by Dan Wingreen
Really? People actually said they liked me? Because they sure as hell never said that to me.
“But that’s fine. Because even if everyone hates me and thinks the sun shines out your ass, you’re never going to get the recognition you want. I’m going to take it—no. Even better. You’re going to give it to me. Hand it to me, even. Right now. And then you’re going to have to spend the rest of your career knowing I have the best classroom in the school, and every single new teacher who comes here won’t know anything about me other than that I have 210, and that makes me the best. So don’t even pretend like you’re not going to accept my offer. I’ve heard you and Cassandra talking about how much you love your little raisin enough times to know better.”
Spencer flinched when he heard his cute nickname for Connor pass her lips. How long had she been eavesdropping on his conversations? Better question, how long had she been building up this fantasyland where Spencer was the super popular Teacher of the Year and she was the unfairly maligned outcast? Which was such bullshit Spencer didn’t even know where to start. He wondered if this was how people felt when they found out they had a stalker. Because this kind of obsession with shit that never happened was scary.
Aside from Cass, he had exactly zero friends at this school. Every shred of professional recognition he’d ever gotten from anybody he’d had to scrape and claw for. He was always too young or too short to be taken seriously; too hard on his students or too casual with them; he gave too many writing assignments and not enough tests; he spent hours making up assignments that challenged kids to think for themselves and hours more of his life reading and grading and trying to give commentary that was actually useful, instead of xeroxing a bunch of multiple-choice tests that would take a fraction of the time to grade; he’d gotten into shouting matches with Corbin over their reliance on standardized testing. Nothing in his professional life had ever been handed to him, and no one in this school deserved 210 more than he did.
Which was why a large part of him absolutely hated that Steph was right.
“I can’t give you the room,” Spencer said. He took a second to memorize the way her face twisted into outraged disbelief. Maybe looking back on this moment would help later when he had to deal with her being a smug cunt for the rest of eternity. “All I can do is tell Corbin I don’t want it. I can’t promise he won’t give it to someone else, and I’m not telling him anything until you talk to Julie and the bullying stops, but…” He cleared his throat. “But if it does stop, then I’ll tell Corbin I’m not accepting the room.”
Steph pursed her lips. “You’re lying.”
Spencer sighed. “No, I’m not.” She started to argue, and he quickly cut her off. “Look, if I don’t give up the room you can just tell Julie you’re not gonna threaten to kick her off the team if she beats up my kid again. You actually have the upper hand here, so don’t get your panties in a twist about what I’m gonna do. If anything, I should be the one worrying about you fucking me over.”
Steph frowned like she hadn’t considered any of what he’d said until right then. “How do you know I won’t?”
If there had been even a shred of her earlier hate or spite in her voice, Spencer would have called the whole thing off. Instead, when all he heard was genuine curiosity tinged with the barest hint of confusion, he decided to answer honestly.
“Because I think you’re a despicable waste of humanity who should be in jail. And you hate me right back. But you also know how much Connor means to me, and even though you know seeing him hurt is a thousand times worse to me than giving up a classroom, you still offered to help me protect him.” He shrugged. “No matter how young I look, I’m not a teenager anymore. I’m aware there’s no such thing as a person who’s 100 percent irredeemably evil, just like there’s no such thing as a person who’s 100 percent good. There are probably much easier ways for you to get teenage boys into bed, so I believe there’s a reason you spent all that time and money to become a teacher, beyond the obvious one. There has to be a reason you coach a girl’s field-hockey team when you could just go home at the end of the day and relax like the rest of us. I have to trust there’s at least enough humanity in you that you don’t want to see these kids getting hurt.”
Spencer felt ill even implying that what she did didn’t hurt kids, but he was pretty sure that was exactly how she thought. She didn’t seem like the kind of person to get off on actively hurting children. In her mind, she was probably doing them a favor. It didn’t change the reality of the situation, and it didn’t change how disgusting of a person she was, but it was something. An island of morality in a sea of filth.
