Chapter 4 Naughty and Nice
Naughty and Nice
Teagan and I drove together to my first day at Mistletoe Elementary the Monday after Thanksgiving.
She’d been too excited to show me around and introduce me to everyone for me to suggest I drive myself.
Honestly, it was nice one of us was happy, as I felt like I’d just woken up in the zombie apocalypse—as a zombie.
Which was ridiculous, because we’d actually had a pretty relaxing weekend.
I’d spent Friday back at the Meyer’s house, hanging with Tom and Linda.
Thankfully, this was a day her brothers, and Sam, had traditionally always gone camping on.
Which seemed crazy given the frigid temps.
But the boys said it tested their manhood and made them stronger or whatever.
I didn’t get how getting drunk off their asses and nearly freezing to death made them stronger, but what did I know? I was just a girl. A girl who preferred indoor plumbing and a night without worrying about coyotes.
Teagan and I spent Saturday and Sunday unpacking some, but not all, of my shit, arranging her guest room three or four times until I was satisfied the flow would work, and catching up on all the life things.
Sure, while we’d been apart, we had never not been texting or calling each other, and she’d been to visit me very recently.
But there were still undissected topics we couldn’t get to with the distance between us.
The only thing we didn’t talk about was Thanksgiving.
And Sam.
But only because there was nothing to say, and nothing had happened. And she knew better than to bring up he-who-shall-not-be-named in front of me.
“You’re going to love it here,” she promised, yanking the heavy front doors open. “You’re going to be so happy you came back.”
I grunted as I stepped through the same elementary school I went to as a child.
The school smelled the same—like industrial carpet and mold.
But there was a nostalgic skip to my heart, too.
The lunchroom looked eerily the same, but the gym and performing art centers were newly remodeled and state of the art.
The most shocking changes, though, were the Christmas decorations around every corner, on every surface, hanging from every ceiling. They said you can always go home again. But what happens when Christmas elves have invaded your hometown and turned it into a Christmas theme park?
“It’s, uh, really festive in here,” I said as we walked through the main office door.
“Isn’t it great?” The front desk secretary turned around with a smile lacquered in bright red lipstick.
I was shocked to see she was our age. I had been expecting Ms. Feinstein—a dinosaur of a woman who had run the school since the Cold War and knew every single person in Mistletoe.
“The decorations are above and beyond,” the young, beautiful, imposter said energetically.
She glanced at Teagan. “I mean, they’re always great, but this year they’re extra special. ”
Teagan smiled thinly at her. “Yes, they’re extra special this year, Monika.” They blinked at each other, Teagan seeming to hold her breath, Monika seeming ready to pounce. “This is—”
“Your brother’s stopping by later,” Monika interrupted.
Teagan took a deep, unimpressed breath. “Which one?”
Monika laughed like she’d just told a joke, but when Teagan didn’t also laugh, she added, “Cooper. Obvi.” She gestured around the office. “For the—”
“This is Holly Haden,” Teagan interrupted. “Belcher’s long-term sub.”
Monika was easily moved on. “Oh, of course! Hi! We’re so excited you’re here! Teagan has sung your praises over the last month.” She smiled, and I had to blink against the brilliance of it. “We’re expecting big, big things from you!”
Gosh, there were so many exclamation points in her tone for seven-fifteen in the morning. “Big things, huh?” I said, not quite able to match her aggressively positive energy. “Let me have some coffee first, and then we’ll see.”
She laughed again, head tipped back, long blonde hair bouncing. “Oh, you’re going to need that. Have you met our first graders?” More laughing—but why was it starting to sound maniacal?
“She’ll be great,” Teagan said, sounding both annoyed and determined. “Do you have her packet?”
“Oh! Right!” She moved around her U-shaped desk area, hunting under stacks of papers and folders until she came up with a lanyard holding a keycard and a key, and a fat stack of instructions.
