Chapter 1
ELIZABETH
It was truly my favorite time of year. Perhaps I should say one of my favorite times of the year.
Because here I was, with some of my favorite people in the world, watching them practically shake with a sugar high, their eyes expressive, filled with delight and anticipation, as the clock ticked slowly.
With each passing second, I knew we were one moment closer to our salvation. Or perhaps just our relative freedom.
“Ms. Ellis, are you teaching summer school this year?” Hannah, one of my students, asked, her smile bright, her pen tapping to a rhythm only she could hear against the desk.
“Not this year,” I answered, an odd sense of relief flowing.
I loved teaching. I had been teaching at Ashford Creek High School since graduating from college and returning to my hometown to be with my family and friends.
Ashford Creek might be a small town in the middle of the Rocky Mountains outside of Denver, one that didn’t easily flow off the lips of strangers, but it was my small town. It was my home, filled with memories.
I’d gone to high school in a different part of the building as my classroom was in the newer section, but part of the halls still held the same feelings as they had when I’d been younger.
Ashford Creek and the surrounding areas had grown in size and population over time, and now, while it was still a small town, I didn’t recognize every single person at the town hall.
“Like you would ever be in summer school,” Clayton sneered.
“Clayton. You do realize we still have detention available today, correct?” I asked with a single brow raised.
It took all within me not to smirk or react in any other way.
Clayton wasn’t a bad kid, but sometimes he forgot to watch what he said in front of other adults.
Of course, if he spoke like that to Hannah alone, I would hope someone else would stand up for her as well.
The class booed, and I kept my face expressionless.
Clayton just winked at me before lifting his chin. “I graduate this weekend. My mom would literally kill me if I got detention the day before.”
“Then maybe don’t be an ass,” Alecks added.
Everybody made oohs and aahs, and I held back a sigh.
The last day of high school for my lovely teenagers was already turning into a very long day.
I would never give any of them detention, but keeping them on track so we could enjoy our afternoon and make sure we were ready for the summer wasn’t easy.
All exams were through, their GPAs sorted.
Nearly every student here had an acceptance to their college of choice—whether it was a community college or a university in-state or out.
Some were set for trade schools, and others were taking a gap year to spend with their families.
There were many ways to begin adulthood, and none of them needed to be one set perfect path.
I couldn’t help but remember the start of my own path so many years ago.
One where I went through the unexpected, surprising even myself.
Then I had taken perhaps a path less traveled, one that had put me on the outskirts of a town I thought had respected me.
I had been the one left behind, after all.
It didn’t matter that I had faced it head-on, making my own decisions.
A small town that I loved with every ounce of my being had judged me from the start, and I would always be the girl left behind.
But I shoved those thoughts from my mind, as I needed to focus on the students in front of me.
I let my gaze drift towards Will, one of my quieter students.
He had his head down, his attention focused on his notebook.
Will was one of the best artists in his graduating class—of a student body of less than three hundred—but I knew he would rather saw his own arm off than have anyone tell him he was good at drawing.
He didn’t join in on our board games or other ways to pass the time; instead, focusing on his own paper and ignoring the rest.
Getting him to graduate had been one of the hardest endeavors of my teaching career, and not because he wasn’t brilliant. No, it was because sometimes the world couldn’t quite forgive where you were born, or the decisions of others.
He had passed and would graduate this weekend. Of course, I would be there shouting for him and the rest of his peers. Everybody had worked so hard to get where they were, and as a teacher, I was proud of them beyond all measure.
I might not have been blessed with children of my own, but each student that walked through these halls was like a small part of me escaping into the future, clinging to what could be.
As the final bell rang, my students stood up and cheered, and I couldn’t help but clap.
Yes, it was ridiculous, embarrassing, and sentimental, but I didn’t care.
I held up my arms for the ones who wanted to hug me, and they took out their phones, with selfies being taken to memorialize the moment.
My little babies were now adults, walking out into the real world, and I waved at them, knowing that I would have to do this all over again next year.
I got them when they were in ninth grade and watched them walk into their forevers at eighteen.
Will was the last to leave, and as he dragged his feet towards the door, I frowned.
“Are you ready for tomorrow?” I asked, trying to keep the worry out of my voice.
I didn’t want to say that he wasn’t my problem anymore, because I would never believe that, but he wasn’t a student in my classroom any longer, and he had never been one for asking for help or talking about his feelings.
He shrugged. “I don’t know if I can go.”
Worry edged into the tiredness of the day and the end of another long year.
“Do you need a ride? I can pick you up.” It wouldn’t be out of the question for a teacher to drive a student to and from school.
Not in Ashford Creek. Most of the teachers had kids in our school or were best friends with the parents of those kids.
It was hard to set some boundaries when you were neighbors with most of your classroom.
The graduation would be held in the same place that most events were held in our small town—the town hall and barn.
Every festival dance, homecoming, reunion, and other major event was held underneath that roof.
Our town hall decorators and committee members put their all into making every event individual and pure Ashford Creek.
The outdoor seating area was large enough to fit at least twenty people per graduate, with enough room for everyone to be comfortable and to celebrate our new adults.
I also knew that Will could probably walk to the event easily, but he rarely did anything in town.
“I have to work.”
“You didn’t ask Rune for a day off?” I asked.
Rune was a friend, and I had known him since I was a child. He owned Summit Grill, where I knew Will was a busboy. Now that he was eighteen, he had been shifted and was training to be a waiter. Rune paid well and treated his staff well.
He was also my ex’s big brother, and while I enjoyed going to eat with my friends there, I tried my best to avoid him.
He never gave me the pitying looks that the rest of the town gave me for being Atlas Carter’s ex-girlfriend.
But he looked so much like Atlas sometimes that it was hard to want to be near him often.
“I said I would work because the rest of the staff needs to be at the graduation. I don’t mind.
It’s not like I have any family going. They don’t even give you your diploma.
You get the cover, which they can mail to me.
I don’t really care, Ms. Ellis. Not that you aren’t great or anything.
You and the other teachers are nice and all, but I don’t really need a party or an event to tell me that I’m out of high school and not going to college.
I see that every time I look in the mirror. ”
My heart ached for Will. I had known him since he was a good little kid, and he had always been a bright light, smiling and laughing.
Great at sports, art, and just a good person.
His parents had died in a snowmobile accident when he was in middle school.
The event had shaped so much of his life and had been a town tragedy.
Just a few years prior, another man had lost his children and wife in a car accident on an icy bridge, and that had broken some of the town’s spirit.
But we had all clawed together, doing our best to care for those we could.
Nobody had come for Will and offered to raise him.
He had been such a cute little kid and had ended up a hollow-eyed little boy who needed family.
Part of me had wanted to reach out to say I could help, but I had been in my early twenties.
A single woman on a teacher’s salary. I was an only child with elderly parents, and in the eyes of so many in town and the legal system, hadn’t had any prospects.
I wasn’t the right person to adopt a child to keep him in town.
Instead, he had gone to a few different foster families and had ended up with one on the far east side of town.
From what I could tell, his foster mother had run off a couple of years ago, and his foster father had gotten his last check once Will had turned eighteen.
I knew he still was living underneath that roof, at least that’s what he had told everyone, but I didn’t have any right to know anything else.
My friends in the system did their best, but they were overworked, and the fact that Will had even been able to stay in Ashford Creek with his friends and familiar moments had been a miracle.
And now he was eighteen, and he wouldn’t have anyone for him at graduation.
“If you decide to go, I’ll be cheering your name.”
“Just like you always do with everyone else, Ms. E. You’re a good person, you know that?”