Troublemaker

by Kayley Loring

  But when we both put him to bed and she reads Harry Potter to him, I get a glimpse of what’s right.

  “Hey, Miss Stiles,” he says sleepily after we insist that one chapter is all he gets tonight and we’re going to turn off the light. “I’m glad you’re finally friends with my dad.”

  “Me too,” she says. “Good night. I have to go home now,” she tells him.

  Wrong.

  “I’ll see you tomorrow, Ryder,” she says.

  “Can you bring Atticus again?”

  “Sure. He’d like that.”

  “Okay. Good night.”

  I kiss the top of his head. “We had a good day, huh?”

  “Yeah.” He holds his hand up for a high-five.

  “Go to sleep.”

  “You go to sleep.” He attempts a wink.

  Fortunately, Miss Stiles didn’t see it. I wink back at him and hold my index finger up to my lips, shushing him. I turn off the light and close the door, almost all the way.

  I haven’t decided which room I’ll take Emilia to yet, but we will have more than ten minutes in there. I’ve found someone who’s a good girl in every room and a bad girl in every room. And I already know I want to spend the rest of my life with her in all of them.

  35

  Emilia

  Two weeks into the new semester, and I already have twenty-seven items on my list of Valentine’s Day gift options for Alex. Many of them were transferred from the would-be Christmas gift list. I’ve been thinking that January might be my new favorite month in LA, but I guess the truth is, that’s any month that I get to spend with him.

  I had the happiest New Year’s Eve I can remember, with Alex and Ryder. I was officially at their house as a friend, but I did end up spending the night in the guest room. For fun, Alex and I made a pretend dating profile for Ryder on WooHooCupid. We deleted it that night, of course, but I’ve never seen Ryder squirm so much and I’ve never seen Alex laugh so hard.

  What I’m all about… we typed. I am all about chocolate snacks and monkeys and Pokémon and girls who like chocolate snacks and monkeys and Pokémon. Also, my dad and teacher think I’m really cute when I’m annoyed, so I love it when people annoy me.

  What I’m doing with my life… Eating snacks and farting and looking for a nice girl I can share snacks and fart jokes with.

  Current life goal… Break my dad’s laptop.

  It has been almost exactly a month since I first went to Alex’s house, and I already feel more comfortable and in love with him than I ever thought possible.

  I’m used to the constant butterflies in my stomach. But I am constantly trying to chase away the fluttery, anxious feeling in my chest. There is the other shoe that is always just hovering right above me as I wait for it to drop. It seems wrong and unfair to hide this. To feel guilty about dating someone who is so completely worthy of my time and affection. Especially when Alex wants so badly to let his son and the world know that we’re together. I want to give him everything. But I can’t give him that. Not yet.

  I’m about to go photocopy tomorrow’s assignments so I can get home and shower before going to Alex’s for dinner, when the classroom phone rings. It hardly ever rings, and it startles me every time.

  “This is Miss Stiles,” I answer.

  “Emilia, it’s Judy.”

  “Hi, Mrs. Hernandez.”

  “Can you come see Mrs. Woodard before you leave today?”

  “Like now, you mean?”

  “If you can.”

  “Sure. Yes. I’ll be there in a minute. Should I bring anything?”

  “I don’t think so, dear.”

  “Okay. See you soon.”

  Go away, chest flutters.

  As I walk down the hall to the principal’s office, I pass the teachers’ lounge. Miss Farrell walks out of it.

  She smirks at me. “Have a great evening,” she says.

  That smirk. That tone of voice. It gives me a chill, and I get that sinking feeling in my stomach.

  I don’t respond to her. I wouldn’t, even if I didn’t have a lump in my throat all of a sudden. She can kiss my ass with her stupid thin lips.

  Mrs. Hernandez smiles at me when I walk into the front office. “Go on in, honey. She’s expecting you.”

  All I can hear as I shuffle toward Mrs. Woodard’s open door is the insane pounding of my heart and the Star Wars “Imperial March” theme in my head.

