PARALLEL

Take the split-second shift where Sullyoon levels you with those brilliant fawn-eyes, sets her lips in this arrogant tilt, then says, “Oh hey,” softly.

It sounds like an exhalation - and it is. Her tone: daring, dimpled, disaster.

She’s a student of yours, incidentally - or rather she was, and she’s obviously, immensely, unapologetically pretty, but the language is limited. You think she’s transcendent. Princess-perfect. When she leans into the edge of her palm and drags her gaze down the length of you, there’s plenty of nondisclosure in that too. “Small world,” is her observation, ever-astute.

Sullyoon doesn’t elaborate. She’s smart enough to know she doesn’t need to.

-

It’s cliché obviously, the whole going-to-hell-for-a-woman bit, but that’s the script; you know this story. You’re familiar with all its associated allegories from the moment she first walks in. You catch the spill of whiskey-brown hair, the honeyed undertones. She’s dolled-up in stockings and stilettos, in antithetical pairs - sharp, sweet, sin and salvation - ah, well.

The devil, the details, here’s what you oughta know:

You teach highschool literature, no surprises there. You’re smart, handsome, available - case in point, she slides into the barstool right beside you, a little closer than strictly necessary. But you’re actually something of a saint, and that’s the absolute tragedy here; you’ve been grading papers, scribbling angry little notes in red ink; you’re sipping something dark, glaring at the pages; you’ve got no plans of being interested.

And that’s the hiccup.

You’d never recognize her. Or you try and can’t place her: she’s gorgeous, is your first thought. A face like hers, you realize, a waist like that, you rationalize, and it’s all off the rails from there.

You look away; look down. Some fatal flaw makes you curious about pretty things.

She’s got two little slingback heels against the barstool’s wooden rung, her knees angled inward; a pair of frilly-cotton stockings that do nothing but draw focus upward, from the lines of her calves to where the lace trim hugs her soft, silky thighs, the gauzy little bows; and further still. No pants, obviously. Why would there be. Just that high-waisted, high-hemmed, high-crimes-and-misdemeanors skirt that rides at approximately fuck-me height - and you, with your one-word repertoire, bleeding red ink all over the page.

Sensational. Exemplary. Outstanding. Eminently fuckable.

It’s all speculation until the last two lines.

Sullyoon asks the bartender a question: this looking-through-lashes kinda thing, an angel’s mouth, a devil’s grin. The how-we-got-here and the where-it-went-wrong in one.

“Oh,” she says first, affecting nonchalance when she notices you noticing, and the realization hits you all at once: exactly who she is, what you’ve just done. “I know you.”

It’s a real gallows-humor bit, right here, a punchline, a setup:

An old student walks into a bar, and she’s flawless. You think back on the papers, the menial mistakes, and blink at her. She tilts her head as though it’ll shake up any repressed memories, the nice ones first: she’s a good student. She’s a little more than that.

“Oh my god. Hi.”

“Hi,” you say, dumbfounded. That little fantasy-fuck-you, all in reverse. And you laugh, tossing up a hand into your hair like it’d been nothing, waving a white flag. “Sullyoon,” you say, as it dawns.

She smiles. Says, “Yeah,” and her heel swings over with intent.

“It’s been,” you add, stilted, still processing. Because what the fuck, honestly. “Well shoot, it’s been forever,” which isn’t really accurate - but she’s got it right anyway, small world.

“Tell me about it,” she says, mercifully enough. “You still teaching?”

You can’t even address it, that starry-eyed, adoring expression of hers that makes you forget where the fuck you even are. You’re mentally placing her in the front row of your classroom blinking at everything you said. The undivided attention can’t be healthy, but the placebo will keep you talking.

“Yeah,” you say. “Not cut out for much else.”

A laugh makes a surefire path up the line of her throat; pretty and polished. She’s perfect, and that’s not even your first, most pressing concern.

“I’m surprised you even remember me,” she says conspiratorially, and you’re fixating on where that curtain of hair tangles in her fingers, slides off the sharp point of her wrist.

