3. Nick

CHAPTER 3

NICK

You’re a little heartbreaker, aren’t you? Give me a chance. I’m not trying to get in your pants. Not yet, anyway. JK. I heard you talking to Molly about your dad in English class, okay? Hit me up if you ever want to talk. I think we can relate to each other. Friends, that’s it. - Nick

Finally, I’d made it to my prep period. In a daze, I wandered from my classroom to the teachers’ lounge, heading directly to my favorite Keurig on the battered old table in the corner. There were three, but I only had the mental capacity to maintain one of them. I had no idea what went on with the other two, but some of my co-workers were slobs.

The dim light and dingy décor felt familiar, almost comforting. I shoved a mug under the machine and waited for it to do its thing as I contemplated all the choices I’d made that led me here.

Damn, I did not have time for an existential crisis right now. I had an entire day of classes to get through.

My stomach rumbled and my head pounded. I inhaled a deep breath to get myself together and almost gagged as that familiar musty odor from the fridge assailed my olfactory senses. Of course no one had cleaned it over the summer—gross.

There were a few first day of school celebratory boxes of doughnuts from Daisy’s Nut House next to the K-Cups and other coffee accoutrements. Starving, I snagged a cream-filled and had it halfway to my mouth before turning to my fellow English teacher, Clay—known to the students as Mr. Meadows—who grinned knowingly as he watched me from his seat at the long table that bisected the room. “Are they safe?” I asked.

Clay was also from Green Valley and had been a few years ahead of me in school. He had become a good friend over the years.

“Pin Dick brought them in this morning, they’re fresh.” Principal Pindich, not so lovingly called “Pin Dick” by ninety percent of the faculty and staff behind his back, had become the bane of our collective existence. Hiring him after the former principal, Kip Sylvester, had done nothing for the morale around here. One would have thought any person who replaced a lying, cheating, secretary-banging, criminal asshole would be an improvement, but here we were, stuck with his numbskull successor.

“Good, I’m starving. I skipped breakfast.” Grinning, I took a huge bite as I waited for the coffee to finish brewing. I’d brought a breakfast burrito with me this morning, but my perpetual exhaustion coupled with the Clara sighting had caused me to lose my appetite, so I’d tossed it.

“You were almost late today. Is everything okay?” Clay asked just before he took a huge bite of his own doughnut.

“Yeah, I’m fine. The kids didn’t want to get up this morning.” I’d never been late before. Ever. Blaming them for my four-minute nap in my truck felt wrong, but the truth was a secret. The thought of spilling it felt like a betrayal, even though it had been well over a decade since I’d even seen Clara.

“That’s relatable. And hey, first day is almost half down. Only a hundred eighty or so to go. I will not get specific until we’re under three digits.” He looked as tired as I was.

“That would be depressing. Weird how we can love this job so much and dread it at the same time.”

“You got that right,” he affirmed with a sardonic smile.

I grew quiet as my mind pathetically wandered back to Clara. I laughed to myself because back was not the right descriptor. I had been fixated on her ever since I saw her this morning.

“Your coffee is done. You okay there, Nick? You seem distracted.”

Shit.

“Sorry, yeah. I’m good.” He was right. I was hopelessly distracted and nowhere near okay. If I didn’t get my shit together, my students would run all over me, which was not the way I wanted to start the school year off.

I had to get Clara out of my head again.

How had I done it last time? I cringed as the haze of memories of myself drunk or hungover in my dorm room infiltrated my thoughts. Going off to college and spending nearly every day wasted was not an option anymore, and I never should have done it in the first place. I’d have to forget about her sober this time.

Who was I trying to kid?I’d never forgotten about her. She had been lurking somewhere in the back of my mind ever since I lost her. Right or wrong, she was the standard I had compared every woman I’d ever been with to, and they all came out lacking.

Was it because she was my first love? Or was it more than that?

I had yet to figure it out.

The rest of the day went by in a blur. I’d managed to keep control of my classes only because I made it a point to always be thoroughly prepared and the first day was no exception. I was also able to coast by on my reputation as firm but fair. Friendly but not to be messed with. However, I knew the goodwill would not last if I didn’t bring my A game tomorrow.

Damn her for showing up when my life was so close to being settled again.

I’d often felt like my life was divided into a series of boxes: my father’s death and how it had destroyed my family, my losing Clara, then my failed marriage and having to share my kids’ time with my ex-wife, leaving me a part-time dad, which was never the type of father I’d set out to be. I coped by labeling my shit and packing it away to deal with later.

The problem was, later never came and my boxes had been stacking up for years.

She left me.

After all the plans we’d made, she fucking left me and never looked back, not even once.

