Chemistry Lessons

by Rebecca H Jamison

  Her students barely noticed the bell when it rang. “We’ll have to keep talking about this next time we meet,” Rosie promised, signaling that it was time for the students to leave.

  Rosie watched the students exit the classroom, still discussing difficult situations they had encountered.

  Destry gave Rosie a fist bump. “That was extraordinary.”

  At his words, she beamed. Knowing how well he interacted with his own students, she valued his opinion more than any other teacher’s. “Thanks for coming. I’m not sure anyone would have dared laugh if you hadn’t been there.”

  “I was happy to help.” He tipped his head in the direction of the faculty lounge. “Are you staying for lunch? I was hoping you could look over my students’ essays. I can’t tell whether I should be pleased or worried.”

  She grabbed her purse and water bottle from her bottom drawer. Then she remembered Tanner was taking her to La Cocina. “I’m going out for lunch today, but I’d be happy to look over it after school.”

  Maybe it was her imagination, but it seemed that a look of disappointment crossed Destry’s features before he smiled. “I’ll see you after school then.”

  She watched him saunter down the hall in the direction of the faculty lounge. For the first time, it struck her how very alone Destry was in Lone Spur. He had no family, and he interacted more with the students than with the other teachers.

  Then Mercedes turned the corner, heading toward him. She wore a lacy, light pink skirt, the kind that would have made Rosie look like an overgrown poodle. Of course, Mercedes looked more like a model as she smiled up at Destry. “I was wondering where you were.” She executed a perfect pivot turn and headed toward the teacher’s lounge with him, walking close enough to let him know she liked him.

  Rosie should not have stood watching them as long as she did. She waited until they turned the corner before she walked out the side exit. Tanner sat in his truck at the edge of the parking lot. “Guess what’s up on the internet already?” he asked as she slid into the passenger seat.

  She was still thinking of Destry and Mercedes. “What?”

  “Your paintings.” He turned his phone for her to see. She blinked, trying to forget about Destry. There, on the auction website were two of the paintings that had hung on Grandma’s wall for decades. It didn’t seem real that they could be worth so much money. Within two months’ time, they would be auctioned off, and she would have enough for their down payment.

  Once they got to the restaurant and sat at their booth in the back, Janessa bounced over to wait on them. “What can I get you today?” Her words tumbled out with the lilting tones of a former cheerleader.

  For the first time since the accident, Rosie raised her eyes to look Janessa in the face. She was still Rosie’s former student. Though Rosie couldn’t yet forgive her, she could fear for Janessa in that anxious way a teacher can predict a student’s future. This was a smart girl who spent her days serving tables and her nights staggering from bar to bar. Would she ever change?

  More than that, would the town ever change? Janessa wasn’t the only one in denial. Mr. Moore, the bartender, Janessa’s friends, and the sheriff all seemed to overlook the fact that Janessa still drove while impaired. Even Grandpa refused to let Rosie file a lawsuit.

  As Tanner ordered a couple of enchiladas, Rosie searched Janessa’s face for a sign that she might have heard about the health lesson. In the girl’s eyes, Rosie recognized a stubborn defiance. She had seen the expression over and over again in the faces of her students, who only seemed to care about themselves.

  Once Janessa zipped away with their orders, Rosie told Tanner about her lesson, keeping her voice hushed in case anyone happened to be eavesdropping. She felt relieved that the videos made an impact on her students, but nervousness still plagued her. At any moment, Mr. Moore could call her into his office, where she would have to justify her actions.

  Rosie looked around the restaurant at the townspeople. Her grandmother’s best friend sat on the other side of the restaurant at the table by the front window. Jade sat with a few of the other teachers just a few booths over. And next to them sat Mrs. Santiago who traded Grandpa her homemade bread for milk. None of them deserved to die the way her grandmother had.

  Tanner covered her hand with his. “You did the right thing, Rosie. I’m proud of you. And who knows? You might have saved someone’s life.”

  Rosie swallowed. “I hope so.”

