Knock-knock.
"Come on in."
Elena opened the office door and entered. David was sitting on the couch opposite her, cross-legged and reading a magazine.
"d.a.m.n, no matter what he does, every time it looks absolutely s.e.xy ... Or is it just my unhealthy fantasy?" The girl thought to herself.
"As I see, Mr. Anderson, are you enthusiastically studying another material for the lecture?"
"Elena! And I kept thinking, when you will honor me with your visit!" David broke into a charming smile. "Come in, sit down here." He patted the sofa, hinting Elena to sit next to him.
The girl went ahead and instead of sitting on the sofa, went further and stood by the window. David grinned, put the magazine on the sofa, slowly got up and walked over to her.
He gently hugged her from the back and pulled her close to him. The man lowered his head to the girl on her shoulder, whispering in her ear "I am so glad to see you ... The thoughts about you did not let me sleep all night," and gently kissed her neck.
Elena shivered slightly, but not so much from an unexpected kiss, but mostly because of the scenes from her nightmare that suddenly appeared in her head.
David noticed the tension of the girl, straightened up and slightly loosened his arms.
"What happened? Is something bothering you? It seemed to me that you have too many thoughts about something."
"No, nothing special. I just had a bad dream and couldn"t rest." Elena turned her head to David and smiled at him. Then she put her hand on one of his hands which hugged her around the waist.
The man smiled back at her and took this signal as a sign that he could hug her even tighter.
"What dream was it? You can share it with me if you want. I will be very glad to hear you out."
He turned the girl over to face him and looked intently into her eyes. Elena"s cheeks blushed and she looked away. The man touched her cheek with the palm of his hand and turned her head back. "I am all ears."
Elena sighed as she was not eager to recall the details of that dream again. But seeing an encouraging and gentle look of the man, she decided to share her experiences with him.
"You know, I don"t know where to start. I sometimes have very strange dreams; they are so realistic that it becomes scary. Especially today"s dream..."
Seeing the confusion and sadness of the girl, David wanted to pull her closer, but then he decided to hold himself.
"And how is today"s dream different from the previous ones, that it worried you so much?"
"I was in some strange room, there were different people there. One of them made me memorize some information. When I was making a mistake, he ... He was killing people. This was really scary. As if all this was actually happening ..."
David stroked the girl"s head and pressed it to his chest. Gently stroking her hair, he asked: "Elena, and what information did he ask you to memorize?"
"It was some kind of formula. I don"t know why, but there was ... " She wanted to finish the sentence, but suddenly someone knocked on the door.
David let Elena out of his hands. She immediately turned back to the window and pretended to water the flowers.
"Come in," said David and the door opened.
"Excuse me, I would like to see Professor Richards. I was told I could find him here."
Elena heard a stranger"s low voice behind her back. Judging by the pitch of the voice and manner of speech, he should be not older than 30.
"Professor Richards is currently at a meeting. He will be in the office in about an hour. Will you wait for him or can I give him a message?" David asked an unexpected visitor.
The man said nothing, and Elena felt as if the stranger"s eyes were fixed on her back and gooseb.u.mps ran down her. For some reason, his voice caused an incomprehensible alarm in her.
"No, thank you. I will come back again later", the man answered and left the office.
Elena turned to David. He smiled and looked at her, as if nothing had happened.
"David, do you know who it was?"
"No, I have no idea. But his appearance was strange for a person who Professor Richards would know."
"What do you mean? How was he strange?" Elena asked, feeling an incomprehensible tension inside her.
"He was dressed in all black. Cap, hoodie, pants. Even the mask on the face was also black."
"As if he didn"t want his appearance to be remembered", thought Elena.
David noticed that the girl was thinking about something, and decided to return to the conversation that they had interrupted.
"Well, so, tell me more, what kind of formula you had to memorize?"