Shay turned to face me. She stared while I looked everywhere but at her. Eventually, she said, “Let me help you with Gennie.”
“We have plenty of help.”
“I don’t doubt that you do but Gennie is still going to be held back if you don’t change it up. Let me help her. I have a good idea of what she needs. I’ve taught kindergarten for nine years—”
“You’re a teacher? When did that happen?” The last thing in the world I could imagine for Shay was a job as intense and hands-on as teaching.
“As I’m sure you’re aware, things change.” She gave me a salty look. “I can tutor her before school starts and catch her up while working on some of the behavioral issues too.”
That was exactly what Gennie needed and what I’d begged the school to provide, and my hostility toward this woman was almost great enough to flat-out refuse. “Why do you want to do that?”
“Because I hate seeing kids held back,” she said immediately. “And Gennie is a quick kid. She’s bright. I bet she’s behind in a lot of basic skills and that leads to frustration and other big feelings, and that probably triggers some of the behavioral stuff.”
“What’s in it for you?”
She gave a rueful laugh. “What’s ever in it for teachers?” When I only stared ahead, she added, “I need something to do to keep me distracted from my life before school starts, at which point I’ll be too exhausted to think about my life.”
That…didn’t sound right.
“And what are you looking for in return?”
“What am I—what?” She frowned at me like she couldn’t believe I’d ask that. “I’m looking to prevent a good kid from repeating a grade level and adding another helping of childhood trauma to her life. Get rid of that poison ivy for me and we’ll call it even.”
Gennie appeared in the beam of the headlights, yelling, “There are three eggs!”
“Do not go near that nest unless you want a duck chasing you.” To myself, I muttered, “She’s gonna get chased by a duck.”
Again, I was reminded I was not qualified for parenting.
Finally, I glanced over at Shay. Goddamn, she was pretty. But that was only the outside. The girl I’d known wasn’t selfless. She didn’t go above and beyond simply because it was right. She didn’t go looking for the good in others. I had to ask, “Why?”
She pulled her keys from her pocket, rubbing the pad of her thumb over a fob. “Because you’d do it for me.” She motioned to the four-wheeler like it could prove her point. “And you wouldn’t take no for an answer.”
chapterthree
Shay
Students will be able to handle marriage proposals with the grace of a squawking goose.
Noah Barden rolledup two days later with a trailer full of goats and a six-year-old waving her sword out of the truck’s back seat window.
I spotted them from my spot on the floor of the left parlor—two of everything in this house—where I was enjoying a pudding cup for breakfast. The floor because there wasn’t much furniture, and the pudding because I was done with dieting for the dress. Or any other reason.
I went in search of shoes and grabbed my water bottle before meeting Noah and Gennie outside. I was proud to report there was water in that bottle. I’d debated spicing it up with something stronger but day drinking alone in an empty house felt like an altogether different level of drunkenness. It was a plateau I didn’t want to hit.
I’d polished off a bottle of wine and a block of cheese last night but that was different. Totally different.
From the shelter of the porch, I watched Noah release the goats while Gennie used his leg for sparring practice. If he noticed her attack, it didn’t show on his face.
Kinda like how all memory of our friendship didn’t show on his face.
Of all the people I’d guessed I’d run across here in Friendship, Noah Barden hadn’t even made the list. That boy’s singular mission had been getting the fuck out of this town. He’d hated farming and farm life and the entirety of this place—and I’d shared a lot of those sentiments with him. We’d been united in our desire to hit the road and never look back.
Funny how that worked out for us.
But the part I really couldn’t reconcile was that my old friend seemed angry with me. Not only was henothappy to see me, I had the distinct impression he didn’t want to see me at all.
That was strange, right?
