by Keary Taylor
Once again I’m amazed at how life can continue on so normal for everyone else when my world has been rocked by a nuclear bomb. Students mill about the parking lot toward the school. The busses roll in. Teachers collect things from their cars and head inside.
I watch them for a minute. Wishing I could steal their normal-ness, and live in those small moments.
“You can do this.”
I look over at Drake and see support in his eyes. He places his hand over mine, giving it a firm squeeze.
I open the door, and step out into the parking lot.
I’m scared for this day. I honestly don’t feel ready. I feel ready to walk about my apartment, attempting to clean up after the out-of-her-mind Kaylee of the past few days. I feel ready to cook myself lunch and to maybe flip through the channels. I don’t feel ready to have to face over a hundred students. I don’t feel ready to have to assign homework and teach something of value.
But when are we truly ever ready for anything in life?
I don’t say a word as we head for my classroom. Drake walks with me. We work our way through the crowded halls, and every once in a while, I feel his hand on the small of my back. It’s a reminder that he’s here if I need him, and that he knows I am strong enough to make it through this day.
At my door, he stops and I look back at him.
“I will see you during break period, okay?” he says. His tone surprises me. It’s him looking for confirmation, as if he’s afraid I’ll slip away into nothing again, afraid I won’t be here when he comes to look for me.
“Okay.”
I turn and walk inside.
It takes me a minute to figure out what is different about my class. Something feels off, something has changed.
It’s my whiteboard. It’s lower. Low enough I can nearly reach the entire board.
The hints of a smile pull on the corner of my lips. Because I know exactly who did this.
I didn’t even stop this morning to think if it was an A or a B day. Am I teaching Ancient World or Word History this morning?
I’ve just set my stuff on the desk when Lake walks through the door. His eyes fix on me and his expression is serious and firm when he walks straight over to me and wraps his arms around my shoulders.
He’s huge and I’m tiny, so my head rests square in the middle of his chest and that is as high as it can reach. But he holds tight and firm with sincerity I wasn’t sure he was capable of until the other night.
“Thanks, Lake,” I say, trying to fight back the tears that want to well up again.
“I’m sorry about everything that’s happened,” he says.
“Thanks,” I repeat. The warming bell rings and he finally lets go of me. He takes a step back, and stares down at me, a good thirteen inches taller than me. I can see it there in his face. He cares about me.
And I realize then that Lake feels like a little brother. I feel protective of him. I don’t mind that he teases me and that he’s seen me cry. I’m glad he’s here.
My students seem surprised to see me in class. But they’re on their very best behavior. They pay close attention. They’re deathly quiet. I have to wonder if they know what has happened. Do they know anything about Diana and Drake and me and that complicated triangle? Do they know I’m an orphan now?
No matter what they do know, I’m grateful for their respect today.
____
Principal Riker comes to see me during my break period. I can tell he’s angry. I can tell that if this were under different circumstances, he would fire me. And he would have every right to. But he knows the hell I’ve just gone through. So all I get is a stern look and a talking to that he expects me to be in class every day from now on.
When he leaves, Drake is waiting outside my classroom door. He walks in and sits in the front row of seats.
“I need to make a quick call,” I say.
He nods and I pull out my phone.
It takes me a few minutes to get through to the headmaster.
“I’m honored by the offer, but I’m going to have to decline,” I say, never looking away from Drake. “Thank you.”
We say our goodbyes and I hang up.
Drake doesn’t ask me what the call was about, or what is going on. He just gives me a tiny, lopsided supportive smile.
We spend our break period and lunch catching up on work. We silently plan our lessons side by side. We grade papers. We do what we’re supposed to do as teachers.
After fourth period world history, Drake appears in my doorway again. And quietly we walk down the hall to the parking lot and his car.
It putters and squeals when he starts it and I wonder how many more starts it has left in it. But it gets us to the grocery store.
Drake grabs a cart when we walk through the doors and side by side, we start down the aisles.
How is it possible that I can breathe when he’s around but feel as if I will drown when he’s away? He’s a life raft and I am a sinking rock. We walk next to each other, not saying much of anything, but just his presence is a million words of comfort and understanding.
“Bananas?” he asks, picking up a bunch of them. I give a nod. We walk a few steps. “Apples?” I nod. “Strawberries are a must.” I just smile back at him as he sets them in the cart.
This is a gift of Drakes. He knows how to make people comfortable and to put them at ease, even when their world has been knocked off its axis.
I recall the first day of teaching, the first day we met, the first day of school, when he found me about to have a nervous breakdown. He sat with me in the dark, and not sixty seconds later had me laughing.
“I…” I start and stop. I don’t exactly know how to say what I need to. “I’m here for you, too. I’m here.”
He smiles. He slips his fingers through mine and squeezes my hand. “I know.”
It’s as easy as that.
We gather the rest of our produce and head for dairy.
I don’t know where things stand right now, things between Drake and I. And I honestly don’t have the emotional energy to analyze it too much. But for now, he’s here with me and something feels okay for once.
