TUESDAY TALES - WORD PROMPT "PREPARED" TWO OF HEARTS

Welcome! Doing something different this week. I'm stepping out on a limb here. I'm interrupting Skip's story to post from my NaNo project. It's women's fiction, not romance, although there is much romance in the story. It's unedited, so please be kind. The story is called "Two of Hearts." Thanks for stopping by. 

This is Jen Hogan's story. Her husband, Stan, has been in a serious motorcycle accident. He's in a coma in intensive care. She's home to walk the dog, when she sees a picture of them together and remembers...

TWO OF HEARTS

   He’d been the aloof professor, totally unbending. She’d begged to no avail. He wouldn’t budge. If he had those expectations, she might as well drop the class before she failed. As she was leaving his office, her monumental self-control gave way and tears broke through. She tried to escape before he saw, but Stan was sharp.          
   He’d taken her by the elbow and drawn her back into his office and closed the door. Then he sat her down and guided her through the assignment with pertinent questions that forced her to drag out her innermost fears and put them on paper.

   

   After the session, she had felt ten pounds lighter. Stan instructed her to edit the piece, but assured her she would get a good grade on it. He lauded her imagination and told her she could have a good future in fiction, if she’d just stick with it. Looking back now, Jen realized that she had fallen in love with Stan right then and there. No one had ever shown confidence in her ability to do anything but look pretty.

   

   The fact that Stan didn’t make a pass at her had impressed her. Could he be telling the truth? Was his confidence genuine? Or did he simply want to get into her pants, like every other man she’d ever met? Working with him in his office quickly became a regular thing. Dinners followed. Serious about writing and teaching, Stan had not breached the teacher pupil barrier all semester. Jen had been head over heels for him, but took his lead and didn’t get overly familiar. After the semester, he made his move.

   

   As she recalled their first real date, a smile graced her face. He’d decorated the back deck with soft lights, burned candles and had prepared an elegant meal. Champagne had cooled in a bucket of ice, classical music played in the background. He’d ordered from the best Italian restaurant in the City.

   

   Jen had been swept off her feet, straight into his bedroom. Their affair had lasted all summer. In the fall, he asked her to move in. At Christmas, he’d presented her with an engagement ring. They were married on New Year’s Eve, for tax purposes. Stan was, and still is, the most romantic man she had ever known. Five years later she professed to be more in love with him than ever. So he had to get better. He simply had to. 

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