  A few minutes later, Janessa rushed in with their enchiladas. This time, Rosie stared down at the food, avoiding eye contact. Her stomach still ached from nervousness. She couldn’t help worrying what would come next.

  They found out soon enough. As Tanner pulled out of the parking lot and drove down Main Street, Rosie noticed the sheriff’s car trailing them. Although Tanner drove at the posted speed, the sheriff flashed his lights and blared his siren.

  Tanner pulled to the side of the road. “Great!” he said, throwing his hands up. “Now we’re both going to be late to fourth period.”

  “Maybe you have a brake light out,” Rosie offered, hoping this had nothing to do with her lesson. Word couldn’t have traveled to the sheriff this fast, could it? Even if Mr. Moore knew already, he wouldn’t have had time to tell anyone else yet.

  Sheriff Dan Moore, a pot-bellied man with a bad dye job and a comb-over, approached the driver’s side. Tanner rolled down his window. “Good morning, sir,” Tanner said in a tone of respect.

  But the sheriff wasn’t looking at Tanner. He stared straight at Rosie in a way that let her know that this was all because of her. “I just clocked you at ten miles over the limit.” Right then, a gust of wind caught the top of the sheriff’s hair and sent it flapping upward.

  Rosie sucked in her lips, trying to hold back laughter. The worst thing she could do right then was to laugh about the sheriff’s hair. While Tanner explained that he had been driving much slower than that, she held her breath, but the sheriff kept glaring at her with his wing of hair waving in the wind. That’s when the giggle started shaking in her stomach. She turned her head toward the window.

  “Are you laughing, ma’am?” Sheriff Moore asked, scribbling something onto his ticket pad.

  Rosie shook her head, but even as she did, a laugh exploded out in a snort. She covered her mouth. “No.”

  Tanner narrowed his eyes at her.

  The sheriff looked like he was trying to suppress a belch. “There’s nothing funny about ten miles over the limit.”

  “Sorry,” Rosie whispered as the sheriff waddled back to his squad car. “But his hair. It’s like a tarantula’s stuck inside his brain and is trying to get out.”

  Tanner covered a grin with his hand. “I thought it looked more like a bat coming in for a landing.”

  By the time the sheriff came back, they had both regained their composure. “I’ve decided to leave this as a warning,” the sheriff exclaimed, “but just know I’ll be watching you.”

  “Thank you,” Rosie said, knowing the warning had more to do with what happened in her classroom than what happened on the road. But instead of regretting her actions, as the Moores probably hoped, she felt, for once, that she had done the right thing.

  Chapter 23

  Destry threw a tennis ball to the top of the fifteen-foot-tall dirt pile in his North field. StainMaster sprinted up the pile, leaving Destry in a cloud of dust so thick that he could barely tell the dog made it to the summit. Within a few seconds, the dog was back at his side, offering him a broken piece of plastic pipe. “What happened to the ball?” Destry asked, climbing up the pile of dirt.

  He found the tennis ball halfway up and threw it downhill, across his field. This was what Cody would have liked about living in the country—being closer to animals and farther away from people.

  This time, StainMaster brought back a filthy old sock instead of the ball. “Where’d you get that?” he asked, refusing to pick it up off the ground. He pretended to throw a ball in the direction h
e had thrown before. “Go fetch.”

  StainMaster ran. Then he paused and looked up as a V of migrating birds flew overhead.

  Since the construction crew of three men had gone back to the city for the weekend, Destry had wandered out to inspect their progress. Though it was early October, the construction workers hadn’t yet begun to dig the foundation of the new building. Their first month of work had gone into leveling the land. That was okay. He had learned from experience that construction was often a slow process, about twice as slow as the contractors usually predicted, and he still had plenty of work to do in convincing his neighbors that his specialized vacation home could benefit their town.

  His work at the school wasn’t helping with neighborhood outreach as much as he wanted. Even after the majority of students scored well on their tests, parents continued to complain about his lessons. At least things weren’t as bad for him as they were for Rosie. After her lesson on impaired driving, angry students—mostly those related to Janessa Moore—had started recording her lessons, trying to catch her doing something wrong. He guessed it was their goal to get her fired.