  Which is dumb. Because maybe she just wants to congratulate me again on the work that Alex and I did on the holiday show. Maybe tell me that it was nominated for a local theatre award or something.

  She’s at her desk, holding a bottle of drinkable yogurt with one hand and typing on her keyboard with the other.

  I knock so quietly on the door because I am hoping she won’t actually hear me.

  She glances up, completely stone-faced. “Emilia. Come in. Close the door behind you, would you? Have a seat.”

  “Thank you.” I do all of those things, hesitantly.

  She puts her yogurt drink down, places one hand over the other, flat on her desk, in front of herself. She gives me a tight smile. “How are you?”

  “Fine. How are you?”

  “I have a bunion on my foot and a canker sore in my mouth. Other than that, I’m tired and stressed. But enough about me. I want to bring something up with you… This is not an official reprimand.”

  Oh shit.

  “Because, as I’ve mentioned, we do not have an official policy regarding such matters.”

  Oh fuck.

  “It has come to my attention that you have been spending non-school-related time with the single father of one of your students. Is this correct?”

  “Yes.”

  “Romantically? Don’t answer that—I can’t ask.” She watches my face for a response, even though she clearly already knows the answer.

  I don’t even blink because I’m afraid a cascade of tears will fall if I do. I clear my throat. “Can I ask how you know about this?”

  She sighs. “Miss Farrell overheard Ryder Vega and the blonde girl—Cheyenne—talking about it. He was asking her what his dad should get you for Valentine’s Day. She heard him say you’ve been at their house a lot and that you had a sleepover.”

  Fuck you, Paige.

  “Um. To be clear, I did stay in his guest room when I slept over that night. As a friend. Ryder is…well, I thought he was unaware of the kind of relationship I’ve been having with his father.”

  “Oh, honey. Kids know. They always know. And I know it’s not like he’s married or anything, but there are optics to consider. I’ve had nothing but positive feedback about you from the parents so far. But you’re new. You’re young. You’re pretty. I’m sure I don’t need to explain it to you. Perceptions. Gossip. Jealous students.”

  “I do understand.”

  “I am asking you to consider putting a pin in this. Nip it in the bud before more people find out. Wait until Ryder is no longer your student.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “I know that’s easier said than done. I mean, let’s face it—he’s one of Hollywood’s Hottest Bachelors. Why would he wait for anyone for five months?”

  So Mrs. Woodard has Googled Alex Vega.

  She realizes her mistake in saying that. “Yes. I’ve broken my own unofficial no-Googling rule. But to be fair—I have met him. And he’s very cute.”

  “Yes.” I sigh. “He is.”

  I keep staring at my hands. I can’t look at her. And I don’t know how I’d survive if I don’t get to look at Alex Vega’s cute face every day for five months.

  She clears her throat. I have no idea how long I blanked out for.

  “I’m sorry if I’ve disappointed you, Mrs. Woodard. It wasn’t my intention to cause any trouble. We certainly tried to be discreet.”

  “I’m not reprimanding you here, Emilia. I’m just hoping to offset any possible situation where I might have to in the future.”

  For a brief, crazy moment, I have a v
ision of myself telling the principal that I quit, storming out of here and head-butting Miss Farrell, and then driving straight to Alex’s house to curl up in his arms for the rest of my life.

  But unfortunately, I’m not crazy.

  And I wouldn’t be happy ever after if I couldn’t teach.

  And so, I nod, look her straight in the eye, and say, “I appreciate it. I will deal with this. This won’t be a problem.”

  It will be shitty and sad and unbearable, but it won’t be a problem.

  “I always want to do what’s best for my students,” I continue with a shaky voice. “I hope you know that.”

  “I do. It sucks that what’s best for the students isn’t also best for our vaginas. But that’s life.” She waves me away. “Go on. Deal with it, and then take a nice hot bath or something.”

  “Yeah.”

  I trudge out of her office, hearing nothing but the pounding of my breaking heart and the Cinema Paradiso theme in my head for some reason.

