Chapter 18 Tuesday
Tuesday
(Fifteen Days Left)
I can’t wait to see you tonight.
That’s what Finn said to me at afternoon dismissal. I had just buckled Danny into his car seat when I felt a presence behind me. Finn was on his way to his car when he said it.
Flustered, I gave him a double thumbs-up and a smile so wide, I could feel a breeze on my gums.
“They might get married,” Danny said to his mom. “Once they get to know each other a little better.”
“Is that so?” Danny’s mom winked at me behind her Prada sunglasses.
I shrugged. “Anything’s possible.”
Once the words left my mouth, I found myself latching on to them.
Anything’s possible.
My new mantra.
I chanted it under my breath the entire drive home from work.
I recounted it to my reflection as I applied my lip tint and changed into my most flattering black cotton dress and ballet flats.
And now I repeat the phrase as I climb into the back seat of my Uber.
Tonight, at Brentwood Friends Academy’s Sixteenth Annual Middle School Fall Ball, anything is possible.
I buckle myself in and begin to go over the details of tonight’s plan.
Call an Uber. Check. Arrive. Wait for Finn.
Mention that my car is in the shop. Mention it again in case Finn misses it the first time.
By this point, hopefully he will have offered to drive me home.
If he hasn’t, I will be brave, and I will ask him.
When he pulls up to my apartment, I won’t open the passenger-side door immediately.
I’ll turn toward him, reveling in the sexual tension that accompanies a nighttime drop-off… .
My phone buzzes in my lap. A FaceTime from Ethan.
I answer on the first ring. “Is everything okay?”
“Why wouldn’t it be?” He lifts the edge of a severed coconut to his lips and sips. I recognize the cabana in the reflection of his sunglasses from Jamie’s countless Instagram stories. “Can’t a brother FaceTime his sister as he pleases?”
I suppress a smile while rolling my eyes. “Not when you’re on your honeymoon. You’re supposed to unplug and spend time with your wife. Speaking of, where is she?”
He pans over to the left, where Jamie, perfectly sun-kissed under her floppy straw hat, swipes at her phone screen with fierce determination. “She’s plugged.”
She gives Ethan a glare. “I’m editing the photos of us from the luau last night. The flash made you look demonic. Aloha, Pheebs!”
Ethan flips the camera back to himself before I get the chance to offer an aloha back. “Listen, we need to talk,” he says, raising his glasses to reveal two bright red strips of sunburnt skin below his eyes.
“About?”
He holds up his tattered copy of Keep It in the Family: An Unconventional Love Story.
“I finished.”
I gasp. “It’s about time!”
With all the wedding hullabaloo, Ethan’s been late to finish the August selection of our two-member book club.
There used to be three of us, Jamie having been the third, but she quit only a few months after the club’s inception, claiming that the romance novels Ethan and I pick aren’t “real literature.” It’s just as well, since I would rather read my car manual twice over than have Jamie sic another one of the classics on us.
“Well?” I prod. “What did you think?”
He takes a giant gulp from his coconut. “I freakin’ loved it.”
“Right?” I beam. “The age gap between James and Mimi was risky, but I found it to be handled so tastefully.”
He nods. “So tastefully. And to be honest, I completely forgot it existed until we found out that James’s first wife was Mimi’s estranged mother.”
“Me too! And what a plot twist, by the way. I didn’t see it coming. What did you think about the scene in the outhouse?”
When Ethan and I get going, it can be hard to stop. Which is why Jamie cuts us off during my detailed recounting of James’s family tree.
“Let’s walk to the beach,” she nudges Ethan from off camera.
“Hold on.” I can see his brow furrow beneath his glasses. “So James’s daughter is actually Mimi’s half sister?”
“Yes. Which also makes Mimi her half sister’s stepmother,” I explain.
“Holy shit. How did I miss that?”
A freshly manicured hand reaches into the frame, grabbing the phone from Ethan. “I love you, Phoebe,” Jamie says with a sigh. “And I’m also hanging up on you.”
“Love y—” The call disconnects before I can finish. A blessing in disguise, considering I’ve just now looked out the window for the first time and we’re already pulling into the school parking lot.
I make my way to the teachers’ lounge, opening the door to find Cheryl in the midst of her punch preparations. Hunched over a bowl of pink liquid, she stirs intently while adding pieces of finely chopped fresh fruit to the mixture.
