Twisting in my seat, I find Miles staring at me.
“What if she gives him a hard time because he reminds her of me? Maybe I should have requested a class change?—”
“She wouldn’t?—”
“You don’t know that.”
“I do, and so do you. Even though it pains me to say this, she’s notthatmuch of a dick.” He snatches up a baseball cap from the floor that he likely left in here the last time and slips it on. “Let’s get this over with. I’ll hold your hand if you want.”
A laugh snorts out of me, loosening a little of the tension in my chest at the same time.
Max runs ahead with Birgitta while she tries to put his blazer on, leaving me to gather up his school bag, sports bag, and the rest of the paraphernalia that children need for the start of the term.
I soon lose sight of them in the sea of pupils and parents fresh from Christmas break, all making their way through the gates. Some I recognize from school,though most I know because they’ve brought their dog/cat/rabbit, etc. into the practice.
“D’you remember our first day here?” Miles asks quietly. “I really didn’t want to be apart from you.”
“Only until you found out all our friends were in your class.”
“Yeah.” He chuckles.
Up ahead, Max comes back into sight only to disappear around the corner toward the reception building, where his classroom is, dragging Birgitta by the hand. In contrast, each footstep of mine is increasingly slow and sludgy like I’m walking through mud. My insides become knotted, and my eyes are on stalks as I scan for the first sighting.
It doesn’t happen until Miles and I turn the corner, and all it takes is a flash of lilac to realize she’s standing in the entrance to Max’s classroom. Regardless of how many flowers of the same name my mother fills the house with—the long, woody stalks and delicate petals in varying shades of purple—it’s a color I’ll forever associate with Story.
Her smile burns into my brain, beaming out at the children arriving, and I pause in my stride to watch her entire face light with happiness as she greets each one with a warm “good morning,” taking time to introduce herself to her pupil first, then to the parent.
Thisis the Story I remember. The one who was desperate to become a teacher, the one who practiced her morning greeting in front of the mirror and wrote her name over and over in her notebook for the day when she’d write it on the board. I’m so proud of her for achieving exactly what she wanted, even if I wasn’t a part of it.
Even if I didn’t get to see how she arrived here.
Her hair bobs along her shoulders—Iknewshe’d cut it—something she swore she’d never do. But it suits her.
And suddenly, I realize I don’t know this person.
She’s a stranger yet familiar. A stranger in a cloak of memories.
She was the one person I could tell anything to, and now, I don’t know how to talk to her. Don’t know where to begin. There’s so much I want to say that it would take weeks and weeks.
And now is definitely not the time.
I’m stuck in place as I watch Max reach her, still holding Birgitta’s hand, and I know the second he tells her his name. Her body stiffens, her smile freezes, and her big liquid-chocolate eyes dart around until they find mine.
My chest stalls. Six years of bottled-up anger and a heart mended together with Band-Aids. It’s like my confrontation a few weeks ago never happened. Thatthis momentright here is the first time we’ve seen each other since the fountain.
Neither of us blinks. Parents and kids flit around us. Her gaze holds mine as we assess the changes between us that time has brought on. The broken pieces of our hearts, the corners of our souls that we knew better than our own but no longer do. We stay there for what feels like hours but is, at most, seconds.
We stay until Miles brushes against me, and her focus flicks to him. I don’t need to look at him to know he’s glaring because I see it all play out on Story’s face. The way her eyes narrowed like they always did when he pissed her off before turning away to a parent callingher name and another child to greet.
We walk inside, and I hang up Max’s bag on his peg, put his sports kit in his locker, and ride the wave of flashbacks to my first day with Story sitting next to me.
I smile at all the parents I know and nod knowingly at a couple of the dads dropping off their kids on their way to work. The ones I occasionally meet for a beer or commiserate with on the really tough parenting days. Everyone else, I keep my distance from, because Max sprints back to me.
“Bye, Daddy.”
I kneel, kiss him, and run my hands through his thick curls. My mini-me. The other half of my soul. My life. “I love you, bud. Have a good day. See you later.”
Wrapping his hands around my neck, he says, “Have a good day, too. Don’t be sad that I’m back in school, okay?”
