“I’ll wait right here,” Ryke says.
I leave my door ajar for a second. “Why?”
“I don’t want to get in the fucking way and make things worse.” He fixes his rearview mirror, which is disturbing seeing as how he’s adjusting it after we’ve parked.
I shift my weight, hesitating. “I need you to come with me…at least until Connor arrives.”
Now he asks, “Why?”
“Because…” I pause. “I’m really pissed, and I’m afraid of what I might say to the vice-principal. The last thing I need to do is accidentally get my daughter expelled on her second month of kindergarten.”
Can they even expel her for my behavior? I blink a couple times. That’s a frightening prospect. Even worse, I’m actually worried something like that might happen. What does that say about me?
My temper.
I unleash all my claws and my razor-sharp teeth when it comes to my sisters, my children—my family. I won’t back down, even when I should.
Lily is right.
I’m one of those piercing corners on the hot-tempered triad. I eye my brother-in-law, his aggression palpable in his brooding eyes.
So is Ryke.
But I’m hoping he can maintain a level-head this once. For me. Maybe it’ll be possible.
Maybe.
Ryke wavers. “I may say some fucking shit, Rose.”
“Better the foul-mouthed uncle than the witch mother.” I know it’s what they’ll call me, and since I have many more young children who’ll eventually attend Dalton Elementary, I can’t set every bridge on fire. For their sake.
Ryke takes the keys out of the ignition. “You’re not a witch. By Lo’s fucking definition, I’d be a witch with you.” Outspoken. Hot-headed.
“You’re not a woman. You wouldn’t be called one,” I remind him, my eyes cold.
His gaze nearly softens.
I add, “Let’s not forget that I’ve called Lo names too. We tease each other. It’s what we do.”
Ryke nods. “I’m thinking more about what my daughter is going to have to fucking deal with.”
“If she’s anything like me, you can expect at least one person to call her a bitch.” I tap my nail to the frame of the door. “Are you coming with me?”
He’s already climbing out of the car. “Let’s go.”
Together, we walk along the cement path to the double doors. I hope fate has good fortune in store for us. I hope that one side of the hot-tempered triad can cool off for just one meeting.
Is that even achievable?
* * *
“She did what?”
“Maybe you should sit down,” Mrs. Morgan-Stuart suggests for the fifth time. I’ve abandoned one of two wooden chairs that face her sleek oak desk. Ryke stands beside me like a loyal soldier, and I combat the vice-principal’s hot and heavy judgment with a scathing glare.
She treats me like a sixteen-year-old who was sent to the principal’s office, and to be precise, that situation never happened. I prided myself on being a model student.
“I’m not sitting down until you explain why that warrants a parent phone call.” I swear, if they punish her for this, I will create the mother of all fucking storms.
“She kissed a boy,” Mrs. Morgan-Stuart repeats.
My daughter’s first kiss was in kindergarten. Of course it was.
“And?” Ryke asks, his muscles as strained as mine.
“And it was in front of the jungle gym where other children could see. It was highly inappropriate for someone her age.”
“She’s a child,” I say. “Children are curious, and it couldn’t have been anything more than a simple peck on the lips.”
“Regardless…it was still out in the open where other children could see and get ideas.”
I stifle this maddened noise that scratches my throat. “It was a small kiss. You’re acting like she masturbated in public.”
Mrs. Morgan-Stuart flushes red. “Mrs. Cobalt,” she scolds and avoids meeting Ryke’s gaze. Her embarrassment is unmistakable.
“Masturbation isn’t a swear word,” I rebut. “I won’t apologize for saying something we all do.”
Mrs. Morgan-Stuart is about the shade that Lily turns when she’s mortified. “I think it’s best if we wait for your husband. Mr. Meadows…you should leave.”
“She’s my niece,” Ryke refutes, the three words beyond stilted, as though he’s trying very hard not to include a fuck. I watch him mechanically take a seat in the chair and raise his hands like he comes in peace. Then he nods to me like let’s go fucking easy on her.
