Page 10 of Working for the Teacher

“Oh.” A relieved laugh slips out. “Right. Yeah. Grading.”

He doesn't call me on the lie outright, but the look he gives me says he doesn't need to. I step back and let him in before I can embarrass myself further.

I lead him upstairs to the bathroom, and he crouches in the doorway, forearms braced on his knees, flashlight steady in one hand while he examines the damage.

“Burst pipe inside the wall,” he says after a minute. “This place have the original plumbing?”

“Unfortunately.”

“Old galvanized pipe corrodes from the inside, and you don't know it's failing until it fails.” He runs a hand along the water-stained drywall. “Bathroom's older, so the insulation's probably shot too, and depending how long this has been leaking before you noticed it, you might be looking at compromised subfloor under the tile.”

“How bad are we talking, worst case?”

“Worst case, we're pulling this whole wall down to the studs and replacing the flooring in here and probably part of the hallway too, depending how far the water traveled.” He glances at me, gauging my reaction. “Best case, it's contained to this one wall.”

“I'm going to go ahead and assume worst case, because that appears to be the theme of my life.”

A laugh moves through him. “Rough year?”

“You have no idea. So, is this something your crew can do?”

He straightens, and I notice how solid and entirely too sexy he looks standing in the middle of my destroyed guest bathroom.

“We’re booked out for a few months.” He looks at me for a second, something calculating behind his eyes. “I could work after hours, though. Nights, weekends. Get you back to a functioning bathroom.”

“You don't have to do that.”

“I'd be happy to. I'll need about an hour tonight to look at everything more closely. Get you a rough idea what this is gonna run. That work for you?”

“Yes,” I say, too quickly, and clear my throat. “I mean. Yes. That's fine. Thank you.”

There's a beat of silence that goes on a little too long, both of us just standing in my hallway with a ruined bathroom between us, and I finally remember that I possess manners.

“Can I get you something to drink? Water, or…” I trail off, because I genuinely don't know what else is in my fridge.

“Water's fine.”

I lead him down to the kitchen, painfully aware of him following a few steps behind me. I pull a glass from the cabinet and my hand is shaking so badly when I turn on the tap that water splashes over the rim and onto the counter.

I feel him move closer behind me, close enough that I can feel the warmth of him at my back even though he isn't touching me.

“Do I make you nervous?” His mouth is close to my ear, and I feel it everywhere at once.

“No.” The word comes out unconvincing even to me.

I turn around and hand him the glass instead of answering further, and he takes it without breaking eye contact, lifting it to his mouth and taking a sip. I watch him lick a stray drop of water from his bottom lip and think, with real and immediate concern, that I might actually pass out in my own kitchen.

“You always did get nervous around me.”

That stops me cold.

“I did not.”

“You used to twist your fingers together.” He sets the glass down on the counter without looking away from me. “Every single time I walked near your locker.”

The air goes out of the room. He noticed. All those years ago, all those hallway glances I thought were happening entirely inside my own head. He remembers it specifically enough to describe it back to me all these years later standing in my kitchen.

This isn't an embarrassing teenage crush on a boy who barely knew I existed. This is something else. Something that apparently existed on both sides the entire time.