He leaned back against the foot of the bed, dazed.
This was what Fiona dealt with every day?
He clicked into a blog post and read through a minute-by-minute breakdown that made him feel physically tired. Reading groups. Differentiated instruction. Fire drills. Parent emails. Social conflict mediation. Lunch duty. Math assessments. Data entry.
And then the comments—hundreds of them. Teachers sharing stories about kids showing up hungry, or without clean clothes. About collapsing in their cars after work. About how no one understood what they did, except other teachers.
Dean stared at the screen.
He’d assumed he understood what Fiona did. He’d nodded along when she vented about budget cuts or standardized testing. He’d made supportive comments—“you’re amazing," or "they’re lucky to have you."
But he hadn’t really listened. Notdeeply. Not with the same curiosity he gave to branding trends or conversion metrics or how long a user lingered on a landing page.
And he’d certainly never given itrespect.
His stomach churned.
He’d thought of it as herlittle job. Meant it kindly. Patronizingly. Like he was indulging her. Like her work was sweet but not serious.
God, what an asshole.
Fiona didn’t have a little job. She had a calling. One that demanded more skill and stamina and selflessness than anything he’d ever done in his entire career.
Dean exhaled hard, rubbing a hand over his face.
Some days she’d come home tired. He'd assumed tough days meant a kid talked back or she'd had to grade too many papers.
Jesus. He'd been such an ass.
He remembered her excitement last month about some kid finally reading at grade level. Dean had nodded and made some generic encouraging noise.
Reading at grade level.
The article he'd just finished explained what that actually meant—comprehension, confidence, the foundation for every piece of learning that would come after. For a kid who'd been struggling, it was everything. It was his future unlocking.
And Fiona had done that. Fiona had seen something that no one else had, had stayed after school to work with him, had probably spent her own money on books that might interest him, had celebrated that breakthrough like it was the moon landing.
Because to that kid, it was.
Dean leaned back in his chair, staring at the ceiling. All those late nights she'd spent checking worksheets and planninglessons. All those weekends she'd worked on bulletin boards and classroom projects. He'd thought it was... cute.
He’d been married to someone who literally changed lives for a living, and he’d thoughthisjob mattered more—because it paid more.
She was doing work that actually mattered—not selling people things they didn't need, not crafting messages designed to manipulate emotions for profit, but genuinely making the world better, one kid at a time.
And he'd patronized her for it.
Dean closedthe laptop and sat in the dark kitchen for a long time, heart pounding with a feeling that was part awe, part shame.
And then he got up.
So many of her things were gone: her slippers from beside the bed, her warmth, her presence.
But Fiona's books still lived on the shelves in the apartment. The shelves were still full of her.
He ran his fingers over the spines.The Art of Teaching Reading. Creating a Culture of Inquiry. Trauma-Informed Classrooms. The Whole-Brain Child.Thick binders labeled with unit themes and months. Tabbed and color-coded. Her notes in the margins, meticulous and warm at once—“good for Ben?” “Try this with Marisol’s group” “Add movement—Isaiah learns through motion.”
Dean pulled one out and opened to a random page. She’d underlined a section and written in purple pen:YES. Learning is emotional.A few sticky notes fluttered out and landed in his lap.
