“Good morning.” I smiled back and handed the secretary a coffee from the tray. “Vanilla oat milk latte.”
She gave me a bemused look. “How did you know?”
“Intuition,” I joked before moving down the row of desks to our school’s IT manager. “Black for you, Mr.Cowan,” I said. “Two sugars.”
I chanced a quick look to the right and caughtherwatching me from behind the glass wall of her private office.
Excellent.
“Oh, James,” Vice Principal Navani said as I held out her cup. “You’re so sweet, but I actually don’t like—”
“It’s black tea with lemon,” I said. “If you’d prefer green next time…”
I even handed a coffee to the gym teacher, Mr.Murphy,because he was always hanging around; the whole school knew he had a thing for our vice principal.
By the time I walked into Principal Unger’s office, the Dunkin’ Donuts carrier was empty. Nope, sorry, no more. I made a big show of dumping it in her trash can before dropping down in the chair across from hers. This face-to-face meeting was routine. Well, not even routine—more like arequirement.Because of all my absences, pranks, and inevitable detentions, Principal Unger had red-flagged me. I couldn’t tell you what it achieved, but it was the highlight of my day.
Obviously.
“Hello, Mr.Barbour,” Unger said now. She was dressed in a god-awful pink pantsuit, an oversized bow on her shirt. “Playing coffee boy this morning, are we?”
“Yeah.” I suppressed a smirk. “Sorry, I would’ve gotten something for you, but I don’t know your order.”
The principal didn’t comment. “I see Mr.Henderson has given you detention today,” she said instead. “Care to sharewhy?”
“Gladly.” I sat up straighter, feigning excitement. Unger would never embarrass me. No way in hell. “I moved his car.”
“You what?”
“I moved his car,” I repeated, and when that blank expression wasn’t wiped from her face, I backtracked. “The other day in English, he realized he’d forgotten some lecture notes in his car, so instead of leaving the class unsupervised, he gave me his keys and asked me to retrieve them.”
Principal Unger pursed her lips. “Keep going.”
“Well, you remember how sunny it was,” I said confidently.“I thought I’d move his car to a shadier section, under the trees. That way the leather seats wouldn’t get too hot.”
“How considerate of you,” she deadpanned.
“Thank you,” I replied. My buddy Ryan and I had stayed after school to film our dazed and confused teacher looking for his ride, since the shady side of the parking lot was forty yards away. The joke had gone overreallywell on Snapchat. Grace called me an asshole but thought it was hilarious, and Isa had texted a ton of crying-laughing emojis.
Even Mr.Henderson gave credit where credit was due. “Detention is nonnegotiable,” he’d said yesterday, “but well played, James. Well played.”
Unger did not agree. In fact, she looked like she could use some coffee. “You can go,” she said. “Straight to your locker, then straight to homeroom.”
“Hold on,” I said. “One more thing.”
“What?” She was pinching the bridge of her nose.
“My sister’s out today,” I said, reaching into my back pocket for a crumpled piece of paper. “Here’s a note from our mom.”
It was written on the back of a lengthy CVS receipt, and my mother had raced out of the house with it before I could speed away in the Subaru. “James Robert Barbour, you wait a moment!”
Principal Unger was not impressed. “You didn’t actually think I’d believe this, did you?”
I cocked my head. “Pardon?”
The woman laughed. “James, this is absurd.” She cleared her throat and read: “Principal Unger, Grace out today. Veryill.” She tossed the note on her desk. “And the signature is all but illegible.”
“Well, she was in a rush—”
