Requested by @isabella-2025
By mid-October, I had apparently become the most scandalous person on campus.
Not because I cheated on an exam. Not because I got arrested at homecoming.
Not even because someone caught me sneaking into the faculty parking lot, which had actually happened once, but only because Charlotte Flair had sworn it was a shortcut to the dining hall.
No. My great crime was raising my hand in class.
"Teacher's pet," someone whispered behind me as Professor Rhodes returned my social-work paper.
There was a red ninety-eight written across the top, followed by three full paragraphs of feedback in his neat handwriting.
I turned in my seat. "You know he'll give you feedback too if you write more than six sentences."
Charlotte covered her laugh with a cough. The girl behind me rolled her eyes. At the front of the lecture hall, Cody Rhodes adjusted the cuffs of his pale-blue dress shirt and looked in our direction.
"Is there something you'd like to share with the class, Miss Flair?"
Charlotte immediately straightened. "No, Professor Rhodes."
His eyes moved to me. They stayed there a second longer than necessary.
"And you, Miss Isabella?"
The corner of his mouth lifted.
"Pity. You usually have plenty to say."
Soft laughter rippled through the room. Heat rushed into my cheeks, but I smiled anyway. "I'm conserving my brilliance."
"It's exhausting being interesting."
"Then perhaps you should rest," he replied smoothly. "Preferably while someone else answers the next question."
Charlotte's elbow pressed into my side. I faced the front, but I could feel Cody watching me for another moment before he continued the lecture.
That was how it had always been between us. Professor Rhodes taught Social Work Practice and Human Behavior, or SOWK 342, as the university insisted on calling it. He was intelligent, polished, and frustratingly good at making a three-hour afternoon lecture feel like a conversation.
He remembered things. Not only assignments and attendance, but little details. He remembered that my grandmother had been a social worker. He remembered the community center where I volunteered. When I mentioned during one class discussion that I struggled with speaking in formal settings, he began giving me chances to lead smaller group conversations before presenting to the entire room.
Professor Finn Bálor made me feel something else entirely Seen.
Finn's psychology class was held in a smaller room on the other side of campus. Where Cody's classroom was bright, organized, and filled with carefully structured slides, Finn's room always looked as though a particularly intelligent tornado had passed through it.
Markers without caps. Books stacked sideways. Notes covering half the whiteboards.
An abandoned coffee mug that read, I'M ANALYZING YOU. Finn leaned against the edge of his desk while lecturing, sleeves rolled to his forearms, dark hair falling forward whenever he looked down at his notes.
He rarely used those notes. He preferred asking questions.
And he always seemed to know when I was pretending not to have an answer.
I looked up from my notebook. Finn's gaze rested on me from across the room. "You've been suspiciously quiet."
"That's what worries me."
I gave him an offended look. "I think all the time."
More laughter followed, including mine.
Finn tilted his head toward the diagram on the board. "Attachment theory. What do you think?"
I explained my interpretation, stumbling slightly in the middle before finding my rhythm. He listened without interrupting. That was the thing about Finn. When he focused on you, everything else disappeared. He didn't look around the room or check the clock. His attention settled completely, intensely, until it felt less like answering a question and more like being uncovered.
When I finished, he nodded slowly.
One word. Low and deliberate. My stomach performed an embarrassing little somersault. Charlotte noticed all of it. Unfortunately, so did my boyfriend.
Bron Breakker had been charming when we first met. Loud, confident, and impossible to ignore, he had swept into my life with the subtlety of a marching band breaking through a library wall.
For the first few months, I liked it. Bron always knew what he wanted. He planned our dates, chose the restaurants, and pulled me through crowded parties with one heavy arm around my waist. Then things began to change. His confidence became impatience.
His protectiveness became suspicion. He didn't like Charlotte texting me late at night. He didn't like me volunteering at the community center. He especially didn't like my classes with Cody and Finn.
"They pay too much attention to you," he said one evening as we sat in the student union.
"They're teachers. Attention is part of the job description."
I closed my textbook. "What kind?"
Bron leaned back in his chair. "You know exactly what I'm talking about."
