The bar wasn’t anything special. It was one that was far enough away from campus that Simon could easily go to without worrying he would be recognized.

Simon hadn’t been looking for anything that night. He never was. During the school year, it was always just a drift between a neat and controlled routine: lecture to office to empty apartment.

But during the less busy months, when most university students were off of classes and off campus; he let himself indulge in night life. Not too close to campus but close enough.

He’d been admittedly stressed recently, the start of a new semester was always horrible and so busy he barely had time to breathe. It was times like this where he let the rational side of him slip.

And then you sat next to him.

You were put together but he could tell you were looking for a distraction. Your voice was soft and warm; and it matched the way your eyes laid on him. He was lost the moment they did.

“You look like you need a distraction,” he muttered into his drink, eyes over the glass to meet yours.

You smiled. Christ. The kind of smile Simon could’ve drowned in.

One drink turned into two, then fingers brushing, then knees touching, then breath shared in the cramped backseat of the cab back to your place and then—

Bodies tangled together in your sheets, breaths caught against one another, shared pleasure between the two of you. Drowning in each other. Starved for each other.

And when you ask him to stay, he briefly thinks he wants to. But he doesn’t. He leaves the moment you fall asleep, tells himself it was easier that way — tells himself it was easier if he didn’t even learn your name.

The next morning was the first lecture of the semester. Simon arranges his notes on his desk, posture straight and expression carved into neutrality.

Until the door opens and you walk in.

No amount of discipline could make him ready for the sight of you. And when your eyes caught his, with the same eyes that looked up at him last night while you were gasping his name; everything fell apart.

The air between you both snaps taut. His finger grasp the syllabus tighter, watching you take a seat in the front of the class. Simon forces himself to swallow. To breathe.

“Welcome,” he says, eyes peeling off of you and going to the rest of the class, “to Advanced Criminology.”