Breaking the Rules: The Honeybees, book 1

by Archer, Amy

  No, I thought. Devin was negligent and irresponsible. Fun as he may be, I just didn’t need someone like him in my life. I’d been right that very first time we’d talked about Taco—I’d been right that he was a bad dog owner.

  For now, I decided, I just had to get through the rest of the school year. And I’d do it by eating right, exercising with my arms however I could, getting a full eight hours of sleep each night, and returning to the normalcy I hadn’t had with Devin around. I’d do whatever it took to feel grounded and stable. I’d move on with my life once and for all.

  Determined, I stood up, then almost fell over right away in pain. I still wasn’t used to having a broken leg, and I’d forgotten that even simple tasks like standing up weren’t as easy as they used to be. I grabbed the crutches and positioned them under my arms, then picked up the mug to take it to the sink.

  Every little thing involved so many steps! Why did this have to happen?! Why did everything have to be taken away from me? In frustration, I let out a guttural scream in the empty apartment, and my fists clenched reflexively. As they did, the mug slid out of my grasp. I started to dive for it, but the crutches anchored my arms in place, and pain shot through armpit as the top of the crutch dug into my skin and muscle.

  The mug crashed to the floor, and, almost in slow motion, I watched it shatter into dozens of pieces around me.

  Suddenly shaky, it was all I could do to hobble over to the armchair before collapsing onto it, my breath coming in ragged gasps. And then I was sobbing and shaking, not holding anything back, mourning my loss of mobility, mourning the marathon, mourning losing Taco, mourning how I’d appear to all of my old classmates at the reunion, but most of all mourning losing the man who made me feel more alive than anyone I’d ever met.

  By Wednesday, I was getting much more comfortable with the crutches—which was a good thing, because it was the day of the museum field trip. Ms. Mayfield had offered to go in my place, but I assured her that I was capable of herding my class around the space, at least with help from the parents who had volunteered to chaperone. Secretly, though, I hoped it was true. I was also grateful for the distraction from thinking about everything that my mind had been mulling over nonstop for the past two days.

  “Ms. Burleigh, what happened?” my students had asked, wide-eyed, when I’d shown up to school on Tuesday.

  “I fell,” I told them simply, and they accepted the explanation with a naiveté that I appreciated. By Wednesday, it was old news.

  With lots of help from the parent drivers, I got the kids to the museum right on time. “Are you excited?” I asked Angelina as we all shuffled through the door to meet our guide, the kids holding the hand of their assigned buddy.

  She nodded solemnly, but I saw her eyes sparkle as she stared around her at the art on the walls. “It could be your work here someday,” I told her.

  The guide came out to greet us. “I’m Miss Martha,” she told the group, and explained the museum rules: no touching the art, stay with the group, no yelling. I zoned out a little as I looked around me, thinking of the art gallery I’d visited with Rachel. I’d have to text her, I decided, to make sure she was coming to the reunion. It had been so good to reconnect with the Honeybees, all of them, and I couldn’t imagine the reunion without any one of us.

  Martha led the group around the museum, explaining in the simplest possible terms what the artists were trying to accomplish. She was good, I thought, asking the kids what they thought and how the pieces made them feel, asking them to identify the main colors—though some, I noticed, like Brandon, were much more absorbed in their own shoelaces than in anything going on around them.

  Oh well. They couldn’t all appreciate it. At least Angelina was hanging on Miss Martha’s every word, nodding along and staying carefully behind the tape lines on the floor as she examined the pieces. I was so proud of her. She was so much more mature than her five years.

  We shuffled into the next room, the sound of tiny feet and whispered voices punctuated by the thump of my rubber-tipped crutches.

  “Now, what do you all notice about this piece?” Miss Martha asked, standing in front of a large paper collage.

  “It’s a sun!” a tiny voice said.

  “That’s right,” she said. “It’s made to look like a sunset—here’s the sun, the land, and all the pretty colors in the sky. Does everyone see that?”

  “Yes,” the group chorused.