I did. That was the problem. I knew the moments he meant. Cody standing beside me after class, close enough that I caught the clean scent of his cologne while we discussed case-study papers. Finn reaching past me for an eraser, his hand brushing mine as we cleaned the whiteboard.
The way both of them said my name. The way their expressions changed when Bron appeared. But nothing had happened.
After Cody's class, I sometimes stayed to help him organize papers. He would sit behind his desk grading while I arranged assignments by section.
"You don't have to do that," he told me every time.
"And yet you never stop me."
"Because you alphabetize correctly."
"Nearly extinct among undergraduates."
Sometimes our conversations drifted away from school.
He told me about his father, about the pressure of living up to family expectations, and about how teaching had surprised him.
"I thought I'd hate it," he admitted one afternoon.
"Because students talk too much."
I placed a hand over my heart. "That feels targeted."
I threw a balled-up sticky note at him.
He caught it without looking.
His whiteboards somehow became my responsibility, though neither of us could remember exactly when that began.
“You missed a section,” he said one evening.
I stared at the board. “That is permanent marker.”
“So I’m a psychology student, not a miracle worker.”
He came to stand behind me.
His hand reached around mine, taking the cloth from my fingers.
“There’s alcohol in the cabinet,” he murmured.
“For the marker,” he added.
He stepped away before I could answer.
But nothing had started to feel dangerously close to something.
One Thursday morning, Charlotte cornered me while I stood in front of our dorm-room mirror, changing my earrings for the third time.
She sat cross-legged on her bed, watching me with narrowed eyes.
“You’re wearing perfume.”
“You’re wearing the expensive perfume.”
“It was inside a box beneath your winter scarves.”
I turned toward her. “Why do you know where I keep my perfume?”
"That too." She pointed at me. "You're blushing."
"It's forty-eight degrees outside."
"The radiator is aggressive."
Her eyes softened. "What's going on?"
"You're nervous about something."
I looked back at the mirror.
Cody's class was at eleven.
The thought of seeing either one of them made my pulse quicken. Seeing both of them on the same day had begun to feel like being slowly pulled between two magnetic fields.
“I have two presentations,” I lied.
“You don’t have any presentations.”
“I have emotional presentations.”
“That doesn’t mean anything.”
“It means I’m presenting myself emotionally to the world.”
Charlotte grabbed a pillow and threw it at me.
A knock sounded on our door.
Charlotte and I exchanged a look.
When I opened it, Bron stood in the hallway wearing his university jacket.
I blinked. “You’re awake.”
His expression tightened. “Funny.”
“You don’t have class until noon.”
“I thought I’d walk you.”
Charlotte rose from the bed. “How romantic.”
Her tone could have frozen boiling water.
Bron ignored her. “Ready?”
He had barely spoken to me all week. His messages had become shorter, his excuses longer. But now he was standing at my door, suddenly eager to escort me across campus.
Bron kept his hand on my lower back as we walked.
When we reached Cody’s lecture hall, students were beginning to file inside. Cody stood near the podium, speaking with another professor.
His gaze found me immediately.
Then it moved to Bron’s hand.
Something cool passed over his expression.
“Good morning, Isabella.”
“Good morning, Professor Rhodes.”
Bron pulled me closer. “Morning.”
Cody nodded. “Mr. Breakker.”
Bron had never taken Cody’s class.
The fact that Cody knew his name made my heart beat strangely.
Before I could step away, Bron bent and kissed me.
It wasn’t tender or spontaneous. It was a performance, complete with his hand gripping my waist and his body positioned so Cody couldn’t possibly miss it.
I pushed lightly against Bron’s chest.
When he released me, he smiled with smug satisfaction.
I stared after him as he walked away.
The room felt silent, though conversations continued around us.
“Everything all right?” he asked.
His gaze dropped briefly to my mouth before returning to my eyes.
The question contained far more than three words should have held.
For the first time all semester, he didn’t call on me once.
By three o’clock, I had convinced myself the morning had been a strange, isolated incident.
Then Bron appeared outside Finn’s classroom.
“What are you doing here?”
“You already walked me to class.”
“Can’t I do something nice for my girlfriend?”
The way he said girlfriend made my shoulders stiffen.
