MessageFromViolaMari

by Sabrina Devonshire

  I’m a research scientist at one of the most prestigious oceanographic institutions in the world. So why can’t I hold onto a simple piece of paper?

  Once Justin finished passing out papers, he reviewed the syllabus line by line. The rubber soles of his shoes squeaked as he paced. Every other week, we would bring in copies of our work for the class to critique, he explained.

  Justin’s eyes followed me over the top of his black rectangular reading glasses as I leaned over and whispered, “What the hell did you get me in to?” into Jennifer’s ear.

  “Is there a problem, um…” He glanced through his pile of papers before saying, “Miss Jones? Or do you mind if I call you Marissa?” How the hell did he know my name?

  “Um, no. I mean I don’t mind if you call me that--Marissa, I mean. And everything is fine and good over here,” I said, drumming my fingers on my desk.

  “Very well then, perhaps you would like to read your writing sample aloud first.”

  He took one look at me and identified me as the worst writer in the class. If only I could projectile vomit at will like Jennifer. Her skills are amazing. But I can’t vomit unless I see blood, which would require stabbing myself with a pencil, or sticking fingers down my throat, which might be a bit extreme. I sat there feeling naked in my chair, with no scientific podium to stand behind, no scientific jargon I could use to talk my way out of my predicament.

  Maybe there is a way out. Justin probably just wants to make sure I don’t quit my day job since I have no talent whatsoever.

  “Read my sample?” I scratched my chin. “Oh, no I’d really rather not. It’s not like I’m aiming to publish any of this stuff.” A burst of laughter ensued. Feeling more confident, I leaned back in my seat and crossed my arms over my chest. This is what the Collegiate types call attitude, right? Justin drew his bushy blond brows together in one long line of irritation.

  “Very well then. We’re dividing into two groups. If you’re in A, you’ll bring in work next week, if you’re in B, you’ll bring in work the week after. Miss Jones, you are officially the first member of group A. Any one want to volunteer to join her?”

  While hands shot up, my gaze roved over Justin’s muscular physique. I told myself I was merely objectively observing a male specimen, who was a million times more pleasant to look at than the men I worked with who tended to wear the same plaid shirt daily and have concave pectorals. Justin’s shoulders were broad and nicely stretched the tight T-shirt across his pectorals. I’d like to see what he looks like without the shirt.

  Justin’s calf muscles flexed as he walked and pleasing dimples accented his facial muscles when he spoke. An image flashed in front of me – teacher man naked, painted white and glued to a podium at the Prado. It made my mouth water more than the aroma of freshly baked pastries.

  I gazed at the curly blond hair brushing against his athletic shoulders. Whenever he tipped his head to peer over his reading glasses, his eyes, sometimes sea green, occasionally changed color. I imagined that golden flash of his eyes was reserved exclusively for me.

  Perhaps if Justin’s shirt pockets bulged with clip-on pens, I wouldn’t have forgotten to breathe whenever I looked at him. Whenever he paced past my desk, I caught a whiff of after-shave, which smelled pleasantly of cinnamon and man.

  “I’ve opened this book to a chapter from a famous sci-fi romance, Dangerous Entanglements.” He laid the book down on my desk and rotated it. “Marissa, will you please read the first three paragraphs?”

  “Oh, fine,” I answered, rolling my eyes. My face warmed. Why can’t I unclothe him in my mind without being noticed?

  “Before you start—I’m just curious—why did you sign up for this class?” When he spoke, his eyes sparkled like the North Star on a breezy evening.

  “I have no bloody idea,” I said. Everyone laughed except Justin. The right side of his lip curled up in annoyance. “As a matter of fact, I never would have showed my face in this room if it wasn’t for her.” I pointed at Jennifer. “My friend Jennifer’s a really talented writer and wanted a friendly face in the crowd. So here I am. Truth is, other than freshman composition essays that I paid a classmate handily to doctor up, I’ve written only scientific research articles and technical reports. No protagonists, no murders, no love affairs or disasters, no he said, she said. I don’t claim to have an ounce of literary talent in my blood.”

