The girl narrowed her eyes, assessing him. “I’m Piper. And if you’re one of Ms. Martin’s friends, why didn’t she put anything about you in her favorite things on her All About Me poster?” She pointed toward the back wall of the classroom. Below the row of windows that looked out onto the main entrance of the elementary wing of the Summertown district were posters with stick figure self-portraits and drawings of favorite things like flowers or pets. Levi wasn’t sure, but it looked like one student either had a pet dinosaur, really loved dinosaurs, or possibly was aiming to draw a hairless cat. In the middle of all the first-grade creations, he found Haddie’s poster. Her own self-portrait was also a stick figure, which, of course, Levi found ridiculously adorable. Then surrounding her portrait were what Levi guessed were the favorite things that told all about Haddie.
A soccer ball.
A pair of running shoes.
A Toblerone.
Two other stick figures, who were clearly Emma and Matteo.
And then rows of much smaller stick figures along with slightly taller ones. Her first grade students and her team.
Piper was right. Levi’s brother made the poster, but no mention of Levi himself. Ouch.
He cleared his throat. “Um, Piper… Did Ms. Martin say anything to the class about whether or not she was going to the home-opener football game tonight?”
The young girl crossed her arms. “She said she was going but only to give…” Her brows drew together. “What did she say again? Only to give someone a piece…a piece of her head?”
Levi laughed softly. “A piece of her mind?”
Piper’s eyes widened. “YES! That’s it! A piece of her mind. Does it hurt to do that?”
Levi shook his head. “It won’t hurt Ms. Martin, but whoever is on the receiving end is probably in for a world of hurt.” That person was either Coach Crawford, himself, or both. “It was nice to meet you, Piper,” he added. Levi’s knee began to throb, so he pushed himself back to his full height.
The young girl looked up at him with eyes narrowed. “I know,” she replied. “I’m delightful.”
Levi laughed, but he was interrupted before he could form a response to Piper’s very true statement.
“Okay, everyone!” Darlene called to the class. “Time to line up! If you’re taking the bus, please stand behind the yellow star. If you’re being picked up in a car, please stand behind the blue star. And ifyou’re being picked up to walk, please stand behind the red star.”
She pointed to three large star cutouts taped to the floor in front of the classroom door. As little bodies milled about and settled into place, Levi finally got a full bird’s-eye view of the room. Alphabet cards with upper- and lowercase versions of each letter lined the perimeter of the room just below the ceiling. A colorful rug with bright flowers and a train carrying all sorts of woodland animals was framed with yet another alphabet. And then surrounding the rug were five pods of three desks each, a decorative, laminated nameplate taped to each one.
All he had to do was look at the work she’d done in her room to know how much Haddie cared about a school where she’d only taught for one day so far. Levi’s prep for his high school health classroom had been nothing more than counting the desks and making sure the number he got matched the number of students listed on his roster.
“If you could tell her I stopped by, Ms. Darlene, I’d really appreciate it. Though you might want to tell her after the students are dismissed, just in case she has any colorful words to say about my visit.”
He weaved through the not-quite-single-file lines of first graders to the door and pivoted back to give them all a quick smile and a wave. Then he made his way back to the high school wing to close up shop for the day and hopefully figure out his next move.
***
Levi knocked on the open classroom door even though he could see Tommy sitting at his desk, eyes trained on his laptop.
“Come in,” Tommy replied absently, still not looking up,so—being the grown man that he was—Levi grabbed a forgotten piece of notebook paper from an empty desk, crumpled it into a ball, and launched it right at his friend’s head.
It bounced off of Tommy’s temple and landed on the desk.
Tommy sighed, glanced up, and rolled his eyes.
Levi grinned and pumped both fists in the air. “Muskies!” he cried in his deepest bro voice. “Come on. Aren’t you heading out to the field for the pregame pep rally?”
Tommy sighed. “Did you not see my father’s email after the faculty meeting Wednesday night?”
Shit. He’d been so wrapped up in Haddie’s reaction to the email that he hadn’t stopped to think that Tommy might be hurting too. Man, he was out of practice when it came to this whole friendship thing.
Levi rounded the rows of desks and attempted to take a seat in the front row but then realized he was not really high-school-sized anymore and opted for leaning against the window kitty-corner to Tommy’s desk.
“I’m sorry,” Levi told him. “But are you surprised? Your dad did exactly what you expected him to do.”
Tommy leaned back and crossed his arms. “Look… I get that this job doesn’t really mean anything to you. You’ll be in and out of here faster than I can blink. But this is my career, man. It’s everything to me, just like…” He blew out a defeated breath. “Like football and only football is everything to my father…and I guess you.”
