Sweet Romance11 min read
My Professor, My Brother, and the Afternoon He Brought Cake
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I remember that study room like the back of my hand: neat desk, tidy shelves, nothing extra. He sat at that desk, focused, as if nothing else existed except the pages in front of him.
"Morning," someone called at the door.
I stood up. Declan had come to drop something off for me and, of course, to see his old friend.
"Happy New Year," he said as he stepped in, light on his feet like always.
"Happy New Year," I answered, holding a cup. "Why are you here so early?"
"Couldn't resist. I brought a special treat from home." Declan set a small box on the table like it was nothing.
"You didn't have to," I said.
"Old friends don't say 'had to'." He smiled and sat. "Is she here yet?" he asked before I could ask him anything.
"Who?" I asked.
"That girl you call your little one," he said, teasing, and then pointed at me.
"She's in her second year now," I said. "She lives far, Declan. Don't bother."
"Give me her number," he insisted. "I am her teacher, right? Maybe I can help with her studies."
"No," I said too quickly. "Just... no."
"You're being mean," Declan laughed and left. The car disappeared down the street.
I went back to my papers. The air had a winter crispness. My scarf still smelled faintly of coffee.
Later, I walked to the drugstore. The clerk handed me a small box of medicine for cramps.
"Take it with warm water," he said.
"Thank you," I said.
The rain started when I got off the subway, small drops that made everything look fuzzy and soft. I sat on a bench under the station awning and waited. I wrapped my arms around myself and wished Declan had driven me.
When I finally reached the dorm, my room smelled like coffee and textbooks. My roommate Sofia was asleep, her phone buzzing with messages. Katharine was reading something in the next bed, and Gabriella was at class.
"You're late to life, Casey," Sofia teased as I yawned my way inside.
"Period ache," I said. "I'm useless today."
"Eat something," Sofia said. "Or we'll drag you out for dinner."
We walked to a cheap place downtown. We talked, joked, laughed. They called me "school beauty." I rolled my eyes and kept biting at rice, hiding behind the safety of my glasses.
"Casey," Katharine would whisper, "you should smile more."
"Like you two need more attention," I countered.
Later, back at the dorm, my phone beeped with a photo. Someone had posted a picture of me online — me without glasses, eating a sandwich. A hundred comments in an hour.
"Don't say you know her," I warned.
"Why?" Sofia asked, curious.
"Because there are people from my old school here," I said. "I don't want trouble."
"You're being dramatic," Katharine said.
I was trying to protect us all from a scrap of a past I didn't want to pull open. It was childish, stupid, and it had nearly destroyed things once. I learned to hide after that. I learned to be small, to be careful.
The next day, a student named Emilian came to class with a photo. "Professor Mercier, do you know this girl?" he asked.
I froze when Vicente Mercier looked at the photo. I felt like the room tilted.
"Do you know her?" he asked Emilian.
"No," Emilian said. "But someone took this on campus."
The truth was, I remembered him at once.
"She... used to call me South Brother," Declan said later, in the kitchen, after I'd told him I'd been seen. "Why didn't you tell me you were here?"
"I didn't want you to worry," I said. "I thought being silent would keep things calm."
"Silence never solved anything," he said, gentle and firm.
I had not seen Vicente in years. At first I had clung to that childish title — "South Brother" — when I wasn't old enough to understand more serious things. I remembered him arriving at our family house with milk and jokes. Back then I followed him like a dog; now I tried to disappear.
At the library that evening, I sat in the last row. My paper was returned with notes in red. My professor Ashby had said it needed revision in a week.
"One week?" I muttered.
I stayed until the lights flicked. I opened the laptop and stared long at blank sentences. Someone left a cup of coffee and a piece of cake on the table. The crumbs were warm.
"Thank you," I whispered to the empty room, and felt him near before I recognized the voice.
"You're working late," Vicente said, soft like a secret.
I jumped and then laughed at myself. "I didn't expect anyone."
"Sit," he said. "You look like you need a break."