  He gazed across to the horse pasture where Alan was irrigating. Though the pump had broken once again this week, Alan had fixed it before their scheduled watering time. With a smile, he remembered the first time he fixed that pump—he had barely gotten it going when Rosie marched up and switched it off.

  He found StainMaster’s tennis ball and threw it toward some earth-moving equipment. The dog took off in that direction. It had a way of running low to the ground that reminded Destry of a lion chasing after its prey. The ball fell down into a hole, and StainMaster lost interest in chasing it. Destry walked over to get the ball. Curiously, the hole seemed to be custom-sized to the dog. Had StainMaster dug it himself? He gazed across the construction area to six more holes of a similar size.

  As he knelt to pull the ball out of the hole, an ATV hummed up the lane. Tanner and Rosie were at it again. He had seen them driving several times already that week. This time though, they stopped on the other side of the fence from where he stood. Rosie got off. She wore cut-off jeans, and Destry’s eyes traced the curves of her tanned calves. He groaned. Why did he melt every time he saw her? Just the curves of her legs could send him over the edge.

  After throwing the ball extra hard toward some of the equipment on the other side of the field, Destry walked to the fence line, trying to keep his focus on Rosie’s head. She wore a pink baseball cap, her blonde ponytail sticking out through the hole in the back. Tendrils of hair framed her face, and her cheeks glowed pink. “We just came from the bank,” she said. “Everything is set for us to buy the ranch in December—right after we get the paintings auctioned off.”

  Tanner reached over the fence to shake Destry’s hand. “Thanks for finding out about those paintings.”

  Instead of answering you’re welcome as his mother had taught him, Destry cleared his throat and said, “No problem.” He hadn’t intended to do a favor for Tanner. In fact, he wished the other paintings were valuable enough that Rosie could have bought the ranch on her own.

  The dog dropped an old hairbrush at Destry’s feet as Tanner surveyed the flattened earth. “How big is this place going to be?”

  Destry glanced at Rosie as she bent and reached her hand through the fence to connect with StainMaster. “I don’t plan to host more than twelve people at a time,” he said, avoiding any mention of square feet. “But I’ll have space for my parents to come stay here after they retire, and there’ll also be rooms for my employees to stay on site.”

  “You’re not going to hire from around here?” Tanner asked.

  Remembering what happened the last time Tanner didn’t understand his motives, Destry took a step back from the fence. “I’ll hire people around here for most of the positions, but I’m planning to bring in one of my psychiatrist friends who specializes in addiction recovery.”

  Tanner knit his brows. “Addiction recovery? I thought you said these would be former drug addicts?”

  Destry decided it was best to speak sooner rather than later. “They will be clean and sober when they get here, and I want to make sure they stay that way. If you have any concerns, you’re welcome to bring them to the Town Meeting at the end of the month. I want everyone to be comfortable with how I’ll run things.”

  A stiff breeze picked up, howling in their ears as Rosie poked her head in between the fence wires and nuzzled her face against StainMaster’s. It was the first time Destry had ever envied his dog.

  Tanner squatted beside Rosie and rubbed his hand across her back. “We ought to get going.”

  Rosie let go of the dog and looked at Tanner. “Not before we invite him to our party. We wouldn’t have as much to celebrate if it weren’t for him.” Destry would have liked to reach out and brush a stray hair from her cheek, but he restrained himself as she stood. “My mom’s throwing a little barbeque for us tonight at six—to celebrate our new life together and the fact that Tanner has been pre-approved to buy the ranch.”

  “It’s an engagement party,” Tanner emphasized.

  Rosie tilted her head to the side and smiled at Destry. “Will you come?”

  He answered in a rush. “I’d love to.” He didn’t feel like celebrating anything that had to do with Tanner, but he couldn’t disappoint Rosie.

  She had to know how hard this would be for him, though. She knew how he felt—he had seen the battle in her expressions when he told her he loved her. She had even admitted that she felt the same emotions he did. Yet she still chose Tanner.

