Teach Me

by Olivia Dade

  His stomach growled, and he tried to remember how much cash remained in his wallet. Not enough, that was for certain.

  A veritable blizzard of paper snowflakes hung overhead, and colored strings of light draped over every booth. All appropriate for winter. Fair enough.

  But there also appeared to be a limbo contest occurring off to the right. Plastic bags of cotton candy jostled for retail space next to pumpkin pies. An enormous fake palm tree hovered over a selection of grilled burgers and hot dogs for sale. And if he wasn’t mistaken, a cluster of girls dressed all in black was gathered around…

  A dunk tank? Really? In December?

  From behind the circle of girls, he heard a distinct thunk. Then a breathless squeak, quickly followed by a splash and gleeful cackles from the surrounding crowd.

  Yup. A dunk tank. In December.

  “The girls’ softball team holds a mean grudge.” Keisha appeared next to him, braids swaying with the shake of her head. “It’s been two years, and they still haven’t forgiven her.”

  He blinked at her, confused. “Excuse me?”

  “You’ll see.” Keisha grinned. “But you may not believe what you’re seeing.”

  Whatever. He had more pressing questions to ask. For instance: What the actual fuck?

  “I don’t…” He swiveled his head to survey his surroundings, spotting a hula lesson in the far corner next to a pin-the-red-nose-on-Rudolph game. “I don’t quite understand the theme of this festival.”

  “It’s exactly what it says. A Seasons’ Greetings Festival. Seasonzzzzz,” Keisha emphasized. “Plural.”

  His brows rose. “I thought that was a typo.”

  She recoiled. “Are you kidding? The English department would slaughter us all in our sleep if we abused our apostrophes so badly.” Her eyes had gone wide, and after darting a look around them, she pointed an accusing finger. “Don’t even joke about that.”

  He raised his hands. “I won’t. I promise.”

  The English department did seem rather intense, now that he thought about it. He should have noticed during the whole Frankenstein Is Not the Monster Initiative earlier in the year, given all their posters and morning announcements and costumes and yelling during staff meetings. Not to mention the assembly.

  A quality production, but the hand puppets had been overkill.

  Keisha directed a hard stare his way. “Good. Anyway, we used to have two festivals. One for winter, another for summer. But we had trouble getting enough volunteers for both, so we merged them into one big fundraiser in the middle of the year. Then the decision had to be made about which season to celebrate, and no one could choose. So Principal Dunn said screw it, let’s do both.”

  “Thus the caroling snow-cone purveyors.” He rocked back on his heels. “This festival truly has it all.”

  “It does.” Keisha patted him on his arm. “I need to get eggnog in a coconut before they run out of those little umbrellas. While I do so, I suggest you study the dunk tank a bit more closely.”

  Bea would want pictures of the festival, since she and her mother were visiting Virginia Tech that weekend, so he got out his cell and wandered in the direction of the splashes and a veritable army of black-clad young women.

  After greeting a few of his students and taking several photos—notably, of an island-themed menorah—he finally edged his way through the crowd surrounding the dunk tank. Only to discover a waterlogged, laughing mermaid inside that tank, her red-and-green tail impeding her progress up the ladder to her little wooden seat.

  He didn’t even recognize her at first. Not with her face devoid of noticeable makeup and her hair plastered to her cheeks and along her neck. Not wearing what appeared to be the top of a short-sleeved wetsuit and a long, fishy tail, both clinging to the generous curves of her body.

  Rose. But not the same Rose he’d seen to that point.

  “C’mon, Bianca.” She finally managed to plop herself back onto the wooden platform. “Take your best shot.”

  The apparent ringleader of the girls had dyed her curly hair a shade of black that absorbed all light. Her eye makeup did the same, and what he’d guess was naturally golden skin had been powdered to a deathly ivory. A goth, just like all the young women arrayed around her.

  Queen of the goths, he amended, as she gestured peremptorily for another softball.

  “Give the guy more money,” the girl ordered one of her minions. “Ten balls.”

  The shorter girl dug through an odd-looking wallet—was that black duct tape?—and went to talk to the amused-looking parent manning the outside of the booth.