I feel exhausted when we get back to the car. After we load things into the trunk, I lean my head on the glass window and watch the world roll by. I must doze off. When I wake, Drake has taken all our things up to my apartment. He wakes me with a gentle hand on my arm and I wake to his eyes.
“Come on,” he says quietly. He offers me his hand and I take it, letting him lift me from the seat.
There’s something simple and gentle, my hand in his, as we walk up the stairs. There’s no expectations or past or future. It’s just the moment of two people who have experienced something more than they thought they were capable of surviving and standing together.
There’s a duffle bag sitting on the floor just inside my door and I can Drake’s things threatening to spill out of it. He must have stopped at his apartment while I was asleep.
Together we put the groceries away. And then I set about the task of making shepherd’s pie. While it cooks in the oven, Drake and I sit on the couch, side by side and watch some comedic show that’s on.
But my mind is elsewhere. There’s that song again the one from the library, on the second day we met. Happiness.
Let it go, live your life, and leave it.
Then one day, wake up, and she’ll be home.
I don’t know that I’m there yet. I had to let it go. It crushed me to do so, but I did it.
I tried to live my life, I tried to leave it.
I woke up. In such a devastating way.
Despite all that, I think maybe, just maybe, I’ll be home soon.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Saturday, Drake leaves for a few hours to attend Diana’s funeral. I go to Dicks to spend some time with Skyler. He’s sad and he doesn’t quite grasp everything yet, but he’s dealing.
On Sunday, Drake, Armando, Anthony, and I all have dinner at my place.
We don’t talk much about what happened.
We don’t talk about the future.
We don’t kiss.
But he sleeps in my bed every night. He holds me close, wraps his arms around me tight, and whispers in my ear when the nightmares come. And I run my hands across his back and trace my fingers over his cheek when his wake him in a cold sweat.
Somehow, we’ve started living together. Being a couple again without actually being a couple.
On Tuesday, the last day of school before the Thanksgiving Day break, Drake grabs my mail from the box and we head upstairs. As Drake unlocks the door, he hands it over and I start sorting through it.
“How’d that big test go?” he asks as he takes his messenger bag off and hangs it on a hook by the door.
“Okay,” I say as I start sorting through the mail on the counter. “Most of the class averaged a B plus. Surprisingly Lake aced it.”
“He likes you, so he tries,” Drake says with a smile as he sits at the bar and starts untying his Chucks.
A smile pulls at my lips.
An envelope from an insurance company catches my eye. It’s big and official looking. I tear it open and start reading the enclosed letter.
It basically states that I am one of the beneficiaries of my mother’s life insurance policy. I’m sure Skyler is the other. Since my mother was young and in good health, and worked for an insurance company, she had a good policy. And there were basically no funeral costs, since there wasn’t one, and she was cremated.
“Holy,” I breathe when I see the check and the amount.
“What’s wrong?” Drake asks, concern instantly in his voice.
I hold the check up for him to see.
It will not make me rich. It will not make me set for life, or for even more than a few years. But for a teacher, it’s huge.
And in a way, it proves that my mother was really trying all along.
“From your mom?” Drake asks.
I nod and there’s a tiny pinch at the back of my eyes.
That’s all the cue that Drake needs to cross the tiny amount of space between us and wrap his arms around me.
He just knows when I need him.
____
My phone rings and I grope for it through the dim morning light. Drake grunts softly, his arm lying across my stomach. Finally, my fingers catch the edge of my phone and I drag it toward me. It’s a number I don’t recognize.
“Hello?” I say groggily.
“Kaylee, would you and Drake mind swinging by the store on your way over here and grab a pack of butter? I can’t believe I forgot it when I went out the other day. And some whipped cream for the pie?”
“Mrs. McCain?” I ask, my sleepy brain struggling to keep up with her. Drake’s head pops up from the pillow, a confused look on his face. He squints at my phone through the dark.
“Of course,” she says. “Who else would you think it was?”
I rub one eye. “Of course, sorry. What time is it?”
“It’s eight o’clock but there’s lots to be cooked before dinner,” she starts rattling. I can hear dishes clanking in the background. “You do know it’s Thanksgiving and we’re eating dinner at four, right?”
“Thanksgiving?” I say, not feeling up to speed with the conversation.
“What time do you and Drake think you can be here? I really need that butter by one at the latest. Though I wouldn’t complain about extra hands if you two wanted to come earlier. Can I talk to Drake?”
My brows have furrowed deep together by this point and I hand my phone over to Drake with a confused little smile. Drake looks just as confused as he takes it and holds it to his ear.
“Mom?” he says.
“Honey, I know it’s early and you two are probably still sleeping, but I could really use some assistance. You know how useless Sage is in the kitchen and your father and brothers are no help either.” I hear her, even though the phone is pressed to Drake’s ear. “Can you two come help out?”
“Uh,” Drake stutters. That look of his is forming on his face. “Yeah. We’ll get ready to go.”
“Thank you, see you soon!”
And she hangs up.