She looks up at the sound of the door opening.
“Well, don’t you look sweet,” she says to me as I move forward to help her with the punch.
She shoos me away. Anxious for a task, I busy myself by pacing across the room as, one by one, the rest of our colleagues begin to fill the small space.
I find my heart rate increasing slightly each time the door opens.
“You okay?” Cheryl asks, a crease of worry lining her forehead.
“Yeah, totally. Why?”
“You’re going to burn a hole in the floor.” She chuckles, and then lowers her voice to a whisper. “Is Finn coming tonight?”
Unfortunately, to the prying ears of Sue, the seventh-grade teacher and notorious school gossip, no whisper will ever be quiet enough.
“I knew it!” From the other side of the room, I can see Sue’s eyes light up under her librarian-style glasses.
“There’s something going on between the two of you, isn’t there?
I’ve seen you on the playground. Gosh, I don’t think there’s been any teacher-on-teacher romance on these grounds since…
” She pauses, deep in thought. “The nineties.”
Almost imperceptibly, her eyes flit over to the couch, where Teacher Rob mindlessly tunes his guitar in an attempt to hide his eavesdropping. She blushes. Cheryl and I share a brief, knowing look at the revelation. We’ll discuss this later, it says.
“Nothing is going on between anyone,” I say, loudly enough to make sure it falls on the ears of every busybody in this room.
“Why not?” Sue pouts. “You two would be so cute together.”
My curiosity gets the best of me. “What makes you so sure he would even be interested?”
At this, Teacher Rob, clad in the powder blue suit that he wears for every special occasion, chimes in. “He’s a guy. Guys are always interested.”
His point is one that I’ve heard countless times before.
It’s what all the early 2000s rom-coms wanted me to believe.
But after twenty-nine years of lived experience, and one brutal rejection in a janitor’s closet, I’ve gathered enough evidence to confidently say that guys are not, in fact, always interested.
“That’s what I’ve been telling her.”
I glare at Cheryl. “Whose side are you on?”
“Yours. That’s why—”
The creak of the opening door cuts Cheryl off, and every pair of eyes in the room turns toward the entrance, where Finn stands, looking completely gorgeous in a blue button-down, khakis, and surprisingly fashion-forward loafers.
The room goes completely silent. Everyone looks at him expectantly, waiting for him to tell us that we’re busted. He heard everything. We’ve been caught red-handed.
“Uh.” Finn hesitates before stepping forward and closing the door behind him. “Hi?”
“Hey!”
“Hi, Finn!”
“Lookin’ good, kid!
“Welcome!”
“Come on in, have some punch!”
Our high-pitched greetings come tumbling out all at once. Cheryl shoves a glass of punch into his hands.
“So,” he starts, taking a sip of his drink. “What are we all waiting here for, exactly?”
“Dan,” I tell him. “He usually makes a few announcements before the kids get here. And between you and me”—I lower my voice—“the last Fall Ball was a complete shit show. So Dan might really crack down on us this year.” Finn raises an eyebrow, an invitation for me to keep going. “You’ll see” is all I offer.
I fidget with my fingers anxiously, cracking my knuckles one by one as we wait.
Tonight will be the first time I’ve seen Dan, our principal, since he asked me to interview for the assistant principal position last month.
I wouldn’t say I’ve been avoiding him. Not at all.
I’ve just been making a conscious effort to stay clear of spaces I know he’ll be in.
And if I do happen to see him approaching, I’ll begin walking in the opposite direction.
It’s not that I don’t want the job. In fact, I think I’d be a good fit for the role.
Shannon’s archaic filing system could use a massive overhaul, and the thought of reorganizing decades’ worth of paperwork makes my heart skip a beat.
It’s just that it’s a big decision. A big change.
And I don’t know if that’s what I need right now. Or even want.
Thankfully, the unease I was feeling about seeing Dan dissipates the second he walks through the door.
He has the type of calming presence that reminds me of my dad, a slightly resigned air that comes from the desire to please everyone.
“A few quick things to go over before we get the ball rolling tonight,” he announces.
“First, no more than two glasses of punch per person. Two and a half if you spread them out appropriately. We don’t want…
well.” Everyone goes out of their way to avoid looking at Jane, who, after finalizing her divorce just hours before, suffered a very public punch-induced breakdown at last year’s Fall Ball.