  “I see,” he said. “Thank you for that illuminating confession, Marissa. Now you can proceed with the reading.”

  “If you insist.” I cleared my throat and hoped my face wasn’t darkening. Why does he make me feel like kissing him one minute and punching him until his nose bleeds the next?

  The book opened with a graphic sex scene. “What the..? I signed up for sci-fi, not for erotica,” I grumbled.

  “Not every sci-fi book features the terminally celibate protagonist.” Justin’s green eyes seemed to see too much.

  I squirmed in my chair. The warm rush of blood that ignited my face felt a little like anger, somewhat more like desire.

  “Now do read on, okay?”

  The arrogant bastard is insulting me. Why you… I ground my molars together so tightly they hurt. I didn’t want to read this lewd content in front of anyone, let alone him. I thought my flushed face might melt as I read the words engorged member. After I finished my three paragraphs, Justin called on someone else. This class gave the phrase out of my comfort zone a whole new meaning.

  After the bell rang, Justin mingled with the class. It seemed he wanted to create a relaxed atmosphere with them whenever he wasn’t hell-bent on intimidating me. I wrung my hands together as Jennifer dawdled with her notebooks. Let’s get the hell out of here. Gazing away from Justin, I stood and fidgeted with my cell phone, pretending to download text messages.

  Justin reached out to shake my hand as I passed. “It was nice meeting you.”

  My fingers melted like chocolate when our hands met and I felt like parts of them dripped on the floor. “It was nice meeting you too,” I said. Too bad I’ll never see you again.

  Chapter Three

  I sat on my balcony overlooking the ocean, sipping a glass of Australian Chardonnay. For the first time in months, I sipped from a fluted glass rather than a plastic cup. And instead of jeans and a T-shirt, I wore a short black mini-dress, which fell slightly off one tanned shoulder. It was the first night in I couldn’t remember how long that the soft tickle of sea breeze on my shoulders made me feel desirable. That night, I wanted to be more than just the scientist behind thick glasses or the sweaty athlete who loved to feel the burn.

  Every time I tried to focus on the peril that faced Earth, I saw Justin’s brilliant green eyes in front of my face. Analyzing me. Seeing into me. Desiring me. You are so naïve. How can you be so distracted by a guy you spent three hours with? How can you think about something as trivial as love at first sight—or is it lust at first sight—when the Earth will soon be obliterated?

  Continental meteorite impact sites weren’t my focus, but my department head had accepted my proposal to collect Canadian Shield and other ancient rocks worldwide. But when I’d shared my evidence of periodic, pre-life-on-earth comet bombardment episodes with other scientists, NASA, the President, and the Department of Defense, they’d all shrugged their shoulders as if my discovery was insignificant. They weren’t convinced my conclusions were correct.

  I’d tried to explain how the earth’s gravity would pluck thousands of comets from their orbits and they would subsequently slam into the earth, annihilating every living being in a matter of minutes. But important men couldn’t be bothered with the hysterical mutterings of a female scientist. “She’s probably about to start her period,” the Secretary of Defense had muttered to the President. If that were the case, I’d strangle you with that ugly tie you’re wearing, I had wanted to scream.

  The reality of the disaster worried me more than ever. Now that the fact-collecting brain I’d come to trust had turned to mush, I feared I wou
ld never come up with a solution. For a moment I thought about the history, hopes and dreams of so many people that would be destroyed in an instant. Then a tear slid down my face for another reason altogether.

  If my body was incinerated and the sky dripped with acid rain, I would no longer feel what I’d felt since the minute I met Justin—as if all of my senses had become super-sized. Attraction heightened my senses, making me relish each breath, each never-to-be-re-captured moment of being alive.

  The breeze brushed my shoulder like a fingertip, leaving residual tingles. The full moon glowing over the water appeared magnified, like it was underwater. I could take a big leap and my feet would land with a crunch on its cratered surface. The moon’s reflection on the dark water looked like a path leading to somewhere I’d never been before and the twinkling of lights on the hillsides reminded me of Justin’s eyes.