She seemed surprised by his honest assessment, and maybe that worked in his favor too. The villain of her self-constructed fairy tale finally giving the heroine her due.
Whatever.
“Also.” He pushed out of his chair and stood as tall as he could, staring into Steph’s eyes with every ounce of stubborn determination he possessed. “If you don’t keep your end of this agreement, I will spend the rest of my life making every second you spend in this city a living hell. If you think people hate you now, that’s nothing compared to how they’re going to feel about you when I’m through. I’ll follow you everywhere. I’ll mortgage my house and spend every cent of what I get on the best cameras and audio equipment I can find. I’ll record you every time you come within ten feet of an underage boy. If you touch them, or flirt with them, or take them off for a private whatever the fuck you call it, I’ll send those tapes to everyone I can think of. The cops and the FBI and the media will be drowning in the amount of footage I send them. I’ll mail them to your house. I’ll find out where every single member of your family lives and mail them there too. I’ll mail them to your old college professors. I’ll mail them off to the local papers of whatever town you came from so everyone you grew up with will know exactly what little Stephanie McConnell grew up to be. There won’t be a single person in your life who won’t know what you are. And I don’t care how good the teacher’s unions are, when I’m done with you there won’t be a single school district in this country that will want to touch you with a ten-foot pole. And if you think I won’t, if you think I’m just saying all this to scare you and there’s no way I’ll ever follow through, think back to all those conversations you spied on over the years. Think about everything you overheard that made you so sure I would do anything to protect my son, and then realize that no matter what I might have said, it’s nothing compared to how I feel inside. I will destroy you with a smile, Steph McConnell, if you don’t keep your word.”
Spencer knew he was less than intimidating to most adults. That was fine. He didn’t need Steph to be intimidated.
He just needed her to believe him.
“So,” he said, extending his hand across the desk. “Do we have a deal?”
Steph said absolutely nothing.
But she shook his hand all the same.
*
The best thing about Tim’s job was, even though he had to get up during the ungodly pre-dawn hours of the morning, once noon hit, the rest of the day belonged to him. And while that would change once the new semester started and he had to drive three hours each way to get to classes, right now it meant he could always be at Spencer’s house when Connor got home, an arrangement that seemed to make everyone involved happy. Spencer liked knowing that his son wouldn’t be going home to an empty house, Connor liked having someone to come home to, and Tim…
Tim absolutely loved how domestic it all was. He honestly didn’t know how he was going to cope when classes started.
For now, though, he’d settled nicely into a routine he loved.
Then, one day, Spencer came home from school and everything changed.
It began subtly at first, a small fluttery pressure in Tim’s stomach as Spencer walked over to Connor without a word and pulled him into a tight hug. The pressure built as Spencer pressed a dozen kisses into his son’s hair, and it rose up into Tim’s heart as
Spencer began to speak. He told Connor he was safe. That he would never have to worry about Dean and Julie again. That he could go to school and learn and skip homework and barely pass tests and be stressed and miserable for all the right reasons, instead of being made that way by circumstances no one should have to endure. It was such a Spencer explanation that even Connor couldn’t be upset by his lack of tact. He threw his arms around his dad and hugged him so tightly Spencer’s face started to turn red. The pressure inside Tim began to blossom, slowly taking shape as Spencer reached over and dragged Tim into their hug. It expanded as Connor wrapped one of his arms around Tim’s waist too without even thinking about it. As if it were something they did all the time. As if this was another in a long line of situations where Tim was a necessary part of Connor and Spencer’s happiness.
As if they were a family.
