The sentence was a crime against the English language. It lacked structure, the grammar was atrocious, and I am fairly certain the student had invented three new words that did not exist in any dictionary.

I sighed and took off my reading glasses. I rubbed the bridge of my nose and felt the familiar headache building behind my eyes. This was the reality of my Thursday nights. While other women my age were out having dinner or maybe grabbing a glass of wine with a date, I was sitting in my home office grading papers for English 101: Creative Writing for Non-Majors.

Unofficially, the faculty called it “Jock 101.”

It was the mandatory credit course for the university’s athletes. They needed it to stay eligible for the team and the university needed them to keep the alumni donations flowing. My job was simple. I had to drag them across the finish line with a C-minus and try to ensure they could write a coherent email by the time they graduated.

I looked at the stack of papers remaining on my mahogany desk. There were still twenty left.

I picked up my glass of Pinot Grigio and took a large swallow. It was a decent vintage but it wasn’t doing the job. I felt restless. I felt itchy.

It wasn’t just the bad grammar that was bothering me. It was the silence of the house. I had bought this place three years ago after I finally made tenure. It was a beautiful two-story colonial on a quiet street. It was perfect for a respectable academic. It was also incredibly lonely.

I leaned back in my leather chair. My mind drifted to my dating life. Or rather the smoking crater where my dating life used to be.

I had tried. God knows I had tried. I spent a year on the apps. I swiped left. I swiped right. I went on coffee dates with men named Gary and Steve who wore pleated khakis and talked about their 401ks. They were nice men. They were stable men. They were looking for a partner to grow old with.

They were also terminally boring.

The few times I had slept with them it had been a disaster. They wanted to “make love.” They wanted to look in my eyes and connect emotionally. They asked if I was okay. They stopped to ask if I needed a pillow.

I didn’t want a pillow. I wanted to be fucked.

I looked down at my lap. I was wearing a silk blouse and a pencil skirt. My red hair was pulled back in a severe bun that my colleagues jokingly called “The Librarian.” I looked every inch the stern, uptight Professor Sally Evans.

But under the desk my legs were crossed tight. I shifted in my chair. The seam of my panties rubbed against my clit. I felt a little jolt of electricity.

I wasn’t looking for romance. I was looking to scratch an itch that Gary and Steve didn’t even know existed.

I looked at the stack of papers again. They weren’t going anywhere.

I pulled out my iPad and powered it on.

This was my secret. This was the release valve that kept me sane while I discussed Chaucer and Victorian sensibilities during the day.

I didn’t read romance novels. I didn’t want stories about dukes courting maidens or billionaires sweeping secretaries off their feet. I wanted filth. The darker and dirtier the better.

I opened my current read. It was a poorly written piece of digital smut called The Team’s Toy. The plot was nonexistent. A cheerleader gets locked in the locker room and decides to service the entire offensive line.

I knew I should be offended by the lack of character development. I knew, intellectually, that it was degrading trash.

But my nipples were already hard.

I scrolled to the bookmark. The protagonist was currently on her knees in the shower. She had one cock in her mouth and was stroking two others. The author used words I would never allow in my classroom. Cocks. Pussies. Holes. Breeding.

I read a paragraph where a nameless linebacker grabbed the girl’s hair and forced her face into his crotch.

I let out a breath I didn’t know I was holding. My hand drifted to the buttons of my blouse.

“One chapter,” I whispered to the empty room. “Just to take the edge off.”

I undid the top button. Then the second. I pushed my bra down, exposing my breasts to the cool air of the room.

I stood up and walked to the full-length mirror mounted on the back of the office door. I liked to see myself. I needed to juxtapose the reality of who I was with the fantasy I was reading.

I looked at the woman in the glass.

I was 43 years old. I stood 5’7” in my stocking feet. At 145 pounds I wasn’t the waifish twenty-something I saw on campus every day. My hips were wider than they used to be and my belly wasn’t rock hard. But I held it well. My breasts were a heavy, natural 36C. My pale skin was smooth, though dusted with freckles that matched my deep red hair.

I looked professional. I looked stern. I looked like a woman who chaired committees and attended faculty teas.

“You look like a nun,” I whispered to my reflection.