Drake shuts my phone and looks at me through the dim light. A small smile plays on his lips and he chuckles.
“I honestly hadn’t thought about where I was going to go today,” I say, looking at him.
“Sounds like Mom isn’t going to give you much of a choice,” he replies. He reaches up and brushes his fingertips over my cheek.
I place my hand over his, pinning his palm against my cheek. Until this point, I’ve just needed him here, I needed him keeping me afloat and alive, and he needed me. That was all we needed.
But we’re both thawing. We’re both surfacing back to the real world. We’re waking up.
And we’re both here.
“I think we’re going to have to talk about stuff,” I say quietly, never losing his eyes. “Soon.”
“Yeah,” he says. I know him well enough to be able to tell he wants to kiss me.
But we need to have that talk first.
It takes a while, but we finally break the moment and both roll out of bed.
“So is your family one of the types to dress up in their nicest clothes for Thanksgiving dinner, or the dress-in-whatever-clothes-will-let-you-eat-the-most-amount-of-turkey types?” I ask as I turn for my closet.
“Do you even have to ask?”
I look over my shoulder toward him. He’s in the bathroom with the door only half closed. He pulls his shirt over his head and leans forward to start the shower. I admire the toned lines of his arms and stomach for a moment.
“So jeans and a shirt of my choice it is?” I ask, my voice a bit breathy.
Drake turns and looks surprised to find the door partly open, as if he didn’t realize. His eyes meet mine, and suddenly I feel like we’ve just met again. A little uncertain and not fully sure how approach, but with undeniable chemistry. His lips go all lopsided and smiley. “That’ll do just fine.”
A smile tugs on the corner of my lips and I feel my face flush, knowing he knows I was checking him out without a shirt.
Drake showers while I get dressed and we both hurriedly get ready. We grab our stuff for the day and head down to my car.
I can feel the change coming on as we walk through the store. We’ve been there for each other but distant the last week we’ve been living together. We’ve had boundaries and an unspoken agreement of caution.
There’s a wave surging up and it’s going to leave everything changed.
And I’m scared and look forward to it all at the same time.
We get the items Robin requested and drive the few minutes to her house. And the moment we walk through the door, she puts us to work.
I’m in charge of the stuffing and Drake gets charge of the mashed potatoes. Robin whirlwinds around the kitchen, giving instructions, getting irritated when someone gets in her way, making jokes about how it might not be perfect, but it will fill our bellies.
“I think…” Robin says at a quarter to four. Her eyes dart from one dish to the next. “I think we’re ready to eat.”
I survey the damage and nod.
There’s food everywhere. The bar is stock full of vegetables, stuffing, cranberry sauce, this pink fluffy stuff that is apparently a McCain tradition, mashed potatoes, a huge bowl full of homemade rolls. The turkey sits hot and ready in the oven.
“Boys!” Robin suddenly yells. “Turn the game off and come eat!”
When no one responds, I walk into the living room and watch them for a minute.
They’re all gathered around the TV, watching some football game. I can see Sage pacing outside, talking on her cell phone. But the boys cheer as someone scores a touchdown. Lake gives Drake, who abandoned the kitchen the moment the game came on, a high five, and Kale moans and complains about the wrong team scoring.
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“Boys,” Robin suddenly huffs, standing beside me. “We’ve been working on this fantastic meal all day. Come and eat it before I have to get loud.”
“Yes ma’am,” Robert says, standing and pressing a kiss to Robin’s cheek. Drake clicks the TV off, giving me a little smile as he meets my eyes.
Yeah, something is going to change, and quick.
With the help of the boys, we move everything to the table and Sage darts inside. Robin offers grace on the food and Robert starts carving the turkey.
“What’s with all the phone time?” Robin asks as she hands the bowl of rolls to Sage.
“My stock just tripled this morning,” she says with a smug little smile on her face.
“Didn’t it just do that two weeks ago?” Robert asks, surprise on his face.
Sage nods enthusiastically.
“You’re going to make more money than me this year, and you don’t even have a job,” Drake chuckles as he scoops a heaping pile of potatoes onto his plate.
“I may not have an official job yet, but I work hard for my money.” She gives him a pointed look, but there’s a little smile on her face.
“When you rule the world someday, please forget about that time I pretended you were invisible for a week.” Drake steels a look at her, looking rather sheepish.
“You were such an ass sometimes,” she says, the words coming out in a hard laugh.
“Sage!” Robin screeches. “Language!”
“At least it was only a week for you,” Lake says around a mouthful of stuffing. “It lasted two weeks for me.”
“Drake,” I say, my voice accusatory. “You didn’t really do that, did you?”
“Oh, he did,” Robin says. She passes along the tray of sliced turkey. “And he got grounded for a month when I found out.”
“I didn’t think you were capable of that kind of mean-ness,” I say, my brows furrowing at him.
“He is an older brother,” Sage interjects. “I’m pretty sure it’s his job.”
“See,” Drake says, raising his eyebrows. “It was expected if nothing else.”