Chapter 4
FOUR
I’m standing on a stepladder, adjusting the final wall poster so it doesn’t hang crooked. Either the ceiling is uneven or my level is broken.
“I hate you.”
The three words startle me, and I cling onto the ladder to steady myself. When I look to the open doorway, my friend Sloane smiles in at me.
“I nearly fell three feet to my death,” I say, matching her grin. I come down off the ladder.
Sloane steps into my classroom, glancing at the tables already arranged for students and the walls covered in posters of famous mathematicians and helpful formulas.
Her voice is quiet but awe-filled as she asks, “How do you already have this place looking so organized nearly a month before school starts?”
“Bored. Lack of a social life.” Nerves for my date tonight. “I didn’t know you were here.”
Teachers don’t officially report back for another two weeks. School starts the week after.
“Tomorrow is the deadline to order textbooks and reference materials, so I have an inbox of emails from teachers who waited until the last minute.”
I bite the corner of my lip.
“You sent me an email, didn’t you?” she asks with a laugh that is almost too soft to hear.
“Noooo.” I fight a smile. “But I was going to text you later.”
“What do you need?” Her eyes still crinkle with laughter as she shakes her head.
I hurry over to my desk. It still feels surreal. My desk. It isn’t much. Scratched and dented with three drawers—two of which stick—and behind it a heavy wooden chair that looks like it’s been here since the dawn of time but is surprisingly comfortable.
Currently, said desk is covered in books and papers. The rest of the room is in order, but my desk is chaos.
Sloane follows behind me. She’s the high school librarian and my only real friend among the staff.
I came in as a long-term sub last fall. I did my best to get to know the other teachers, but there are cliques even in education circles.
Nearly all the other sports coaches are men, and while Grady has never made me feel less than, I get the sense some of the others think my only qualification is my family connection to hockey.
And the other math teacher is a seventy-five-year-old woman who has been here for fifty years and has seen “a lot of you young ones come and go” as she put it.
It was clear she wasn’t looking to get to know another teacher who might leave.
And since I wasn’t sure if I’d be back, I didn’t take it too personally.
But here I am. My very own classroom and a contract for an entire year to teach two classes of Geometry, one period each of Algebra I and Algebra II, and my favorite: Statistics.
And of course coaching the JV hockey team.
It’s going to be a busy year, but I can’t wait for it.
It feels like something of my own for the very first time.
“Do you think we can get a copy of this?” I ask, handing her my personal copy of my favorite statistics textbook.
“Just one?”
“I’m not teaching from it, but I’d love to have resources available for the kids to look through or take home if they want.”
“Okay.” The right side of her mouth lifts higher in an amused grin.
Do I think most of the kids are going to be looking for extra reading material? No, but even if only one student enjoys it, it’ll feel worth it.
“Anything else?” she asks.
“You know me too well already.” I reach for the second stack containing a variety of math-based books—everything from hearty textbooks to fun cartoon-style books. Something for everyone. Hopefully.
“I’ll see what I can do,” she says without taking them from me. She places the first book on top. “Email me the list.”
“You’re the best.” I put them back on a corner of my desk as my phone pings from somewhere in the room. I move a few pieces of paper around searching for it. “I owe you.”
“You can buy me a coffee sometime.”
“Done.” I give up on finding my phone for now.
“I should be done here in a few hours.”
“Oh, I can’t tonight.” My stomach flips. “I have a date.”
“Really?” Her voice lifts as her smile grows. There’s a shyness to Sloane that makes her excitement always feel more genuine. “Who are you going out with?”
“This guy I met . . .” I trail off, then wave my hand. “I don’t want to say too much yet. I’m not sure it’s going to work.”
“Sounds promising,” she says with another quiet laugh. “Cute?”
“Probably the hottest guy I’ve ever met,” I murmur. My stomach is liquid heat as I picture him.
“Oh, really?” Sloane’s eyes widen as she waits for me to say more.
“Yeah, but I’m not sure why he asked me out. We’ve barely talked.”
“Your general awesomeness doesn’t take long for people to notice.”
I chuckle, but I don’t know that I’d bet on Conrad thinking I’m awesome. Through most of our interactions, I thought he hated me.
“I haven’t been out on a date in forever,” she says almost dreamily. “Where are you going?”
