by Holly Rayner
Marissa couldn’t help but grin, too. “I met a guy when I was in Austin,” she explained to Kelly. “I was just telling Dave here that we might try to get together again once he straightens out some issues related to his business.”
“What kind of issues?” Kelly asked.
The grin faded from Marissa’s face, as a memory of the explosion flashed through her mind. She pushed it away. It was bad enough that it still haunted her dreams—she didn’t want the memory to plague her at work, too.
Instead, she focused on the positive. “It’s a problem that has to do with money, stolen from his company accounts. He has a whole team of people helping him get it resolved. I’m sure he’ll get it sorted.”
“Sounds like a big deal,” Kelly said.
Dave glanced at the clock on the wall and then began packing up. “Five minutes until lunch is over, ladies,” he announced. Then he turned to Marissa. “What line of work is your Texas man in, anyway?”
Kelly liked that. “Ooh! He’s a Texan!” she squealed. “Southern guys are so dreamy… I do love a good southern accent. Does he speak with a drawl?”
To Kelly, Marissa gave a quick, “Sure does!” Then, she turned to Dave and said, “He’s in the oil industry. I think he inherited the company from his parents. He’s quite successful, I believe.” She thought of the penthouse and how luxurious every inch of it was. Colt was wealthy. She wasn’t sure how wealthy, but she was sure he was more than comfortable in terms of his finances.
“Wow!” Kelly said. “Marissa, you are so lucky! All those oil guys are well-off, you know. Maybe he’s rich!”
Dave chimed in. “What’s his name? Maybe I’ve heard of him. I read financial magazines all the time. The wife is always trying to get me to invest in one thing or another.”
“Colt Thorpe,” Marissa said. She began packing her containers into her lunch sack, waiting for more questions from her two coworkers. They seemed fascinated by the news that she’d finally met a guy, and she was sure their questions would continue until they all exited the lounge and parted ways.
To her surprise, they both fell silent.
She fastened the velcro top of her lunch sack and then looked up expectantly at her coworkers. Both were staring at her with wide eyes.
“What?” she asked.
Kelly’s face drained of all color, until she was white as a sheet.
Dave’s frown almost reached his jawline.
“What is it?” she asked again. “You two look like I just said I’m interested in dating Frankenstein, for Pete’s sake.”
Kelly turned to Dave. “She doesn’t know, does she?” she said in almost a whisper.
“Know what?” Marissa asked.
Dave spoke to Kelly. “Maybe it’s a different Colt Thorpe,” he said. “It has to be a common name. There has to be more than one of them in the oil industry.”
Kelly nodded and pulled her phone from the back pocket of her khakis. “Marissa, have you been watching the news?” she asked carefully, as she tapped her phone screen.
“Not really. I never do,” Marissa said, stunned by the unexpected response she was witnessing. “What’s going on with you guys? You’re acting weird. I know Colt’s rich, and I know he’s having trouble with the mafia, if that’s what you’re…”
Her voice trailed off as Kelly placed her phone down on the table in front of Marissa.
Dave stood up and hurried over to Marissa’s side, so he could see the phone screen over her shoulder.
Marissa read the headline on the news page that Kelly had brought up on her phone. She gasped, as the meaning of the words hit her.
Oil Tycoon Colt Thorpe Dies at Age 36 in Plane Crash, the headline read.
“No,” she said, shaking her head. “This can’t be. I was just with him last week. This is wrong. I’d know if…” Her voice trailed off. She swiped the phone screen so that she could see more of the article. She gasped again as a picture of Colt, looking as handsome as she remembered, popped up between two paragraphs of the article. “That’s him,” she said. Her voice shook with emotion.
She felt Dave reach out and place a hand on her shoulder.
She couldn’t tear her eyes from the photo of Colt. Could it be true? Was he really dead?
She skimmed some words of the article. “It says his plane went down in the Gulf of Mexico,” she murmured. “But they haven’t found his body yet.”
