Page 27 of Clued in to Love
As she started to text him, a call came through.
“Hilary speaking.”
“Thank goodness I caught you. There’s a problem.” A woman’s voice sounded on the other end of the line.
“Who is this?” Hilary recognized the Bend area code, but the number wasn’t in her phone.
“Sorry, this is Amanda, the mayor’s assistant. This is Hilary Baldwin, right?”
“Yes.”
“Did you hear what happened?”
“No, what?”
“Uh, well, you better get to your office right away. There’s a major issue.”
A major issue?
Hilary clutched her stomach with her free hand.
What could have gone wrong? She had planned for every possible scenario.
“I don’t understand.” It couldn’t be a team, could it? Had someone been injured?
Amanda’s tone was curt and short. “The mayor needs to speak with you.”
“Can you give me a little heads-up? Why does he need to see me?” The suspense was killing Hilary. She glanced around the nearly empty park. The last of the folding chairs and the speaker system were being carted away. Vendors were closing their shops for the evening. They’d return for special holiday market hours over the weekend. Teams had started on their quests. Everything was fine.
Amanda cleared her throat. “We have reason to believe there is cheating going on. The mayor wants you to shut down the entire event—now. Passport to the Holidays is done.”
SEVENTEEN
DARBY
Darby was often the first staff member to arrive at work in the morning. She enjoyed the empty hallways and the smell of lemon cleaner used to buff the floors. Her classroom was a bookish retreat. It didn’t look like a typical high school classroom. Instead of uniform rows, she had arranged the desks in a circle for their daily Socratic seminars. Bookshelves lined every wall. There were reading nooks in each corner—one with a thick rug and bean bags and another with two oversized plush chairs and fake candles, the kind with electric flames that actually flickered. The snack station was her students’ favorite. She kept granola bars, chocolate cookies, fruit, and nuts for them to enjoy while curled up with a book.
Her teaching practices and style hadn’t changed much over the years. Darby had always prided herself on introducing her students to a wide range of authors from diverse backgrounds. She was happy that the AP English curriculum reflected stories from new perspectives in recent years. Her only worry was that so much of the current reading lists centered on trauma. Not that Darby opposed exposing the young, bright minds in her classroom to the harsh realities of the world around them. Shestocked up on tissues at Costco because nearly every discussion led to tears.
Darby wasn’t afraid of tears or letting her kids feel the big feelings that books brought up. Her classroom was a safe space to explore deep conversations, vulnerability, and self-reflection, and to challenge her students and herself to examine their long-held views and personal biases.
Her only concern was that there wasn’t a balance. Reading should also be fun. Her students were exclusively reading books that triggered deep emotional pain without also experiencing the utter bliss that could come from escaping into the pages of a beautifully crafted story.
She had made an impromptu change in her syllabus in early November a couple of years ago after her senior class had finished reading back-to-back novels that had left her and her students a blubbery, teary mess. To remedy the situation for the last two weeks of school, before winter break, they would find joy in reading again and participate in planning a holiday prank.
The assignment was two-fold. First, her class had come up with an elaborate, yet not mean-spirited, prank to play on the staff. This year’s Project Candy Cane was a perfect example of a festive and fun way to round out the year before holiday break.
The second assignment was for each student to bring the book they remembered completely falling in love with. It didn’t matter if it was a picture book from childhood, a graphic novel, or a romance. Darby didn’t care or offer specifications. Any book that had made them laugh. Any story that had brought them a moment of joy. Any reading that became an escape, a place of comfort and solace.
Maybe she was projecting, but the statistics were on her side. At a teaching conference last year, she’d learned that over forty percent of high school graduates would never pick up a book again in their lifetime. Books had been her companions in grief.She wanted to ensure this next generation had fictional friends to turn to in times of darkness.
Darby flipped on the overhead fluorescent lights and checked her lesson plan. A soft knock on the door interrupted her thoughts. She looked up to see William Graff standing in the doorframe. He was so tall that his head almost touched the top of the frame. There was something about his naturally calming aura that put her at ease. She suspected his students picked up on that same energy, which was likely why he was the most sought-after sub in the entire district.
“Hey, am I interrupting?” He leaned against the doorframe, holding a pink bakery box as if trying to decide whether to step inside.
“No. Not at all.” Darby closed her notebook. “Please, come in.”
William had been hired as a long-term substitute to cover for another teacher on maternity leave. Aside from his student teaching, he had never set foot in a classroom. Even though he had little experience and lacked the basics regarding classroom management, the kids adored him. He was also eager to learn and had a great sense of humor. Darby believed that a sense of humor should be a prerequisite to hiring any high school teacher. She’d been in education long enough to witness a steady stream of teachers who took themselves way too seriously for the halls of a high school opt for new career paths.
