I didn’t bother taking my car when I left Second Chances. I knew better because there was nothing but drunkenness in my future for the night.

Instead, I walked across town to the first bar I could find, without paying any attention to the name of it. It didn’t matter what it was or where it was, so long as it served alcohol. I stormed inside, tears streaming down my cheeks, and made a beeline for the bartender. He watched me with wide eyes as I approached, probably thinking I was a basket case coming in to hold the place up for what little dough it had, but instead I slumped down at the bar stool and ordered a shot of gin, the strongest he could find.

The bartender didn’t object, probably knowing better, and slid me a shot glass. I knocked it back in one go without a chaser and ordered another one, this time a double. I barked at the bartender to keep them coming until I couldn’t order them anymore, and he didn’t object.

Why did I feel so shitty about what I'd done? If it was as right as my mom said it was and if it was the most logical thing to have done, then why did it feel otherwise? The only thing I could see, no matter how blurry my vision got thanks to the alcohol, was the look on George’s face the last time I looked at him before I left Second Chances.

He looked destroyed, utterly ruined, and I only had myself to blame for that. As awful as it was, it wasn’t over yet. I still had to tell Parker, still had to face him once he put the pieces together—and it wouldn’t take long. Parker was a smart kid, possibly too quick for his own good, and he'd bonded with me.

More than once I considered storming out of the bar and back over to Second Chances to beg George to forgive me—but it was too late for that. Nothing I could say or do now would convince him to take me back, to believe that I was acting irrationally before. No matter how I sliced it, things were done, we were finished.

I should’ve known better, should’ve known that getting involved with George was a terrible idea from the start. If I'd listened to Mom weeks ago, if I'd never come down south in the first place, none of this would’ve happened. I'd met the right person in the wrong place and wrong time.

That was the worst part. In any other situation, if I’d met George in any different context, we would’ve been a perfect match—despite all of our surface level differences. There was nothing inherently wrong with the relationship, at least not as it used to stand, but because of my position, we couldn’t continue it. It didn’t seem fair, didn’t seem just, but there was nothing I could do about it.

Like my mom said, I had two choices: I could quit teaching, or I could quit George. As painful as it was, the better answer was to quit George, as much as it killed me. I ordered another double shot and had just knocked it back when a gaggle of voices invaded my senses, coming from the front door of the bar. The scary part was that they were familiar voices.

Carefully, quietly, I turned on the barstool and almost had a heart attack when I realized Emily and several of the other staff from school had walked inside. Fear and anger both burned in the pit of my stomach. It wasn’t fair of me, but I didn’t have anyone else to blame, so I projected it all onto Emily. If she hadn’t gone digging, hadn’t come in asking those questions about George and me, maybe we could've kept going—but that was silly, because at some point it had to catch up with me.

If it weren’t Emily, it would’ve been somebody else, somewhere along the chain.

Still, that didn’t mean I wanted any of them to see me in my present state, so I whipped back around to the bartender, who raised an eyebrow at me, but I held my finger to my lips and silently begged him not to draw any attention to me. The voices carried to the far corner, thankfully far away from me, but I had to get out before I got caught.

I wasn’t sure I could stand reliably, wasn’t sure I wouldn’t fall as soon as I tried to put my feet back on the ground. I'd knocked back the alcohol quickly, so it hadn’t quite set in, but in the few moments that I sat contemplating everything and how it wasn’t fair, the alcohol had kicked in with a vengeance.

But I had to get out, and I had to do it fast before I was recognized.

Carefully, I pushed back from the bar stool and almost fell, as predicted. Still, I managed to straighten myself up enough to be able to take a few steps forward before I tripped on my own ankle and nearly went sprawling across the bar floor. Hands caught and held me up.

When I looked up, horrified, it was Emily who'd caught me. Oh man, talk about rock-bottom.

“Clay? Are you okay?” Emily asked, and all my will seemed to evaporate as soon as the words left her mouth. My boss, the one who'd come knocking and asking uncomfortable questions about George and me, had also just caught me boldfaced drunk after school. It couldn’t have looked good, no matter what.

“Me? I’m just peachy,” I slurred, horrified at my own behavior. Emily chuckled and shook her head.

