A Story Line
Ken Leland
In the Spring semester, gossip spread through Ontario University’s Downtown Campus concerning a violent assault on a junior faculty member. Word was, she barely survived and spent almost three weeks in the hospital before being discharged. Newspapers did not, of course, publish the victim’s name, but through the university grapevine, anyone interested could soon learn she was a part-time lecturer in English Studies. It seemed rather ghoulish to track down her identity, and so Adjunct Professor William Hanson did not pursue the matter any further. He was already reconciled to the loss of his new raincoat in the course of that miserable night.
* * *
Five months later, William Hanson found himself sitting opposite a fetching, but decidedly odd, young woman at a University Avenue coffee shop. Outside on that November evening, sleet battered pedestrians. Inside Mocha Java, patrons sat in booths, pausing only to sip steaming mugs between bouts of frantic laptop composition.
Hanson and the peculiar person seated across the table had already exchanged first names, though Miriam barely spoke above a whisper. “It just struck me, William. A novel could begin this way, set on a night just like this.”
Chin propped on elbows, he glanced past his coffee cup at Miriam, towards blonde falls and freckled cheeks. Tilting his head to one side, then bending a bit lower, he tried for a smile. “You mean the novel’s first line would be, it was a dark and stormy night?”
Her back stiffened as she studied the tabletop. “No. No. That’s such a cartoon cliché. It might begin with how it feels to be a woman, or a man, trudging city sidewalks in miserable weather, describe how wind-blown sleet stings one’s face, how frightening it is to be alone on gloomy, empty streets. Hurrying home, the protagonist would hear someone call out, ‘Please, wait for me,’ and she, or maybe he, would pause to let the stranger catch up.”
He nodded. “Depending, I suppose, on whether this story is going to be from your point of view or from mine.”
Hanging on the booth beside her, Miriam’s umbrella marked time as melting slush ticked down onto the coffee shop floor. “Couldn’t it be about either of us?”
Her hands cradled a blue striped mug. Hers were long, delicate fingers he hoped to touch, but then he recalled how they’d just met on the street outside. “I think the plot would spin quite differently if I was the one who’d called out to you.”
She glanced up at him momentarily, then quickly looked away. This time he glimpsed green eyes and a lime colored gemstone on a silver chain draped across her throat. “Miriam, would we even be sitting here together if I’d been the one who called to you?”
Warming her hands, she rotated the cup in quarter turns. “No, you’re right. It’s not likely. I would have run like a deer for the nearest open store.”
He blinked. “Demi’s All Night Barbeque?”
This time her lips quivered before breaking into a smile. “Well, Smarty Pants, maybe I’m partial to Peking Duck. We’d have to work that into the story line somehow.”
He reached to touch fingers on her bare, left hand. “Creative writing. That’s where you were tonight.”
She stood quickly and grabbed her umbrella. Balancing en guarde, she pointed its metal tip at his eyes.
“Please. Don’t. I only guessed! I’m not a stalker, not whomever you’re frightened of.”
She held her ground, as all around them, Mocha Java’s startled customers half rose to her defense.
“Wait, Miriam.” Digging into his wallet, he produced an official, university business card. “Tonight, Thursdays, I’m usually at Fort Book, near where you saw me.”
“Dr. William Hanson, Philosophy Department. That’s you, is it?”
On the way to her apartment in a tower on Front Street, twice their gloved hands brushed together but neither latched on. In her building foyer, she studied his shoes. “Would you like to see if we can develop this story together?”
“Yes, Miriam. I’d be pleased if we could.”
“My university ID is upstairs – so you’ll just have to accept my word. I’m Dr. Miriam Stevens, English Studies.”
Ah, yes. English Studies. Now it was clear – there was a reason why this woman was afraid on lonely city streets. He hadn’t recognized her. He remembered almost nothing about the appearance of last Spring’s tragic victim. “I’m pleased to meet you, Dr. Stevens.”
Her reply was almost inaudible. “And I, you, Dr. Hanson.”
Then, to his delight, she looked into his face. “Would it be all right if we met in public again, somewhere quiet?”
“Your choice, Miriam.”
She patted his shoulder, then scooted away as the doors to an empty elevator slid open.
Later, in his second story room in Parkdale, Will found an email with Miriam’s suggestion to meet in a week’s time.
On the following Thursday evening, Hanson waited in the balcony ring of an amphitheater-shaped classroom in Queen’s College. Dr. Stevens was on the dais, lecturing scores of students as she outlined salient characteristics of different novel genres. Miriam must have spotted him; she would smile slyly each time she clicked for the next slide, then glance upward to the gallery. Promptly at 7:30 P.M., she switched off her computer. “See you next week, folks.”
Students streamed up the wooden stairs while she answered a few lingering queries. Finished at last, she gathered her notes. Arching an eyebrow to him, she climbed to the exit level. “Shall we try that same coffee shop?”
