by Aria Blue
Chapter 3
The vultures began to circle during the second week of school. The PTA moms, AKA, the vultures, were just a little too involved and helicoptorish for Presley’s taste.
Before Presley’s mother had passed away when he was sixteen, she had never behaved the way these mothers did. Presley knew she loved him, but she didn’t have to terrorize his teachers to make that point known. All the PTA parents weren’t bad, but there were some who acted as if the school staff and administration had no idea what they were doing. They had to give their two cents on everything. Presley’s stomach twisted in knots every time he saw them because they were always complaining about something that would be a pain in the ass to fix.
The four worst mothers were perched on the cushioned chairs of his office, tapping their pedicured feet impatiently. They were bad enough one-on-one, but now he was being quadruple-teamed. Presley had often tried to put the PTA moms on his father’s plate, but Dean McGuire refused to deal with them at all. “It’s about time you earn your paycheck, son,” he would always say. Not even Mrs. Wimberly could protect him from the vultures as she often tried to do.
School hadn’t even been in session for ten days and the vultures already had a long list of complaints and calls for changes.
Presley thought that Mrs. Cross, Mrs. Hogan, Mrs. Fields, and Mrs. McKenna must have called each other to coordinate their outfits. Each wore a tight-fitting tank top showing off their expensive boob jobs. Presley could always tell the real from the fake. He appreciated both—but he could tell the difference. Two wore black tops while the other two wore white. They either wore a pair of denim shorts that were too tight or skirts that were too short and young for them. To Presley, they looked silly. He couldn’t remember PTA moms dressing like that when he went to school.
Mrs. Cross, the PTA President, was always the most vocal. “Principal McGuire, there is absolutely no reason the dismissal pickup line should take so long. Many of the upper classmen drive their own cars anyway. Why does the parent loop take so long?”
Presley had always thought calling it the parent loop was stupid since very few parents actually used it. It was mostly nannies, assistants, and people considered to be “the help”.
“Actually,” Presley said, trying not to look annoyed. There were so many things more important than this. “I’ve timed it this week and it’s taking two minutes less than it did last year.”
Mrs. Hogan rolled her eyes. “We can do better, I’m sure.”
Presley nodded because arguing served no purpose with this group. They’d only gang up on him and he’d lose simply by being outnumbered. “Indeed we can, Mrs. Hogan. Let me meet with the staff and we’ll discuss how to work out the kinks.” He would do no such thing, but he knew the moms would become preoccupied with the upcoming Fall activities and forget about the minor issue. Mostly they just needed something to complain about for the time being or they wouldn’t feel like they were doing their jobs.
The vultures smiled approvingly, showing off their perfect veneers while Mrs. McKenna went on rambling about the construction going on in the school’s auditorium. Presley tuned her out wondering what Sara was doing at that very moment. He hadn’t seen her all day, even though they both worked in the office. He couldn’t help but think that she was avoiding him.
Before Presley knew it the moms were standing and slinging next season’s LV purses over their shoulders. He breathed a sigh of relief as he stood himself. “Great meeting, ladies. I have a feeling this is going to be the best year yet.”
“Yes, it is,” Mrs. Fields said as they each flashed him a grin. He knew very well the charm he possessed and how the moms talked about how hot he was. He was flattered.
“Thank God that’s over,” He muttered after the women ambled out, but Mrs. Cross hadn’t moved from her seat, much to Presley’s chagrin. Had she heard him? The last woman out had closed the door behind her so this one-on-one meeting had been planned. He glanced at the clock because he was ready to leave. “Mrs. Cross, was there something else?”
“Heather. Call me Heather. I’ve told you that before.”
She had, but it seemed unprofessional. The last thing he wanted was for the vultures to think he was their friend. Presley sank into his seat thinking of sitting in front of his big screen television with a cold one. All he wanted was to go home. “Heather,” he muttered. “Was there something else?”
She crossed her lean, tan legs and leaned forward. “Yes, Principal McGuire, I don’t want to take up too much of your time, but I was hoping we could have a personal conversation.”
