Dr. Wendy Nogard

Wendy's cramped faculty office sits tucked away at the end of a nondescript corridor in the Wayside wing of the Foxcroft building on campus. Precisely stacked papers and books line the walls. A well-worn mahogany desk sits before the lone narrow window, its polished surface unmarred aside from a squeaky-clean laptop, notepad, and a sparkling glass paperweight—a gift from an admiring yet unwitting former student. Two comfortable leather chairs face the desk, ready and inviting.

Wendy sinks into her distressed leather desk chair with a sigh, surveying her private kingdom. Her thumb smooths over her hair, brushing across the top of her head and the concealed edge of her third ear hidden neatly beneath frizzy locks. It pricks at the muffled voices drifting down the hall beyond her door, snippets filtering through the walls.

But it's not sound her third ear hears - rather, the thoughts of those around her are clear as day, growing more audible as people pass by her door. With careful concentration, Wendy plucks gentle threads of thought amidst the din, sifting for fibers that might weave into future influence.

'Wonder if they'll postpone midterms.' 'Pretty sure that bitch is cheating on me.' 'Can I please go home?'

"Useless," she mutters to herself as she flips through a stack of papers for grading. She makes a mental note of which students secretly plan to get drunk tonight with the intention of calling on them first thing tomorrow. "And just like that, you've already earned yourselves a pop quiz. Enjoy your hangover." Wendy chuckles under her breath, already delighting as she imagines the dejected look in her students' eyes.

Usually Wendy can sense people before they arrive. Their inner monologues are loud, unfocused, bouncing off the walls and echoing loudly as they approach. But today something feels different, and she glances up at her closed office door when a figure stops outside. The footsteps pause and a knock sounds. "Come in," Wendy encourages.

The staff break room in the psychology department is a tight space, but it gets the job done. With faded linoleum floors and dated appliances, it feels more like a high school cafeteria than part of a prestigious university.

Wendy strolls in, nodding politely at colleagues milling about. A pot of aggressively brewed coffee sends its acidic aroma throughout the room. Groups of bleary-eyed professors and TAs cluster around small tables, discussing research or complaining blithely about the daily academic grind.

At the far end, a table holds half-empty boxes of discount donuts and a revolting fruit salad swimming in murky citrus juice. No doubt Linda's generous 'donation', judging by the way she can sense her preening from across the room. Wendy pours herself a mug of tar-water masquerading as coffee and leans against the counter, sipping slowly.

"Good to see you," Wendy says with a warm smile as she greets another adjunct professor. "Looks like I'm just in time before we're all out of coffee again."

But Wendy isn't here for the coffee. This is her daily routine - reading the room. Quite literally, in fact. She idly smooths her hand over her hair, feeling the all-too familiar hidden ridges of her third ear beneath it, resting at the top of her head like a perverse crown. Concealed from view, yet she traces a finger around it with idle familiarity before letting her hand drop back to her side.

Taking another sip of her coffee, Wendy closes her eyes to better hear the thoughts of the people around her. Their unspoken words echo within the confines of her mind as they filter through her third ear. She picks up surface thoughts first, the ones that float to the top like the grease on a frying pan. They're loud and hard to ignore, especially when they're coming from a particular direction. Wendy opens her eyes again, glancing over towards one of the clusters of teachers gathered around the center of the room.

There by the water cooler stands Linda, holding court before two impressionable new TAs. Her phony laughter rings clearly, but her thoughts underneath say something different. Wendy steadies her breathing, closing her eyes until—ah, there it is.

'What do they see in her, really? I've published twice as much. If only they knew how much runway she walks to get ahead...' Linda's bitter thoughts swirl like sour milk. And Wendy, being Wendy, can't help herself.

"Colleen, didn't you say your dissertation is nearing submission? Wonderful work, I'm sure." Wendy beams at the young TA, watching color rise in her cheeks at the praise. There will be time to take her down a peg later. For now, she simply basks in watching Linda's smile flicker and wilt.

'Freak,' her own inner voice hisses. And maybe it's true. Maybe she is a freak, listening in on peoples' inner thoughts. So be it. What good is being different if you can't use it to your advantage?

The tinkling bell announces Wendy's entrance to the salon on a Friday afternoon. A tinny radio nestled on a corner shelf plays Frank Sinatra, and the scent of shampoo hits Wendy's nose before she even steps over the threshold. Barbara closes the hood dryer over her customer with a thud before waving at Wendy. "Well if it ain't Dr. Glamorous. Right on time as always. Sal's just setting up for you."

Wendy chuckles, removing her coat and draping it neatly. She settles into Sal's chair with a sigh. "Busy week?" Sal's bushy white mustache bristles as he speaks. Every trim starts with the same question, and it always receives the same answer. "As always. The usual, if you please."

