Oh, just #@(&!%$ shoot me...

6:53pm, still a few minutes to class. I peer in the CBC-C232B window--only one person looks familiar. I pass a bit down the hall to the 232A window--even more dismal. Have I gotten the classroom wrong? Did they change it? No time to panic--head to the drinking fountain, then make another pass.

232A still shows no sign of it being correct person-wise, but I spot the textbook on the desk closest to the back door--it has to be it. I enter. Slightly full, surprising for the tiny room. I make my way along the back row to circumnavigate the class clockwise to an empty refuge. Without even catching a full glimpse--Oh, God... she's there.

It had to have been three years since I'd first seen in her Anthropology 101--a wonderfully beautiful woman, always with perfect hair in some elegant or cute form, and a pristine countenance*. Quiet, but who wasn't in that class? I always sat to get a decent view--sometimes sitting within a few seats. We'd depart for the same trek back across campus from the engineering building (you tell me why they had ANT101 in the engineering building). We never spoke. We walked mere feet from eachother twice a week, for the quarter-mile or so.

I ruined it. I spoke up. Well, whatever I did--from a verbal confrontation, a note, or a casual mention of something--it really doesn't matter. I'm pretty sure my then-pneuomonia was affecting my ability to be suave. Not that I've a suave bone in my body--hell, I don't even use Suave in my hair.

That was the end of that. I avoided walking along with her, she sat farther and farther away in the lecture hall. Once again, you've F'ed it up, MacD.

Semesters pass, with chance sightings here and there--perfect hair, perfect face, perfect avoidance. Not even eye contact. The slightest hint of a peripheral glimpse was assured, however.

Last semester cut it close--for some reason she was in the math department (I get it now). I picked up my mail and high-tailed it out of there, having to pass within inches. Why was she there? No bother--the years had passed, and I was over it all.

Class seemed to crawl--with recitations of Dr. Bhatnagar's reflections (Joel's powerful voice, Brian's belting-to-finish tone, and Aaron's monotonous 'I really don't want to read this' drawl). Odd that I'd never even heard her speak before, and here she was reading a passage in class (okay, maybe she had said something that cold night--perhaps an innocent and polite, 'excuse me?'). My thoughts, oddly, weren't on the Dr.'s reflection for the evening, Fun With Mathematics. My internal reflection was a bit more like Jumping in Front of Cars. I just wouldn't want to hurt a car that bad.

Class ends, and I try to time my exit with colleagues, but both Joel and Brian needed "a word with Satish." Yeesh. I make my way to the door--she's already out. We're in the hallway alone. My notebook and Satish's reflections firmly gripped in one hand, backpack on the other shoulder as I bolt for the stairway to the bridge to our offices. My goal is clear--refuge on the third floor. Perhaps a stop in the bathroom to throw up after dropping everything on my desk.

Just F'ing shoot me. Please.

* in fact, I'm pretty sure I even used the word countenance in my comments to her.