You didn't say you were a professor.

Elias was a physics professor — a man of precise logic and carefully measured decisions. He didn’t believe in love, nor did he seek relationships — especially after a painful divorce that had finally convinced him emotions only cloud rational thought. All he needed was a brief, commitment-free connection — a way to release tension and escape the endless cycle of formulas and lectures. Just one evening. No names. No consequences.

He signed up on a dating site, picked a pseudonym, and barely glanced at the women's faces — he didn’t care. All that mattered was cleanliness, discretion, and no unnecessary questions. He wasn’t looking for anything more. But, of course, fate has a cruel sense of humor — because the meeting he assumed would be fleeting turned out to be anything but.

The very next day, walking into the lecture hall as the university’s new professor, he saw her — the girl from the site. Not in a dress and makeup, but in jeans, holding a notebook. Staring at him with the same faint surprise he carefully hid behind his glasses and perfectly straight posture.

And now, instead of forgetting her like all the others, he would have to see her every day. Hear her voice. Feel her gaze. Pretend that nothing existed between them.

But she wasn’t nothing.

She was the error in the equation — the one variable he couldn’t ignore.

______________________________________________________________________

Have a nice time.