He smiled and I sat. He had always been careful with words. He asked how my family was. He asked if I was eating.
"Do you have class tomorrow?" he asked.
"Ten," I said.
"Come to my office after," he said. "I'll help with your paper."
"Why would you do that?" I blurted.
He shrugged. "Old friends do things like that."
So I went. He put his jacket over my shoulders because I was red from the cold and embarrassed. He handed me a key with a small little ring.
"Here. Come whenever. There are biscuits and tea."
"Why so much trouble?" I asked, my fingers curling around that key.
"Because I want you to have an easy time," he said. "Because you used to call me South Brother."
"Vicente," I said, bashful. "Please, call me Casey."
"Casey," he said, and it felt like a safe place.
He helped me rewrite the paper in two hours. He pulled books, he made coffee, he listened. The office was warm, and he had a small fridge stacked with things he offered with no fuss.
"Take some for your roommates," he told me. "And take this key."
"Do I have to?" I asked.
"No. I insist." He pushed it into my palm with a look that was both firm and impossibly kind.
When I left his office, it felt like a small miracle.
After that he was there. Sometimes he would pass me fruit. Sometimes he tucked a jacket across my shoulders. He called me "my girl" in jokes and I called him "South Brother" in my head, until one night I heard someone say his name in the dining hall: "Professor Mercier, you look great tonight."
So I tried not to let anyone know our whole story. My roommates tempted me with their matchmaking. They wanted to set me up. I wanted to be small and safe.
"Casey," Sofia said, "you're not trying! Let us help."
"I don't want a boyfriend," I told them.
"Everyone says that," Katharine muttered. "Until they don't."
The art department asked Josiah Zhou to request a dance partner. He slid the request across the table with eyes like a careful bird.
"Would you be my dance partner?" he asked.
"I—" I almost said no. But when your friends put you forward it feels like stepping onto a stage you didn't choose.
"Yes," I finally said. "I will do it."
We rehearsed once. I was nervous. I wore a simple dress and a borrowed pair of earrings.
"Don't be scared," Josiah said. "You will be fine."
He had good hands. He taught me the steps gently. He smiled like the sun is a small thing he could borrow. I liked that. I liked him. It was simple and safe.
Then the school canceled the dance night. I was glad and disappointed in the same breath. I texted Josiah. He replied with a simple message: "Thanks for agreeing. We'll hang another time."
"Are you happy?" Vicente asked me at lunch that day.
"Yes," I said. "In a small way."
He stood up and bought me an overcoat that didn't fit the way coats usually fit when you don't expect such things. It fit like something made for me.
"Try it," he said.
I tried it on. I couldn't form the words for thanks. He patted my head with a fondness that made my face warm.
"You shouldn't pay for anything to be kind," I said.
"Kindness has many ways of being paid forward," he said, and gave me the car keys.
Once, we took the subway together. Sofia and Katharine squealed the entire time. I felt like a secret the entire ride. When he dropped us off, the streetlights glittered and I was afraid of being small and noticed.
"Get in," he said quietly. "I'll drive you."
We drove through the city quiet. He bought me a beret at a kiosk and put it on me like a crown. I was ridiculous and warm and happy, a child with a secret prize.
"You can wear it when you study," he said.
"I will," I promised.
I started using his office more. I would nap on the couch there between classes and wake to his voice, "Get up. You missed the tea."
He liked to tidy. He liked to know where books were. He called me "my girl" so casually that sometimes people would think we were related. Declan hated that bristled feeling when people assumed. He liked his friends, but he loved me. He often said, "Protect Casey."
We laughed and read and fixed papers. I grew more comfortable being seen. People noticed: Josiah, the shy senior who asked me to dance; Cade Barnett, a generous boy from acting class who threw a party for Sofia and invited us; Mateo Baldwin, kind, a friend of Jab; and others who made the dorm corridors louder.
One night, a terrible sound came from outside — a thud like a tree falling. Lights flashed. Someone screamed, then many screams.
