My Oxford Year(20)

At least I can still make myself laugh.

THE NEXT FEW days fly by faster than I can account for them. I finally feel like I’m in the right time zone and I can understand the accent now. Although I would have been happy to misunderstand the drunk guy who walked past me last night, then turned to his mate and loudly slurred, “Oi, that’s a tasty bit.” I’ve also managed to sleep through Eugenia’s arrival three mornings in a row, and I’ve had my two other classes, but the professors didn’t assign any work.

No, only Mr. Jamie Davenport does that, apparently. Then never reads it. Apparently.

I spend my days cutting through the course’s suggested reading and fielding Gavin’s requests. His e-mails come in at all hours. He calls at least once a day.

In the late afternoons, Maggie and I get on our bikes and she shows me the city. Maggie comes from London (she mentions an area and then apologizes in a tone that has me suspecting it’s an embarrassingly posh neighborhood), but she did her undergrad at Magdalen, so she knows every corner of Oxford. She takes me through narrow, winding stone paths and special little places she’s discovered over her years here. Now she lives in Exeter College’s graduate housing complex, where she shares a kitchen and living area with four other students: two Chinese guys, a Rubenesque British girl who insists on only speaking Italian, and an older Middle Eastern woman who—as far as Maggie can tell—is never actually there. As a result, Maggie spends a lot of time with me.

At the end of our rides, we tend to join Charlie and Tom for dinner, so I’ve also been getting familiar with Oxford’s hit-or-miss cuisine. I’m ashamed to admit that I already miss American food. I’d exchange sexual favors with anyone who could direct me to a decent cheeseburger.

Today Charlie and I are standing in the upper reading room of the Bodleian Library. Charlie gives me a tour, clutching a book on rowing to his side and whispering Oxford trivia. “The Bodleian has a copy of every book ever printed in the UK since 1611.”

I silently repeat the way he pronounced it (Bod-lee-un), understanding why everyone just calls it “the Bod.” The room is beautiful and cavernous, mostly filled with reading tables and chairs. I notice only a few stacks. “Where do they hide them all?” I whisper.

Charlie points down at the hardwood, seeming to indicate rooms and floors that live beneath us. He tosses a glance over his shoulder, then slips behind the unattended front desk. He reaches under the counter and pulls out a glossy magazine with the word “TATLER” in bold print. He hands it to me. “There’s always a new issue stuffed under here.”

I leaf through it and see picture after picture of people I don’t recognize. It’s like an alternate universe. It seems Britain has its own version of Kardashians. “You know what’s interesting,” I begin. “These people are totally interchangeable with—” but I’m interrupted by the sound of a book dropping down onto the counter next to me.

I look at the book: Dear and Honored Lady: The Correspondence Between Queen Victoria and Alfred Tennyson. There’s more to read, but it’s blocked by the hand splayed across the cover. It’s a nice, masculine hand. Long and tapered fingers, just the right amount of wrist hair, clean fingernails—

“Ella?”

Startled, I glance up and find the stabbing blue eyes of Jamie Davenport looking down at me. “My rooms, if you will. Today. Half three.”

Not hearing what he says, I nod. He glances down at the Tatler. Raises an eyebrow. “Research?” he says, oozing sarcasm. Then he looks back at me, smiles tightly, and is gone.

“Masterful,” Charlie breathes.

Wherever I just was, I come back to Charlie and the Bod. I’m completely lost. Maybe I overestimated my grasp of the British language. “What did he just say?”

Charlie’s eyes are wide. “He wants you.”





Chapter 8


Did he not come to me?

What thing could keep true Launcelot away

If I said, Come?

William Morris, “The Defence of Guenevere,” 1858

I’ve made my way to Lincoln, a small medieval college with a converted church for a library in the middle of town on Turl Street. Maggie explained to me a few days ago that each professor is affiliated with a specific Oxford college, where they have an office and often teach undergraduates. Lincoln is where Jamie Davenport hangs his skinny jeans.

After making a right on Turl from the High, I step through a cutout door in a wooden gate and into a small portico. Beyond the portico’s flagstones is a manicured quad surrounded on all sides by ivy-covered buildings. The college is smaller than Magdalen, but quaintly elegant and feels older (if that’s possible). I go into the lodge, ask the porter for Professor Davenport’s office and he directs me to staircase eight, off Chapel Quad, and up two flights of stairs.

Near the second-floor landing, I hear raised voices coming from behind a closed door. I stop climbing. Forgetting my nervousness for a moment, I find myself eavesdropping. Two men. One of them, I realize, is Jamie Davenport.

“I’m not interested in your opinion.”

“James, this is absurd—”

“Add it to the list, then.”

“We are your family!” the older voice yells.

“By birth! Nothing more, nothing less,” Davenport shoots back, half as loud but doubly cutting. Then, more muffled, “Excuse me, I’ve got work to do.”