If we must.
I settle in the chair next to Ryke. “My husband is on the way. I’d like to discuss this now.” I need more details. “Did the boy kiss her back, did he run away, what else happened?” If it was an unsolicited kiss, it changes the narrative.
“He kissed her back.”
My shoulders slacken.
“According to the students, Jane and Wesley kissed a few more times on the cheek before the teacher intervened. We’ve given her entire class a stern speech about appropriate behavior between classmates, but the children are all very animated about the situation. We think it’s best that Jane go home today.”
Smoke gushes out of my ears. I swear to all that is righteous. “You’re suspending her over a peck on the lips?”
“Just for the day. Jane being in the school is a distraction to the other students.”
I rise out of my seat, and if Connor had been beside me, he would’ve tugged me down. Instead, Ryke is rising with me. I can’t think about the negative result of recruiting Ryke as a teammate.
I breathe fire. “The administration created more of an uproar by acting like kissing is the plague.”
“Mrs. Co—”
“She did nothing that’d warrant suspension.”
“Is Wesley being suspended for the day?” Ryke questions, still carefully choosing his words.
I fume silently, watching Mrs. Morgan-Stuart waste time by shifting papers in a beige folder. “Is he?” I snap.
“Wesley wasn’t the one who initiated the kiss.”
Ryke mutters under his breath, “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”
“This is insane!” I shout. “What kind of place is this? I didn’t send my daughter to the Academy of Kiss-and-Be-Punished.” I’m seconds from pacing.
Ryke rubs his unshaven jaw aggressively and then drops his hand. “Look,” he says to Mrs. Morgan-Stuart, “this is kindergarten. Why not just tell them don’t do it again and call it a fucking day?”
She looks disgusted. “Please, watch your language.”
The slip-up was bound to happen.
Ryke turns his head, and I think he’s worried about the future when his own daughter enters kindergarten. He’s holding back with his niece, careful not to step on my toes, but if this had been Sullivan, rest assured, he’d be as volatile as me.
“Dalton has values that will be upheld,” the vice-principal says. “We’d appreciate if you talked to Jane thoroughly about what’s inappropriate for school grounds.”
“I will,” I say, “and do you know what will be on my list? Drugs, bullying, stealing, cheating, murder. Not a kindergarten kiss.”
“Please,” she tries to reason with me. Am I being unreasonable? “Maybe take a good look at what goes on in your house…or places your children visit.”
She went there.
Subtly, she pokes at the sex tapes of me and my husband, and the fact that my little sister is a sex addict who lives down the street. As if we’re all so deviant.
This is ridiculous.
“This is fucking ridiculous,” Ryke growls beneath his breath.
Thank you.
“It’d be wise to play by the school’s rules. This display is hardly putting good will towards the future of both your children.”
I go very still.
Ryke and I just made an utter, shitty mess of things.
[ 22 ]
&
nbsp; September 2021
Dalton Elementary
Philadelphia
CONNOR COBALT
I walk down the quiet hallway of Dalton Elementary. A little girl with a worried pout waits slumped on a plastic blue chair—right outside the principal’s office. She accessorized her plaid, private school uniform with green pom-pom hair clips and fuzzy pink and yellow socks.
Incredibly mismatched.
The corners of my lips rise high.
Jane Eleanor Cobalt is in pursuit of finding her own identity, and I’m grateful to be a witness.
As I approach, Jane picks herself out of her slumped state, relief in her blue eyes.
The twenty-something teacher’s assistant stands and greets me. “Hi, Mr. Cobalt. Your wife is in the office speaking with vice-principal Morgan-Stuart. I can let them know you’re here.”
“Actually, I’d like to talk to my daughter for a minute first.”
“Sure, yes. Of course.” She searches left and right for what to do, and then she decides to head to the nearest bathroom out of earshot.
Since the administration wouldn’t tell Rose what happened, I assume they view Jane as being in the wrong. I don’t believe she would’ve hurt anyone. Jane apologizes to her stuffed animals when she drops them. She even gives them medicine.
