Free Tolstoy Lied : A Love Story (9780547527307) by Rachel Kadish Page B

think?”
    â€œSo this is a ploy?”
    I level my fork at him. “You could be a serial food thrower. I hear about that all the time.”
    He chuckles.
    The waiter brings the dessert cart.
    And as I watch George mull the selection, a loose feeling overtakes my limbs: the knowledge that something important has happened. I order blindly, echoing George’s choice.
    The waiter brings two cannolis. I’ve never eaten a cannoli, never thought I’d like them. But these look delicious.
    Across the table, George cracks the shell with his fork.
    That’s when it hits me: a man who composes theories of the universe, a man who makes me notice things I never noticed—there it is. Right there. This is my romantic.
    Â 
    At the entrance of my building we stop. George smiles right into my eyes. He pulls me into a hug—my head slips just under his chin, and for a second I fit against the surprisingly muscular elasticity of his chest. Then he lifts my hand and kisses it—a warm, soft kiss.
    And I think: Did I just lose him?
    Â 
    Wednesday afternoon’s meeting has been called by Joanne Miller. According to an e-mail addressed to the entire department—including, in a break with usual protocol, graduate students—it has come to Joanne’s attention that the faculty has no consensus on grade inflation. Hence Joanne’s e-mail, titled “Time to Clean House.”
    Grade inflation has come to my attention too—as well as the attention of every major national newspaper, everyone in higher education, and even a handful of enlightened parents. A few intradepartmental resolutions on the subject would, indeed, be useful, and if Grub were a more energetic chairman he’d have convened a meeting on the subject months ago. Instead he’s turned the task over to Joanne, whom I once heard him refer to as “bushy-tailed.”
    Walking the several dozen yards from my office to the conference room, I try to muster my thoughts on grade inflation. Instead I’m distracted by recollections of last night. Was George, in chiding me for talking too long about my work, dismissing everything I care about? Belittling the dedication and passion I’ve poured into literature? Or was he after something else; was he coaxing me to peer out of a shell—one I’ve grown comfortable in? And was I too defensive? And didn’t I break up with Jason because he
didn’t
challenge me? And was that the stupidest move a sentient human has ever made?
    Reaching the conference room, I tuck these thoughts away and focus on the unpleasant business—and colleague—at hand.
    The first time I encountered Joanne, during my second semester as a graduate student, she was at the lectern. I’d arranged, as partof a requirement for a pedagogy seminar, to attend four professors’ opening lectures of the semester. Joanne’s course was titled Sixteenth-Century Literature. At ten o’clock sharp she darkened the hall without a word of greeting to the students, many of whom became plainly uneasy they’d entered the wrong room. Up went a giant projection of King’s College Chapel. There was a moment’s deep silence. Then Joanne began to recite. “Did not we meet, to Truthe enthrall’d, our Soules enlarg’d in this Hallow’d Hall.” Another silence. Several chairs creaked. “Most people,” intoned Joanne from the bulb-lit lectern beneath the screen, “approach the great cathedrals with awe. They ought to approach them with relief.” The slide changed to a view of the chapel’s interior. “These buildings, and the literature that went with them, embody an era in which people weren’t afraid to believe what they believed—no matter if that brought glory or suffering.” Behind her, the lacy stone vault of the chapel soared impossibly high. “No apology
there,
” she said, stabbing the slender shadow of her pointer