"Someone jumped," said a voice down the hall.
I froze like a photograph. My hands went numb. The corridor below our floor gathered a crowd. The police and an ambulance came. Red and blue lights painted the windows.
"Don't go," I heard Vicente say into my phone. "Stay where you are. I'm on my way."
My knees gave. I called Declan. He said, "Hold on. I'm coming."
I wasn't sure how long passed, only that my chest felt like a bird trapped in a jar. I video-called Vicente and watched his calm face on the screen. He told me quietly not to be afraid.
"Don't go downstairs," he said. "Please."
"Okay," I sobbed.
"Stay on video. Talk to me."
There were sirens and murmurs, and the dreadful sound of people gathering. When Vicente arrived I crawled into his arms as if I had been four. He wrapped his coat tightly and kept repeating, "You're safe. You're safe."
"Let's go to my place," he whispered. "We'll not stay in that building tonight."
And so I left the dorm with him. Declan followed in his car, angry and worried and unwilling to leave me anywhere alone. We went to Vicente's apartment. He made soup and sat with me into midnight.
"The girl…" he said the next morning, voice tight. "She died. She had depression."
"It was an accident," Declan said. "No. It wasn't an accident."
They were sad and exhausted. Declan drove me to the hospital. The doctors put an IV in my arm and checked my sleep patterns. They told us the name of the girl. I felt guilty for being alive.
"You're here," Vicente said gently. "Hold water. Breathe."
For two days, I slept and didn't sleep. Sometimes I woke and saw flash-blood and bodies in my dream. Vicente sat and watched the clock the same way a lighthouse watches the sea. He didn't sleep properly. He brought me fruit and warmed milk. He told me stories of his youth and his own mistakes in soft, safe facts.
Declan rarely left. He would rub my back and call our father to delay worry. He blamed himself, as older brothers often do, for not keeping me from small dangers. He told Vicente, quietly and firmly, "You look after her. No surprises."
The hospital told us to rest. We spent the holidays locked in a small orbit of three people: me, Declan, and Vicente. People sent messages. My friends flooded the dorm chat. Sofia sent a long string of accusations and worry.
"Why didn't you tell us?" she wrote.
"I couldn't," I answered. "I didn't want to scare anyone."
"You're selfish," Katharine wrote.
"No," I typed, and deleted it. "I was scared."
Later, Vicente suggested I move near his apartment. "I can pick you up for class," he said.
"No," Declan said quickly. "We can't let people talk. She's my sister."
"It's okay," Vicente said. "Let me be practical. Let me help."
I thought about the offer and felt ashamed and small. To him, it was simple: he liked me and wanted me safe. To me, it felt like more than safety. I told Declan, "I don't want everyone to think anything about him."
"People will talk," Declan admitted. "But I know you. I know him. You are family in a different way."
"Do you like her?" I heard Declan ask Vicente once, when the two men stood by the window, speaking low.
"I care," Vicente said. "But not the way you mean. She is someone I can't let get hurt."
"Then that's enough," Declan whispered, and his voice broke like a small twig.
Days went by. School forced a rhythm. My assignments, my papers, my timid social life resumed. Josiah asked me again about that dance. Cade and Mateo joked and teased. On the surface, my life was safe and normal. Underneath, I was stitched together by two men who loved me differently.
Then one afternoon, Declan pulled Vicente aside in the hospital corridor.
"You can't," Declan said.
"Can't what?" Vicente asked.
"Can't fall for her. She's my sister."
"I am not falling for her in any way that would hurt her," Vicente said. "I promise."
"That's not my point," Declan said. "There is history. There are people who don't understand. They're loud and cruel. I don't want her name used badly."
"She is not yours to lock away," Vicente replied.
"Then don't hurt her."
They looked at each other, then bowed heads. They both loved me, but in different languages. One as brother, one as guardian.
I felt like the quiet between three notes. It made a different music.