  Rose shrugged. “Hey, I’m here no matter what. My shift doesn’t end for another hour.” Her nose crinkled in a teasing smile. “Hey, Bianca, did anyone ever tell you your name is kind of ironic? You know, given your wardrobe choices?”

  “Like you can judge, Elvira.” A fleeting curve of the girl’s lips was quickly buried under a forced-looking scowl. “And no, you’re totally the first. What an original observation.”

  “Thank you. What a sincere compliment.” Rose peeled a wet strand of hair from in front of her eyes. “Question: Have you considered using your superior softball skills for good, rather than evil?”

  Bianca considered that for a moment, tapping a long, shiny black nail against her chin. “No.”

  Rose laughed. “Fair enough. Although maybe, if you practiced enough, your team could be state champions. Just saying.”

  “We’ve been state champions all three years I’ve been captain, and you know it.” Bianca’s eyes had narrowed in trumped-up outrage, until all he could see were two black blots in their vicinity. “Get ready to get wet. Again. And when I run out of money, my shortstop is up.”

  Martin blinked.

  Wait. The school’s state-champion girls’ softball team consisted entirely of goths? Ones who, if he recalled Keisha’s offhand comment correctly, harbored some sort of half-joking vendetta against Rose?

  No wonder they’d lobbied to change the Marysburg High mascot to a raven last month at the school board meeting.

  “More cash for the school, and for our AP programs.” Rose flipped her tail in a cheerful taunt. “Bring it on, Perez.”

  He edged farther to the side, half-behind a sturdy young woman with a nose stud and black boots. If Rose spotted him in the crowd, she might stiffen as she always did in his presence, even three months after his refusal of a date. And he was too fascinated by the scene, by the sight of her grinning and informal and loose, to risk ending it prematurely.

  For those three months, he’d been working to regain her trust. Visiting her in the morning and after school. Walking her to her car. Waiting for her to thaw and let him behind her defenses again, so he could return her invitation.

  It had sort of worked. A little.

  She hadn’t asked him to stop his visits, which he’d half-expected and dreaded. And she would now talk to him easily enough about professional matters, if nothing else.

  They’d switched classes twice already, in what he considered a very successful tactic to interest his honors kids in AP U.S. History next year. The students had returned from her classroom happy and intrigued, although they still had doubts about the AP workload. But he and Rose had several more months to execute their plans, and he possessed full confidence in her ability to sway his students in her direction.

  She’d managed to sway him, after all, despite all his doubts.

  Too bad he couldn’t seem to do the same for her.

  That late afternoon in the social studies office, that brief stretch of time when she’d appeared before him unguarded and soft, had begun to seem more and more like the fever dream of a man obsessed. It wasn’t that her regal composure didn’t stir and attract him. It did.

  He just wanted all of her. Not simply the parts of herself she deemed safe for exposure.

  So, no, he wasn’t going to interrupt the dunking-in-progress. Because right now, right here, the rest of her sat before him, soaked and
laughing and glowing with both cleverness and warmth.

  Although, now that he looked more closely, she appeared to be shivering a little.

  Dammit, what kind of fools rented a dunk tank in December?

  Bianca selected a ball from her minion’s fresh supply. “Enjoy your bath, Ms. Owens.”

  Once she’d retreated behind the designated line, she wound up and threw a perfect pitch. It hit the circular metal plunger with a solid thunk, and down went Rose, who descended into the water with a smile and a little gasp.

  He got close to the edge of the tank as she surfaced, studying her bare lower arms. Goosebumps. And that ruddy color staining her cheeks didn’t come from embarrassment or the tepid warmth of the gymnasium.

  She spotted him in the same moment as he spotted the freckles on her nose.

  Christ, they were a punch in the gut. Adorable and…well, vulnerable. He wanted to kiss every exposed speckle, then move downward. Then downward again, until she was gasping for reasons other than submersion in chilly waters.

  “Mr. Krause.” She slicked her hair back from her face, her smile fading. “I didn’t see you.”

  “I know.” If she’d seen him, she’d have hidden herself. Like she was doing now, without ever moving a single millimeter.

