Chapter Fifteen
Garrett
On Monday, I start picking Callie up in the morning, so we can drive to school together. I don’t know why I didn’t think of it before—all those post-fantastic-screwing endorphins pumping through my bloodstream must be giving me brilliant ideas. Although no one sees us pull into the parking lot or walk in together, by midmorning talk around the school hallways is already rampant. It’s like the kids can smell the attraction on us—nosy little bloodhounds. They whisper and point, and by Tuesday they ask me about it, because privacy and personal boundaries mean nothing to them.
Are you and Miss Carpenter hooking up?
Is Miss Carpenter your OTP?
Miss Carpenter’s hot, Coach. You gotta lock that down. Give a chick a mile and she’ll take the whole nine inches from somebody else, you know what I’m saying?
OMG, Coach D! You and Miss Carpenter should totally go to prom! It’s sooooo cute when old people date!
OTP is One True Pair, by the way . . . and I hate myself for knowing that.
By Wednesday, they invent one of those celebrity, name-mashing nicknames for us. “Darpenter,” Dean tells me, barely managing to keep a straight face.
I sit back in my office chair. “You’re screwing with me.”
He’s pulled some pretty twisted practical jokes in the past.
He holds up his empty hands. “Afraid not. Kelly Simmons told me it’s all over the girls’ bathrooms and Merkle said two of her art kids engraved it on keychains.”
“Keychains?”
“Yep, you and Callie are officially relationship goals.” He makes the hashtag sign with his fingers. “Congratulations.”
Then he cracks up.
“Great—thanks.”
Darpenter . . . sounds like a chemical you use to strip off paint.
“It could’ve been worse, D. Could’ve been . . . Carret.” He reconsiders, “Carret’s kind of cute, actually.”
I give him the finger.
“So it’s official then?” My best friend asks, sobering slightly. “You guys are giving it another shot? I’ve lost my wingman?”
All this time, all these years, when it comes to dating I’ve been fixated on keeping my life my own—keeping it uncomplicated and drama-free. But it’s different with Callie—so easy to slip into that steady groove because we mesh . . . seamlessly fit together. We always did. She knows me, she gets me—and there’s not a single thing about her that I don’t adore.
My life is still simple, still easy . . . but it’s just so much better with her in it.
“Yeah, man. I mean . . . it’s Callie, you know?”
And I don’t need to say anything else. Dean gets me too.
“I’m happy for you. I hope it works out . . .” Then he snickers, “. . . Gallie.”
Dickhead.
~ ~ ~
“You’re the only person I know who doesn’t eat fruit to be healthy, but actually enjoys it.”
It’s kind of nuts the things you find attractive about someone when you’re really into them. Callie was always a fruit salad kind of girl, even when we were kids. Right now, we’re in The Cave, the teachers’ lounge, as our classes attend a first period anti-drug assembly in the auditorium. And she’s popping giant, radioactive-sized green grapes in her mouth. Watching her slip them between her gorgeous pouty lips is turning me on something fierce.
She giggles, shrugging. “Fruit is good.” She holds one out to me. “Want one?”
My eyes dart between the grape and her mouth.
“No . . . I just want to keep watching you eat them.”
Her pretty green eyes narrow wickedly. She takes the next grape and gives it a nice, slow lick and I can’t help but picture her doing the same to my balls. Then she closes her eyes, gives a little hungry moan before making a lovely, wide O with her mouth and popping the big round grape through her luscious lips.
I smother a groan. Looks like a trip to the faculty bathroom for some “private time” is in my future. Jesus, how old am I again?
“Get a room, you two,” Donna Merkle teases as she sits down at the table next to Callie. And then I catch her staring at Jerry’s ass as he pours himself a cup of coffee across the room. They’ve been markedly less vicious with each other during the staff meetings, though they still hate-fuck each other with their eyes.
It’s not an uncommon thing for relationships to develop between teachers—no matter how weird or incompatible it may look from the outside. It’s like costars on a movie set or soldiers on deployment—we’re all stuck in this building together for hours a day, and only other teachers really understand what it’s like. Things are bound to happen. And something is definitely happening with Merkle and Jerry. Callie sees it too.
“You and Jerry first, Donna.”
“Leaving now,” Merkle says, rising. And Jerry’s eyes follow her right out the door.
I lean forward, resting my elbows on the table.
“So, you’re coming over tonight after the game, right?”
