Calhoun stopped short. Instantly he took in several details about the person who'd just spoken to him, enough that he was reasonably sure he wasn't about to be under attack again. Though he couldn't be sure about that, he reminded himself. After all, women could be dangerous too.358Please respect copyright.PENANAXTjw3vmFKn
Even women as attractive as this one. Maybe especially women as attractive as this one. A guy might stand there thinking about how hot she was and never even realize she was about to kill him.
But in this case, she didn't make any threatening moves. She just stood there with her hands in the hip pockets of the jeans she wore and looked at him. It was a casual stance, but it might have been calculated to make her boobs stand out a little more prominently against the shirt she wore. If that was the case, it worked.
The hair that tumbled around her shoulders shone reddish-gold in the light. Calhoun couldn't see her eyes, but he was willing to bet they were brown. A deep, rich brown.
He didn't need to be thinking about that. Other things were more important.
"I suppose you're going to take out your phone and call the cops," he said.
"Would you try to stop me if I did?" she asked.
He shook his head.
"That'd be entirely up to you. I'd like to point out, however, that I'm the one who was attacked, and there were four of them against one of me. If that's not self-defense..."
"The same situation as earlier this evening, right?" she interrupted him. "When you allegedly assaulted those two students and then got into a fight with the Bloods patrol?"
"Patrol?" Calhoun repeated scornfully.
"That's what they say they're doing, patrolling the campus for any signs of extremist, right-wing aggression and oppression."
Calhoun snorted.
"They must not stay very busy. How many people on this campus aren't progressive assholes? A dozen? Two dozen? I'd say we're all outnumbered." He paused. "And I apologize if you're a progressive asshole."
"You're an obnoxious young man, aren't you? In addition to being a violent one."
"I speak my mind too bluntly sometimes," I guess. That's called free speech.," Calhoun added dryly. "As for the violence, I'm as peaceful as a kitten as long as nobody backs me into a corner."
"But then you fight to win, no matter what it takes."
Calhoun shrugged.
"I never saw any point in being any other way."
For a long moment, she regarded him in silence, standing at the edge of the porch with six broad steps between her and Calhoun on the sidewalk. Then she said, "I'm not going to call the campus police."
"'preciate it."
"You're already liable to be in enough trouble from the earlier scuffle, even though it wasn't your fault."
"You admit that?"
"I know those two---Jesse and Delores---and their relationship is fraught with tension, as the literature professors might say. They fight and break up and get back together almost daily. The real trouble is Jesse really is abusive, and Delores is a textbook example of an enabler. I've talked to her, tried to get her to see that, but it hasn't done any good." A sad smile touched her lips. "These students consider themselves so progressive and forward-thinking and woke, but a lot of the time they're just like young people have always been, making foolish choses about whose pants they're going to get into."
"You sound awfully world-weary and cynical for somebody who's pretty young herself.
"I'm older than you," the woman said.
Calhoun shrugged.
"By six or seven year, maybe. I'm Calhoun Weaver, by the way."
"I know who you are. You're not quite a run-of-the-mill Stonewall College student. There are rumors among the faculty that you must be related to some big donor, but nobody seems to know exactly who it is, or if they do, they're keeping it to themselves."
"You're a professor?"
"Criminal Justice. Dr. Brooke Tucker."
"You don't look like a criminal justice professor to me."
"That would be a sexist, exclusionary, patriarchal, and oppressive statement," she said sternly. "Surely you read the speech guide?"
"I looked at it," Calhoun hedged. "I was more interested in the sexual-conduct guidelines."
"Yes, well, we don't have to worry about that. And you even bringing that up is harassment, you know."
Calhoun held up both hands, palms out.
"I surrender, Doctor. What can I say? I'm an evil cisnormative heterosexual. I can't help myself." He smiled. "Hey, does that mean I'm mentally ill? That cuts me even more slack. I'm a disadvantaged, oppressed minority. On this campus, for damned sure."
Dr. Tucker laughed. She looked a little ashamed of herself for doing so but couldn't seem to help it. She slipped her phone from one of the hip pockets of her jeans.
"I'm terrible. I should have already gotten help for those poor young men you attacked. That's the way they're going to spin it, you know. They'll tell anyone who'll listen that it was all your fault."
"My word against theirs," Calhoun said. "Assuming nobody comes forth to back up their so-called story."
She held up the phone.
"What about video evidence?"
"It'll just show for sure that I was defending myself, assuming it really exists."
"It doesn't," Dr. Tucker admitted. "And I was the last one out of the library tonight and had other things on my mind, so I didn't notice exactly what happened. All I can testify to is that I found those injured men in the plaza and called 911. And that's what I'm going to do---now."
"G'night, Doc," Calhoun said.
"Good night, Mr. Weaver."
He walked a few more yards to another sidewalk that cut across the plaza to Eastwell Hall. When he glanced back, Dr. Brooke Tucker wasn't in sight. The trees must be hiding her, as the porch columns had earlier.
He was a little confused. It had seemed (at times) as if the woman was actually flirting with him. If so, it was one hell of an odd time and place for her to be doing that. At the same time, she had been right about one thing: despite everything else swirling around them, political tomfoolery and the like, people still had universal emotions and were driven by them at times.358Please respect copyright.PENANAuSiaqW20na
And she had said that she taught in the criminal justice department, he remembered. Maybe she was not quite as caught up in the so-called progressive movement as some. Then, remembering how he had read where some criminal justice experts always blamed society for creating the predators, or the victims for being preyed upon, and he wasn't so sure again.358Please respect copyright.PENANAZXW1iutKqn
The whole encounter left him baffled. Maybe she would throw him under the bus, maybe she wouldn't, but either way, there was nothing he could do about it now.
He used his keycard on the front door of Eastwell Hall and entered without encountering anyone else. It was late enough that the lobby was deserted and nobody was behind the desk. At this time of night, everyone was studying, sleeping, killing time on the Internet, or having sex----following the proper guidelines, of course.358Please respect copyright.PENANAXwJewIeZuI
Calhoun went up to the second floor. Only a few hours had passed since he heard the frightened cry through the open window and went out into the night, but it seemed longer to him. He pulled his T-shirt over his head, tossed it on the bed, and went into the bathroom. The mirror revealed big bruises on his side, shoulders, and arms. He looked like he'd been through a 15-round fight. Getting whacked with lead pipes'll do that to you.358Please respect copyright.PENANAa3VDViU490
He went back over to the desk and picked up the book he was supposed to read for his economics class. After all that had happened, forcing himself to concentrate on it wasn't easy, but he gave it his all.
After a few minutes of trying to digest the turgid, academic writing that had the evils of capitalism as its central thesis, he was almost wishing he was getting hit by head pipes again. It might not hurt his brain as much.
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