  It was past time for Destry to give up.

  Tanner was already climbing back on the ATV as Rosie waved and hopped onto the back. “See you at six, then.”

  Destry raised his hand as she wrapped her arms around Tanner’s chest. “See you at six.” He watched them drive off, wondering how Rosie could have invited him to her engagement party when she knew how he felt. He supposed she was trying to be a good neighbor, but she might as well have strapped him to an electric chair.

  Chapter 24

  At 6:15 p.m., Destry sat in the closest thing he could find to an electric chair—Orion’s saddle—and rode down to the Curtis home. Chase McFerrin had shown him the proper way to hold the reins in case Orion started to buck. Ever since, Destry had been meaning to take the horse for a longer ride, and this seemed the perfect opportunity—he almost hoped Orion would buck him off. Ending up injured on the side of the road might be better than going to the party.

  Sitting there, atop Orion, Destry rose taller than a NBA basketball player. He felt that odd mix of power and vulnerability—the two emotions that invigorated him the most. This engagement party was just another cliff to scale, another deep-sea dive to descend. He could do it. If not, having Orion around would give him an excuse to leave early.

  As he approached the Curtis place, he smelled hamburgers and saw the row of tiki torches stuck in the ground around the backyard. No matter what, he would not stay long enough to see those torches lit. After presenting Rosie with the gift card in his pocket, he would eat something. Then he would thank her and make his way home. He pulled on the reins. “Whoa.”

  The horse stopped in the shade of a Cottonwood tree, and Destry searched the small crowd of people in Rosie’s backyard. He saw most of the McFerrin family, Tanner Smith, Jade Harris, and Tanner’s parents. Off to the side, almost hidden behind the grill, sat Mercedes. Seeing her, Destry loosened the reins and nudged Orion forward. At least he could talk to Mercedes.

  Remembering the game night at Mercedes’s house, he rode the horse around to the back of Mr. Curtis’s hay barn. He and Mercedes had stayed up late with three other high school teachers—all women—playing board games, drinking strawberry lemonade, and laughing about the most embarrassing experiences of their lives. It felt like the baby shower Destry’s mother once hosted for her younger cousin, and Destry suspected he might have been the only man to ever attend one of Mercedes’s game nights.
r />   He hitched the horse to a fencepost beside some tall grass, dusted himself off, and made his way to the backyard with his gift. He met Rosie’s mother on her way out of the house. Carrying a plate of sliced tomatoes, she waved her free hand high above her head. “Hey, you must be Destry. Glad you could come.” She rushed toward him, grabbing his elbow.

  He’d always been the type of guy that mothers liked, which, so far, had not worked out in his favor. He reached for the plate in Azalea’s hand. “Let me carry the tomatoes for you.”

  She passed him the plate as they rounded the corner to the backyard.

  There, blocking their passage, stood Mercedes talking with Betty McFerrin, who flapped her hand, sending her metal bracelets jingling. “You looked great on that horse, Destry,” she said. “I’m glad you gave him a second chance.”

  “He’s a beauty,” Mercedes added. She wore a red dress and had her hair up in one of those twisty buns. He noticed how pretty her brown eyes were, surrounded by dark, thick lashes.

  Destry set the plate of tomatoes down on a card table next to some other fixings. “Let me get you a burger,” Betty said. “You stay and keep Mercedes company.”

  Destry thanked her and watched as she headed to the grill, where Tanner stood, flipping burgers. Tanner had Wile E on a leash next to him. So far, Destry saw no sign of Rosie.

  “I’m glad you came,” Mercedes said. “I always hate coming to these things without a date.” She twisted a loose ringlet of hair around her pointer finger. “Not to imply that you’re my date. It’s just nice to have someone else come stag.”

  “I don’t mind being your date.” It was the type of thing Destry would have felt obligated to say, but this time he really meant it. Not only did she look like she could win a beauty pageant, she had a way of making conversation easy. If he hadn’t been so obsessed with Rosie, Mercedes could have already been his girlfriend.