  Quick conversations before and after the school day clearly weren’t sufficient to complete the quest he’d undertaken. More extreme measures would have to be taken.

  He emptied his pockets and put their contents in a dim corner behind the tank, removed his watch, and toed off his shoes. “I came to relieve you. Your shift in the dunk tank is over.”

  Her lips parted, revealing chattering teeth, and he was suddenly, fiercely glad he was preparing to take an icy dip. Whether she ever softened toward him again or not didn’t matter. The sight of Rose chilled and shivering was unbearable.

  She dashed water from her eyes and squinted at him. “No one told me you’d volunteered for this. Besides, I’ve only been here for an hour.”

  He loosened his tie, but didn’t bother to remove it. The amusement inherent in dunking a teacher fully dressed in work clothes should provide incentive for students to stay, despite Rose’s departure.

  “It’s December.” He held out a hand, waiting for her to ascend the little metal ladder and climb out with his assistance. “Sixty-minute shifts, max.”

  “But I wanted to dunk her nine more times,” Bianca protested. “Then sic a few of my girls on her. Otherwise, what’s the point of having a vendetta?”

  “I can’t disappoint the students, Mr. Krause.” Rose struggled back up to her seat, ignoring his hand. “Consider yourself off-duty.”

  He dropped his arm to his side and thought for a moment. Clearly, his extreme measures required additional research. As a historian by training, he should have known.

  He swiveled to study Bianca. “Why are you so determined to dunk Ms. Owens, anyway?”

  A snort sounded behind him, a noise he hadn’t heard for over three months. To his ears, it might as well have been a recital by the school’s handbell choir.

  “Yes, Bianca.” Rose flapped her tail. “Tell Mr. Krause why you’ve carried a grudge for two years and graciously shared that grudge with your entire softball team.”

  The girl with the nose stud swung to face her captain. “You’ve never actually told us the full story, Bianca.”

  Bianca shifted, black-painted lips tightening.

  “Yeah,” her minion with cornrows and a skull t-shirt said. “I’ve always wondered.”

  After five seconds of silence, Bianca broke.

  “Fine.” She sighed heavily. “Fine. I was in Ms. Owens’s world history class sophomore year, and we could pick the subject of our end-of-year research project. She said we could choose any topic important to world history. Any.”

  Her pause stretched and stretched, and he couldn’t wait. He had to know. “What did you pick?”

  “Slendermffffff,” she muttered.

  “What did she say?” Nose Stud looked to him. “I didn’t hear it.”

  Another period of fraught silence ensued.

  “Slender Man, all right?” Bianca finally said. “I wanted to do my end-of-year project on Slender Man, and Ms. Owens said no. Which was totally a betrayal, because look at her. She’s clearly a goth who got locked in a Nordstrom and wasn’t allowed to leave until they assimilated her somehow. Probably at the MAC counter.”

  Skull Tee wrinkled her nose. “Didn’t you get those ripped black jeans with the safety pins from Nordstrom? I thought your parents took you for your birthday. You wouldn’t shut up about their café and their stupid bread pudding for like a week.”

  “Slender Man?” Nose Stud shook her head. “That’s so over. What the heck, Bianca?”

  “It was two years ago.” Bianca crossed her arms, her lower lip extending. “Slender Man was a thing.”

  Skull Tee tapped the toe of her Chucks. “Dude. Get over it. Do you know how many real-life massacres and murders you could have researched instead? I mean, Lizzie Borden?”

  Yet more silence.

  “Fine.” Bianca dropped her arms and glared at Rose. “Consider the vendetta cancelled.”

  And there it was. Victory.

  He smiled and turned to Rose. “If there’s no more vendetta, they can dunk me instead of you. Come on out.”

  Her brow had beetled, and she didn’t climb out of the tank. Instead, she tilted her head toward Bianca, eyes pleading with him for…something.

  Dammit.

  A single glance at the young woman revealed everything. She seemed deflated. No longer gleeful. And her team shifted behind her, uneasy.

  Fine. He could fix this too.