“Here you go. Let me know if you have any questions or need help with anything, and I’ll find someone else to help you.
” She laughed again. “I’m just kidding, of course.
I literally exist to help. Don’t hesitate to call me. ”
“You’re the best, Monika,” Teagan said through clenched teeth. “I’ll show her Delia’s room.”
“Awesome!” Monika squealed. And clapped. “Have the best day, you two!”
Teagan waited until we were all the way in the first-grade pod of classrooms before she hissed, “Good lord, she’s great with the kids, but somebody save us.”
“She’s just so much happiness. I mean, for goodness’ sake, the sun isn’t even up.” Butterflies fluttered through my tummy—first day jitters. I loved teaching first grade, but now Monika had made me nervous. Was I really up for this?
My best friend since diapers squinted her eyes at me. “Don’t let her get under your skin. She hasn’t worked five days in a row all school year. She’s constantly calling in for mental health days.”
“So the kids are gremlins?”
She snorted a laugh. “No, they’re just normal kids. She makes everything harder than it needs to be.”
I took a deep breath, knowing Teagan was probably right. She wouldn’t have dragged me into something crazy without warning. Not to say she wouldn’t have totally dragged me into the seventh circle of hell, but she would have warned me before we started the journey.
“You hate Monika,” I concluded as we turned on the lights to my new classroom and explored the new digs. “Teagan Meyer. I can’t believe it.” Mostly because Teagan loved everybody.
Well, almost everybody.
She’d never liked Hudson. Towards the end, she’d stopped pretending to try.
She rolled her eyes and bent over to pick up a rogue pillow on the ground. She put it back in a pile of other soft pillows and squishies under a sign that read “Calming Corner.”
“I don’t hate her,” she insisted. “She’s just obsessed with Cooper and Sam. I mean, like obnoxious about it. She wants me to set her up with one of them, but I keep making excuses.”
Something dark and jealous twisted through me. It was a feeling I often felt when girls were interested in Cooper and Sam. I usually ignored it and chalked it up to a protective, sisterly whatever.
It was maybe a little weird that I didn’t feel the same overprotective urge with Riley and Alex—but they were older, less involved in my life. Cooper was like a brother to me. He had visited me almost as many times as Teagan had when I lived in Denver.
He had also hated Hudson, which was probably because of the same reasons I now hated Monika: brother-sister vibes.
And the same was probably true for Sam, although I was never, ever going to call it brother-sister vibes again, because that was gross and messed up, and good grief, it was time to move on with my day.
“She’s fine,” Teagan groaned when I still had yet to verbally reply. “I mean, eventually she’ll be fine. If Cooper wants to date her then whatever. I want him to be happy.”
“Do not set them up,” I warned. “Imagine him at the next rivalry game.”
She wrinkled her nose, but her gaze stayed sharp. “Maybe I’ll set her up with Sam. Then we’ll only have to deal with her half the time.”
“Do it,” I encouraged, but I didn’t recognize my own voice for some reason. “That would be hilarious.”
“Hilarious?”
I shrugged. “Or maybe they’d be good for each other. I don’t know. I just met her.”
“So you like her then? You like her for Sam?”
“I don’t know Sam anymore.” She was staring at me from across the room and it was making my skin itch beneath the collar of my sweater.
“If you think she’d be good for him, do it.
I don’t care.” I turned around to look at the whiteboard, hopeful it was familiar and easy to teach.
“I mean, it seems like she’d annoy the hell out of him—and us—when we’re forced to be around her.
But if you think they’d be good for each other, then set them up. Don’t wait.”
“Okay, maybe I will.” She flipped her hair over her shoulder and moved toward the classroom door.
“Good,” I insisted. “Do it. I keep telling you to do it.”
“Okay, I’m going to do it,” she said decisively. “Right now.”
“Great.”
“Yay.”
“Perfect.”
“Match made in heaven.”