“Really? You don’t look like you’re peachy,” she said. “Why don’t you come and sit down with us?” she asked. That was the last thing I wanted. It was bad enough Emily had seen me this way; I didn’t need the rest of the staff to see me too.

“That’s okay. I think I’ve had enough, I’m just going to go home and sleep it off,” I said.

“I don’t think you're fit to walk home, much less drive somewhere. Come on, stay with us, we'll make sure you get home safe,” Emily said.

“Emily, please, don’t take me over to the rest of the staff. I don’t want them to see me like this,” I said, tears forming in the corners of my eyes. Emily furrowed her brow at me in concern, but she seemed to realize what I was saying, because she took me back over to the bar stool and sat down beside me, helping me get back into a stool myself.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Emily asked, low enough that I was only one who could hear her.

“No, honestly, I’m a fucking disaster,” I laughed, though it wasn’t funny.

“What’s going on?” she asked.

“Promise this is off the record?” I asked.

“Yeah, sure, but why?” she asked.

“It’s about Parker’s dad,” I said, and Emily smirked.

“Somehow I thought you might say that,” she said. Great, so not only did she have an inkling about things before, she’d already figured me out, put two and two together. Was I that obvious? “Do you want to tell me what’s going on? We don’t have to talk about it, but I’m concerned about you.”

“No, it’s fine, I don’t want you to think I’m here casually drinking myself to death,” I said, and she laughed. “We broke up. Well, I should say that I broke up with George, not the other way around.”

“Really? Why? It seemed to me, at least from what I heard, that you guys were getting along pretty well,” Emily said.

“Wait, how did you know?” I asked.

“Oh, come on, Clay, you’re a teacher in Beauclaire. Haven’t you learned there’s no such thing as secrets yet?” Emily asked. “People gossip,” she continued.

“Yeah, I guess I should’ve seen that coming. I don’t know why I thought I could keep it a secret in the first place,” I said.

“Anyway, it doesn’t matter how I found out. Why did you guys go south?”

“Honestly, because of you,” I said, and she looked horrified.

“What? Why?” she asked.

“Well, when you came to talk to me in my office the other day, asked me about Parker and the wedding I went to play some music at, I thought you were digging around because you were concerned about me seeing the parent of a student,” I said. She looked like she might laugh for a moment but quickly collected herself.

“Why would you think that?” she asked. “Have I ever given you any indication I’m a troublemaker like that?”

“No, you've been nothing but great to me, but I still got concerned,” I said. Now that I said it out loud, verbalized the feelings, I realized how ridiculous they sounded.

“Why?”

“I don’t know; it’s hard to explain. I mean, there’s all kinds of stories out there about bad stuff happening with teachers getting involved with people in the community,” I said. “I just thought maybe you were trying to avoid a potential schoolwide scandal or something. If I were you, I wouldn’t have done anything differently.”

“That’s the last thing I would’ve done, trust me. Do you think you’re the first person to date someone that has a connection to the school?” she asked. It sounded silly, and that’s undoubtedly how she meant it, but I did think I was the first one.

“What if I did?” I asked, and she chuckled.

“Clay, I don’t know if anyone has ever told you this, but the whole world doesn’t revolve around you,” she said.

“No, you’re definitely not the first person to tell me that, but it doesn’t get any easier to hear,” I said. Emily chuckled at me and wrapped an arm around my shoulder, squeezing it.

“I’m sorry you had to go through this. Why didn’t you just come and talk to me?” Emily asked.

“Well, that would require being an adult and no one has ever accused me of being one of those before,” I said, and she laughed again.

“I’m not sure if that’s the alcohol talking, or if that’s your self-consciousness shining through, but either way, you're ridiculous,” Emily said. “All I want is for you to be happy in this job, Clay. If you'd just come to me and told me that you were seeing George, had just leveled with me, we could’ve worked with it. It’s not like it would’ve ballooned out into some big scandal that ruined your career or something,” she said, and I stared over at her. How could she say that so nonchalantly, like it was the most natural thing in the world to do?

And how badly had I fucked up?

“Well, it doesn’t matter now anyway,” I said.

“Why not?”

“Because I broke up with George. I told him I couldn’t see him anymore. After you came and talked to me about Parker, I was terrified you were digging into my business because you'd heard rumors and were trying to telegraph that I needed to call it quits,” I said. Emily stared back at me, her eyes wide, her eyebrows raised.