  I’ll go home, call Alex, take a nice hot bath, watch the end of Cinema Paradiso, and then drink a bottle of Jägermeister and sleep until June.

  36

  Alex

  Just as I’m pulling my phone out of my pocket to text Emilia to ask when she’ll get here, I have an incoming call from her.

  “Bad news,” I say as soon as I answer. “I didn’t have time to make paella because my meeting ran long. But I will order from wherever you want me to. As long as you want pizza, because I just promised Ryder we’d have that tonight.”

  She doesn’t laugh, which is weird. “Are you…um. Are you with Ryder now? Can you go somewhere private? So we can talk for a bit?”

  “Ohhhh. I didn’t realize it was that kind of call. Give me a minute.”

  I hear sniffling from her end as I leave Ryder in the kitchen and go down the hall to my office. “You getting a cold?”

  She makes a sound like a hiccup.

  I shut the door to my office. “Okay. I’m in private. Are you naked and lying down?”

  “Alex…”

  “Topless and standing up?”

  She sniffles again. And I’m now realizing it’s not because she has a cold. “I don’t know if there’s a good way to say this. Or a better way to say it. I can’t tell you this if I’m looking at you because…”

  Shit. This can’t be good.

  “I wouldn’t be able to.”

  She’s crying. Really crying.

  “Baby. What’s wrong?”

  It takes her a moment to catch her breath. I’m used to her needing to catch her breath for very different reasons. I hate hearing her like this.

  “I can’t come for dinner. I’m sorry. I can’t be with you—the way we’ve been with each other. Not until the end of the school year.”

  “What happened?”

  She tells me about being called to the principal’s office. About Miss Farrell overhearing Ryder and Cheyenne talking about us. Fucking Miss Farrell. Like she didn’t try everything to get me to ask her out when she was Ryder’s teacher. I mean, she literally asked me out once, and when I said no, she was like, “Right. Next year, then.” No. Not next year.

  “Fuck Miss Farrell,” I blurt out.

  “It’s not just her. It’s Mrs. Woodard. The principal. She strongly encouraged me to nip this in the bud. Her words. Before more kids and teachers and parents find out. Because they will find out.”

  “So what if they do? You can’t get fired for this. Can you?”

  “Not literally, no.”

  “So what’s the problem?”

  “Alex. I explained this to you before we started…you know. Imagine you were hired to direct something, when you were a young director, and something happened that affected the way people in your business thought about you. That maybe they already thought you were too young and naïve or irresponsible to handle the job. Even if you didn’t lose your job, you wouldn’t be able to do it as well. Or it would affect your credibility. It matters.”

  Fuck. She’s right. I was a young director who had to fight for credibility in New York. I get it. I don’t like it. But I get it.

  “I do love you. And I want to be with you. And I’m so sorry, but if I don’t do this for myself, I’ll always wonder if I should have. And I don’t want to resent you if I choose you over me.”

  “I don’t want you to choose me over you. I want you to choose us. Let me talk to the principal.”

  She takes a deep, shaky breath. “I don’t think that’s a good idea, Alex. I need her and my co-workers and my students and their parents to know that being the best, most responsible teacher I can be is my priority.”

  “I still don’t see how dating me makes you an irresponsible teacher. It hasn’t.”

  “No. It hasn’t. But I’m a young, single teacher. There’s the adults and their perceptions of me, and there’s my kids. Adults can be judge-y assholes. I should know. Kids get jealous. What if other kids in the class—besides Cheyenne—find out and they start to treat Ryder badly?”

  “I’ll kick their asses. Problem solved.”

  I can hear air blowing out her nostrils, so at least she laughed a little.

  “I don’t want to stop seeing you, Emilia.”

  “I don’t want to stop seeing you, Alex. But I have to. For now. I can’t ask you to wait until June. I know it’s not fair. But please. I don’t want to lose you.”

  I hate that she thinks she could lose me.

  I hate that it feels like I’m losing her.