“You sound just like her now,” I said, throwing a barb. “You’re all cheerleader pep and exclamation points.”
She fluttered her lashes at me exaggeratedly. “That’s because we’re best friends.”
Tired of her antics and realizing she was luring me into a battle I didn’t fully understand, I said, “Byeeeee. I have to get ready for work now.”
Teagan was at the door now. “You’re going to do great, by the way. The kids are going to love you.”
She disappeared into the hallway before I could release my shaky breath. Was that true? Were they going to love me? Hate me? Run all over me?
Oof, time would tell.
To be specific, thirty minutes was all it took before I had a classroom full of bashful first graders. I knew the quiet timidity wouldn’t last, but while I was still learning their names and calming my own nerves, I would take it.
After a little wrangling, confusion, and chaos, I managed to get all sixteen of them in their seats. From when I taught in Denver, I knew how to manage a morning meeting and get the day started. But first, I needed these little guys to trust me.
“I’m Ms. Haden,” I told them with my brightest smile. “I’m going to be spending the next few weeks with you while Mrs. B. recovers from having her baby.”
A hand shot up from the back row of the morning meeting mat—a little guy with glasses and a bowl cut. I debated asking him to wait as I had more to say, but I wanted them to know they could always ask questions.
“Yes, bud?”
“Is it true you killed Mrs. B, and stole her baby because you’re actually evil?”
My jaw unhinged. I had been expecting a little pushback. First graders were doggedly loyal. My own first grade class back in Denver had been devastated to learn I was leaving at the end of the year, even though they were going on to second grade and wouldn’t have me as a teacher anyway.
But was I expecting to be called a murderer first thing this morning? Erm, no.
Before I could figure out how to respond to that highly inappropriate and inaccurate question, he continued with an adorable six-year-old lisp, “I heard you’re a serial killer.” He cupped his mouth with his hand and dramatically whisper-shouted, “She kills all the teachers she substitutes for.”
A blonde girl in pigtails burst into wailing sobs to my right. A red-headed girl who was small even for a first grader, jumped to her feet and shouted, “You’re a liar, Brody Perkins!”
The blonde girl continued to cry while I scraped calming words together. “Okay, settle down, class.” I cleared my throat and tried again. “I’m not a murderer! And Mrs. B. is safe and healthy, and so happy to be with her new little guy. I can show you pictures!”
A few students leaned forward, hoping to catch a glimpse of the Facebook page I was going to frantically pull up for a Delia Belcher from Kansas—hoping upon hope she would have already posted pics of the baby. And that she had a public Facebook account.
Not my greatest plan ever, but desperate times . . .
The floppy-haired devil-child jumped to his feet. “She’s a murderer!” And while I was shouting my denial over the growing commotion and wondering how to turn this psychotic propaganda into a positive message, he ran for the door.
“Wait!” I yelled after him. “Stop!”
But he did not stop. He bolted out the door like he was a child-size Olympian sprinter.
I met the red-haired child’s eyes as she crossed her arms and huffed out her annoyance. “He always does this.”
“He accuses substitutes of being murderers and runs away?”
She shrugged, wearing the over-it expression of someone who was so tired of her classmate’s bullshit. Girl, you and me both.
She widened her eyes at me and jutted her chin like I was the one trying her patience now. “Well, go get him.”
Oh, right.
So off I went, into the hallway in my Birkenstock mules, knowing they were the worst, slippery shoes I could have worn when chasing down a child. Especially a fast child.
Good grief, what was I going to do? I’d forgotten my walkie on my desk. I’d forgotten my phone in my purse. I’d forgotten my way around this ancient school building.
And I’d forgotten how to be a teacher in the six months I’d been on hiatus when all my life plans had fallen apart.
“Let me go!” a tiny voice growled from around the corner. “Let me go, Bam Bam!”
A prickle of foreshadowing raced down my spine just before I turned the corner. There stood Sam Autry, holding the little monster upside down by the ankle.