More than that, I didn’t want to shatter. I didn’t want Xavier’s words to matter enough to make me shatter. He didn’t have the right to break me twice.
Noah didn’t leave my side for hours. He stayed with me as I chatted with all my friends from school, always quick to refill my drink or push a small plate of snacks into my hand or stroke my back. He was quiet, perhaps a bit more quiet than his usual, but he was pleasant to all my friends. He asked about their grade levels and how long they’d lived in Boston, and he indulged everyone’s desire to know more about the idyllic town of Friendship.
Aside from questions about our storybook small town—which it was not, regardless of what Emme said—they all wanted to know if I was coming back next year. I had a really hard time answering that with Noah’s hand in my back pocket.
Honestly, I was having a hard time answering anything while Xavier’s words echoed in my head. I couldn’t stop hearing them and I couldn’t stop thinking of all the times Ihadforced it. I’d been convenient, as he’d put it, and I’d cranked up the intensity on that convenience until the only next step was an engagement.
I remembered not wanting to waste my time dating people who weren’t looking for a serious commitment, and making my priorities clear from the start, but looking back, I realized I’d basically put him in a marriage headlock until he tapped out.
If I’d just dated him without all that frantic energy, I probably wouldn’t be fighting to keep myself from falling apart right now. I wouldn’t be examining every single moment of the past few years and wondering which were organic and which I’d dragged into existence.
If I’d just dated the ex, I wouldn’t be standing here with Noah now.
I wouldn’t be married to Noah now.
I wouldn’t be in love with a man who’d only signed on for one year and access to my step-grandmother’s land. I wouldn’t have a little family with him, wonky and patched together as we were, and I wouldn’t feel as though I’d gone to Rhode Island searching for the remnants of home and I’d found precisely that.
Jaime waved to me as she approached with another woman. “This is your replacement,” Jaime announced. “Aurora Lura, meet Shay Zucconi. And we can’t forget the Daddy Bread Baker, Noah Barden. I told her she wasn’t allowed to be that girl who left the city for a small town only to run off with the first farmer she met but no one listens to me.”
“I thought we were on the same side now,” Noah said to Jaime.
“We are,” she drawled. “But you took my bestie. I’m still allowed to be salty.”
The first thing I noticed about Aurora was her funky glasses. They were an oversized cat’s eye style in dark, sparkly green. They were gorgeously excessive.
“I feel like I already know you just from inheriting your classroom,” she said.
“And I feel like I know you from everything Jaime has told me,” I replied. “Thank you for keeping her sane, by the way. I don’t know what I would’ve done if her new neighbor wasn’t someone who could hang with her brand of nutty.”
“Don’t worry,” Aurora said with a laugh. Her long, dark hair spilled over her shoulders. “I mean, she’s nutty. There’s no two ways about that. But she always has food in her classroom. I don’t mind the nutty when I get a cheese stick and some crackers with it. Cold seltzer too.”
“The snacks do help,” I agreed.
“Oh, this is cute,” Jaime mused. “It’s like an ex-wives’ club over here.”
“You know we love you,” Aurora sang.
“Yeah, yeah. I’m going to leave before one of you smothers me with all this love.”
As Jaime drifted to another group, Aurora said, “I know everyone here has been hounding you about whether you’re coming back next year. I don’t want to be another person doing that, especially since the next school year is approximately twenty years away.” She glanced at the beer bottle in her hand. “But please don’t worry about me while you make that decision. I’ve heard there might be a fourth grade opening next year if Audrey decides to loop up with her class and I really don’t mind bouncing around to different grade levels if I’m in a good school. I’ll be fine either way.”
Noah stiffened beside me and that subtle move shifted my glass façade. On a different day, I would’ve been able to bluster through this conversation. I would’ve been able to put Aurora at ease and avoid answering anything. But I didn’t think I could do that today.
“I assumed you were coming back anyway,” she went on, “since you left all your materials in the classroom.”
“Don’t worry about it,” I said. “About the stuff. In the classroom.”
Aurora’s forehead creased. “But your decorations and posters and books—”
“I’ll find new ones,” I said. Maybe it was cavalier to walk away from the supplies I’d spent years amassing. Maybe it was as destructive as running away to Rhode Island without any form of plan or future for myself. And maybe I was just too busy holding the patched up pieces of myself together to worry about storybooks and thematic decorations.
Aurora didn’t seem convinced. “There are a lot of anchor charts too. Those must’ve taken ages to create.”
“It’s okay. Really. I’ll make new ones. This guy can’t stop ordering markers so I have to make use of them somehow.” I smiled up at Noah. “Maybe you could order some flip charts next. We have a lot of markers and sticky notes.” He pinched my backside in response. “I might need you to remind me which books I used for the gingerbread unit or to send me a pic of some of the posters I made but it’s your classroom now. Don’t worry about me coming back to collect anything. I knew what I was leaving behind when I went.”
“Here. I’ll send you a text so you have my number.” She pulled out her phone and keyed in the digits as I rattled them off. “Would it be okay if I called you sometime to talk about kindergarten stuff?”
“Kindergarten is my favorite topic in the whole world. Call me anytime.”