Finn was inside erasing notes from the board. He glanced through the open doorway.
Before I could say anything, he cupped the back of my neck and kissed me again.
This time I turned my face away.
His brows rose. “I kissed my girlfriend.”
“You were marking territory.”
His expression darkened. “Maybe somebody needs the reminder.”
Behind him, Finn had gone completely still.
His marker was clenched in one hand.
“I’m trying to look out for you.”
“No. You’re trying to control what everyone thinks they’re allowed to feel about me.”
Bron stepped closer. “And what are they feeling, Isabella?”
I looked toward the classroom.
Finn’s face revealed nothing, but the muscle in his jaw pulsed.
I entered the room on unsteady legs.
Finn placed the marker down carefully.
“Everyone keeps asking me that today.”
“Maybe you should consider why.”
I dropped my bag beside my chair. “With respect, Professor Bálor, my relationship isn’t part of today’s curriculum.”
“No,” he said quietly. “It isn’t.”
I didn’t raise my hand once.
Afterward, I packed my things as quickly as possible.
Finn stood beside his desk, watching the final students leave.
Something shifted in his expression.
I forced a polite smile. “Good night, sir.”
His gaze locked onto mine.
My fingers tightened around my bag strap. “Don’t what?”
His throat moved as he swallowed.
Finn took one step toward me.
“Go back to your dorm, Isabella.”
The softness in his voice was more unnerving than anger.
I left without cleaning the boards.
That night, Charlotte went out with friends while I stayed behind, claiming I had reading to finish.
I read the same paragraph seven times.
At nine thirty, someone knocked.
I assumed Charlotte had forgotten her key.
I opened the door wearing sleep shorts, an oversized university sweatshirt, and fuzzy socks.
Cody Rhodes stood in the hallway.
Finn Bálor stood beside him.
Neither wore the polished expression I was accustomed to seeing in class.
Cody had removed his tie. The first two buttons of his shirt were undone, and his sleeves were rolled past his forearms.
Finn wore a black coat over a charcoal sweater, his hands buried inside his pockets as though he didn’t trust them anywhere else.
For several seconds, nobody spoke.
“Professor Rhodes. Professor Bálor.”
Finn’s expression tightened at the formal titles.
Cody looked down the empty hallway.
My heart slammed against my ribs.
“We need to discuss what happened today.”
The hallway suddenly felt far too narrow.
They entered, but Cody left the door partially open.
That small detail registered immediately.
Cody stood near Charlotte’s desk. Finn remained closer to the doorway.
I crossed my arms over my sweatshirt.
“You both came to my dorm at night to talk about boundaries?”
Cody exhaled. “When you phrase it that way, it sounds remarkably ill-advised.”
“It is remarkably ill-advised,” Finn muttered.
The truth entered the room before either of them could give it words.
Cody’s silence confirmed it.
My mouth went dry. “How long?”
Finn answered. “Since September.”
I laughed once, breathlessly. “You’ve been discussing me since September?”
“Not in the manner you’re imagining,” Cody said.
“What manner am I imagining?”
Cody moved closer, though several feet still separated us.
“We noticed that the situation was becoming complicated.”
“The attention,” he clarified. “The attachment. Our reactions to certain things.”
“Certain things like Bron kissing me?”
Cody’s voice lowered. “Yes.”
“Why did that bother you?”
Finn let out a quiet, humorless laugh.
“Don’t ask questions you already know the answer to.”
“I don’t know the answer.”
Finn looked at him. “She deserves honesty.”
“She deserves protection from our lack of judgment.”
“I don’t need protection from honesty,” I said.
Both men turned toward me.
My nerves had transformed into something hotter now. Something reckless.
“I’m twenty-four years old,” I continued. “I’m not a child. I understand that you’re my professors. I understand that this is complicated. But I’m tired of people talking around me like I’m too fragile to know what’s happening.”
Cody’s expression softened.
“What do you think is happening?”
“You make me feel like what I say matters.”
His breath caught almost imperceptibly.
Then I turned toward Finn.
“And you make me feel like you can see every thought I’m trying to hide.”
Finn’s voice came out rougher than before.
“And what are you hiding?”
Cody said his name again, but this time it sounded less like a warning and more like an anchor.