Presley’s throat tightened. That was the last thing he wanted to do, but what could he say? “Okay.”
“I don’t know if you’ve heard—news travels so quickly around here, but Mr. Cross and I have been separated for a while. He moved out four months ago. We’ve decided to file for divorce. Our marriage just wasn’t working no matter how hard I tried.”
Presley had no experience with divorce. His parents had stayed together until his mother died. For the most part, they seemed to be happy and in love. “I’m sorry to hear that. What can I do?”
Mrs. Cross ran her fingers through her sleek strawberry-blonde bob. Now that Presley thought about it, she wasn’t a bad looking woman at all. Actually pretty cute.
“I married my husband straight out of college and we were high school sweethearts before that, so this whole dating thing is a bit new for me. Can you give me any pointers from a man’s point of view?”
Presley had no clue how to respond. Why was she asking him? Surely he couldn’t have been the only man she knew. Still, she had come to him so he wanted to help. He tried to imagine what he would tell his best friend, Ava. “Just be yourself. Take it slow and don’t try to make things too serious too fast. You’ve been tied down to the same man forever. Just date and have fun for a while.” That was all he had.
He couldn’t imagine being with one person forever, unless that one person was Sara Snow.
Heather’s plump pink lips curved into a seductive smile. Her boobs weren’t real, but the pouty lips were. Presley could tell those too. Her lips looked ever so kissable. “I have another question,” she said.
“Shoot.”
She uncrossed her legs, spreading them wider than necessary, and then crossed them again. “As I said, we were high school sweethearts. I lost my virginity to Benjamin, so he’s been my one and only . . . you know, experience.”
Presley gulped and thought what it shame it was to have only experienced one person, but then he was slightly jealous because she must have really loved Benjamin to make that sort of commitment. “Um, okay.”
He noticed Sara’s thighs clench. She was horny as fuck. If he wanted to, he could have taken her on his desk and she wouldn’t have objected.
A sharp knock on the door pulled his gaze from Heather’s thighs. Ms. Jones stuck her pea-sized head into the office. She always did that—knocked and then barged right in. Her glasses sat on the tip of her nose looking as if they were about to fall off. Presley always had the urge to push them up on her face.
Ms. Jones scowled at him like she always did, no matter what he was doing. Her mousy brown hair fell right on her shoulders. “Principal McGuire, I’ve been waiting for twenty minutes. Did you forget we were supposed to be meeting?”
Before Presley could respond, Heather piped up. “That was our fault, Vice Principal Jones. The PTA moms just popped in on him without an appointment. And you know our Principal McGuire, he always makes time for the parents of McGuire Prep.”
Presley raised his eyebrows. “Parents first.”
Ms. Jones smiled, but it was a fake one, like all of her smiles. “Of course. When you’re done, please swing by my office.” Presley closed the door behind her.
He’d only responded with an eye roll. He hated how Ms. Jones acted like she was his superior instead of it being the other way around. She wouldn’t even let him call her by her first name—Adella.
Heather chuckled. “She stays on top of you doesn’t she?”
“She does.” He wanted to say more, much more, but he needed to keep things professional. Ms. Jones was his least favorite person in the world, but he couldn’t badmouth her in front of a parent.
She bit her bottom lip. “Well, lucky for her being able to stay on top of you.”
Presley blushed at the innuendo and her boldness.
“Anyway,” Mrs. Cross continued. “I should go and let you get to your meeting. I’ll get with you tomorrow.”
Presley stood and shook her hand. Both their palms were sweaty. “Tomorrow.”
He stood in the doorway watching Heather leave, noticing how nice her ass was in her shorts—round and perky. She probably did squats every day.
A file cabinet slamming shut drew his attention away. Sara removed a folder from a drawer where the student records are kept. “Like the view? Some things never change, huh?” She gave Presley a half-smile as if she hadn’t expected any different and walked off.