When I was well enough, Vicente invited me to his office. He had a small table set up with a teapot and two cups. He put a little cake in a box and handed it to me.
"Do you want to open it?" he asked.
"Yes."
"It's my favorite," he said. "It has peach filling."
I laughed like a small, bright sound. "You always remember the little things."
"Little things are the scaffolding of big ones."
"I don't know how to be brave," I said. "I don't like crowds after what happened. I still flinch."
"That's okay," he said. "You don't have to be brave yet. You can be small with me."
I ate the cake. He poured the tea. We talked about nothing and everything. He said, "One day you'll open a coffee shop and let the world in, little by little."
"I want to," I said. "But I am afraid of failing."
"You won't fail," he promised.
After that, life resumed. The girls had new crushes, new plans, new squabbles. Sofia and Katharine teased me. Gabriella ran around with her boyfriend and sent us candy.
Cade, the generous actor, invited us to a small celebration. He made an odd joke about being everyone's "big brother." I smiled and ate shrimp he took the shells off for me.
"You're too thin," Vicente said when he saw me finish. "Eat more. Let me feed you."
"I am not a child," I protested, though I let him.
"Maybe not. But you are my girl to protect," he whispered.
I hated those words and loved them both. They made me feel safe in a way that had nothing to do with being controlled. Here was choice and care.
Sometimes school can be small and large at once. People gossiped about professors and students. I tried to ignore it, but the rumor mill is loud. Someone misread an email; someone assumed too much. Declan always came to my defense loudly and fiercely when he thought things were unfair.
One afternoon, as we walked past the courtyard, Josiah handed me two tickets and said, "I got extra; want to go to the show?"
"Yes," I said. "Thank you."
"You are welcome."
I wondered sometimes why so many people wanted me. Maybe I was soft in a way that allowed people to care. Maybe people liked the idea of helping. I didn't want to be a project. I wanted to be a person.
Weeks later, as autumn brushed the trees, I knew I would not run anymore. I had scars, yes. I had memories that woke me in the night. I had two men in my life who loved and guarded me — one by blood, one by choice. They argued once about what they should or shouldn't do. Declan told Vicente plainly, "You cannot be—"
"I can be a friend," Vicente said. "I can be her teacher. I can be someone who helps."
"That is all she needs."
"Then I will be that."
On the last night of the term, we sat in Vicente's small kitchen. He wrapped his scarf around my shoulders and handed me a small velvet box.
"What's this?" I asked.
"For you," he said.
I opened it to find a brass key on a ring. It was simple. It was the key to his office.
"You already gave me a key," I said.
"This one is mine to give more permanently," he said. "Keep it. When you feel lost, come here."
I slid it onto my chain and felt like all the pieces that had been loose for years were finding a place. I looked at Declan. He smiled and waved his fork, chopsticks, his soldier face soft.
"You two have your own rhythms," I said.
Declan laughed. "I want you to be happy."
"You already are," Vicente said.
We hugged. We ate cake. The city outside blinked and moved.
Later, as I packed my bag for the winter break, I tucked the office key into the deepest pocket. I closed the wardrobe where he had left the overcoat. I left the beret on the shelf like a little flag.
I thought about the girl we had lost and felt a grief that was quiet and solemn and wide. I promised myself two things: I would try to be brave, and I would let people help.
On the train home, with snow like powder outside the window, I took the small key from my pocket and felt it warm in my hand.
"Where will you hang this?" Declan asked as he pressed his forehead above mine.
"Right here," I said, touching my chest. "Where I keep the things that remind me I can be found."
He squeezed my hand and kissed my brow.
"Don't get into trouble," he teased.
"I won't," I said.
Vicente's voice was a small sound in my ear: "I'll be here whenever you need me."
"Promise?" I asked.
"No promises," he said softly. "Just the key."
I closed my eyes and let the rocking train be like a cradle. It was not the end of anything. It was a place to start, again and again, with a coat in the closet, cake in the fridge, a beret on the shelf, and a little brass key tucked safe inside my pocket.
The End
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