I woke up sore, but good sore. Curiously, Stella wasn’t beside me. I groggily hoped I didn’t dream all that, or that she took off in the night, never to be seen again. Those worries were squashed when Stella walked into my room with a long t-shirt on. 

The sight of Stella Faleur with slightly messy hair wearing only a big t-shirt immediately topped my “best visuals to wake up to” list.

“Borrowed one of your shirts, hope you don’t mind.” Stella said.

“You can wear any of my clothes if they all look that good on you,” I said.

Stella smirked and twirled a bit, like the hem of the shirt was a dress. “I was going to make coffee, but I didn’t know how your coffeemaker works, or where you keep your coffee. Do you want coffee?”

“I can brew us up some,” I said. “What time is it?” I groaned when I checked my phone. “It’s not a snow day…” I was very tempted to call in sick.

After I took a quick shower (I was very tempted to invite Stella in with me but I would definitely not make it to work if I did) and got some clothes on, I brewed coffee and made some toaster pastries while Stella showered (I was very tempted to invite myself in but again, it wasn’t a snow day and I had to be a little responsible). I still couldn’t believe that Stella and I actually had sex the night before. And that we agreed to have more sex. I was a little worried that our “I don’t want this to be a one off” talk could evaporate after clarity from a good night’s sleep. But that’d be something to think about more later.

“So you have to pay your rent today, right?” Stella asked as she sipped her coffee. “Or, our rent. Do you have time for that and class?”

“I was going to go on my lunch break,” I said. “Do you need me to drop you off at your place before then?”

“Here’s what I’m thinking,” Stella said. “You go to work, I get a cab back home, then I can pack up some stuff and bring it down with my car. Then if you let me know where to bring the rent checks, I’ll get them on the way. How does that sound?”

“That sounds…” My eyebrows were raised, impressed by Stella’s planning skills this early in the morning. “Like it solves a lot of problems at once.”

I wished I didn’t have to rush off to work, but Stella insisted I focus on getting ready after I gave her the address and instructions for our rent checks (I cannot accurately describe the relief when our checks were together, defeating my fears of financial turmoil for the month), as well as my spare key to the apartment. As I headed towards the back door, Stella grabbed my coat sleeve.

“Hey, um,” Stella said. “Before you go…”

“What’s up?” I asked.

Stella had a bashful smile. She quickly kissed my cheek. “Have…a good day?”

With that, I was a lot more motivated to do my best that day.

Despite me being sore (again, good sore), I did everything in my power not to let my students and especially fellow teachers have any inclination about how good my last night went. I tried to be regular ol’ Dr. Diast. 

There was an awkward moment in my first period class when Stella's little sister Zeta walked in. I obviously wasn't going to be like, "Hey, guess what Zeta?" And drop some big relationship news on her. But when she arrived, I flinched for a second in a moment of panic. What if I was stupid enough to blab to Stella's little sister, who is also my student, that I had a fling that's maybe turning into more than a fling immediately and that big sister of yours is moving in with Diast and we slept together and— In a moment of stupid luck, as I trailed off on a bizarre mental tangent I also turned quickly, slamming my right knee into a particularly hard and jabby metal part of my desk. The sound rang like a bell, silencing the idiotic tangent I was on in my head and replacing it with pain.

"Dr. Diast?" Zeta asked.

"Yes...? I winced.

"That...sounded like it hurt." Zeta said. "It looks like it hurt too, going by your face."

"Sure does." I bit my lip, grateful at least that the pain made me not think anymore about how bad it would be if I blabbed everything to Zeta immediately.

"Did you mean to do that?" Zeta asked.

"I did not." I said.

"Guess that's kind of a dumb question." I said.

"No dumb questions here..." I said weakly.

"...alright..." Zeta looked concerned about this, but did not question any further as she took her seat. Outside of my knee hurting, class went on without incident, and I was fortunately able to not like glance in Zeta's direction all the time in that "You may be a bit more of my responsibility going forward if this Stella business works out" sort of way.

At lunch, Caya asked if I got my rent situation figured out, and I bullshitted my way through some story about bank accounts working out because while a very petty part of me wanted to brag about how much better Stella was in bed than my ex, my logic brain won out. If Stella was going to be my coworker very soon, I couldn’t go around immediately blabbing about our newfound…something.

Relationship? Is that the right word?

I froze while my students were doing a group assignment. I probably shouldn’t have been thinking about it in class but it was a straightforward assignment, so nobody had any questions for me, giving me time to think at my desk. Stella and I had sex, sure. There was a definite connection, sure. I hoped at least. I stopped myself there because I remembered what she told me. Take the slow parts slow, enjoy the fast parts fast. As if she sensed me thinking about her, my phone buzzed with a text.

“Rent checks: Delivered!” Stella sent that alongside a picture of her at the real estate place’s drop box giving a thumbs up.

There was a small part of me worried she’d just not bring the rent checks, but that’d be very unlike the Stella I knew so I didn’t let that worry gestate much. “Awesome! I seriously appreciate it so much, Stella.”

“Now to get some moving done.” She added a bunch of bicep emojis.

I typed in, “You’re too cute for words” but deleted it because that seemed like she might find it a bit much, instead opting for emojis I hoped would convey that.

“I didn’t take you to be the type to use emojis.”

“Quiet, you.”

Right after that, a student caught me smirking and texting and asked me to share it with the rest of the class. I took getting snarked at in stride, but waited until my break to check my phone again.