“MVP.”
Her brows lift in surprise, then she hums a light sound of disapproval. “Not the most original spot, but I guess it’s better than . . .” She trails off. “Someplace worse.”
I laugh loudly. “I picked the restaurant, jerk.”
“Why MVP?” Her expression is all amusement as she waits for my answer.
“I don’t know that many restaurants around town and every other place felt too formal or too casual.”
“The sports restaurant and bar didn’t fall into the too-casual column?”
She’s right. It was a terrible idea. What was I thinking? “Maybe I should text him and see if he could bring a friend. We could double date.”
“Don’t try to pull me into your crappy date.”
“Oh god. It’s going to be crappy, isn’t it?”
“I was teasing,” she assures me.
I groan.
“Why are you stressing so much? It’s only a first date. Go, have fun.”
“I don’t know. There’s something about him. He’s . . .”
“Hot?”
“Yes, very, but he said, like, two full sentences to me all week.”
“Why did you say yes?”
It’s a good question. One I’ve thought about a lot. “He’s interesting. I don’t know anything about the guy, but I want to. Does that make sense?”
“Yeah.” She nods. “It does.”
“Good, because I’m thinking I made a huge mistake saying yes. What if we have nothing in common?”
She laughs again. “I think that’s why the kids date these days, to get to know each other and see if there are shared interests.”
“The kids?” I roll my eyes at her. “Because you’re so old?”
“I feel ancient.” She sighs. “I mean look at me. I’m twenty-three and wearing a dress I sewed myself from hideous fabric I got at the fabric store where I’m a card-carrying member and the woman who owns it knows me by name. I’m a grandma.”
“You made that?” It’s a cute sundress made of baby-blue fabric with white flowers. The straps are thin, and the skirt is flowy. Sloane is shy and unassuming. She often fades into the background in conversations, but no one would look at her and compare her to a grandma. She’s beautiful.
“I could never. I’m completely helpless when it comes to artsy things,” I say.
“Sure you could.” Her gaze flits around the room as if the way I’ve taped posters to the wall is any comparison to her making a whole dress. “If you can teach math, you can do anything.”
“I thought the saying was ‘those who can’t do, teach.’”
Now she rolls her eyes. “I hate that saying. No one who has ever tried to keep the attention of thirty teenagers would ever repeat that.”
My phone rings again. Sloane raises her brows at me expectantly. “Need to get that?”
“If I can ever find it under this mess.”
“It’s the only messy part of this room.” She looks around again. “You somehow managed to make math look fun.”
“Math is fun,” I insist.
She pulls my buried phone out from underneath a stack of papers and hands it to me.
“Thank you.”
She starts toward the door. “Good luck tonight.”
“Thanks. I feel like I’m going to need it.” As I glance at my brother’s name on the screen, I catch the time. Crap. I silence the call and grab my hockey bag.
I hurry out of my classroom and down the hall, then out the side door. The school’s hockey rink is two buildings over. Two players are already waiting when I arrive. A freshman, Jonathon Pepperdene, better known as Pepper on the team, and a sophomore, Landon Wolf.
“Good afternoon,” I say as I pull out my keys to unlock the door and let them in.
“Hi,” Pepper replies in a rough voice that indicates he might have just woken up. That and the magnificent bedhead. His shaggy red hair is flat in the back and sticks up in the front. He files into the building first and then Landon steps up.
“Hey, Coach Whitney.” He gives me a nod and then waves his hand to the door for me to go ahead of him.
I know I’m not supposed to have favorites, but there’s something about Landon.
Part of it is how talented he is. He’s one of our fastest skaters.
He’s really smart on both offense and defense, and he takes feedback well.
He also happens to be the politest kid I’ve ever met.
He’s quick to say please and thank you and just has this air of gratitude about him.
He should make varsity, but we have so many talented players, we’ll likely keep it split with freshman and sophomores on JV and upperclassmen on varsity. Still, I won’t be surprised if Grady pulls him up at the end of the season if we make it past regionals.
The boys head for the locker room, and I turn on all the lights and walk down to the ice. I love the chill in the air and the way the rink looks when it’s been freshly resurfaced.
By the time I change into my skates and set the nets up on either end, more boys have arrived, and they’re all geared up and skating out.