“I’m so fired,” I muttered, my head in my hands.
“Are you kidding?” Trevor wiped tears from his eyes. “Mrs. Hartwell looked like she was about to have a heart attack. I’ve never seen her move that fast. Mr. J, you’ll be a legend for this.”
I groaned again and covered my face with both hands.
“Mr. J,” Sophia said quietly, appearing with genuine concern in her eyes. “Are you okay? You look kind of pale.”
Her simple question seemed to snap the other students out of their hilarity. Suddenly, instead of laughing at my expense, they were rallying around me.
“Yeah, don’t worry about Mrs. Hartwell,” Madison said. “She freaks out about everything. Remember when she tried to ban the word ‘moist’ from being said in school?”
“Besides,” Julian added, his teasing tone replaced with something more protective, “if anyone gives you grief about this, we’ll set them straight. Mr. J, we got your back.”
The chorus of agreement from around the library made my throat tight with unexpected emotion. These kids—mystudents—they were defending me.
“Thanks, guys,” I said, my voice slightly rough. “That . . . that means a lot.”
“Just maybe warn us next time you’re gonna have a good night,” Trevor suggested with a grin. “We need time to prepare for the fallout.”
The explosion of laughter that followed nearly swept me away.
Nearly.
Students gradually returned to their research, though the occasional snicker and whispered retelling of the incident continued for the rest of the period; but instead of feeling mortified, I felt oddly grateful. The kids didn’t just see me as their librarian, some weirdo who lived beneath a mountain of dusty tomes—they saw me as someone worth protecting.
By the time she left, Alexis had a pile of books and a much better understanding of how to find women’s voices in historical archives. I was grateful for the distraction from Julian’s teasing, though I noticed I was still catching myself smiling at random moments throughout the day.
I glanced up at the clock and was shocked to see it was already 2:30. The day had flown by in a blur of research questions and impromptu lessons on source evaluation. The final bell rang at 3:15, and as quickly as it had filled, the library emptied—except for the evidence of the day’s academic battlefield. I normally insisted students take better care of the place, put books away,help file things; but there’d been no time. I’d been in the zone. And now, I would pay the price for that inattention.
Books lay open on every table, notecards scattered like confetti, and at least three different research topics had apparently exploded across the reference section.
I slumped over the desk, exhausted.
My voice was hoarse from explaining the Dewey Decimal System for the hundredth time, and my feet ached from walking students through the stacks all day, but seeing their faces light up when they found exactly the source they needed, watching them go from panic to confidence as they learned to research—that made it worth it.
Still, the mountain of books that needed to be re-shelved before I could go home made me want to put my head down and take a nap right there on the counter.
I was contemplating whether I had the energy to tackle the biography section when my phone dinged with the familiar sound of a text message. A smile was parting my lips as I swiped my phone to life.
Postie: Hey you. Read any good books lately?
Chapter 24
Jeremiah
Isat in my truck, surrounded by packages still waiting to be delivered, staring at my phone like it was some hospital monitor beeping the life out of me.
But it wasn’t beeping. It wasn’t blinking. The dumb typing bubble wasn’t dancing or wiggling or doing a darn thing.
Theo hadn’t even read my message yet. It had been three whole minutes.
God, I was a sad puppy.
Then the dots began to dance—and so did my heart. A massive smile flared on my face as I waited for his words.
How could one man turn my whole world upside down with little more than the flick of his thumbs?
The more I thought about that question, the naughtier it sounded.