“I watched a story about the crash on the news this morning,” Dave said, giving her shoulder a pat. “I’m so sorry, Marissa. They said there’s no chance he survived.”
Marissa lifted her hand, put it up to her mouth, and squeezed her eyes shut.
“I’m so, so sorry,” Dave repeated.
Kelly swooped in and gave Marissa a hug. “What a shock,” she said. “It’s never easy to find out someone you know is gone. I know, honey.” She squeezed Marissa. “You must have really cared about this guy, hm?” She reached for her phone and tucked it back into her pocket.
Marissa couldn’t speak.
Dave filled in for her. “She just met him over spring break, but it sounds like one of those love-at-first-sight situations. It was how it went with my wife, too, to tell you the truth. I was infatuated the minute I saw her at the bowling alley on league night.”
“You gonna be okay, sweetie?” Kelly asked. “Here, let me get you a cup of coffee.”
The recess bell rang in the distance. There was a rush of kids’ voices coming from out in the hallway a few seconds after that.
Marissa knew that her students would be back in her classroom in no time. She accepted the hot cup of coffee that Kelly handed her and then shuffled down the hall to her classroom in a daze.
The afternoon passed in a blur. All she could think about was Colt.
When the 2:30 bell rang, she waved her hands to the line of backpack-wearing children who were lined up at the doorway. “Straight to the bus!” she instructed them, before plopping down into her desk chair and putting her head in her hands.
With the children gone, she finally had a minute to think.
He couldn’t possibly be dead. Could he?
Her stomach twisted into a knot, and her heart ached at the thought of it. She had only just started to get to know him. He was everything she wanted in a guy, and more.
Her friends and family had told her time and again that she had to be more realistic when it came to men. They said she had to settle—to stop hoping for an ideal that didn’t exist.
But Marissa had always refused. She wasn’t going to settle for a guy that didn’t make her heart flutter with joy and her body ache to be kissed.
Colt was that man.
But now, it seemed, he was gone.
She could barely process this.
A soft knock on the doorframe that led out to the hall made her look up.
Her principal, a portly Italian man with more hair on his arms than the top of his head, stepped through the open door and eyed Marissa. “Is now a bad time?” he asked.
She sat up straighter and shook her head. “No, no, come in, Mr. Russo. I just have a bit of a headache, that’s all. I’ll be fine.” She forced a smile.
“Good, good,” he said. He crossed the room and then looked around for a place to sit. There was nothing available except small, six-year-old-sized chairs. He pulled a bright orange one away from the table it was tucked under and perched on it.
“Mr. Russo,” Marissa said, jumping up from her seat. “That chair is so tiny. Sit here, please.” She motioned to her chair.
“I’m fine,” he said. “You sit. Really. I think you should be sitting down to hear this.”
Uh-oh, she thought, as she sat back down on the edge of her chair. She waited tensely for him to continue. He rarely visited teachers in their classrooms, unless trouble was afoot.
He cleared his throat but didn’t speak. He looked nervous.
“Have I done something wrong?” she prompted him while wracking her brain for possible reasons fo
r his visit.
“No, no, Marissa. You’re an excellent teacher. It’s just… you know the trouble we’ve been going through with budget cuts?”
She nodded.
He continued. “I’ve just come from a closed-door meeting with the school board treasury. We’ve finalized next year’s spending. We can only afford one first-grade teacher.”
“But there’s two of us,” Marissa said, tenting her brows. She motioned to a door to her left that connected her classroom to the one next door. “Mrs. Crandall teaches first-graders, and so do I.”
He nodded. “I know this, of course,” he said. “I know I seem to be mighty forgetful, but I don’t forget about entire classrooms.” He gave a nervous laugh.
She pursed her lips and didn’t laugh along with him.
He gave a dry cough and shifted in his seat. “We’re working with a severely depleted budget,” he said. “We have no other choice. We hoped it wouldn’t come to this, but here we are.” He spread a hand out before him.