“Yes. That’d be fine.”
It was raining when they emerged from Queen’s College. Beneath umbrellas, they strolled in silence, hips nudging occasionally as if by accident.
“I’ll find us a window booth,” she said as they neared Mocha Java.
He held the door open. “Same order as before?”
Returning with two lattes, he slid into the booth, and she picked up the story line where it ended last week. “You must wonder why I am this way, so shy and frightened of you, of everyone really.”
“Miriam. You don’t have to tell me . . . so soon.” Of course, he couldn’t admit he already knew, almost from the start.
“But Will, I need to tell you. I practiced my dialogue all week.”
He breathed deep. “Whatever you think is best.”
“You must wonder why I am this way. You see, last spring I was attacked, left stark-naked in an alley, covered only by a raincoat that wasn’t mine . . . or so I’m told. When I awoke four days later, doctors said they took samples. Before leaving the hospital, two police detectives came to interview me, a man and woman. They wanted a list of sexual partners and the names of anyone who might find my existence inconvenient.”
“I thought it might be something like that.” Would Miriam believe him if he said he was the one who found her, broken and insensible that night? Or, would she jump to another conclusion entirely?
“Yes, it was something like that,” she said mirthlessly. “If my attacker is ever arrested, the charges would be attempted murder and sexual assault.”
He looked at her with horror, realizing his teaching career would disappear instantly if even suspected of such crimes.
“I didn’t see who hit me. My post-doc advisor is married with teenagers – not really the sort to slug a woman with a brick, drag her into the dark to do his thing, and leave her for dead. Besides, he seemed to think our relationship was marvelously convenient. I never told the detectives about him.”
“Is there a suspect? Has anyone been arrested?”
“No. I doubt there will be. There was so little for police to go on . . . only his leavings splattered over and inside me.”
His mind ground to a halt. He knew exactly what had happened: the date, the time and circumstances, how she was attacked and left nearly lifeless. If she came to believe he might be the one, even rumors would destroy his academic career. He had to get away from her.
“Miriam, I so wanted to meet you tonight, but I’ll have to cut this short. This afternoon Professor Soblemann called. He has flu and wants me to take his Ethics lecture tomorrow. I’ll have to spend the night swotting Spinoza for the Unenlightened.”
“Oh . . . Well, yes. Of course you do.” Miriam’s eyes were fixed on her lap.
Hanson knew he’d hurt her. His extemporaneous excuse screamed “spoiled goods.” But most importantly, she mustn’t be allowed to suspect him.
“You’re right, Will. I’m sorry. I should have waited to tell you, maybe waited forever. Now I’ve ruined everything.” She snatched up her umbrella and dashed out the door.
As he trudged home on Queen Street, he tired to remember the investigating officer’s name. Maybe the constable’s contact card was still on his bedroom dresser.
* * *
In three week’s time, with a lab report sealed in an official envelope, Hanson waited for Doctor Stevens to finish her lecture. As her students bounded up the steps, Miriam glared at him when he began to descend.
“Never thought I’d see you again, Dr. Hanson.”
“Hello, Miriam. I hope you’ll forgive me after you read this.”
Wriggling her nose in disdain, she snatched the envelope from his hand and tore it open. “What’s this about a negative match?”
“It means I’m not the one who hurt you.”
She was astonished. “Will, I never thought you were!”
“I have to be able to prove it. Because, you see, I am the one who found you in that alley last spring. You need to be certain I’m not the one.”
She wilted onto a chair beside the lectern.
“Miriam, I’d like to continue our story.”
A mid December snowstorm swept along the avenue past Mocha Java.
“There were four of us who found you that night. Three were my last year’s students. I swear on all that’s holy, none of us hurt you. We were the ones who called paramedics and the police.”
Her hand slid across to take Will’s. “I understand. I believe you.”
“Dear Miriam, would you continue your story from the last time we were here?”
She scanned the booths nearby to see who might be listening. “After . . . what happened, someone else finished teaching my spring courses. The Dean’s a good egg; she renewed my adjunct contract for this fall.”
“You’re back teaching. Are you feeling better then?”
“Not really. I hardly recognize myself. Now I’m frightened of strangers and sometimes skitter into panics when I walk alone at night. I’m spending way too much on cabs.”
The amethyst at her throat sparkled. He could barely tear his eyes from it. “When you called to me on the street a few weeks ago, you didn’t know me from Adam.”
“That night, Will, you were in such a rush, almost running through the storm. It didn’t seem likely you would hurt anyone.” Their fingertips laced together. “I was terrified and took a chance I might be safe with you. It was that or start blowing the damned whistle the police gave me.”
Ken Leland
Ken Leland won the Carleton University Creative Writing Contest, Passages, for 2015 and his debut historical novel ‘1812 The Land Between Flowing Waters,’ was published by Fireship Press. One of his seventeen published stories has been nominated for the 2024 Pushcart Prize.