“Well, good kids stick to memory,” you deflect, and then, when it dawns on you how easily that could get misconstrued, “-good grades. Good behavior. That kind of thing.”

“You have favorites, you mean,” Sullyoon provides, like it’s true.

“Yeah,” you start to agree, except, “no, definitely not,” and look at her mouth long enough for her smile to unfurl properly.

Still, you could justify that: say she was a real pleasure to have in class, a stellar writer, all your parent-teacher-conference boilerplate. Gloss over the bratty streak, perhaps. She had a nickname, ironically enough - which. Huh. It feels sacrosanct to even broach considering you have half a mind to take her right up against the mahogany wood-grain, walnut, teak, asphodel maybe - Princess Sullyoon - and ah, fuck: there goes any good intentions whatsoever.

“I hope you realize you’re buying me a drink,” she decides way too casually, slipping her jacket off to reveal her shoulders, a halter neckline, the immaculate dip of her collarbones.

You barely even notice. You can’t. The bartender swivels by; but she’s not paying him any mind.

“Sir,” she says breezily, wickedly. The inflection alone has your brain working in italics. “You said it yourself: good grades, good behavior."

"Well that’s a bit out of context,” you correct her - unfortunate impulse. Not so long ago, and she’s asking about her paper, leaning over the desk and so, so precocious about it. You shove the image down. “It’s not like I’m still your teacher.”

“Well.” And she drags the syllable like a bullet casing. “Semantics, right?”

The short answer is no, not really; the medium-length answer is that she’s really fucking attractive; face perfect and eyes expressive and well put-together - her waist is sublime if you’re gonna let yourself acknowledge it - but if you really need extended-response: you’re already fantasizing about her thighs, how wide they’d spread for you; her ankles and all the different places you could have them lock around; her nails, her wrists, her hair in a neat ponytail and tugged just right, until she’s incoherently undone for it - so, sure: semantics

She opens her legs, seems to notice the skirt she’s wearing a moment after the fact. You don’t stop yourself from flagging the bartender.

In theory, you’ll dissuade the ideas cross-pollinating between those pretty doe eyes, but in practice, in reality: she’s charming her way through the small-talk, stringing the moments and minutes longer, unbothered by the prospect of a quiet. She doesn’t talk about school - it’s off-the-record. She lets a pause lengthen and then dangles a phrase at the tail end of it: tells you that you’re cute, you were always her favorite teacher, she can see why they all loved you and you just don’t really catch it until:

“They?”

She rolls the word around: “Everyone. You know.” She watches your expression. “My classmates. Girls. Some girls.”

Oh.

She has this quirk to her smile; you try to dismiss it. Brush it off, let it slide.

There’s this novel you’re writing, and you’re not gonna say what about, but there’s an opening sequence unfolding like a roadmap. You don’t know the ending. You tell her as much: a mystery, you say, and you’re making her laugh again. Apparently, you still know how. She knocks her knuckles to your bicep, your forearm - makes expressions like you don’t know better, does things with her eyes: your name a syllable away, everything else like a sin; do you live close to here, don’t you have a girlfriend, what are your other hobbies, besides grading papers and drinking-

“You never actually answered my question,” she points out, because it’s a disaster.

She’s looking at you like she’d believe anything you’d tell her: you’re engaged, getting hitched soon, met someone, anyone - but then she’s crossing her legs in those thigh-highs and it’s anyone’s guess from there.

“I’m not really seeing anybody,” you say eventually, and she does it again, tugs the hemline of her skirt up, up. “Nothing serious,” which is too candid, possibly. Fucked up, probably. Morally reprehensible, certainly.

There’s some guesswork, a bit of napkin math: you’ve got a decade on her, and that’s not something you care to unpack, but when she picks her drink back up, she plays up the alcohol-blush - tipsy, she assures you, blinking languidly.

Tipsy means, for argument’s sake, for academic rigor: pliable. Influenceable. Easy.

“A little more, maybe,” Sullyoon murmurs as her fingers tug on the corner of your sleeve, an unspoken: come here, lean closer.