I had to bite back a snicker at the way Zero blanched. My shoulders shaking drew Ms. Brooks’s attention though, and she turned to me, giving me that look that said she could see right through me and was going to make my life miserable unless I did as she said. I hated that look.
“He’s your guardian, Mr. Reed. His failure is your failure. I’d suggest getting your work done so you can help him, or you’ll both be staying here through lunch tomorrow.”
“Wha–” I tried to protest, but her eyes narrowed and my jaw snapped shut before I could get the words out. Out of all my new teachers, she was the strictest. She’d probably bring the work to my house if I didn’t do it here. I didn’t want to piss her off. “Fine,” I snapped.
She walked away and I turned my attention back to my paper. It wasn’t that hard. Mama might not have been able to cook, but she was a whiz at math. She was a junior math professor at the local college, super smart according to Mom, and thought math was fun. She played math games with mesince I was like Isla’s age, then started teaching me harder stuff as I got older. I’d always been ahead in math, but both moms refused to advance me a grade because they said social development was just as important as intellectual, and they wanted me around kids my own age. I was always happy that they let me be a kid while still making math fun for me.
My chest tightened uncomfortably and it got hard to breathe for a second. Why couldn’t they have just listened to me and not gone out that night? I asked them not to. Why didn’t they listen to me? If they had, they would still be here and I wouldn’t be sitting in this tiny ass town being forced to teach my stupid ass cousin how to do math. If I could go back…
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
ZERO
I saw Jasper’s mood shift. I wasn’t sure if it was because I was bugging him, because Simone scolded him, or something else, but he seemed to curl in on himself and when Simone came around to check on his work again, he crumpled the paper and shoved it off his desk. That surprised me and I opened my mouth to say something, but Simone didn’t even bat an eye. She just walked away.
“Dude. What was that?” I whispered quietly enough not to disrupt the rest of the class.
“Nothing. Leave me alone,” Jasper snapped, burying his face in his arms and pulling his hood over his head.
I thought back to what the therapist had said about kids in grief. She mostly referred to Isla, but she gave me significant looks when it was about Jasper too. The random outbursts—and crying on Isla’s part—were normal for kids in grief. Something I said or did must’ve upset him.
I didn’t want to push, but the whole point of me being here was to get him to act right. I couldn’t just let him refuse to do his work.
Leaning closer so we wouldn’t be overheard, I murmured, “I get that shit is hard right now, and I don’t want to force you, but if you don’t get your shit together, you’ll end up expelled, and then we’ll be shit out of luck. I’m doing my best to keep you and Isla together. You gotta start pulling your weight, man.”
He lifted his head a little, frowning at me. “What are you talking about?”
I gave him a look. “The social worker shows up at least once a week. If she hears you got expelled, what do you think will happen? She’s not going to just let that shit slide. She’ll blame me for not keeping you in check, and if I’m not your guardian, you and Isla will get split up. The age gap is too big to keep you two together. You gotta meet me halfway here. You don’t have to be perfect. Hell, if you passed with all C’s, I won’t be complaining. I did the same thing. But if you want to stick with Isla, you need to do better. We both do.”
He studied me with narrowed eyes, like he was trying to figure out if I was just bullshitting him to get him to behave. I wasn’t. The social worker had been understanding so far, but if Jasper got expelled, I wasn’t sure she’d keep being so nice. I was doing everything I could to keep the kids with me. He needed to help out if he wanted to stay with Isla.
With a heavy sigh, he nodded and sat up, pointing a finger at the paper in front of me. “What don’t you get?”
I looked down at it, then back at him. “I don’t remember any of this.”
He rolled his eyes, dragging it toward me, then started talking like some kind of math genius, saying shit about fractions and intervals I had no hope of understanding. I lifted ahand to stop him. “Hold on, wait. I always sucked at math. Teach it to me like I’m five.”
His head dropped forward and his sigh was long-suffering, which made me smirk. I tried again. “Think of it as practice for when you’re tutoring Isla.” He lifted his head again, frowning at me, and I raised my eyebrows back at him. “What? You didn’t think it’d be me, did you? I know enough math to do my job, that’s about it. You’re the math whiz here. I’m fully relying on you to tutor her when she gets older.”
Something flashed across his face I couldn’t quite catch before he masked it, nodding slowly. “Alright, fine. But you’re not five. Pay attention and it will make more sense.”
He spent the rest of class walking me through the assignment, talking low enough not to disturb the rest of class when Simone started going over the homework from the day before. It was still confusing as hell, but I managed to finish the paper before the class was over.
On our way out, Simone handed Jasper a fresh copy of the paper he’d crumpled without a word. He accepted it with a scowl and walked out, leaving me to chase after him. I’d kind of hoped to talk to Simone for a minute or two, but I did promise I would be professional while she was still Jasper’s teacher. I didn’t trust myself to behave when I was around her.
I gave her a mock salute and jogged after Jasper, falling into step with him in the hallway. “So what’s next?”
“Gym,” he grumbled.
“Sweet. Xander said he shared that class with you. Are you two friends? He’s a nice kid.”
“Ugh, Zero. Don’t be weird,” Xander griped as his class filed into the gym ahead of Jasper’s. He must’ve overheard me, his face pulled into a grimace. “You sound like you’re setting up a playdate. Don’t make it awkward.”
“What? I was trying to help,” I complained, glancing at Jasper to see if I’d overstepped. To my surprise, he was smirking, and he rolled his eyes when he noticed me looking at him.
“He’s right. Don’t make it weird.”
“Who’s making what weird?” a new voice asked. The teacher, a big dude in a t-shirt and gym shorts, was setting up some cones on the ground and looked over his shoulder at us curiously.