  “Hey, Bianca.” He rolled up his sleeves, not that it would matter in a minute. “Let’s talk about how overrated Tim Burton’s films are.”

  Her shoulders slowly pulled back. “What did you just say?”

  Once again, he extended a hand to Rose. This time she took it, and the explosion of prideful glee inside him might have been disproportionate, but he didn’t care. A win was a win.

  “You heard me. Quirk does not always equal quality.”

  Once Rose was dripping safely on the polished wood floor of the gym, the parent manning the booth handed over a plush towel and a bundle of clothing. Martin draped the towel over Rose’s shoulders, using its corners to blot her eyes and cheeks in careful dabs.

  “Oh, I heard you. Ladies?” Bianca stretched her pitching arm. “Did you hear Mr. Krause too?”

  Nose Stud cracked her knuckles. “Oh, yeah.”

  “You’re mine, Mr. Krause. I’m watching you.” Skull Tee pointed two fingers at her eyes, then at his. “I call next turn.”

  “No one insults Tim Burton.” Bianca paused. “Except about issues of diversity and maybe gender dynamics.” Another pause, and then she recovered herself. “No one.”

  A pool had formed beneath Rose, and her tail squished as she widened her stance.

  “Don’t fall on the wet floor,” he told her, unable to stop himself.

  Seventeen-plus years of Dad training. He couldn’t abandon it at a moment’s notice.

  She sighed, but her lips curved. “Thanks for that necessary tip, Mr. Krause.”

  One more swipe of those adorable freckles. Then he forced his fingers to release the towel, handed her the clothing bundle, and entered the tank.

  The wooden seat below him tilted a bit to the front, ready to drop, and droplets of chilly water soaked through his pants. The bluish pool waited beneath. Its chlorinated water smelled like triumph.

  He grinned at Rose, who’d wrapped the ends of her hair in her towel and commandeered another cloth to wipe the floor. She smiled back, amber eyes warm and unguarded.

  “Thank you,” she mouthed.

  His chest expanded in a heady rush, but he forced his attention back to the softball team’s captain. “I’ll repeat: Burton’s movies are overrated. Especially Edward Scissorhands. What are you going to do about it, P
erez?”

  “I’ll give you one guess.”

  Her smirk preceded another perfect pitch, and down he went.

  Fuuuuuuck. That water…Jesus. How had Rose survived an hour of this?

  But she was still waiting, still watching, still smiling when he resurfaced with a shudder, and nothing, nothing in his recent past had felt so horrible but so good.

  He’d splash into freezing water for that.

  Ruin a perfectly good silk tie for that.

  Above all, continue believing—in himself and what he could offer her—for that.

  For her.

  Only, only for her.

  Eight

  Rose frowned at her reflection in the window. Then once more, at the sight of her Audi parked snugly beside Martin’s Subaru in the darkness beyond the plate glass.

  Somehow, she seemed to have waited for his shift in the dunk tank to finish and given him clean towels and sweats she’d scrounged from the boys’ locker room. Somehow, she seemed to have accompanied him to a coffee shop after the festival.

  Somehow, she seemed to have forgotten the importance of a safe distance from him. From everyone except her students, her former in-laws, and a few trusted friends from college.

  Because somehow, there she sat, her hair still damp and tucked behind her ears, no makeup on. Wearing a gray sweatshirt and sweatpants, also appropriated from the boys’ locker room lost and found box, because he’d stared at her original choice of clothing—suitably chic, suitably black, maybe not so suitably lightweight—with such horrified dismay and so many inquiries about possible hypothermia.

  Her spike heels added a little something extra to the outfit, she imagined.

  She cradled her mug of coffee and blew on its steaming surface. Across from her, Martin did the same, his blue eyes intent on her bare face.

  Yes, something had clearly misfired in her brain.

  But the man was a terrible liar. Just awful. There was absolutely no way in hell he’d ever intended to staff the dunk tank until he’d seen her plunge into the icy water. He’d come to the booth with no towel. No bathing trunks or wetsuit. No extra changes of clothing. No excuses to offer when Keisha found him in the tank and loudly wondered what in the world he was doing.