The feeling simmered for a while, as they held their embrace for several long minutes; as Connor slowly pulled and wiped at his eyes with an embarrassed flush to his cheeks; as Spencer kissed Tim lightly on the corner of his mouth before letting him go; as they shared a quiet dinner in front of the TV, the first one in weeks that didn’t carry an undercurrent of tension and worry and dread. It simmered until dinner ended and Connor disappeared into his bedroom while Spencer pulled Tim into what might as well have been theirs with as many nights a week as he stayed over. It simmered until Spencer locked them behind a closed door and told him everything he hadn’t told Connor. About McConnell and her offer, about Spencer’s answer and his threats. Tim listened in awe as Spencer outlined the exact circumstances that had led to him giving up the professional recognition he desperately craved so his son could walk through school without being afraid. And when he finished, the feeling finally bloomed—exploded really; that is if something so quiet could be classified as an explosion. In the end, it wasn’t really a feeling at all. More a long overdue realization that Tim’s life had been changed forever. A realization that came in the form of a single sentence running over and over again through Tim’s head.
Someday I’m going to marry this man.
Perhaps that shouldn’t have surprised him considering how committed he was to both Spencer and Connor, but it did. And with this realization came another: that the different compartments holding each part of his life could no longer be kept shut. Spencer and Connor weren’t just part of his life anymore; they were the whole thing.
And it was long past time Tim shared his life with the people he loved.
After a long period of time where he and Spencer kissed and spoke quietly and kissed some more, he managed to make his excuses and slip away into the bathroom. Probably not the best setting for what he had in mind, but it was the closest bit of privacy he could get.
Surprisingly, his fingers didn’t tremble in the slightest as he pulled out his phone and called home.
“Hello?” his mother answered on the second ring.
“Hey, Mom.”
“Timothy! I wasn’t expecting you to call today! This is such a nice surprise, hearing my baby’s voice.”
If she had said those words to him even a few hours ago, Tim would have read in them a subtle rebuke; a chastisement for ignoring his poor mother for so long that hearing his voice was something to be noted. Today he only smiled at the fondness he heard in her voice, and realized he missed her too.
“Yeah. It’s nice to talk to you too, Mom.”
“So, what did you call for?” she asked in the absent way she did when she was splitting her focus. Probably on dinner. His dad usually got home from work in the evening, so dinners at home tended to be late.
What a coincidence.
“I was just wondering,” he said, “what time do you think Christmas dinner will be this year?”
Tim heard the tinny, metallic sound of a utensil being dropped. “What?” she squawked. “Timothy! Does this mean…”
“Yes, Mamma,” he said. “I’ll be home for Christmas.”
“Oh, Timothy! I’m so happy!”
There wasn’t a trace of smugness in her voice, only happiness and relief, and something in Tim’s chest eased. His mom really did love him. Maybe he should have been giving her more credit all along.
“I am too, Mom. Actually, I—I have some people I want you to meet. Is it okay if I bring them?”
“People? What people? Did you make some new friends?”
“Something like that.” Tim grinned as an idea popped into his head. It might not be the smoothest way to break the news, but he knew his mom. Once she calmed down, this would be a story she’d take special delight in telling for years.
“Tell me,” he said. “How do you feel about grandchildren?”
As the expected screams and cries and demands to “tell me what you mean by that right now, young man” came through the phone, Tim smiled so wide his cheeks started aching as he wiped away a few tears of his own. He could see his future stretching in front of him as clearly as if it were right outside the bathroom window.
And for the first time in a long while, he couldn’t wait to meet it.
Epilogue
Tim pulled his scarf tighter around his neck as a sudden gust of icy wind kicked up. Shivering, he picked up the pace, pushing through the throng of people still clogging the sidewalks even though it was 9:00 p.m. on Christmas Eve. Not that he could judge them, really, especially since, going by the grocery bags he could see weighed down by a familiar rectangular shape, he wasn’t the only one out braving the New York City winter because someone hadn’t bought enough eggnog.
Personally, he blamed Connor. That boy inhaled the stuff like it was air.
Although, Tim thought as the wind kicked up again, it would probably be better if it were air. Eggnog had to be warmer than the ice crystals currently passing for an atmosphere. Despite the cold Tim couldn’t help smiling. I’ve been with Spencer so long I’m starting to sound like him. It was a surprisingly warm thought, and since Tim could use any warmth he could get, he let himself sink into happy memories as he trudged through the slush covered sidewalks.