Callie’s parents have made some good progress on the recovery front. The hospital bed has been taken down—they’re using walkers and crutches to get around now. They still need Callie to do any heavy lifting, but their progress has given her just a bit more time out of the house . . . and over at mine.
“Definitely.” She nods. “Can’t mess with a streak.”
God damn, she’s perfect.
We’ve won every game since mine and Callie’s first night together, and I have no doubt we’ll win again tonight. Her pussy is my gorgeous good-luck charm and I make damn sure I give that beauty the gratitude and worship it deserves.
~ ~ ~
Later that day, in third period, Miss McCarthy comes on the loudspeaker and announces the nominations for homecoming queen, who will be crowned next week. When she reads Simone Porchesky’s name, Nancy and Skylar and more than half the rest of the class bust a gut laughing.
Nancy shrieks and grabs her phone. “OMG, Simone is up for homecoming queen! Hilarious!”
I know Simone—she’s in Callie’s theater class. Blue hair, piercings, tattoos—she’s designing the sets and the costumes for Callie’s play.
“Why is that hilarious?” I ask.
But my gut curdles with the suspicion that I already know why.
“It’s a joke,” Nancy tells me. “A bunch of us got together and put her name in as a joke. I posted about it but I didn’t actually think she’d really get nominated! This is amazing.”
I think about that scene from The Breakfast Club, where Andy the jock talks about the humiliation the kid whose ass cheeks he taped together must’ve felt. I think about Callie, and the care and affection she feels for her students—how hearing about this is going to crush a piece of her.
And I think about Simone, just a girl trying to figure herself out—and the isolation and embarrassment and the fucking hurt she’s going to feel. Because kids know when you’re laughing with them, even if they don’t see it. They know when they’re a punchline. And it’s soul shattering.
“Why would you do that?”
Nancy shrugs. “I don’t know.”
I believe her—and it’s horrifying. That she would inflict this kind of cruelty on someone else without any real reason at all.
Her mouth twists. “Simone’s a freak—have you seen her? She tries too hard to get attention—to get noticed. So, we gave her what she wanted . . . we noticed her.”
“That’s genius!” someone in the back—I don’t even know who—calls out.
David Burke’s not laughing, but he’s the only one. Even DJ joins the party—they sneer and giggle—a room full of pitiless little monsters.
I slam the side of my fist on the desk. “That’s enough!”
The chatter cuts off quick when they see I’m pissed, when they realize this is not fucking okay with me. They go wide-eyed and silent.
“I have never been more disappointed in you than I am right now.” I shake my head. “All of you.”
They’re supposed to be better than us. More accepting, more open, more understanding—a green generation, with hands reaching across the world, and love that always wins. They have more advantages, more resources and benefits than any who’ve come before them—and they still put so much energy into tearing each other to shreds.
Sometimes it feels pointless—like we’re trying to hold up a dam that’s crumbling beneath our fingers. Because kids are kids—no matter the century. They’ll always be so young. Too young to know what matters, what’s important, and how fast it all goes. Too young to not be selfish and stupid and sometimes just straight-up mean. They haven’t lived long enough to know how to be anything else.
But that doesn’t mean I’m going to stop trying. Trying to make them better—everything I know they could be. By any means necessary.
So, I bring the hammer down.
“Research paper.”
And they groan.
“The topic is, propaganda and the ‘othering’ of groups in the lead-up to World War II. Five pages—minimum.”
“Nice fucking job, Nancy.” Dugan, a flannel-wearing, long-haired member of the skater crowd, throws a balled-up piece of paper at her.
“Knock it off,” I tell him.
Then I up the ante. “And I want you to write it by hand.”
Skylar Mayberry’s arm rises like a rocket.
“I don’t understand. What does that mean?”
I pick up a pen and a piece of notebook paper and demonstrate. “I want you to write . . . a research paper . . . by hand.”
She squints at me. “Why?”
“Because I want you to actually think about what you’re writing. The words and ideas you’re putting down.”
David Burke’s hand goes up next. “They didn’t teach script in my elementary school.”
“Me neither,” Brad Reefer joins in.
“You can print.” I point at them. “And use white-out or a pencil. If you hand me an assignment that’s filled with scribbles, I’ll give it back and make you write ten pages.”
They moan in agony again.
And it’s music to my ears. Growth is painful; change is hard. So, if they’re unhappy—it means I’m doing my job right.
