Page 80 of Saving the Last Heir
“If he wanted to hang out with Mariposa and Jackson.”
That brought me up short, my scowl vanishing as I glanced around the shop.
“Jackson? Where the heck are they?” I asked.
He pointed to the back of the shop. “In your office the last time I saw them. Mariposa showed up a few minutes after Jackson got here, and Mikey was right on her heels.”
“For fuck’s sake,” I muttered, turning to the office.
The kid was constantly skipping school to hang out here. I’d told him multiple times that he needed to keep his grades up and eventually graduate if he ever wanted to work in my shop. Preferably, I wanted him to go to a trade school or something. He didn’t have the best home life, and I was pretty sure his parents didn’t care what he did, but I did. He lived in the same neighborhood, and I’d spent my whole life trying to make the place better. What better place to start than with the kids?
Rounding the corner, I got a view into the office and paused, nearly stumbling over my feet as I saw what was happening inside.
“The hell?” I whispered to myself.
Jackson stood at the marker board, which I used to write down the weekly supply and parts order. He had a dry erase marker in his hand and was drawing math symbols on the board. Mikey and Mariposa both sat on the floor, staring up at him in rapt silence.
“So when you have this girl in your book,” Jackson was saying. “I think Carrie was her name. It says she went on a bike ride with friends, and she went ten thousand five hundred feet in ten minutes.” He wrote the number on the board. “It asks how fast she’s going in feet per minute.”
“Right,” Mikey said, pointing at the board. “You can’t figure that out.”
“Yeah,” Mariposa muttered. “It’s impossible.”
“Yes, you can,” Jackson said patiently, smiling at the kids. “It’s not impossible. Let me show you.”
I leaned against the wall, crossing my arms and watching in wonder as he wrote out and explained how to find the solution.
“Speed is equal to distance divided by time,” he said. “It’s all about understanding what the question is asking.”
“Wait…what?” Mikey asked, looking dumbfounded. “That’s all it is?”
Mariposa lifted her hand, looking up from her calculator. “She was going one-thousand-fifty feet per minute.”
“You got it,” Jackson said, pointing at her with the marker and smiling like a proud father. “She was moving pretty fast, right?”
“Dang,” Mikey said, running a hand through his shaggy blond hair. “Ms. Johnson never explained it like that when I took her class last year. Mr. Jackson, you should be a teacher.”
“Andyoushould be at school with real teachers,” I said, finally stepping into the room.
Mikey and Mariposa both jumped in surprise. Mikey looked guilty and didn’t meet my eyes. I glared down at him, arms still crossed.
“What did I say about skipping school?” I said.
“Not to do it,” Mikey mumbled, fiddling with his shoelaces.
“So why are you here?” I asked.
He gave me a shrug and nothing else.
“Hey, bud?” Jackson said.
Mikey turned his head toward the man. “Yeah?”
“Do you know how I got so smart? I went to school. I went all the way to college, if you can believe that.”
Mikey’s face twisted in distaste. “Aw, man, I don’t wanna do school that long. I can drop out when I’m sixteen—my mom and dad said so.”
My stomach lurched in anger. It was fine to not give a shit about yourself, but how the hell did you let your own kid think the best way to get through life was to quit?