It had been a year since the first Christmas they’d all spent with his parents, and Tim had surprisingly little to complain about when it came to his life these days. His commute might be awful, and sometimes there were nights where he crashed on the couch of one of his friends who lived by ISU instead of driving all the way home to the house he now shared with Connor and Spencer, but his doctorate was coming along well. Dr. Payton was patient and encouraging and nothing less than 100 percent supportive when some Connor-related emergency kept him at home, as long as it didn’t happen too often. He made it clear he thought Tim would make a great child psychologist, something even Spencer couldn’t find fault with.
(Spencer hated Dr. Payton. He thought he was a stuck-up prick who looked down on Spencer for being a lowly high school teacher. It was ridiculous, because Dr. Payton had never been anything but pleasant in either of their company, but on the rare occasions he stopped by their house for dinner Spencer was always especially aggressive in bed that night, so Tim had kind of been dragging his feet on figuring out what the issue was.)
Another thing Spencer couldn’t find fault with was what happened with Edward Carmichael. Despite how invincible he’d always seemed to Tim, Professor Inappropriate had finally gotten fired a few months ago after multiple former students sued him, and the university, for sexual harassment and coercion. Tim was even able to get in on the lawsuit, which would hopefully help him pay off his student loans if they won, and he’d made a few new friends during their lawyer meetings and the biweekly meetups most of them had fallen into to bitch about Carmichael. Tim had never been more grateful he hadn’t given in to his advances after hearing some of their stories. Carmichael apparently liked taking secretly recorded videos and pictures as blackmail material, sometimes keeping his students on the hook for years for “favors” even after they earned their doctorate. There was a legal case being developed against him too, and Tim had offered to give testimo
ny if the prosecution wanted him. Even if none of them ended up with any money from the lawsuit, Tim still had high hopes that Carmichael would find himself in jail one day. Some of the things he’d heard Carmichael forced his students to do made Tim sick to think about.
Slightly less traumatizing was the fact that Connor’s puberty was moving right along at a clip. He’d even had a huge sexuality crisis earlier in the year that had gone on for months and involved all three of them as Connor had desperately tried to figure out what he was. Tim had spent most of his nights trying to talk Connor down from his increasingly frequent panic attacks, as well as comforting a slightly traumatized Spencer, who wasn’t taking this latest evidence of Connor’s growing up well at all. Which was a shame, because he had a lot more experience struggling with his sexuality than Tim did, and he probably would have been able to help Connor more. They’d muddled through though. Spencer curling up in the corner and doing his best to come to terms with the fact that his little boy was very quickly rocketing into adulthood, and Tim doing his best to understand why figuring out who he was attracted to was so upsetting to Connor. He’d never really gotten a coherent answer, but a few months earlier Connor had calmed down significantly, and these days he spent most of his free time flirting with a trans girl he’d met online.
“Because that just clears his sexuality right up,” Spencer had grumbled when he found out. Tim had rolled his eyes but otherwise ignored him. Spencer would never be the most tactful or politically correct person, but he never said anything disparaging to Connor about his first tentative steps toward teenage romance, so Tim wasn’t going to make a big deal out of it.
As for Spencer himself? He was probably the part of Tim’s life that had changed the least over the last year. He still wore his adorable cardigans. He still despaired over his hair, grimaced every time he looked in a mirror, and forgot to shower on his days off. He still had the same job. He still taught in the same classroom. (And so did Steph McConnell, something Spencer had laughed himself into a coughing fit over when he’d heard. In the end, after Spencer turned it down, 210 had gone to the next most senior ninth-grade teacher after Benjamin Rasputin, a woman who was two years away from getting her pension. Spencer didn’t want to jinx things, but he’d quietly confessed to Tim he thought Corbin might offer him the room again after she retired. By then Connor would be in college, and there would be nothing McConnell or anyone else could do to make him give 210 up again.)