My hand moved down to my skirt. I unzipped it and let it fall to my ankles. I stepped out of it. I was left standing in my blouse, my glasses, and a pair of sheer black panties.

I looked at the contrast. The intellectual face with the wire-rimmed glasses versus the curvy, soft body waiting to be used.

I turned back to the tablet and read another few lines. The girl in the story was begging for it. She was calling herself a slut. She was thanking them for using her.

I sat back down in my chair, but I didn’t pull it up to the desk. I scooted forward to the edge of the seat. I spread my legs wide.

I pulled my panties to the side. I didn’t take them off. I liked the feeling of the elastic digging into my thigh. It made me feel constrained. Naughty. Like I was doing something I shouldn’t be doing in my workspace.

My fingers brushed my pussy.

“Fuck,” I hissed.

I was soaking wet. I was always wet these days. It was like my body was screaming at me, trying to make up for the years of neglect. My juices coated my fingers instantly. Thick and slick through the thatch of red pubic hair.

I found my clit. It was swollen and demanding attention.

I started to rub. Small circles at first. I kept my eyes on the tablet, reading as I touched myself.

He slapped her face with his heavy dick, the text read. ‘Open up, you little cum dumpster.’

I shuddered.

“Cum dumpster,” I whispered. The words tasted metallic and forbidden in my mouth.

I slid one finger inside my pussy. It was tight but eager. I pumped my finger in and out, matching the rhythm of my rubbing hand. The wet squelching sound filled the quiet office. It sounded obscene mixed with the hum of my computer hard drive.

I imagined it wasn’t my finger. I imagined it was one of the men from the story. Faceless. Aggressive. Hung.

I imagined being bent over this very desk. My papers scattered on the floor. My skirt pushed up.

“Fuck me,” I moaned softly.

I added a second finger. My pussy stretched to accommodate them. It felt good, but it wasn’t enough. It was never enough. That was the problem with jilling off. I could make myself cum, but I couldn’t make myself feel filled. I couldn’t replicate the feeling of a heavy body pressing me down or a thick cock stretching me open.

But I had to make do.

I read on. The girl in the story was gagging. She was taking it deep. Her mascara was running.

I imagined my own mascara running. I imagined my glasses being knocked askew as a man grabbed my hair.

My pace increased. My hand was a blur against my clit. I squeezed my eyes shut, blocking out the vision of my organized bookshelves and my framed diplomas.

In my mind I wasn’t Professor Evans. I was just a hole. A wet, red-headed hole waiting to be filled.

“Please,” I whimpered.

My hips started to buck against the leather chair. I thrust up to meet my fingers. I twisted my nipples with my free hand, pinching them hard, trying to simulate the rough touch I craved.

The tension coiled tight in my belly. It was a hot, heavy pressure that radiated down my thighs.

I focused on the words in the story. Spurting. Dripping. Used.

“Yes,” I painted. “God, yes.”

I moved my hand faster. The friction was intense. I was so wet that my juices were dripping onto the leather of the chair seat. I didn’t care. The mess was part of it. The mess proved I was a sexual creature, not just a brain in a jar.

The orgasm hit me like a freight train.

It started in my toes and rushed up my spine. My back arched off the chair. I threw my head back and let out a strangled cry that I had to bite my lip to suppress.

“Fuck!”

My pussy clamped down on my fingers. My inner walls pulsed, milking my own hand. I rode the wave, jerking my hips, chasing the sensation until I was breathless and shaking.

I slumped back into the chair. My chest was heaving. My blouse was open, my breasts flushing pink from the attention. My glasses had slid down my nose.

I sat there for a long moment, listening to the sound of my own ragged breathing.

I pulled my hand away. It was glistening. My fluids were clear and sticky, coating my palm and running down my wrist. I looked at it. It was proof of life.

I brought my fingers to my mouth and licked them clean. It was musky and salt-sweet. It tasted like want.

I sat there for another minute, letting my heart rate return to normal. The shame usually crept in around now. The “post-nut clarity” as my students would call it. The voice that said you are a respected academic, what are you doing reading trash and fingering yourself like a teenager?

But tonight the shame was quiet. Tonight the hunger was louder.