  “What else do you notice?” she asked. “What’s it made of?”

  The class shuffled. A few kids shrugged. Brandon and his friend Jeff made gun noises at each other. The kids were starting to get antsy, and I just hoped they’d stay on track long enough to finish the tour.

  “It’s made of paper,” came Angelina’s voice from the crowd.

  “That’s right!” Miss Martha said, and I beamed at the back of Angelina’s head. “This is called a collage. It’s a bunch of different pieces of paper, all cut up and glued together to make a sun. I want you all to take a close look at this collage and see if you can see the individual pieces of paper it’s made from. Just be careful,” she warned. “Don’t get too close, and remember: no touching. This piece is very, very delicate.”

  The students shuffled forward toward the artwork as the parents rushed to buddy them back up in an attempt to organize the mass of children. I watched as they glanced at the piece and shuffled away. When it was Angelina’s turn, she went up to the art and examined it carefully, looking closely at all the different colors it was made from.

  In the back of the room, Brandon and Jeff were getting rowdier, and I went over to touch them on the shoulders. “Boys,” I said. “Not in the museum, okay? Have you gone to look at the art yet?”

  Jeff looked up at me wordlessly, but Brandon kept going. “Pow, pow, you’re dead!” he said, aiming his imaginary gun at Jeff’s head.

  “Brandon!” I said sharply.

  “Pow!” he said again, even louder this time, and ran full speed at Jeff.

  Jeff screamed. “Stop!” he yelled at the top of his lungs.

  Everyone in the room turned to look—and, no doubt, people in other rooms had heard it too. My eyes darted to Miss Martha, hoping she wasn’t confirming any suspicions she may have had about letting a bunch of five-year-olds spend time in the museum.

  But then, with horror, I saw something even worse. Angelina, still standing very close to study the sunset art, had turned quickly when Jeff had screamed, and had lost her balance. “No!” I said, but it was too late. As I watched, helpless, my careful, perfect protege toppled backward and, struggling to right herself, punched a hole right through the middle of the setting sun.

  Half an hour later, the parent chaperones had taken all the kids back to school—everyone but Angelina, who was still at the museum with me. We sat on a bench together, waiting for the director of the museum to get out of a meeting and talk to us. I felt like I was a child who had gotten sent to the principal’s office, except this was so much worse.

  Angelina had burst into tears before she’d even had a chance to stand up and extract her arm from the artwork. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” she’d wailed.

  But since the initial meltdown, she’d been still and silent, looking afraid.

  “Hey,” I said, and squeezed her hand. “It’ll be okay, all right? You’ll get through this.”

  She looked up at me with damp, wide eyes. “What are they going to do?” she asked.

  “I don’t know,” I told her. This was a new situation for me too. Would they call her parents, like Ms. Mayfield would’ve done if this really were the principal’s office? Would they make them pay for the piece? How much was a sunset collage worth, anyway?

  Angelina looked down at her hands, folded in her lap, then back up at me. In a tiny voice, she asked, “Will they send me to jail?”

  “Oh, no!” I assured her, startled. “No, nothing like that! Don’t worry.” Poor girl. I wanted to scoop her up in my arms and protect her from the world.
I hoped her parents wouldn’t be too mad.

  The museum director’s office door opened then, and a couple of men in suits came out followed by the director, whom I’d met only over the phone. She was an elongated forty-something in a flowing, flowered dress, dark hair pulled back into a bun.

  “Come on in,” she said. We sat down in the plush armchairs in front of her desk and introduced ourselves. I wasn’t sure where to lean my crutches, so I ended up laying them awkwardly over my lap.

  “Now, Angelina,” the director, who had told us to call her Bobbi, said. “I understand that you damaged a piece of art today.” The five-year-old in me squirmed uncomfortably, but Angelina stayed still.

  “Yes,” she said abashedly. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to.”

  “I know you didn’t,” the woman said. “Miss Martha told me that you were asking a lot of really good questions during her tour, and that you seemed very interested in the art. Is that true?”