  I should have buried my face in my notes, with a pencil poised to scratch out possible solution scenarios. Instead, I wondered if Justin sat on his patio, peering out at the same ocean, admiring the same moon.

  Chapter Four

  On Sunday morning, I left a message for Jennifer saying I intended to drop the class. Then I paced around, anxiously waiting for her angry call. She has to talk me out of it. My head spun with giddiness when the phone rang and her familiar voice greeted me. Get a grip. You’re acting like a horny teenager.

  “You can’t back out now!” she shrieked. “All these people are going to read my work. What if they hate it or say it completely sucks? I’ll never get through this without you.”

  Done, sold. I guess I have no choice but to soak up this guy’s amazing eyes and physique three hours a week for the next four months. “Jennifer, you’re a great writer,” I said, feigning argumentative. “They’ll love your story. There’s no need to worry.”

  “But having you there matters to me.”

  “Jennifer, I’m not sure I can take it. Not only because I can’t write worth a damn, but because teacher man keeps making me feel even more out of place than I expected in this class.”

  “Did you say feel? I rarely hear an emotional word come out of your mouth…Hmm…” She paused. “Uh, oh…You like him, don’t you?” Her normally deep-pitched voice leaped up to a curious soprano.

  “No, of course not!” My too-loud, defensive answer must have pierced her eardrums almost as much as her ebullient laughter impacted mine. I pulled the receiver further from my ear.

  “No wonder your face looked like a radish when you read that sex scene. You wanted to go for it with him right then and there, didn’t you, Mar?”

  “Hell no!” I might as well have screamed the very opposite. If I didn’t like him, I wouldn’t have to shout so loud to convince myself. “Fine, I won’t drop the class,” I grumbled. My lips curled up in a smile and I skipped across the room. “But only if you promise to use your magic writing wand to make my submissions passable.”

  “No problem. Just email them a couple of days before class and I’ll doctor them up for you so he’ll be really impressed. Then before long, you’ll be playing doctor together. Did you notice the size of his fe—”

  Images of Justin naked, enormous and erect popped into my head. “Stop, will you?”

  “Fine, but no more talk about dropping out. He’s much better than any of your options at work. I may not make the bucks like you but at least the guys I work with aren’t pimpled at age thirty.”

  No, they’re more like good enough to eat. “I get it, OK? I won’t drop the class.”

  An hour before our second class, I stood in front of the mirror, fussing with my face, violating my normal rules by applying a light layer of foundation and dabbing blush on each cheek. I rolled shiny gloss over my lips—I wanted them to look kissable—and changed outfits five times before deciding the one I wore adequately showcased my well-toned, tanned legs.

  In class, everyone stared with furrowed brows at their copies of five manuscripts, including Jennifer’s and mine. I’d read each one during the week, written tidy notes in the margins, and typed up comments. I knew how to approach this scientifically—you read it, you corrected grammar and punctuation, and summarized what you did and didn’t like. My summaries on works featuring female protagonists usually said something to the effect of she’s a spineless, wailing, miserable excuse for a woman who needs to be committed to an institution or put on a strong dose of antidepressants.

  Justin had laid down the ground rules the first week of class. The writer wasn’t to comment or ask questions until after the class had done so. Readers were to comment on voice, structure, dialogue, and description. Instead of saying what they liked or disliked, they were to say what worked or didn’t work. I didn’t understand the last part. If I don’t like it, it isn’t working, right?

  We critiqued Amanda’s manuscript first. Once again, her foundation had been thickly applied—like frosting on a cake. A few people commented—the dialogue was very realistic, she created a great setting. I nodded my head in agreement. Too bad the protagonist is such a pansy.

  “What do you think, Marissa?” Justin gazed at me over slightly tilted reading glasses.

  “Me….Um. Well, I think it’s very well written. I’ve never been to Savannah, Georgia, but I feel like I could go there now and almost know my way around town. I agree the dialogue is great. It’s just the…” I really shouldn’t say what I’m thinking. Then everyone will say even worse things about my work.

  “Go on, Marissa.” He raised a blond brow.

