His eyebrows ascended. “Oh.” There was a bit of a silence. Then he cracked what was almost a smile. “Late assignment?”
“I guess you can say that.”
He nodded and moved past me to the door. “You can follow me. I’m headed in the same direction.”
It was a fairly mundane scene but I watched with increasing excitement as his gloved fingers went through a ring of a dozen keys before finding the one that opened the side door. “Yes!” I breathed out when it turned in the lock to finally let us in the building. Mr. Teacher gave an awkward but vaguely amused smile and peered at me, walking stiffly at my side as we made our way down the very familiar hall. I had initially pegged him for the quintessential hot, young teacher that existed in every school, but now I felt like he was a bit too quiet for that title. “Sorry, by the way. If that was weird,” I said, eyeing him back as I brushed my hands along the wall of lockers.
“No problem. Just not used to seeing anyone too excited to be here.”
“Oh, I wasn’t back in the day either, but I just… have a purpose now,” I said, unfolding my letter. He looked at it and mouthed wow.
“That looks like a… pretty lengthy essay.”
I looked sheepishly down at the damned near packet I was holding. “Oh,” I blushed. “Yeah. I wrote her a letter and I guess I got a little carried away. There was just a lot I had to update her on. It’s been a shameful while since we talked.”
“How long?”
“Two years. Because I’m an asshole,” I said, going instinctively stiff for a second till he laughed.
“I’m not your teacher. You can say asshole.” He sifted again through his keys as we stood outside Mrs. Nolan’s old classroom. It looked the same yet completely different. I cocked my head at him.
“How do you have the keys to her classroom?” I asked.
He gave that almost smile again. “It’s my classroom, too,” he said, opening the door and letting me into the room that still smelled heavily of whiteboard marker. I stopped for a moment, a cringing smile twitching my lips as I took in my painfully familiar surroundings. Mr. Teacher set his bag on his desk and peered at the nerves on my face. “You look like someone who’s still bad at math.”
“Yes.”
“Yeah. I hear the fear of it never goes away,” he said somewhat humorously as he opened a drawer, taking out a folder and slipping it into his briefcase. He watched me watch him then explained. “Told myself I wouldn’t grade their exams over my break. But then the guilt set in.”
I laughed. “Grading on Christmas though?”
“It’s only a little weirder than whatever it is you’re doing,” he said. My eyes widened but he was in no rush to apologize. Zipping his briefcase, he finally said, “Sorry.”
“It’s okay. It is weird,” I conceded as I stood there for a second, staring down at my letter and for the first time all day, wondering what everyone was doing back home. Mason in particular.
“She your long lost mother or something?”
My eyes fluttered up to find Mr. Teacher sitting at the edge of his desk. “Mrs. Nolan? No. She was my favorite teacher. Well, actually, not necessarily. She graded without a curve and she gave pop quizzes like she enjoyed watching us freeze over in terror.”
There was finally a flicker of interest in his eye. “So why her?”
“She was the best person. Ever. She helped me plan my future
to leave this town and move to New York.”
“Which you did, where you’re now successful,” he finished. When I cocked my head, he let his gaze dip for the first time to my body. “Judging from the way you’re dressed. Figured you’d done well for yourself.”
“Right.” I felt my hands getting clammy as they gripped the letter. “I guess… I have. Especially compared to my what my expectations were for myself in high school. She’s actually always been the one to remind me that,” I admitted, nodding toward her desk. “Mrs. Nolan. Whenever I felt down about anything, she’d remind me to put myself back in my high school shoes and imagine what I’d think or say if I knew that I’d end up growing up to work and live where I did, and know the people I did. And that would make me realize I didn’t have anything to be upset about – at least until my problems got bigger, but you know.” Crap, I was rambling and this guy really didn’t seem like the type to be interested in anything about me, let alone my life story. But to my surprise, I looked up to see his expression thawing. His scarf was off now and he looked completely different to me. There was a scruff on his sharp jaw line that I hadn’t expected. Even less expected was the slightly entertained look on his face. “What?”
“Nothing.”
“Please tell me,” I said with a nervous smile.
“Then please don’t take this the wrong way. I just…” he trailed off, rubbing the scruff. “I guess what you said just now kind of went with the narrative that I made up for you in my head.”
“You made up a narrative about me? In the two minutes since you’ve met me?”
“Naturally. You were an unexpected sight when I got here and you aren’t dressed like someone who lives around town. And the whole being alone at your old high school on Christmas thing. Definitely adds to the story.”