Chapter 4
Presley didn’t have much time to dwell on Sara’s comment before he was bombarded by his best friends, Ava Gardner, who taught art, and Harrison Murphy, the algebra teacher. Presley had been pacing his office, making a list of things he needed to do the following day, when Ava looped her arm around his.
“Happy hour at your place right now. This has seriously been the week from hell. I won’t make it to Friday,” she whined. Her breath smelled like the cherry Twizzlers she was always eating. She brought them as treats for her students, but ended up eating most of them.
He pinched her nose. Ava was the cutest thing he’d ever seen. Long curly red hair that fell halfway down her back, big blue eyes, apple cheeks, and the smallest dimples. She was short and thin as a twig. They had been friends since college and even back then she reminded him of a fairy.
Harrison scoffed. “What are you complaining about, art teacher? Did you have a hard time teaching the kids how to glue macaroni to a picture frame? Did somebody paint the sky green instead of blue?”
Ava swatted him in the head as he ducked. Harrison was always teasing her about how easy her job was and how hard his was. Presley had to agree with Harrison. He couldn’t imagine having to teach algebra, which had never been his strong suit.
Harrison patted Presley on the back. “My third period is the dumbest class I’ve ever had. I need a drink. It’s going to be a long year.” Harrison Murphy was just as good-looking as Presley, but maybe not as charming. Women went crazy for the mahogany-skinned, well-toned, tall, dark, and handsome teacher. Unfortunately, Harrison had the bad habit of treating women like shit. Like Presley, he had been hurt before, now every other woman he came across was going to pay the price.
Presley hated that his friends were already feeling this way so early in the year. Teacher burn-out was an epidemic, but for it to be happening during the second week of school . . . that was a huge problem.
He checked his watch. “Let’s meet at my place in thirty. I have a meeting with Ms. Jones about something and I’m giving her ten minutes, tops.”
Ava and Harrison exchanged glances because they knew Ms. Jones and her long-winded meetings very well. “I mean it,” Presley insisted. “I’m going to be in and out and in thirty minutes the three of us will be chilling in my man cave.”
Ava raised her eyebrows. “If you say so. We’ll see you in a few—but probably not.”
Presley watched the two of them head out and he dragged himself to the VP’s office. Swinging into her office, he plopped himself in a seat in front of her desk, not afraid to let her know how he didn’t give a shit right about then. “What’s up, Ms. Jones?”
She sucked her teeth and glared at him. He hated the way her office always smelled like lemon tea because she never drank coffee. The smell of tea mixed with the old lady perfume she wore, though she wasn’t a day over thirty-five, gave him a headache.
Ms. Jones cleared her throat. “I was thinking that it’s about time we sat down to plan the Halloween Harvest activities.”
Presley sat forward. “Halloween Harvest? We’re in the beginning of September and the harvest isn’t until the very, very end of October. You made this meeting sound like an emergency.”
She folded her arms across her flat chest. “Well, it is. I know you love to leave things until the last minute and then have the entire staff scrambling around to pick up your slack, but events always turn out better when they’re planned far in advance. We need to discuss it and then we can meet with the PTA—”
Presley hopped up from his seat. “It is important, Ms. Jones, but it’s not stay-two-hours-after-closing-time important.” He thought about his two friends waiting for him and how much he needed a drink and relaxation. “I promise you, we can talk about this first thing in the morning. You’ll have my undivided attention.”
She frowned and stood behind her desk. “But—”
“I really have an appointment I need to make. Have a good evening!”
Moments later, Presley was wheeling out of the parking lot, headed for his condo.
Presley Manor, what Presley called his condo, was located on the top floor of the luxury building, only minutes away from the school. Both Ava and Harrison had keys to his place in case of an emergency, so they were already inside. The need for alcoholic medication was indeed an emergency.
Inside, Presley tossed his jacket on the back of his brown leather recliner. Presley Manor wasn’t your typical bachelor pad. No one would ever find piles of dirty laundry or stacks of dishes in the sink. A cleaning lady came in twice a week to keep the place spotless.
