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After giving Teddy three kisses, five byes, and two waves, I was back in the car. The flashing notification of a new message had me reaching for my phone.
Kyle: *crickets chirping GIF*
Oops. Totally forgot to respond when I got here.
Me: Sorry. Just dropped Teddy off with my parents.
Me: No. I haven’t mentioned the swim lessons to Callie yet. But I will tonight.
Kyle: Ok. Have fun setting up your classroom.
Me: Thanks.
I got almost everything on my list at the teacher supply store. While I was shopping, a fun idea for one of the bulletin boards in my room ran through my head, and I couldn’t wait to put it all together.
“So, what do you think?” I asked my assistant a few hours later as I stepped back to survey my work.
A blue background, with grass along the bottom and twenty suns placed throughout.
“The sunflowers are a nice touch,” Sarah said from across the room, where she was busy sorting and organizing supplies, games, and toys.
“Yeah? Not too much yellow?”
She shook her head. “Nope. It’s perfect. What are you labeling it?”
“I was thinkingYou are my sunshine, my only sunshine.”
“Cute. Where do you want?—”
Her words hung in the air as she looked over my shoulder. I turned, following her line of sight.
A tall man had stepped into the room. “Sorry to interrupt. Just wanted to make sure you’re making out alright. My classroom is just down the hall.”
I nodded. “Yes, I think so…actually, do you think you could help me figure out why the projector won’t come on?”
“Sure.” He walked toward me and stuck out his hand. “I’m Darius, by the way.”
I introduced myself and Sarah before we got to work brainstorming the projector problem.
To my mortification, Darius solved the problem within minutes by flipping the switch on the power strip. He probably wondered what halfwit the school had hired. Even though I could feel the flush of my cheeks, we had a good laugh at myexpense.
After Darius left, we organized my classroom library, and shortly thereafter, when I told Sarah she could head out, she hightailed it home. When school started, she’d be away from her nine-month-old daughter for much longer than a few hours, and it was clearly going to take some getting used to.
I, on the other hand, stuck around so I could take advantage of my kid-free time. Guilt niggled at the back of my mind, but I reminded myself that Callie was having a blast at camp and Teddy was enjoying time with his grandparents. I needed to get this work done, so I intended to focus on something I enjoyed doing for the next few hours.
While I was laminating name tags for desks, my phone vibrated in my back pocket. I pulled it out and swiped the screen to pull up the new message from Kyle. A wave of excitement hit me—and not for the first time since we’d started texting last night—because I looked forward to his texts. What did that mean?
Kyle: How’s the classroom?
He’s just being friendly, and you don’t have time for anything more.
My inner dialogue did nothing to quite the excitement, though.
Me: Good. Finished two bulletin boards, set up my classroom library, and organized a bunch of toys and boxes of materials.
Kyle: Send me a pic.
Me: What?