  I hate everything right now.

  “Alex? Are you there?”

  I exhale slowly. “I think you’ll find that I’m always here for you, Miss Stiles.”

  And she’s crying again.

  “So we aren’t going to see each other at all until then?” I ask.

  “You know that if I see you I won’t be able to keep my hands off you.”

  “Yeah. I do. It’s one of my favorite things about you.”

  “I don’t know what else to do. Besides not see you. Or hear your voice. Or text with you, because you’re such a sexy texter.”

  “I can tame my sexy textiness.”

  She barks out an adorable, snot-filled laugh. “I don’t think you can.”

  “Shit. Ryder isn’t going to like this.”

  “I’m not going to change the way I am with him in class. I will be very conscious of how I treat him.”

  “It’s not that. He really wanted us to be together. You know that.”

  “I know. I’m sorry.” There’s a long pause, and then she says, “I should hang up now. Or else I never will… Okay?”

  “No, it’s not okay. But yeah.”

  “Please don’t be mad at me. I mean, I understand if you are.”

  “I’ll see you at the end of the semester, Miss Stiles. I’ll still love you in June.”

  I hear her crying again, and I do her a favor and hang up.

  Fuck.

  “Fuck.” I kick the metal trash bin that’s by my desk. It’s almost satisfying, for a second, when it hits the bookshelf with a loud clang. It’s almost satisfying, for a second, when I pick up the three-hole-punch and throw it down on the carpet.

  But when I hear “Dad?” outside the door, I feel like shit.

  “Hey. It’s okay. I just kicked something. Be right out.”

  Fuck.

  When I go back to the kitchen, Ryder’s sitting at the table, waiting for me. He looks like he’s expecting a monster to walk in. I probably shouldn’t have let him watch my You’re So Wizard! episodes. They weren’t scary, but maybe you’re never old enough to see your dad as a werewolf. Even a Disney Channel werewolf.

  “Hi,” I say. “What kind of pizza should we order?”

  “Don’t we have to wait for Miss Stiles?”

  “She can’t come over, actually.” I take a seat next to him, scrubbing my face.

  “Does she not want pizza again? We can have something else.”

  “It’s not that, buddy…”<
br />
  He looks at me, blinking, waiting for an explanation.

  I blame myself for this. I pushed too hard. We should have tried to hide this from Ryder. But I don’t like keeping a secret from my son. Especially when it’s something that I know would make him so happy. And I didn’t want to tell him to keep this a secret because that’s too much pressure to put on a little kid.

  “You know how Miss Stiles has been coming over and hanging out with us since winter break?”

  “Yeah. It’s fun. She needs to have more fun.”

  “I agree. But the thing is, teachers aren’t really supposed to have fun with the parents of their students after school.”

  “Huh? Why not?”

  “I mean, I don’t think it’s a problem. But sometimes when other people—like other kids in your class or their parents—find out that the teacher is hanging out with the parent of one of the students… They might think that Miss Stiles is going to give you special treatment in class. Or they might think that she’s not taking her teaching job seriously enough. Which isn’t true. But sometimes people get the wrong idea.”

  “But she definitely does not give me special treatment. She should. But she doesn’t. And she’s too serious.”

  “I know. But here’s the thing—Miss Stiles is worried that there’s going to be a problem like that if she keeps hanging out with us after school. So she isn’t going to for a while.”

  “Why?”

  “Because she got called to the principal’s office. Did you tell Cheyenne about us? About Miss Stiles coming to our house?”

  I watch as he processes twenty different thoughts and emotions, and he ends up with guilt, and that’s what kills me.

  “I told her to keep it a secret. Did she tell someone? I won’t be friends with her anymore if she did!”

  “She didn’t tell anyone. I don’t think. Someone overheard you guys talking. Anyway. That’s not the point. The point is—you and I are having pizza tonight. Just the two of us.”

  He scrubs his little face, same as he’s seen me do. “Am I in trouble?”

  “No.”

  “Are you in trouble?”