The weight of my life hit me hard as I walked through the crowded halls at the end of the day to leave. The only thing I’d never regretted, not even for a second, was having my kids. They were the silver lining to everything I’d ever been through. Having them in my life meant at least some of my choices hadn’t been terrible.

Students milled about at their lockers, chatting and taking their time on their way to the buses or the parent pick-up area. I was in no rush; the sound of the kids drowned out the thoughts pounding around in my head.

Why couldn’t I get her out of my damn mind?

Seeing Clara was like having Pandora’s box blown wide open, my memories of her scattering across the forefront of my thoughts instead of staying where they belonged: packed up, neat, and put away somewhere hidden in the back of my mind.

The sun blinded me as I crossed the parking lot and I squinted against the glare, keeping my head low until I reached my truck. I tossed my messenger bag into the back and looked up.

She was parked in the same spot as this morning, hip resting against her car as she waited for Gracie. My mood veered away from the cloud of confused melancholy I’d been stuck in all day to anger. Why would she park here again? Right by my truck.

Was she taunting me?

“Hey, heartbreaker.” I tried to be impassive, to keep my simmering anger at bay. But a wry, twisted smile crossed my face despite my efforts, and gave me away.

Her eyes flared as her hip came off her car and she faced me, standing tall and just as angry as I was. “Heartbreaker? Really?” she sputtered in surprise. “You have some nerve, Nick.”

My eyebrows shot up. “I⁠—”

Her eyes flashed and her brow furrowed. “After all these years, that is what you choose to say to me? Heartbreaker?”

“I—”

“I have no patience left for men who don’t stick around and can’t keep their promises, so let’s pretend we don’t know each other, okay?” she hissed. “Kind of like the last fifteen or so years, right?”

I reared back, completely at a loss. “What are you talking about?”

“Hey, Mr. Easton, you look peeved. Did she shoot you down?”

I spun to find Gracie hobbling toward us on her crutches with a huge smirk on her face. “What? No.”

Had she heard?

She couldn’t have. Not when I’d barely heard Clara’s almost-inaudible whispers myself.

“Clara is not in a dating frame of mind right now. I’d steer clear if I were you⁠—”

As she spoke, I noticed her T-shirt was stained with partially dried-up food. My eyes narrowed as I interrupted her. “What happened to your shirt, Gracie?”

Clara rushed to her side. “Who did this? It looks like someone threw a few pudding cups at you. Is that chocolate?”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Does Pindich know?” I prodded. “Did the cafeteria staff report it? If someone is bothering you, you can tell me, and I’ll help you. I hope you know that.” Even though Clara was still right there, I managed to turn my focus to Gracie.

“Thanks, I know. But I’m fine. Nothing happened. I got clumsy with a Snack Pack. It happens.”

“Pindich?” Clara butted in. “Who’s that? That name sounds familiar. What’s going to be done about this?” She gestured to Gracie in her pudding-covered shirt.

I already knew Pindich would do nothing. He was the type to engage as little as possible with the students and staff beyond making demands and acting like a self-important, pompous ass.

“He won’t do shit.” Gracie confirmed the thoughts I hadn’t said out loud. “Pudding bombing someone isn’t really something you can hide, right? Everyone in the cafeteria saw what happened. ‘Kids will be kids,’” she air-quoted, her voice rising in obvious frustration. “A little pudding is no big deal, right? Clara, can we go now? Please?”

“Of course.” Clara opened her door and took the crutches as Gracie folded herself inside.

Gracie’s voice was softer when she said, “To your house, please. Can I borrow some clothes? And maybe take a shower? I’m sticky.”

“What’s mine is yours. Anything you want.”

This situation wasn’t okay. “I’ll look into this, Gracie. No one deserves⁠—”

“Thanks,” she muttered before Clara shut her door with a slam.

Clara’s glare for me was ice-cold. “Don’t worry about Gracie. I will handle this.”

“She’s a good kid,” I argued. “And I won’t stand by and allow one of my students—any student at this school—to be bullied. I’m not that kind of teacher.” I dragged a hand over my beard. Except for today, apparently, when I had almost drowned in the riptide of memories I’d been swirling in since seeing her. My students could have gotten into a knock-down, drag-out fight in the middle of my classroom and I don’t think I would have noticed.

She huffed and rolled her eyes. “Fine. If it’s to help Gracie, then step in all you want. Just leave me out of it.”

I took a half step in her direction. “I can’t help but think there’s something I’m missing here⁠—”

“Don’t think about me at all.” She cut me off with a sneer. “I don’t exist for you. A fact you made abundantly clear about fifteen years ago when I rode out of Green Valley on that bus alone. Goodbye, Nick.” She spun on her heel and marched around to the driver’s side, casting one last glare as she climbed in the car and slammed the door.