I stood up and grabbed a tissue from the box on my desk. I wiped my hand and then cleaned the leather of the chair. I pulled my panties back into place, though the damp fabric clung uncomfortably to my skin. I liked that too. It would be a reminder for the rest of the night.

I hoisted my skirt back on and buttoned my blouse. I checked the mirror one last time.

My hair was a little messy. My cheeks were flushed a bright, healthy red. I looked better. I looked alive.

I sat back down and woke up my computer monitor. The screensaver vanished, replaced by the grade book.

I felt calmer. The edge was gone, for now.

I reached for the next paper in the stack. I glanced at the name at the top of the page.

Damien Washington.

I paused. A picture of him popped in my mind like an intruder. He was the starting linebacker. He was 6’3” of solid muscle, dark skin, and a smile that could talk a nun out of her habit. He sat in the back row, usually stretched out like a panther napping in the sun, watching me with eyes that seemed far too old for a twenty-year-old.

Most of the athletes turned in papers that were barely legible. But Damien was different. He was quiet. He was observant.

I adjusted my glasses and pulled his stapled pages toward me.

The assignment had been simple. Write a descriptive narrative about a moment of intense conflict.

Most of the class interpreted this as “describe the time we played State and we were down by a field goal.” I had read twelve football stories tonight. I was expecting a thirteenth.

I took a sip of my wine and looked at the title.

The Office Hours.

My eyebrows went up. Okay. Not football. That was a start.

I started to read the first paragraph.

The room smelled like old books and expensive perfume. It was a library, but it felt like a cage. She sat behind the desk, her red hair pulled back so tight it must have hurt, looking at me over the rim of her glasses. She thought she was hiding it. She thought the high collar and the long skirt fooled everyone. But I could smell it on her. I could smell the heat.

I froze. My wine glass paused halfway to my mouth.

I read the lines again.

Red hair. Glasses. High collar.

My heart gave a single, hard thump against my ribs.

This wasn’t fiction. Or rather, it was fiction, but the subject was undeniable. He was writing about me.

I gripped the paper tighter. My first instinct, the Professor Evans instinct, was to be outraged. This was inappropriate. This was sexual harassment. I should march this paper straight to the Dean of Students. I should have him expelled from the class.

I lowered the glass to the desk. My hand was trembling slightly.

I looked at the words again. I could smell the heat.

I thought about my damp panties clinging to my skin. I thought about the vibrator in my drawer and the smut on my tablet.

He saw me.

This twenty-year-old boy, this jock who barely spoke in class, had looked at me and seen right through the silk blouse and the tenure track position. He had seen the itch.

I swallowed hard. My throat felt dry.

I should stop reading. I should give it a C and move on.

But I didn’t.

I adjusted my glasses, took a deep breath, and turned to the second page.

My eyes scanned the second page of Damien’s paper. I was breathing heavier now. I told myself I was reading it as an instructor. I told myself I was looking for sentence fragments or comma splices.

I was lying.

The narrative voice in the essay had shifted. The first paragraph had been observation. The second was pure predation.

Professor S stood up from behind the desk, the paper read. She tried to use her teacher voice. She tried to tell me to sit down. But her voice shook. She knew why I was there. She knew I had been watching her cross her legs all semester. She knew I had seen the way her skirt pulled tight across her wide hips when she wrote on the chalkboard.

I shifted in my chair. Wide hips. I had always been self-conscious about my bottom half. I starved myself to try to keep my ass in check. But here was this twenty-year-old athlete writing about it like it was the main attraction.

She walked around the desk, Damien wrote. She wanted to be authoritative. She wanted to be the boss. But when I stood up she had to look up. Way up. She stopped talking. She just stared at my chest. She could smell the sweat on me from practice. She liked it. I saw her nostrils flare. She was hungry.

I lowered the paper to the desk. My hands were shaking noticeably now.

I looked at the empty space in the middle of my office. I imagined him standing there. Damien Washington.

He was a physical specimen. There was no other way to describe him. He was dark-skinned, broad-shouldered, and moved with a terrifying grace. In class he wore grey sweatpants and tight t-shirts that strained against his biceps. I had caught myself looking. Of course I had. I was human.