Literally, she spooned fruit punch on her lion.
Rose hand-washed him until the cherry-red stains disappeared, and then I made certain the real children’s medicine was still locked in our cabinet out of Jane’s reach.
I squat in front of my daughter, light freckles scattering the tops of her cheeks and nose.
She scoots to the edge of her chair. “I’m so sorry, Daddy. I didn’t know…I didn’t think it was wrong. Princesses do it all the time.” She lets out a breath. “For as long as I live, I’ll never, ever kiss another person.” Tears flood her eyes.
She kissed someone?
Surprise jumps my brows. She kissed someone. I expected a variety of things, but this never crossed my mind. I don’t know what I feel. On one hand, she’s a curious child. On the other, she’s my six-year-old daughter, and every year I fight this irreparable need that says, spare her heartbreak and misery. You have the power to do so, Connor. Do it now.
I hear Rose, they will feel more than you ever did, Richard.
They’ve already begun.
“Mon cœur.” My heart. I brush my thumb across her cheeks, just as her tears overflow. “Parlons.” Let’s talk.
Jane sniffs and nods in agreement. “Parlons.” Let’s talk.
I rest my knee on the floor but remain here, closer to Jane’s height and not towering over her little frame. “Who was this someone?”
“Wethley.” She slurs his name. I know of a Wesley in the same class as Jane.
“Why’d you kiss Wesley?”
Very softly, she says, “Because of Jane and Rochester.”
I shake my head once. “I don’t follow.” Then I do remember. The boy. His name is coincidentally Wesley Prescott Rochester. And Jane is a little passionate about her namesakes.
My daughter explains, “Jane Eyre falls in love with Mr. Rochester, and so I kissed Wethley so our love would begin…and then Miss Turner yelled at me and dragged me into the classroom by my wrist.” Her chin trembles. “I’m so very sorry. I didn’t know…” She rubs her eyes.
Repeatedly, I replay the part where the teacher dragged her by the wrist. My jaw muscles tic, my teeth bearing down harder. I try to remember that Jane embellishes her stories like her mother. Not entirely inaccurate just hyperbolic.
I waste no time.
I gently roll up the sleeve of her buttoned blouse and check her wrist. Front and back. No bruise or reddened skin. I try to ease myself with this knowledge. She’s physically fine.
Calmly, I tell her, “Kissing another person isn’t bad, but love doesn’t work that way, Jane. You can’t kiss everyone with the name Rochester and expect to fall in love.” I sense her disappointment before I see it.
“Mommy said that some people are fated to be together. Fate guided me to Wethley.”
I nearly cringe at the talk of fate, especially in conjunction with Jane and love. “Mommy also believes in ghosts. It’s all just mere coincidence and partially fictitious.”
Jane pouts and crosses her arms.
She reminds me so much of Rose here. Even with the talk of fate, I feel my grin rise. The precious moments in life, I hold very close.
“My advice,” I say, “don’t seek love from other people. Just love who you are enough that it won’t matter whether or not you find your Rochester.” Rose would explain this to Jane all the same.
“Can I love you?” Jane wonders.
My own mother would’ve told her no.
I smile by her words. And I say, “Bien sûr, mon cœur.” Of course, my heart. I kiss her cheek and then lift her into my arms as I stand. I put her on the ground in front of the office door. “Ready?”
“Oui.” Yes.
When we head inside the office, the sight doesn’t surprise me. Rose and Ryke, red-faced with ire, stand side-by-side like two crackling fireworks prepared to blow. What’s mildly irritating? Ryke here. Next to Rose. He’s where I’m meant to be.
“Rose…Ryke,” I greet first, their murderous eyes swinging from me to Mrs. Morgan-Stuart who looks relieved by my entrance.
She shouldn’t be.
The vice-principal hasn’t realized yet that I will always be loyal to my wife.
Does her relief shock me? No. Since I can remember, this has always been a common expression when I enter the room. They might as well be muttering, thank god Connor is here.