Presley Manor was furnished with modern, expensive pieces of furniture Sara had picked out from an exclusive gallery when they had been dating. The walls were covered in rare paintings Ava claimed would be extremely valuable one day. Dark wood floors, mahogany shelving that held fancy trinkets, and plush rugs could be found in every room of the condo along with a cactus plant. The place definitely had a woman’s slight touch. Harrison had hounded him to change the décor to get rid of any traces of Sara, but Presley could never bear to do it.
He headed to the back room of his condo, AKA, the man cave.
As soon as he entered, Harrison tossed him a cold beer from the mini fridge. Ava stood at the bar mixing herself her signature drink—rum and coke. On the large screened television played the repeat of some reality show on mute. Ava watched those shows religiously and then complained about how stupid they were. Presley plopped down on the sectional between his two friends and kicked his leather loafers off. “No work talk,” he warned his friends.
Ava took a long sip of her drink. “Does Sara count as work talk?”
“Yes,” Presley said quickly because she was the last thing he wanted to talk about. He’d rather talk about Ms. Jones than her. “Sara is an employee of McGuire Prep so she’s work talk.”
Harrison let out a loud belch. “Fuck that, bro. The love of your life has resurfaced. Not only that, she’s working with you, right in the same office and you have to see her every single day. We’re talking about the woman who ripped your heart out and stomped on it with her red bottoms. Then she—”
“Harrison, stop,” Ava said sharply. Then she squeezed Presley’s free hand. “But seriously, you have to feel some kind of way about her being here. You don’t have to pretend for us.”
Presley swallowed hard. He couldn’t tell them the truth. That he had just gotten to the place where he had stopped thinking obsessively about Sara and now here she was kicking up those old feelings again. “It’s awkward, okay? I think anyone would feel that way about working with an ex. Other than that, it’s fine.”
Harrison jabbed Presley in the side with his elbow. “How do you think she’s going to feel about you smashing Marcia.”
Ava coughed, almost spitting out her rum and coke. “Oh my God! Are you still doing that?”
“No. That’s been over,” Presley lied. It had always been important
for Ava to respect him. He didn’t want her to look at him as some womanizing dog. She hated those types of men. He didn’t care what most people thought of him, but he cared what Ava thought.
She stood and went back to the bar. “Marcia’s seeing Trevor, you know. He’s a great guy. He wants to marry her and I’d hate to see her mess that up just to fool around with you.”
“Ava, I told you. There’s nothing going on.”
She slammed her glass on the bar countertop. “I’ve known you for almost fourteen years. You think I don’t know when you’re lying to me? You need to leave Marcia alone. She really has feelings for you and I don’t want her to pass on a man who really loves her just to bang a man who will always be in love with Sara Snow!”
Presley and Harrison both gasped at her words. Harrison, because Ava had had the nerve to say them, and Presley, because they were absolutely true. The wound he had from Sara leaving him had never healed. He’d simply placed a band-aid over it and her coming to McGuire Prep had ripped it off.
Chapter 5
Presley was checking his emails when the phone rang. It was almost five PM and everyone should have been long gone. According to the caller ID, the call was coming from the auditorium. Reluctantly, he lifted the receiver.
“Hello?” He heard nervous laughter on the other end. “Hello?”
“Hey, Principal McGuire. It’s Mrs. Cross, you know, Heather. Mrs. McKenna and I are backstage trying to find the signs for the bake sale tomorrow. We think they’re locked in the storage closet so we need a key and we don’t see any of the janitor’s around.”
Presley sank into his seat. The auditorium was on the other side of the school. But what could he say? No, to parents trying to help the school? “Sure, ladies. I’ll be right there.”
He grabbed his keys and locked the door to his office because after he helped the vultures, he was going home.
The auditorium was dead silent when he walked in. The right side was a mess, covered in plastic sheets because they were having new lighting installed. He looked around and found the auditorium empty.