She glared at his empty hand. “This is crazy,” she said. “There’s no way Mrs. Crandall or I could handle all of the first-graders in Dulcett county. There are over twenty per year, sometimes closer to thirty.”
He nodded. “Yes, yes, I know. It’s not ideal, but it’s necessary.”
“Who will stay on?” Marissa asked. The day had worn her nerves thin. She wasn’t in the mood for beating around the bush. “Me, or Cynthia?”
“Cynthia has seniority. And that is really all it is, on that account,” Mr. Russo said, averting his eyes from Marissa’s.
Her heart began to hammer in her chest.
“You’re saying I’m fired?”
He shook his head. “Not exactly,” he said. “But your contract will not be renewed. We’ll give you a glowing recommendation when you find a new position to apply to.”
“When does this go into effect?” she asked.
“We’d like you to finish out the school year,” he said. “And then we’ll no longer be able to keep you on as a staff member.”
She crossed her arms over her chest and tried to contain her frustration. She remembered vividly that when Mr. Russo had hired her, two years prior, he’d gone on and on about the retention rate of the school.
She’d thought she’d finally found the school she could stay with until her retirement. She’d been looking forward to finally settling down in a town and feeling grounded, rather than moving houses every few years.
Mr. Russo stood, and the little chair gave an angry squawk as metal rubbed against linoleum. “I’d better be going,” he said. His shoulders slumped. “I have to go talk to Mr. Richards. We’re combining kindergarten classrooms as well.” He sighed heavily.
As he left, she tried not to feel angry with him. The poor guy was just doing his job. Yes, he’d promised her a long career with the school, but the budget cuts were out of his hands.
With a heavy heart, she packed up her belongings and then shouldered her bag. She had hours of work to do still—homework assignments to grade and lesson plans to make—but she decided it could be done from home.
Once at home, she took a hot shower and then got into pajamas, even though it was only four in the afternoon.
Her body felt as though it was much, much later. She felt completely exhausted. With a cup of hot tea in one hand, she hauled her heavy work bag over to the couch and set it at her feet. She sipped her lavender-lemon tea a few times, and then set it on the coffee table. As she pulled out a few notebooks and binders, her mind turned to Colt.
It can’t be, she thought.
She reached for a remote.
There must have been some kind of mistake. He’s not dead.
She flipped through the channels until she found the news station, and then she opened up a binder and pulled out the first in a stack of math sheets. With a pen in hand, she went to work correcting the problems. At the same time, she listened to the local news.
When the local program ended, the national news came on.
She reached the end of the stack of math sheets and moved on to a handwriting assignment. The children were practicing capital and lower-case letters. Usually, their wobbly attempts at penmanship filled her with a warm, fuzzy feeling of happiness, but today, she couldn’t muster it. Her whole body felt heavy and clenched with apprehension.
“…when Colt Thorpe’s plane went down, around midday on Wednesday, March 21st,” the newscaster said.
Marissa’s head jerked up, and she pinned her gaze on the television screen. “We have here photos of the wreckage surrounding the craft.”
Marissa put down her pen and papers and tucked her knees up under her as she settled back on the couch. She examined the series of photographs that populated the television screen. The first was of some clothing, draped over what looked like a section of plane wing. The white metal of the wing was smudged with black streaks. Next there was a photograph of flotation devices, floating in the water.
“Though the plane was equipped with a life preserver, it appears that Mr. Thorpe didn’t have time to get it on before the plane hit the water. That may have been due to the fire aboard the plane, which experts say most likely took Mr. Thorpe’s life before the craft submerged into the ocean.”
A third picture popped up, this one of charred and mangled metal. It was impossible for Marissa to identify which section of the plane might be on display; it was so badly deformed. The sight of it made her grimace. She felt ill. She had heard enough.