  Angelina nodded uncertainly. “I want to be an artist.”

  “Well, I hope this experience won’t turn you off to art,” Bobbi said. “It must’ve been pretty scary to have that happen, wasn’t it?”

  Angelina nodded again. I couldn’t believe how nice this woman was being. Hadn’t she been the one Ms. Mayfield had spoken with who was uncertain about inviting kindergarteners into the museum in the first place?

  “It’s pretty serious to hurt a piece of art,” Bobbi continued. “But I know that it was an accident, and we can’t change what’s happened. I know you’ll be really careful in the future, right?”

  More nodding.

  “Good,” she said. “Angelina, everyone makes mistakes sometimes. The important thing is that we learn from our mistakes so that we don’t have to make the same mistakes over and over. Does that make sense?”

  “If I hear a loud noise again at a museum, I won’t turn around fast to look because I could fall,” Angelina said.

  “That’s right. You seem like a really good kid, so don’t beat yourself up too bad, okay? Everyone makes mistakes,” she repeated. Then she turned businesslike. “But I do need to get contact info for both of you so that we can submit the insurance claim.”

  I breathed out a sigh of relief. Of course—insurance. Insurance would pay for this. I wrote down my info and Angelina dictated what of hers she remembered, and then we thanked Bobbi for her kindness and left.

  Everyone makes mistakes. Her words echoed in my mind. If Angelina, the most careful student I’d ever had, could accidentally fall into a work of art, then it was true—it really could happen to anyone. Maybe I needed to accept that I too would sometimes make mistakes.

  Maybe, a little voice in my head said, I needed to accept that Devin would too.

  But I quickly shoved that thought out of my mind.

  When I got home that night, there were flowers waiting at my door, a huge bouquet of color. They were from Devin. I hated to admit that after the day I’d had, this was exactly what I needed.

  A card tucked into the bouquet read, “Sophie, I’m so sorry about what happened. Hurting you was my worst nightmare come to life. I feel awful, and I don’t blame you a bit for not wanting to see me. I never expected Paco to chew through his leash and run to find us—I didn’t even think he could if he wanted to, but I should’ve known, and I feel terrible.”

  Wait, I thought. Taco had chewed through the leash? I’d assumed he’d wiggled out of his collar, like he had the day he’d run away from Devin so many months ago, the day I’d found him outside the library. The leash we’d used was made of sturdy rope, even sturdier than the one I’d bought from the animal shelter the first day I’d taken Taco home—I certainly never thought he could get through it. I’d just assumed Devin hadn’t made the collar tight enough. I’d assumed this was all his fault.

  I took the flowers inside and sunk down into a chair. Did this change anything?

  No, I decided. My leg was still broken. I still couldn’t run the marathon. If Devin couldn’t change the past, nothing he could say now would make me feel any better.

  I tried to concentrate on my students the rest of the week and on redefining my goals for the coming months, but I couldn’t get Devin out of my head. The reunion was on Friday, and I’d be going alone. As much as I didn’t want to, I missed Devin like crazy. Part of me wished he could still come with me to the event and be my emotional support.

  But we’d broken up, and I’d have to face it alone. Besides, he had a marathon to run early the next morning. And thinking about the marathon, remembering why I wouldn’t be running it myself, I was glad he wouldn’t be there.

  At least I had my Honeybees. I was so glad I’d reconnected with each of them over the past few months. I hadn’t realized how much I’d missed them since we’d lost touch, and seeing them had reminded me how much I’d enjoyed our friendship back then.

  Finally, the evening of the reunion arrived. After going back and forth a few times, I put on the deep blue dress I’d worn the night Matt had dumped me. I hadn’t worn it once since then—too many bad memories—but it felt far enough in the past now that I could face the dress again.

  What would everyone look like? I wondered. What would they be doing with their lives? I imagined them all married, possibly pregnant or with a kid. The ones who didn’t have kids would’ve been traveling the world or starting companies. By now some of them would have masters degrees or even PhDs. Some would be doctors or lawyers, some would be executives at national corporations. Maybe there would be successful filmmakers or artists or writers. I tried to remember what my classmates had wanted to do for a living back in high school.