~ ~ ~
During the weekend, on Sunday, Callie and I hit the grocery store together—because even something as boring as grocery shopping is better if I can look at Callie’s ass while doing it.
“Pork rinds?” I ask as she puts a massive bag in the cart.
“My dad loves them. Colleen and I have been rationing them, hiding the bag, or he’ll eat them until his stomach pops.”
She looks especially hot today, with her hair pulled up into a high ponytail, a touch of pink shine on her lips, wearing snug black jeans and a royal-blue sweater that highlights her creamy skin and hugs her round tits perfectly.
I come up behind her when she bends over the cart, rubbing my ever-hardening dick against her ass. “I’ve got some pork for your rind right here, baby.”
And I’m only half-kidding.
She turns, her face scrunching, and pushes me away. “Ew . . . you’re disgusting.”
I grab her hips and pull her flush against me.
“You know you like it.”
She peers up at me, biting her bottom lip.
“Yeah . . . maybe I do.”
She reaches up and pecks my lips—and I taste the promise of more to come. If we ever finish fucking grocery shopping.
I move to the back of the cart so we can get on that, and almost crash into another cart.
A cart that’s being pushed by Tara Benedict.
Tara looks back and forth between us. “Hey, Garrett. And . . . Callie . . . hi . . .”
“Hey, Tara.”
“Tara . . . hey. How’s it going?” Callie smiles.
And because Tara’s cool, there’s only a hint of awkwardness.
“It’s good. I heard you were back in town. Welcome home.”
A dark-haired little boy comes up behind her, Joshua, holding the hand of a light-brown-haired guy with glasses.
Tara gestures to the man beside her. “Matt, this is Garrett and Callie—old friends from high school.”
I shake Matt’s hand and the four of us talk for a few minutes about nothing in particular. Eventually we say goodbye and Callie and I walk over to the next aisle.
“So . . .” Callie says, walking next to me, “you and Tara Benedict, huh?”
I toss a box of corn flakes into the cart. “It was a casual thing. Not serious.”
“Right.”
“Was it that obvious?”
She shrugs. “A woman looks at a guy that she’s slept with in a certain way. I could tell.”
I slide my hand into the back of her jeans, giving her plump, pretty ass a squeeze.
“You jealous, Callaway?”
She takes a second to think about it. Then she shakes her head.
“You know what . . . I’m not. Lakeside’s a small town, we were bound to run into someone you’ve dated—probably won’t be the last time. Whatever happened through the years, it brought us both here. And I like here.” She takes my hand out of her pocket and holds it in her smaller one. “Here is good.”
I lean down and kiss her, softer, longer this time.
“Here is very, very good.”
Callie smiles, then resumes pushing the cart. After a minute, she laughs. “Besides, it’s not like you hooked up with Becca Saber or something.”
Becca Saber . . .
The back of my neck goes itchy and hot.
Becca is Coach Saber’s daughter—she was in the same grade as us, and the splinter under Callie’s fingernail all through high school. She was on my dick like white on rice, and not subtle about it. She’d drop by the locker room after practice, always making sure I knew she was available and up for anything. She got off on doing it in front of Callie. I told her to cut it out, that I wasn’t remotely interested, but that didn’t stop her from trying over and over.
And Callie . . . pretty much just sucked it up, let it go, ignored it, and kept her mouth shut. For me.
To not cause problems between me and the football coach I idolized, who thought his daughter was an angel straight from heaven.
“That would be a different story.” Callie shrugs, still smiling.
I open my mouth to tell her, because—like I’ve said before—a guy gets to a point in his life when he knows that straight-up, brutal honesty is simpler. The best way to go.
Except . . . when it’s not.
I look over at Callie again—and she’s so happy—gazing at me with the perfect combination of playfulness, tenderness, and heat.
Here, where we are now, really is good. And it could all go away at the end of the year when Callie goes back to San Diego. Distance was the reason we ended the first time . . . one of the reasons anyway. And if history is bound to repeat itself . . . well, fuck . . . this could be all the time I get with her. The only time I get.
I think about what I tell my kids every Friday . . . “Don’t be idiots.” And I take my own advice. Because only an idiot would waste a minute—a second—with Callie explaining and rehashing shit that happened years ago. That shouldn’t affect us at all here, now, in this moment.
So I nod. “Yeah, totally different story.”
Then I put my arm around her, kiss the top of her head, and we head off together to the frozen food section.