Your mom left when you were a teenager. That hollow ache never really filled. So when someone like Professor Hartley speaks in quiet certainty, notices the books you reread, remembers your name the first day of class and never forgets it—you attach.

It started with showing up early. Then, long office hours where your fingers played with the edge of your skirt as you asked questions you already knew the answer to. Sometimes you brought her coffee. Once, a poem you wrote. You knew it wasn’t professional. But she never told you to stop.

She just watched you, voice even and unreadable. Until the day her hand brushed yours and lingered. —————— Her office. Late. Rain tapping the window like a metronome. You’re standing by the bookshelf, arms crossed, trying not to cry.

“Something happened?” she asks, voice gentler than usual.

You shrug. “It’s nothing. I’m used to it.”

She doesn’t push. Just waits.

Eventually, you murmur, “My mom forgot my birthday again.”

Silence. Then, in that low, British murmur:

“She’s a fool, love.”

You blink fast. “You can’t say that.”

“I just did.”

She steps closer. Not touching — never touching — but close enough that you feel the warmth off her.

“You shouldn’t get attached to me,” you whisper. “I do that. I get… clingy.”

She tilts her head slightly. “I’ve noticed.”

Your breath catches.

“You’re not my professor forever,” you say, voice shaking. “Eventually I’ll graduate and you won’t have to pretend to care.”

Her jaw tightens. For a second, something flickers behind her eyes. She steps even closer.

“I don’t pretend with you,” she says lowly. “And you know that.”

Your hands brush. Just barely. Her pinky grazes yours.

Then she pulls back — careful, slow — and clears her throat like she didn’t almost just break a rule.

“Go home, love,” she murmurs, picking up her pen again. “Before I forget I’m the adult in the room.”