  And then there was me. Fifteen pounds overweight, broken leg, single, with nothing to show for my decade since high school except my failed relationship and a few former students who still remembered me. I pinched my stomach through the lush fabric of the dress and sighed. No accomplishments to my name. No marathon to tell about.

  As I headed out on the BART toward the hotel where the reunion was taking place, I wished I’d asked the Honeybees if they wanted to meet for happy hour beforehand. I’d be a lot more nervous walking in alone—and a drink might help.

  But of course I hadn’t—until a few days ago, I’d thought I wouldn’t be drinking at all tonight. I’d thought I’d be preparing for the event I’d been working toward for months.

  My stomach clenched as I walked into the hotel lobby, where a sign directed me to the second-floor ballroom. “Richardson High School Reunion.” This was really happening.

  Upstairs, my old class president and vice president sat behind a table full of name tags, checking people in. I got in the short line, smoothing my dress anxiously and scanning the people around me for familiar faces. None.

  When it was my turn, the former class president greeted me, then looked more closely. “Sophie! I almost didn’t recognize you.” Then, looking down at my cast, she added, “Oh, you poor thing.”

  I felt myself blushing deeply. “Hi Tessa. Good to see you.” Had I really gained that much weight? I must look terrible to someone like her, someone who hadn’t seen me in so many years. The broken leg was only the rotten icing on the whole unpleasant cake.

  “You look great,” she added, but I thought she must’ve just been trying to cover up her initial reaction. “And your guest?” she prompted, glancing up from her list of names.

  “He’s…he’s not coming,” I said, feeling my stomach sink. This was going so poorly already; what other horrors would this night bring? Should I not have come?

  She gave me my name tag and I headed into the ballroom. It was decorated to look almost like a prom, clusters of balloons and streamers decorating the room and a big balloon arch stretching over the stage. The back half of the room was full of tables, and the front had been made into a dance floor. People were milling around or standing in small groups.

  Why hadn’t I come with someone? I wondered again. I kicked myself for walking into this situation alone.

&n
bsp; And then I saw Caroline. She was standing alone near the bar, and I headed toward her, relieved. “Hey, Sophie! I’m so glad you’re here,” she said, then, “Shit! What happened to your leg?”

  “Oh…” I looked away. “It’s a long story.” More specifically, it was just a story I didn’t want to tell. Even Caroline. “How are you?”

  “I’m nervous. Have you seen anyone you know yet?”

  “Not really.”

  “Oh hey! So how’s that, uh…” Caroline gave me a knowing smile and then whispered, “vibrator working out?”

  I laughed. “You would not believe what happened.” I told her about walking in with Devin to find Taco with the buzzing vibrator in the middle of the living room floor.

  “No!” she gasped. “Oh, that’s terrible! But—wait, isn’t Devin the one you were so mad at because he thought your dog was his?”

  I nodded. “I have a lot to fill you in on,” I said. But before I could start, Olivia and Hannah appeared at our side.

  “Oh wow, hi!” There were hugs all around as we greeted each other, along with exclamations about my broken leg, and then the Honeybees were almost complete.

  “Has anyone heard from Rachel?” I asked. “I meant to text her to ask if she was coming, but I—” I glanced down at my cast “—got distracted.”

  “No,” murmured the others, shaking their heads. “I don’t think I’ve talked to her once since graduation,” Olivia said.

  I was disappointed. But at least I had the others—Caroline, who had helped me get over Matt by buying a new toy; Olivia, who had encouraged me to listen to my heart when it came to Devin; and Hannah, who told me to have fun and not take life too seriously. Without Rachel, though, the final piece of the puzzle was missing. I remembered how she’d told me at the art gallery that we seek out in a romantic partner what we were missing in ourselves. It had been good advice, even though with Devin things had crashed and burned—literally. Well, maybe not burned.