But this girl? She’d just proved me wrong.
TEN
maggie
Naturally,the kids noticed there were now eleven dollars in the swear jar.
It hadn’t occurred to me that they would have questions about who exactly had cursedthat muchin the past weekend…or that it would give them a fun game to play. I heard more bad words from my students in that day than I’d heard from kindergarteners in my whole life.
It also hadn’t occurred to me that maybe incentivizing the swearing was a bad thing.
But…at least the classroom was getting a guinea pig.
All I was thinking about leaving that day was the guinea pig—certainly not the sparkly green gel pen I’d found wedged under the leg of Rosie Sullivan’s desk, the gel pen I knew had landed there while I was doing things in this classroom that were way, way worse than swearing. On Monday morning, I’d come in and thoroughly sterilized everything, mortified at what I’d done…but it was too late.
It was done.
Twicenow, and I wanted it to happen again, even though it absolutelycould nothappen again.
I was very much looking forward to a hot bath, a book to get my mind off Garrison Nash, and maybe candlelit takeout at home, but I found Delia aggressively waving at me through the office window when I walked by to get to the front door. I paused, popping my head in; there was nobody else in there with her, and she didn’t hesitate to use that to her advantage.
She pointed at the chair across from her, normally reserved for parents whose kids had gotten in trouble.
I reluctantly sat down.
“Dish,” she said. “Right now.”
She clasped her hands on the desk, watching me.
I sighed. “I really shouldn’t,” I said. “Not here.”
She tilted her head forward and raised her eyebrows. “Uh-huh…so something happened after the fall festival.”
“Something happened after the fall festival, yes.”
She made this—well, to be honest, this utterly ungodly shriek. I snapped my head around to make sure no one was watching, that Mrs. Petersen wasn’t creeping around and waiting to bring down the hammer of judgment.
“Can you please chill?” I asked in a harsh whisper. “I really can’t have these conversations here.”
“So we’re getting drinks tonight, right?” she asked.
“It’s a Monday?—”
“And you’re an adult who can make her own choices, like going out on a Monday,” she interrupted. “Come on…I amdyingfor something interesting to happen around here and this is so much better than reality TV.”
“I don’t know if I should be offended that you just compared me to reality TV,” I muttered.
“You shouldn’t be! You’re like…not the villain we love to hate, you’re the good girl we’re all rooting for.” She paused. “In all honesty, Maggie—I just desperately need to get out of the house.I spend every night with my grandma and I love her to bits, I do, but she’s much more Law & Order than Love Island.”
It was the first time she’d ever actually told me anything about her life…and it made me just a little more sympathetic. I needed to remember that I wasn’t the only one who was new here; Delia was too, and I had no idea what was going on with her.
“Okay,” I said.
She blinked. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.” I picked up my bag. “But not Rick’s.”
“Obviously not Rick’s.” She frowned. “How about Summit & Vine over on Main? It’s kind of a tourist trap but they honestly have a great selection and their cheese board is amazing.”