“Are you serious?”

“As serious as a heart attack,” I said.

“Clay, honey, you’ve got to stop acting on your impulses,” Emily said with a laugh. “How is Parker taking all this?”

“I haven’t told him yet. I literally just broke up with George just an hour ago, before I came here,” I said.

“Well, that certainly explains why you’re drinking so much,” Emily said, side-eyeing my empty shot glass and the line of other empties in front of me the bartender had failed to pick up. “And why you almost fell into my arms when we came in.”

“What else are you supposed to do when you feel like shit?” I asked with a laugh.

“You’ve got to get him back; you can’t just let him go like this,” Emily said. “I don’t know what your relationship with him was like, but I know it must’ve been good to make you crash off the edge like this when it came to an end. Jesus, Clay, I still can’t believe you did this because you thought I disapproved or something,” she said.

“Well, I don’t exactly have a good track record of people in my life approving of my decisions, so sue me,” I said, and she laughed again.

“Well, I feel responsible for this, even if it isn’t my fault. How are we going to patch things up? How can I help you get George back?” she asked.

“I’m not sure I can at this point. George was hurt when I told him I couldn’t see him anymore, especially because the only reason I could give him was my job,” I said.

“Well, I hate to break it to you, but I’m certainly not gonna let you quit to go be with George,” Emily said, though she winked at me. “So we'll have to come up with something else. Wait, isn’t there a band concert coming up soon?” she asked, and though I tried to temper my enthusiasm, my heart almost jumped right out of my throat and landed on the bar counter in front of me.

“Yeah, there is, why?” I asked with my heart hammering, not daring to follow her train of thought.

“What if we did something there? What if we made some statement, or something like that, played a song or something?” Emily asked.

“Don’t you think that’s a little cheesy?” I asked.

“Clay, honey, you’re a band teacher, cheesy runs in your blood,” she laughed, patting me on the shoulder again.

“I guess I can't argue with that, can I?” I asked. Still, I couldn’t think of anything to do. Would it work? What if I just made a bigger fool of myself in front of the entire student body's families? What if they took it the wrong way, thought that I was in their face about things? And what if George didn’t show?

“But I don’t know for sure that George is going to be there,” I said.

“Parker is still in the band, isn’t he?” she asked.

“Maybe for now, but once George tells him that I broke up with him, he might not want to see me anymore. I wouldn’t blame him, to be honest,” I said, holding my head in my hands. As painful as the split with George had been, I couldn’t bear the idea of seeing Parker again, of having to tell him what happened and why. Because I couldn’t explain it, not even to myself, especially after having this conversation with Emily.

“I don’t think Parker will be dropping out of band anytime soon if you ask me,” Emily said.

“Then what are we supposed to do?”

“I don’t know. You’re the creative one, the music teacher, you come up with something and tell me,” Emily said. “But before you get carried away thinking about it, are you going to be okay to get home? I’d be happy to drive you.”

“No, that’s okay. I don’t live far from here, and I can walk if I have to. I would rather not be seen on a drive of shame with my boss if you don’t mind,” I said, and Emily laughed.

“That’s fine, just don’t do anything else stupid tonight. Can you promise me that?” Emily asked.

“I can promise that,” I said and she squeezed my shoulder one last time before she stood up and left me alone again. On the surface, her idea to do something at the band concert seemed silly, borderline absurd, but the more I thought about it, the more I liked it.

It wouldn’t be all that different from what Dan had done for Jason at their wedding. He wrote an original song and played it before they officially became husband and husband. That thought alone sparked others in my head. What if I did something similar? What if I wrote a song and played it for George as my way of saying I was sorry?

It was corny, horribly corny, but it would be the best I could do. There weren’t any words I could come up with that would say I was sorry, that could accurately express it, so I might have to do it with music. But I had to make sure George was still coming to the concert, that he wasn’t going to pull Parker out of the band, and to do that I needed to talk to Parker.

I had to go for it, as ridiculous as it seemed. I had no assurances that George or Parker would forgive me, that they would overlook this blip in judgment on my part, but if they loved me even a sliver as much as I cared for them, I hoped they would.