Hi guys! Happy Valentine's Day! Valentine's Day is a holiday that I don't really like but it's still fun to celebrate and enjoy the long weekend (although that's not due to St. Valentin). I have three intense weeks of tournaments and the mock trial season ended for me today. I went to the Bar Method and am working on my speech to celebrate the holiday of love. The workout was excruciating today. It seems that this Valentine's Day is also a Single's Awareness Day. . . it's really awkward when people ask what I'm doing and expect for me to say something about S. I get a lot of pity and "I'm sorry" responses. I just shrug my shoulders and try to laugh. It doesn't hurt if you don't think about it so much. Anyways, I wrote a story of 5 interconnected characters who all experience different sides of love. I hope you enjoy!
Prologue
Nicole Peterson sat behind her wooden table. Pictures of her fiancé and memorable students were hanging on the walls and the giant, ancient computer took up about half the space. She had been at Rosewood High School for five years now, teaching everything from computer programming to English I. Her fiancé was an engineer who worked in the bustling city of San Francisco. They were planning to get married sometime around next year, or at least that was what she told her mother. It was around five o’ clock and she stood up to make sure everything was in place. The agenda for tomorrow’s world history class was already written and she had finished grading most of last week’s essays. One more couldn’t hurt.
Nicole smoothed out the wrinkles in her skirt and sat down in the comfy chair once more. She loved her job a little too much. She pulled out a red pen from the little tin pail of writing utensils and grabbed the first essay on the rather thin stack of ungraded essays. Harper Marvin, she read. It was already January and she still sometimes called Harper Claire. Claire wasn’t a particularly outstanding student but there was something so uncanny about their resemblance. Claire was never seen without Steven, a delinquent to her knowledge. High school relationships were so fragile and so ethereal yet no one realized it until they reached middle age. Harper was always slinking around the hallways with her mouth pressed against Lawrence Sommers’. It was disturbing to see them together but there was nothing she could really do about it.
The essay was average, nothing particular. 84, she wrote at the top. Nicole leaned back and wondered when she would have another truly remarkable student again. She opened one of the metal cabinets and flicked through the stack of papers she never threw away. She managed to pluck out an old essay Camilla Benski had written her freshman year. Nicole had been blown away by the maturity and complexity of the ideas Camilla addressed. Camilla had always been a quiet kid but in recent years, she was really blossoming as a promising young person. Nicole always felt a burst of pride whenever she saw some campaign poster or club sign with Camilla’s name on it. She glanced at her wristwatch again. 5:20, it read. She was beyond late and scurried her papers together. There was a rapid knocking at her door.
“Come in!” Was it the janitors? She couldn’t think of anyone who was still here.
“Hi Miss Peterson! Is Mr. Deaton still around?” Nicole furrowed her eyebrows. It was the sixth or seventh time that Melanie Hoskins came by to ask about Mr. Deaton. She explained something about tutoring but Nicole couldn’t grasp why a student needed to be tutored at 5 instead of at lunch or in the morning. Melanie was wearing a low cut V-neck shirt and tight jeans. She wasn’t even carrying a backpack but Nicole didn’t say anything further. Perhaps they were just going over essays or some reading she didn’t understand.
“I always tell you this, but he’s in room 221. I don’t think he’s left yet.” David Deaton was also an extraordinarily hard working person. He just started working this year and she was personally happy to welcome him to their family of teachers. He was an English guy and sometimes he came around to ask her for help. A lot of the teacher were bitter that he was given seniors in his first year of teaching.
“Thank you,” Melanie said and rushed off in a hurry. Nicole sighed and locked her door. She remembered when David’s young wife would come around in the middle of the day to surprise him. They got married rather recently. She was a beautiful young woman that could pass for an actress. She was probably waiting at home patiently for her husband. Nicole exited the school and walked to the parking lot. Her own fiancé was probably waiting for her. She started the engine to her car and it made a soft purring noise.