  “Well, the protagonist is supposed to be someone the reader cares about, right? Well, she was such a basket case that by page four, I rather hoped a serial killer would burst from the bushes and put her out of her misery.”

  “Why do you say she’s a basket case?” Justin’s brow arched up higher.

  “She cried on page one, for heaven’s sake. Need I say more?”

  “Not every reader would agree that a woman who has her act together is a protagonist who punches the lead male on the second page.” He tipped his head to one side and bent two fingers on each hand to accentuate his quotation marks.

  I winced. Now he was talking about my work. I’d written the whole scene thinking about Justin. I’d wanted more than anything to punish the male lead—who in my story was basically Justin portrayed as a coworker instead of a teacher--it was his fault I kept picturing him sprawled out naked on my couch, aiming six feet of rippled muscles toward me and making me all hot and wet down there. Writing is a dangerous practice. It makes you feel unstable. Once people start writing, they go stark raving mad. Like Hemingway, for example. Except he could actually write. I’m just doing this as a favor for a friend.

  Man-of-muscles Steve chimed in. “I found Amanda’s protagonist very likable. After all, men aren’t attracted to women who punch people. They’re usually either dykes or they have body odor.”

  “Is that so?” I said, my voice pitching upward. “Well maybe you should smell my underarms before you make a statement like that.” I raised my arms and waved chicken wings his way.

  “I think I’ll pass.” Steve rolled his eyes and shook his head. “This isn’t fifth grade. Man, have you got issues. Just reading your manuscript made that clear to me.”

  “Excuse me?” I leaped from my chair and lunged toward him with raised fists. What is happening to me? Get me out of here and send me back to a safe, comfortable laboratory where I rarely have to speak to anyone.

  “Okay, people, let’s cool it.” Justin grabbed me by the arm and pulled me back from Steve.

  Pouting, I dropped into my chair. Pacing the floor, Justin said, “Let’s take a ten minute break. After that, I expect everyone to stick to the text rather than getting personal.”

  I nearly turned my chair over as I bolted for the door. “Marissa, can I talk to you for a moment?” Justin said. Even facing the other direction, I felt his gaze on my back, like a warm laser beam.

  Shoulders hunched, I turned and reluctantly approached his desk. �
��What is it?” I’d preferred watching him from a distance—it felt safer studying him without being seen. In his uncomfortably close proximity, my insides went squishy.

  He leaned in toward me as he spoke—his deep voice resonated in a distractingly sexy kind of way. I imagined him saying something far more suggestive. Stop that.

  “When you read someone’s work, you may not always like the characters or agree with the author’s point of view. What I would like for you to focus on in this class, is, what does or does not work with the story the author wants to tell. Can you try to do that?”

  I cleared my throat and tried to shut out the images clouding my brain. “Sure, fine,” I said. “Now can I please get some air?”

  I stepped from the room, craving a cigarette. This was a bad sign. I’d only smoked a handful of cigarettes in my entire life and in every instance, the trigger had been man-related. The more irritating the man, the stronger the desire to smoke. That would explain why I’d almost be willing to commit murder to get my hands on a cigarette right now.

  Reviewing my summaries, I crossed out whatever I thought might offend Justin before jotting down the most complementary comments I could come up. I had little material to work with, but the break was almost over. I shrugged and returned to the classroom.

  We reviewed a manuscript by Alicia, the Hispanic girl with the waterfall of dark hair. On paper, my edited comments were milder, yet somehow I couldn’t keep my judgments from leaping from my lips. To my credit, I never used the words spineless protagonist—instead I said the author had done a brilliant job of making the female character appear weak and dim-witted.

  At that, Justin rolled his eyes and laid his head on his desk.

  Jennifer’s manuscript featured a male astronomer with a serious addiction problem. Employed to collect spectroscopic data on various heavenly bodies, he instead passed his nighttime hours travelling to other galaxies through cracks in the fourth dimension and getting it on with heavenly female bodies despite the fact that he was engaged to be married. The piece really hit home with me. I remembered a certain man—my former fiancé—who begged me to spend the rest of my life with him and then fell for someone else three weeks later. Justin is probably just like him.