I’m god in every scenario.
Jane hides behind my legs, scared of the vice-principal. I keep a comforting hand on her shoulders.
“Jane just explained to me what happened.” My gaze drifts to Ryke.
Ryke raises his hands in defense. “I didn’t do anything you wouldn’t fucking do.”
“Our actions are never similar. I use the toilet. You use the woods,” I say in front of the vice-principal. It’s why Ryke lets out a short, flabbergasted laugh like I’m the biggest prick in the world. He doesn’t care what people think, but he’d never insult another person in front of others like he believes I do.
I just tell the truth.
Also a truth: I would’ve never roused Rose in this situation like he did.
He outstretches his arms. “You want me to fucking leave? I’ll leave. Rose was the one that asked me to come here.”
I already know why. Rose wanted another voice, maybe even in case she grew too volatile.
She wanted me.
But Ryke is dependable. He’s here when Rose needed someone, and I value that attribute. I value him. “I’d like you to stay, my friend,” I tell him.
He only nods once before Rose bursts forth.
“They’re suspending Jane today,” Rose says heatedly, hands on her hips, “and they’re refusing to suspend Wesley.”
I see. I take a few calm steps towards Mrs. Morgan-Stuart, and Jane rushes to her mother’s side, whispering quietly to her.
The vice-principal rises to her feet. “I was telling your wife that we have a code of conduct here at Dalton Elementary, and we can’t overlook what Jane has done.”
“I see,” I say calmly.
She even offers me a thankful smile. “Then we’ll see Jane tomorrow.”
“Yes, you will.” I run my fingers across the edge of her desk. “And when we bring her home today, we’ll teach her about sexism within this school system. So thank you for giving us the opportunity to remind our daughter that life is full of inequities.”
Rose brims with pride, and when she catches me staring she doesn’t hide the sight. I love him is written all over her features.
The vice-principal looks microscopically small.
I also have that affect on people.
Before I leave, I say, “My daughter can use words to express her sentiments,
and I’d expect Dalton’s faculty to do the same. Next time a teacher physically drags one of my children, you’ll see me under different circumstances and with far less passivity.”
Rose, beside me, whispers heatedly, “They what?”
The vice-principal gapes. “That…we don’t tolerate that. I promise you.”
We have many more children left to attend this school. Jane is just the first, but I was prepared for the students and the faculty to see them differently.
I even understood that could translate into being treated differently. I’d stand in this office with thousands of words to aid them, to help them—to lift them to their feet. I have no doubts in my own ability to protect my children, so I fear nothing.
They should fear me.
The last thing I say to the vice-principal leaves her ashen and mute.
“Only my promises can be trusted,” I tell her, “so your words are meaningless to me.”
< 23 >
October 2021
Eddie’s House
Costa Rica
DAISY MEADOWS
Eddie is one of Ryke’s oldest climbing friends and often travels to Venezuela, Peru, and Chile to scale new rock faces. Whenever Eddie leaves his home for a week or so, he invites Ryke and me to stay at his empty property. A house lodged in skyscraping trees and located in a remote part of Costa Rica—we accept without a moment’s pause.
No electricity.
An outhouse.
A well for water.
Our trips here, I always pretend that Ryke and I are stranded in the rainforest together like Blue Lagoon or Swiss Family Robinson.
This time we have company.
A naked three-year-old presses her itty-bitty fingers to a floor-length window. She gasps with wonder and awe, nose to the glass. I smile wide, knelt behind her as I dry her sopping wet hair. I clasp a cotton towel around the dark brown strands, beads of water rolling along her tanned skin.
Palm fronds pat the window, no blinds or curtains, but Ryke unknowingly captivates our daughter. Right outside, Ryke balances on the deck railing and clutches a rope, one tethered to a tree about ten or fifteen feet from safety. No pool, no lake, just the rainforest to swing towards.
Some Kind of Perfect (Calloway Sisters #4.5) Page 28