I stood, dragging on jeans, pulling a hoodie over my bare shoulders.The morning air spilling from the cracked window bit at my skin, urging me forward.School wouldn’t wait, and neither would the stack of work I had to get through today.
I told myself I didn’t care.That it was just sex.That Henry leaving was inevitable.
But as I slung my bag over my shoulder and caught sight of the discarded pillow on the floor, the lie tasted bitter on my tongue.
* * *
I slid into my usual seat at the table Henry and I had shared since the semester began, the place where we’d first traded hesitant smiles over our open copies of Song of Songs.
Today the chair beside me was empty.
Rebecca sat at the table next to ours, halo braid neat as ever, lips pursed in that faintly smug way that made it seem like she was grading everyone else’s soul.She gave me a glance, just quick enough to register, then bent over her notebook with the kind of exaggerated devotion that could only be for show.
I dropped my bag on the floor and tried not to stare at Henry’s vacant chair.
Maybe I’d been stupid not to ask for his number.Or his address.I’d been too caught up in him, in us, in the impossible closeness of what we’d done, to think about practicalities.Now I had no way to find him.
The door at the front of the room opened, and Dr.Scheinbaum glided in, all cool elegance: platinum bob gleaming under the fluorescents, a slate-gray sheath dress that skimmed her frame, pearls at her throat.Chic, self-possessed, and sharp as a scalpel.
Her eyes flicked over the room, assessing.When they landed on the empty chair beside me, her brows knit almost imperceptibly.She strode toward my table, heels clicking against the linoleum.
“Mr.Miller,” she said in her clipped voice, “where is Mr.Forrester this morning?”
The sound of Henry’s last name in her mouth nearly gutted me.I shrugged, staring at the open book in front of me.“I don’t know,” I mumbled.
For a beat she didn’t reply, but when I risked a glance upward, her gaze was softer than I’d ever seen it.Not pitying, exactly—she wasn’t the type—but knowing.She gave a single, almost imperceptible nod, then pivoted to the front of the classroom.
“Today,” she began, sliding her notes onto the lectern, “we continue our exploration of the Song of Songs.We’ve spoken of desire, of the joy of union.But the text also sings of separation, of the agony of love unmet.Of heartbreak.”
Her voice filled the room, crisp but resonant.
She read aloud: ‘I sought him, but found him not; I called him, but he gave me no answer.’
The words cut into me.I could still smell Henry on the pillow if I let myself think about it.He hadn’t left me a note.Hadn’t left me anything.Maybe I was a fool to hope it had meant more to him.Maybe he thought it was a one-night stand, a first reckless tumble before he returned to his saintly, celibate life.
But no—that didn’t fit.Not Henry.Not the way his hands had clung to me.Not the way he’d looked at me like I was something more than just a body.
Dr.Scheinbaum’s gaze roved the room.“Mr.Miller,” she said suddenly, “why do you think the poet includes this image of the lover searching in vain?What is its power?”
My throat was dry.“Because,” I muttered, barely audible, “longing is as much a part of love as fulfillment.”
Her eyes lingered on me for a moment.Sharp.Penetrating.But behind them—sympathy.A silent acknowledgement.She didn’t press further, just gave the smallest nod and turned to another student.
Rebecca’s hand shot up, Her chin tilted at a deliberate angle, lips curved in that self-satisfied smile she always wore when she thought she had the answer no one else did.When called on, she clasped her hands neatly on the desk, her voice smooth and almost rehearsed.“Well, clearly the passage isn’t about human longing at all,” she said, with the faintest pause that suggested she was about to reveal a great mystery.“It’s a metaphor of divine absence—God concealing Himself from His worshippers, testing their devotion.”
Dr.Scheinbaum’s lips curved faintly, almost a smirk.“Yes, that is one interpretation.But to reduce this poem to mere allegory flattens it.We mustn’t sanitize what is raw.Heartbreak in this text is not merely divine distance—it is human, carnal, visceral.It is the cry of someone abandoned in the night.”
Abandoned in the night.
I gripped the edge of the table until my knuckles whitened.That was exactly what it felt like.
She went on, reading another passage: ‘I opened to my beloved, but my beloved had turned away and was gone.My soul failed me when he spoke; I sought him, but I could not find him; I called him, but he gave me no answer.’
The classroom was silent except for her voice.The words lodged in my chest, an ache that spread until it was almost unbearable.
Maybe Henry was terrified.He’d told me last night that he was a virgin.For someone like him—raised in faith, steeped in guilt—maybe it was too much.Maybe the reality of what we’d done was crushing him even now.
But hadn’t it been emotional for me too?For once, it hadn’t been meaningless.I’d made love to him, not just had sex.For the first time, I’d let myself feel something more.
