He walks past me down the centre aisle, not fast, not slow, the same pace as always, and I step aside to let him go. As he passes, we almost touch but do not, quite, and then he’s gone through the double doors and the theatre is empty and I’m standing in row three with my heart in my throat and the wordTuesdaysrepeating itself like a coded signal I’ve been issued and told not to break.
I stand there for another ten seconds before I can trust my legs.
Then I walk out the side door to avoid following him down the same corridor.
The side door opens onto the stairwell. A glass panel is in the fire door opposite. Through it: the main corridor.
Haldrey. Stopped. Halfway down, alone, bag still strapped across his back. Head down. From this angle, through smudged safety glass, fifteen metres: His chest moving. Breathing. The way you breathe when you’re forcing composure back into place.
He doesn’t know I’m watching.
He lifts his head, pushes his glasses up. Straightens. Walks. The professional pace reinstalls itself in three steps, and by the end of the corridor, he’s Dr Haldrey again—unhurried, a man on his way to his next thing.
But for five seconds, he wasn’t.
CHAPTER FOUR
Itry again. Obviously.