She reached out for the remote and snapped off the television. Then she fell back onto the couch and hugged a pillow to her chest. She stayed this way, barely thinking or moving, as the walls around her turned dark gray, thanks to the setting sun outside. She didn’t turn on any lights in her living room, even once the sun had gone completely down and she was cocooned in darkness.
The dark atmosphere suited her mood.
Could this day have possibly been any worse? she wondered, as she closed her eyes and finally fell asleep, still dressed and on the couch.
Chapter 9
Marissa
“Maybe this is it!” Marissa whispered under her breath, as she opened her email. She was sitting at her desk, alone in her classroom. The children were out to recess, and the quiet around her was a welcome relief. She’d been fighting a stomachache all morning, and she blamed it on stress. The boisterous six-year-olds that had surrounded her had done nothing to ease her stress levels.
But this email might help. She clicked it open, thinking that at last she might be able to relax, knowing that she had a job lined up for next year. She’d been applying nonstop to open positions, all over the Midwest. She’d driven four hours, the week prior, to meet with the principal of a school in eastern Kansas. He’d finally gotten back to her.
She began reading the email with high hopes.
Dear Miss Garvin,
It was so nice to meet with you to chat about our open first-grade teacher position here at Kennedy Elementary. You have an impressive resume and are certainly qualified for the job.
Marissa’s heart did a somersault. Yes! She liked me! she thought. She thinks I’m well suited for the position! Internally, Marissa felt happy for the first time in the past five weeks—ever since she’d first found out that her position in Dulcett was being eliminated.
The loss of her job, along with losing Colt, had been hard to handle.
For a few weeks, she had simply gone through the motions of life—going to work, staying late to complete her tasks, and then finally going home to eat a quick dinner and continue her job search. Through the end of March and into April, she had stuck to this routine.
In mid-April, she’d started to increase her efforts with her job search. Now that it was early May, she was sure that her hard work would soon pay off.
In fact, it seemed to her that it was, with regards to the position in eastern Kansas.
Another move, she thought wistfully. Ah, well. It’ll be worth it for the position.
She smiled slightly, ignored a slight ache in her gut, and continued to read.
Thank you for taking the time to drive to our small town for your interview. We appreciate your efforts. Unfortunately, we’ve decided to go with another candidate. We will absolutely keep your resume in our files and reach out to you should another teaching opportunity open up that we feel you would be well suited for.
Kind regards,
Beth Lin
Marissa reread the last few lines, just to be sure she got it right. Her shoulders slumped, and she closed her laptop.
Her gaze turned to a bright, poster-sized calendar that hung on the wall next to her chalkboard. Amidst the pink and yellow spring flowers plastered all over the display, she was able to clearly see the boxes that marked the days until the end of the school year.
In four weeks, I am going to be out of work, she realized.
The last day of school was approaching quickly, and she still didn’t have a job lined up.
Her stomach twinged.
I’d better do some relaxation exercises or something, Marissa thought. The stress of my impending unemployment is eating me from the inside out. I must be getting ulcers or something.
I’d better have a bite to eat. That will soothe my stomach.
She began pulling items from her lunch sack, but as soon as she opened her container of yogurt and granola—which was usually one of her favorite treats—she was overcome by a wave of nausea.
Fearing that she might vomit, she bolted up out of her seat and made a beeline for the bathroom at the back of the classroom.
She was lingering by the sink just outside of the bathroom when one of the school’s teachers aids entered the room.
At first the aide, Justine, didn’t see Marissa. She walked right up to Marissa’s desk and placed a stack of papers down on it.
“Justine? Hey,” Marissa said weakly, “I’m back here.”
“Oh!” Justine said, raising her brows. She was a pretty woman with thick, silver hair that she wore in cornrows. As the school’s only teachers’ aid, she split her time between the various classrooms to help with the more challenging children. “I didn’t see you back there! I have Casey’s ‘Why I Love My Pet’ story. He apologizes for his outburst earlier. We talked through it, and agreed that…” Her sentence drifted off as she eyed Marissa with concern. “Are you feeling all right, Marissa?”