Without further comment, Sal sets to work. Shampoo lathers. Scissors snip. Occasionally Barbara interjects with a quip or a comment on the radio program or the weather. Sal is a man of few words outside of professional instruction. For her part, Wendy sits back and closes her eyes, taking in the familiar ritual as she does every second Friday of the month since her first appointment seven years ago.

As Sal trims, his skilled fingers dance perilously close to Wendy's hidden ear. But they both pretended not to notice, just as always. Sal never asks questions. Wendy's ear tunes in to the older man's thoughts, but like the rest of the routine, they remain the same each appointment:

'Nice kid. Good tipper. Shame she has to hide it like that.'

A moment later, Sal's thoughts move on to other matters. Though Wendy has a gift she often wields for less virtuous purposes, she is nonetheless glad to have earned the stylist's unspoken approval. This is one of the few places in her life she simply allows the thoughts her third ear hears to wash over her without any meddling.

Sal suddenly speaks out loud after a while. "Got a new stylist starting today." The scissors clip in tune with the radio. "Need to start thinking about retirement, you see."

At the mention of someone else cutting her hair, Wendy's eyes open. "Oh? You finally hired somebody?" She tries to keep her voice even, but inside she feels a sense of betrayal. Of course Sal will need to retire at some point. And judging by the old man's thoughts, Wendy can read how reticent he is to share this news.

Before they can continue, the bell tinkles once more. Sal and Barbara look towards the door as Wendy cranes her neck in an attempt to see who has come in without disrupting the trim too much.

The late morning sun spills warmly through towering windows into Lecture Hall 3 like liquid gold, its rays illuminating swirling dust motes as they dance upon beams. Dr. Wendy Nogard gazes out among her sea of attentive faces from behind a podium emblazoned with the university seal. It is the first day of her Introduction to Psychology course for the spring semester and the room is filled to capacity - a promising start to what she hopes will be a successful year.

Such bright, chipper faces. A shame that they'll be anything but by the end of today.

"Welcome all, and thank you for attending," Wendy says as the class passes around her printed syllabus. "This course will introduce you to basic psychological concepts in preparation for further study into the field. I hope that by the time this course concludes you will be able to understand the mind and behavior of others better."

There's a healthy, enthusiastic buzz in the room as students flip through the syllabi. She takes this opportunity to scan the room. Not for faces - but for thoughts.

Most people regard thoughts in a lovely, poetic sort of fashion. Elegant, effervescent things that bubble and shimmer, or like clouds of smoke curling into the air. But really, the majority are undeserving of such delicacy. The thoughts of people are far more similar to mud, a disgusting mixture of the mundane and the grotesque. And like mud, you cannot avoid it without getting dirty yourself.

Wendy schools her expression into one of passive warmth while sifting through the intangible detritus. Contrary to whatever flowery misconceptions people entertain, bad thoughts always float to the top, much like chum in shark-infested waters. And Wendy aims to feast.

A student wearing a varsity jacket worries his injury won't heal up in time for the game. Behind him a young woman stews over her roommate stealing expensive skincare products from her closet. The freshman sitting near the back of the lecture hall is nervous about being away from home for the first time. A girl with long blonde hair stares at Wendy intently, wondering if she's single and if she'd date a student. Next to her sits a boy whose thoughts are consumed with anxiety over exams and if his father would approve of his major. And on and on it goes.

Easy pickings. A well-placed comment about career-ending sports injuries is enough to dampen the athlete's spirits. Intentionally assigning the woman behind him an excerpt covering the ethics of theft sours her mood further. Wistful remarks here and there about the hurdles one faces in the psychology profession sends the anxious boy into a spiral. And as for the blonde... well, Wendy doesn't touch that topic and ignores her completely. It has its intended effect, and by the completion of her lesson a cloud of despondence hangs in the air.

Wendy takes quiet, measured steps between the desks as she surveys the class. The thoughts of the young woman by the window scream out with enthusiasm as she looks at the bright, clear skies. "Looks like rain," Wendy muses innocently as she stops by the window.

The girl raise her head with wide eyes. 'Oh no,' she thinks. 'I wanted to go horseback riding.' "You think so?" she asks.

"I have a nephew who went riding on a day much like today," Wendy's tone is light and bright, not unlike the sunny day outside. "It was a terrible shame. Rain and thunder out of nowhere. Spooked the horse and knocked him clean off."

The girl gasps. She hears her thoughts flicker and waver like a candle struggling to stay lit. "What happened to your nephew?"

"Oh, he's fine." Wendy smiles. She has no such nephew, of course. But that's irrelevant. "He broke both arms and legs and was bedridden for nearly a year, but he keeps such a positive attitude. And that's the important thing. Always keep a positive attitude."

As intended, by the end of the class no one had a positive attitude.