Campus Confidential by Sid Stark

Author:Sid Stark
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: College Campus Crime, Romance university professors, academia higher education, Russia former USSR Soviet Union, Satire dark humor noir, Russian professor solves mysteries
Publisher: Helia Press
Published: 2020-04-26T00:00:00+00:00

28

The news of my upcoming interview filled the adjunct warehouse chatter the next day, with Kate and Emma both agreeing that one could get used to the idea of living in a remote hinterland like Charlotte if it came with a twelve-month appointment and full benefits.

Things got even more animated when Alex came in from class and announced that he, too, had gotten an interview invitation for a tenure-track position.

“Wow!” cried Emma, trying and failing to suppress her naked envy. “For where?”

“Beirut,” said Alex.

“Oh,” we all said at once.

“But...Beirut could be nice, right?” said Kate. “I mean...it’s not like it used to be, right? It’s a nice place to live now, right?”

Alex shrugged and threw himself down onto his mattress, which he was no longer bothering to roll up and place against the wall, especially since Emma was also using it almost every day too. I had been speculating to myself over whether they sometimes shared the mattress simultaneously and in a non-Platonic fashion, because that was the way my mind ran, but if they were, they were keeping it well under wraps. Emma always seemed resentful of Alex’s comparative success and Alex always seemed like he could barely stand to be in the same building as Emma, and anyway, both of them seemed too frazzled to have the time or energy for any hanky-panky. More likely, Alex was enough of a gentleman under his stubbly, prickly exterior to offer his mattress to a lady in need, no strings attached, even a lady he disliked.

“It’s far away from my parents,” he said to the ceiling. He sat up. “Hey! That’s right! It’s like a solid fifteen-hour flight from Pennsylvania.” He grinned for the first time since I’d met him. “What’s the occasional car bombing compared with living with my dad at the age of thirty-seven? What?” He looked at our shocked faces. “I don’t look thirty-seven, right? I don’t look a day over twenty-seven, am I right? But really I’m pushing forty. It must be the magic elixir of academia. Or maybe the infantilizing effect of living with my dad while I pay off my student loans. I paid for undergrad by swearing myself over body and soul to Uncle Sam and letting him send me to bad places where people would kill you if only they could find you down in the depths of the supply closet where you get to sit out your war writing reports, and I’m paying for grad school by living at home with my dad and letting him lecture me about how I need to make something of myself. I’d feel a tiny bit better about it if it were actually rent-free, but he even makes me pay rent, so that I can ‘Act like an adult’ and ‘Learn some responsibility.’ I mean, Jesus Christ. Going into academia was his idea as much as mine. Maybe he should foot a little more of the bill for it.”

“Surely he can’t be that bad!” protested Kate. “He was a dean at Temple! He must be very supportive of your career!” She sighed.

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