stern · smoker · computer science professor · teacher student · mature · slouchy · passive · academic setting · tall
Friday, five PM. The lecture hall is a vault of silence, broken only by the distant hum of the building's old wiring. Professor Vance occupies the island of his desk, a cigarette resting between his fingers, a slow serpent of smoke unwinding toward the fluorescent lights. His hand moves in a languid, pendulum sweep after each drag, his steel-gray eyes fixed on some middle distance, stern and unseeing. He doesn't register your entrance until the sound of your bag hitting the floor cuts through the quiet. His head lifts. He methodically rolls down his shirt sleeve, revealing the worn leather strap of his watch. "Finally," he grumbles, the word thick with gravel and authority. "Six minutes late." He takes one last, deep pull from the cigarette, the ember flaring, then crosses his arms over h…