Finn stopped several feet away from me.
“Call me Professor Bálor,” he said.
Confusion creased my brow. “What?”
“In class. During office hours. Anywhere on campus.”
His gaze dipped briefly toward my mouth.
“I was being respectful.”
“No,” he said quietly. “You were testing something.”
Finn’s expression became almost pained.
“Don’t call me that unless you understand exactly what you mean.”
Cody closed his eyes briefly.
When he opened them, control had returned to his face, but it sat there like thin ice.
“This is precisely why we shouldn’t have come.”
Cody looked directly at me.
“Because after what happened today, we needed to make certain you were safe.”
“I’m not afraid of Bron.”
“That wasn’t the question,” Finn said.
Bron had never struck me. He had never threatened me.
But lately, I had begun measuring my words before speaking to him.
I had begun changing my behavior to avoid his reactions.
“No,” I admitted. “I don’t feel completely safe with him anymore.”
But the gentle professor disappeared, replaced by something protective and sharp.
“Then you shouldn’t be alone with him tonight.”
“I wasn’t planning to be.”
Finn remained focused on me. “End it somewhere public.”
“Block him if he becomes aggressive.”
I had emphasized the title intentionally.
His lips pressed together, fighting what might have been a smile.
“You enjoy provoking him,” Cody said.
“I enjoy provoking both of you.”
My boldness abandoned me the instant the words escaped.
Finn’s eyes became dangerously still.
Cody took a measured breath.
The way he said my name sent warmth curling through me.
“Your final grades will be submitted in seven weeks.”
“Until then, nothing changes.”
The word nothing seemed to pulse between us.
Cody looked toward him, then back at me.
“After,” Cody said carefully, “you won’t be our student.”
Finn moved toward the door.
Cody followed, stopping before he crossed the threshold.
“If Bron gives you trouble, contact campus security.”
His eyes moved slowly over my face.
I stood in the middle of my dorm room, staring at it.
When Charlotte returned twenty minutes later, she found me in the same position.
She dropped her purse onto the bed.
“I think I need to break up with Bron.”
The words lingered between us, filling the room with a heavy silence. I felt relief mixed with guilt, making it hard to breathe. I knew breaking up was right, but I still wondered if I’d given up too soon or stayed too long. Uncertainty grew alongside the relief, quietly reminding me that I should feel more sure. Mostly, I just felt tired, as if I could finally put down something I’d been carrying for a long time.
Charlotte nodded. “Good.”
“And I think both of my professors are attracted to me.”
“The blond one and the terrifying Irish one?”
Charlotte blinked several times.
“That’s all you have to say?”
“No.” She grabbed the abandoned bag of popcorn from her desk. “I have several things to say, but first I need provisions.”
I ended things with Bron the next afternoon in the crowded student union.
He accused me of embarrassing him.
Finally, I realized Bron had listed everyone except himself.
When he reached for my wrist, Charlotte stood up from the table behind me.
The following seven weeks were exquisite torture.
Cody became relentlessly professional.
No more helping him grade papers.
No private jokes after class.
His feedback on my assignments became brief and formal.
Strong application of theory.
Please review APA formatting.
Finn stopped asking me to clean the boards.
He also stopped calling on me unless my hand was raised.
But sometimes, when the room emptied, our eyes would meet.
Seven weeks, his expression seemed to say.
I submitted my last paper to Cody at 2:43 on a Thursday afternoon.
Finn’s exam ended the following morning.
Grades were posted the next Tuesday.
I earned an A in both classes.
At 8:16 that evening, an email appeared in my university inbox.
Subject: Academic Matters
Your final grades have been submitted and processed. You are no longer enrolled in any course taught or supervised by either Professor Bálor or me. I want to acknowledge that we are both aware of the professional and ethical boundaries that existed between us until now. This invitation only comes after every requirement and rule has been met. Nothing will cross the lines of respect or propriety.
If you are available Friday evening, we would like to invite you to dinner at a public restaurant downtown.
This invitation is entirely personal. You are under no obligation to accept, and declining will have no academic or professional consequences.
A second email arrived two minutes later.
Subject: Re: Academic Matters
He made me let him write the email.
