Page 4 of John Wilder Gets Schooled
I hurried inside the house, not even bothering to close the front door behind me. I threw together some snacks in the kitchen—apple slices, crackers, little cubes of cheese, and some carrot sticks—and then dashed out the door again.
Uncle Steve called when I was on my way back to school.
“Where the fuck are you, kid?” he asked.
“Running late,” I said.
“Well,obviously. I’ve got a crew here waiting to work, and I’m one man down.”
“Sorry,” I said. “I’ll be there in fifteen.”
He grunted and ended the call.
He was pissed, but I knew it wouldn’t last. Uncle Steve couldn’t hold a grudge. He was my mom’s youngest brother, and he’d been the black sheep of the family before I’d stolen that particular thunder. I’d been working for his roofing company since I finished high school. Steve and Danny and Danny’s grandma, Jane, had saved my life back then, and that was no exaggeration.
I dropped Gracie’s snacks off at school, managing to avoid looking the judgmental Mr. Smith in the eye, and made it to the address on the west side of town within twenty minutes. Steve did me the favor of not chewing my ass off me in front of the rest of the crew.
“You okay?” he asked me in an undertone as I set the ladder against the side of the house.
“Yeah,” I said, ignoring the wave of tiredness that swept over me now I’d stopped moving for a second. “I’m good.”
I gripped the rungs of the ladder and began to climb.
The parking lotwas almost empty when I pulled up to collect Gracie, and tension swirled in my gut.
Late. Again.
Fuck.
I jogged toward the classroom, and if I’d thought Mr. Smith was giving me judgmental looks when I’d been late this morning, it was nothing compared to the one he gave me when I opened the door to find him standing next to Gracie and another teacher in an otherwise deserted room. I swore he looked about two seconds away from telling me to stand in the corner and think about what I’d done. And I probably would have gone too.
Gracie ran over to me with a painting clutched in one hand and said, “Daddy! You’relate.” She pursed her lips in disapproval.
“Yeah, sweet pea, I know.” I wilted a little under their combined gazes.
“There’s an after-school program,” Mr. Smith said. “You should look into it, if this is going to become a regular occurrence.”
I could tell he was just itching to remind me he wasn’t paid enough to hang around and babysit Gracie after class, but he was too nice to say it in front of her.
“Won’t happen again,” I said. I was saying that a lot lately. I grabbed Gracie by her free hand and said, “See you tomorrow.”
Gracie flapped her painting in his direction. “Bye, Mr. Smith! Bye!”
The whole ride home I got to hear about how amazing Mr. Smith was. He taught them a song about cleaning up. He had beanbag chairs in the back of the class. He had a monkey puppet that was naughty. He was the bee’s fucking knees, apparently.
Flipping.
I sighed. It wasn’t fair to be annoyed at Gracie’s teacher just because I was dropping the ball. Gracie liking her teacher was agoodthing. It just worried me that we were only one day into the school year and I was already fucking this up. And yeah, I knew about the after-school program—but I also knew how much I earned and how much the program cost, and those numbers weren’t even close to lining up. Uncle Steve was already cuttingme some slack and letting me finish early so I could collect Gracie, and in theory I should have been able to make it work. Based on today’s shitshow, I was starting to have my doubts.
But really, what choice did I have except to figure it out? The only other option was sending Gracie back to live with her grandparents and there was no way I was letting that happen. I was just gonna have to get my shit together, that was all.
As I went around to the passenger door and lifted Gracie from her seat and grabbed her bags, the For Sale sign next door caught my eye. Not only had it been straightened up, but there was a SOLD sticker slapped across the front of it.
I wondered briefly if whoever bought it had kids. It would be nice if they did, for Gracie’s sake. But I didn’t get to ponder on it too long because Gracie was tugging at my hand. “Daddy, I’m hungry,” she said. There was a crease between her brows and a whining note to her voice that told me she was overtired and done with today.
Well, that made two of us. Except I didn’t get to be done, not until hours from now when Gracie was fed and bathed and tucked up in bed for the night. That was the deal when you were the adult.
I crouched down in front of her, ignoring the ache in my thighs from going up and down a ladder all day. “Let’s go find you a snack, sweet pea, and then later we’ll call Mommy and you can tell her all about your first day, ’kay?”
