“Probably not,” she said absently as she watched him grab a bottle of Pepto-Bismol and finish off half the bottle.
“Then let’s move onto the reason that I called you today,” he said, pausing for a moment before opening his mouth, closing it, opening it again, closing it again, shaking his head, and then downing the rest of the Pepto-Bismol as she sat there, really hoping that this wasn’t about her teaching assistant, because that one definitely wasn’t her fault. But she still planned to make it up to him when, if, he returned.
“We’ve decided to approve your sabbatical.”
“Umm, thank you?” she said, unable to help but frown as she added, “But I didn’t put in for one.”
“And yet, we approved it,” he said, holding up a fresh bottle of Pepto-Bismol and muttered, “Congratulations,” before tossing another handful of Tums in his mouth.
“But my classes-” she started to say, only to have him wave off her concerns.
“Already taken care of,” he said, taking another swig from the bottle of Pepto-Bismol as she sat there, wondering if this was his way of telling her that she was fired.
“This is a good thing,” he promised, and if he hadn’t followed that up with another mouthful of Tums, she probably would have believed him.
---
Bridgewater, MA
“I guess it all started when I found out that Santa Claus wasn’t real,” the little pain in the ass that was trying to get out of detention said from her usual spot.
“That must have been very traumatic for you,” Reed said absently as he finished reading through the rest of the emails, deleting the ones from parents demanding to know why he’d fired Miss Dawson, others calling him a fucking moron for not firing her sooner, and a few wrote just to let him know that he was an asshole.
“It was,” Jen said with a sniffle, “It really was.”
“And when did this life-altering event take place?” he asked, not bothering to read the next email when he saw the word asshole in capital letters.
“Last week,” Jen answered with a forlorn sigh that had Reed’s lips twitching.
“I see,” Reed murmured, closing his laptop as he leaned back in his chair. “And this is why you couldn’t go to detention?”
“I just don’t think I’m ready to be around all that joy,” Jen whispered. “Not yet,” she said with a sniffle and a forlorn sigh that had him nodding sympathetically.
“It’s too soon,” Reed agreed, matching her sigh with one of his own as he grabbed a pen and started writing a note.
“It is,” Jen whispered as she helped herself to the dish of hard candy on his desk.
“You don’t belong in detention,” Reed said with an understanding smile as he held the note out to the little con artist.
“Bless you, Principal. Bradford,” Jen said with a watery smile and a sniffle as she stood up and took the note. “Bless you.”
“I can only hope that this will help ease the pain,” Reed said as he put his laptop in his bag and stood up, more than ready to call it a day.
“It will, Principal Bradford. It will,” Jen said with another little sniffle as she headed for the door, only to stop dead in her tracks with a horrified gasp when she looked down at the note.
“If you hurry, you should be able to make it to the library before it closes,” Reed said, heading for the door.
“How could you after I shared my pain?” she asked before adding, “How?”
“Easily,” he said, locking his office before walking past the little pain in the ass that should probably be heading to the library if she wanted to avoid another two weeks of detention.
“Ten pages?” the little deviant asked, catching up with him in the main lobby.
“Not enough?” he asked, reaching for the note only to have her jump back with a startled gasp and a, “No! It’s more than enough!”
“Good, then I’ll see you in the morning,” he said, once again heading for the front door and freedom.
“Did I mention that my gerbil died?” his little shadow asked, once again catching up with him.
“No,” he said, heading for his truck.
“He did. It was tragic. Very tragic,” she murmured with a sniffle that had his lips twitching.
“When did he die?” he asked, opening his truck door and carefully tossing his bag on the passenger seat.
“Ten years ago, but the pain is still fresh,” Jen said as she stood there, hugging herself and giving him a sad little smile that had him sighing in defeat.
“Fine,” he said, plucking the note out of her hand and crossed out the ten-page paper that he’d assigned her and made another quick note before handing it back.
“Bless you, Principal—No!” she gasped in horror.
“Merry Christmas,” he said, gesturing toward the large hall that housed the library.
“That’s just so wrong,” she said in mock horror as she turned around and headed to the library where she would probably spend the next hour conning some poor unsuspecting freshmen into doing her paper for her, but that was a problem for another day.
Right now, the only thing he cared about was going home, grabbing an ice-cold beer, throwing a steak on the grill, and catching up on some paperwork while he did his best to forget about all the bullshit that could wait until tomorrow. That all changed when he looked down at his phone and saw the text message that was waiting for him.
Chapter 3
“This isn’t so bad,” Joey mumbled to herself, backing up that lie with a nod as she tightened her hold on her grandfather’s old work ladder and gave it a good yank to free it from the mass of briars that had at some point in the last twelve years decided to accept it as one of its own.
It took a few minutes, several curses, and a few mishaps that ended with her sprawled out in the large puddle that she’d been trying to avoid, but finally after several tugs, prayers, and a mishap with her grandmother’s old bird bath, she finally managed to pull the ladder free only to realize that at some point in the last ten minutes, that her only means of getting inside the house had fallen apart. Letting the pieces fall to the ground, Joey turned around and tried to make out the old imposing house that she hadn’t seen since she was twelve, through the freezing, pouring rain.
Maybe she should go find a hotel for the night and come back in the morning, she thought only to immediately dismiss the idea since her car was currently stuck in the mud and her keys were in one of five puddles that she’d fallen into when she’d tried to navigate the front yard full of weeds, rocks, and the occasional garden gnome. After an extensive search for her old hide-a-key that had ended with her discovering that there was a raccoon living under her front step, she’d realized that she didn’t have any choice but to pick the lock.
That had ended with her making a mental note to pick up a new lock in the morning. After a ten-minute break, which had resulted in her locking herself out of her car, she’d decided to try her luck with the second-floor bathroom window, praying that Jackson hadn’t fixed it since she’d moved out. That had resulted in her traversing the huge backyard with the hopes of finding her grandfather’s old ladder, which the briars had already reclaimed.
Still, things could be worse, she reminded herself with a shrug as she headed back to the old house that her grandparents had given them with the hopes that one of them would pick up where her grandfather had left off. This old house had been her grandfather’s dream. Since he was a kid, he’d dreamed of getting his hands on one of these old houses and fixing it up, but the war, his parents dying unexpectantly and leaving him to raise his little brother, marriage, kids, and life had gotten in the way.