And stop calling us Professor.
I laughed so loudly Charlotte ran into the room.
I turned my laptop toward her.
“What are you going to wear?”
Friday evening, I arrived at the restaurant in a fitted burgundy dress and black heels.
Cody stood when he saw me.
He remained seated, staring until Cody nudged him beneath the table.
His sentence disappeared.
Cody smiled. “Beautiful.”
Finn pulled out my chair.
We discussed books, travel, Charlotte’s dramatic response to the invitation, and everything except the current humming beneath our skin.
After dessert, Cody set his napkin beside his plate.
“We should talk plainly.”
Finn leaned back. “Finally.”
“This isn’t something either of us has done before.”
“Taken a former student to dinner?”
Cody continued. “We’re not asking you to decide anything tonight.”
“What if I already decided?”
I looked from Cody to Finn.
“I spent seven weeks thinking about this.”
Finn’s voice dropped. “And?”
“And I don’t want to choose.”
I paused, searching their faces. "If we move forward, it has to be honest. I know people will judge, and it might get complicated, but I want to try—openly. We need to be clear with each other about boundaries, and talk, even if it feels awkward. I will not pretend this will be simple, but I am willing if you both are."
The answer settled heavily between us.
Cody’s expression remained controlled, but his eyes changed.
Finn leaned forward, forearms against the table.
“You understand what you’re saying?”
“I understand that I care about you both differently.”
“Is no longer part of the conversation.”
“No jealousy disguised as honesty?”
I smiled faintly. “That sounds like a psychology professor talking.”
“Former psychology professor.”
The distinction sent a flicker through me.
“You liked that,” he said.
I looked at him. “Liked what?”
I reached for my water glass.
My hand trembled slightly.
Cody’s fingers brushed mine on the table.
It was the first deliberate touch between us.
Enough to make every nerve in my body awaken.
“Isabella,” he said softly. “We can stop here.”
I turned my hand beneath his, palm meeting palm.
Finn watched our joined hands.
Something intense moved through his expression.
When we left the restaurant, a light rain had begun.
Cody stood beneath the awning while Finn stepped closer to me.
“Are you going to kiss me?”
His eyes dropped to my lips.
Finn’s hand rose to my face, pausing just before contact.
His palm settled against my cheek.
The kiss was controlled for approximately two seconds.
Then weeks of restraint broke open.
His mouth moved against mine with all the intensity he had hidden in class, his other hand settling at my waist as I gripped the front of his coat.
When he drew back, his forehead rested against mine.
Finn went completely still.
Behind him, Cody released a slow breath.
Finn’s thumb moved across my lower lip.
His voice became low and rough.
“Then don’t look confused when I respond.”
Cody stepped closer, his hand finding mine.
There was nothing rushed in the way he looked at me.
Cody kissed me differently.
His restraint didn’t break like Finn’s. It unfolded, layer by deliberate layer, until I found myself pressed gently between them beneath the restaurant awning while rain whispered against the street.
When Cody pulled back, his gaze held mine.
“What should I call you?”
Finn’s hand remained warm against my waist.
Cody brushed a loose strand of hair from my face.
Finn’s smile was slow and wicked.
“You do like to talk, Isabella.”
Finn’s grip tightened slightly.
The tension surged hot and immediate, but Cody’s voice stayed steady.
Disappointment flashed across my face.
Cody lifted my hand and pressed a kiss to my knuckles.
“Tonight, we take you home.”
Finn leaned closer, his breath warm against my ear.
“Tomorrow,” he murmured, “we begin properly.”
For once in my life, I couldn’t think of a single thing to say.
Finn pulled back, looking pleased with himself.
And as they walked me toward the waiting car, one on either side of me, I realized people had been wrong about me all semester.
I had never been a teacher’s pet.
I was just someone waiting for two men to finally admit they saw me. But at some point, I realized it wasn’t really about them seeing me. It was about seeing myself. I had to stop waiting and start choosing my own risks and uncertainties. In the end, it wasn’t just their attention that changed things. It was realizing I could want more, speak up, and take up space in my own story. For the first time, the future felt like something I could shape.
And neither of them intended to look away.
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