“Correct me if I’m wrong, but I do believe this list was made up by at least two different girls … well, I’m assuming they were girls,” he teased. “Look at the different handwriting.” He pointed to the first five names at the top and the names that were added near the bottom. I immediately recognized the handwriting.
“This here looks like Maggie’s handwriting,” I said, pointing to a few names at the bottom.
“It seems she’s the one who upgraded you to a 23,” he said, thumping me on the back. “And you claimed she hated you. Wrong!”
“I don’t understand, Maggie’s never set foot in here. How did this get on my counter?” I sat down on a stool, trying to make sense of it all.
“Wait a minute. This afternoon when I was getting the mail, she came jogging down my street and practically plowed me over. Her book bag spilled out, and I helped her pick everything up. This must have gotten mixed up with my mail,” I said, looking over the list again.
“Knock, knock.” Cole walked in the back door carrying the round baguette I’d asked him to pick up from the Little Bakery in town. He was dressed like he always was; blue scrubs and scuffed up leather clogs. “Here’s the bread,” he said, handing me the still warm brown sack. I did a quick scan for a bandage. It was a rare occasion when he didn’t have one stuck to some part of his body. It’d become a game between Booker and me.
There it is; left hand, little finger! I knew well enough not to question him about it, he was self-conscious about his clumsiness, besides once Booker discovered it, he’d tease him enough for the both of us.
“Dinner will be ready in about 20 minutes, we’re waiting on the rice. How’s work going?”
“Yes, by all means, Doc, tell the Hottest Guy at Port Fare High and myself about your day.” He laughed and swiped another sample of dinner.
“I guess I missed the joke,” Cole said. Booker offered him a spoonful of the sauce, along with the list. Cole eagerly accepted both, groaning with pleasure as he swallowed the sauce.
It was probably the first meal of the day for him. If you looked up the word workaholic in the dictionary, it would say “See Cole.” He was the kindest, gentlest man I’d ever met. He definitely had strong ideas about life and the world in general, only he had a way of professing them without coming across overbearingly.
He was the opposite of Booker in that way. Cole was the calm to Booker’s passion. While both men had exceptional work ethics, Booker knew how to play, where Cole seldom did. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d seen him wearing something other than his hospital garb.
Differences aside, Cole, like Booker, was a good man. Compassion poured out of both, and their integrity was unquestionable. It was that quality I admired the most. They reminded me of my dad. Honorable. Cole was a med student at the University of Rochester when we met. I had a Biology lab that was way over my head, and he helped me out. I introduced him to Booker, and the three of us became fast friends.
“I’d say you have a few admirers at the high school. It doesn’t appear as if you’ll be overlooked for the prom,” Cole said with a chortle.
“Good one, Doc. Hey, are those new scrubs?” Booker bantered.
Cole ignored him. “Do you know who wrote this?”
“N–”
“Yes.” Booker interrupted me. “Maggie, the girl he’s sweet on. I’m afraid our little boy is growing up.” Booker wiped away a faux tear. To his credit, Cole tried not to smile.
“He doesn’t know that for sure.” I took their spoons away. Between the two of them, a fourth of the sauce was already gone.
“Tell me about her,” Cole said as Booker began setting the table. He must have been hungrier than I thought.
I took a glass bowl out of the cabinet above the stove then began chopping up some roma tomatoes for a salad. “She’s cute, smart, kind. You should see her with the kids at the elementary school. She lights up whenever we’re there. They adore her. She gives up her lunch hour to help other students. She … What?” I frowned at their goofy expressions.
“I wish you could see your face, you’re partially glowing. It pains me to say this, but you’re right, Booker. Our little boy is growing up,” Cole mooned.
“Keep it up and you two will have to fend for yourselves tonight,” I said, placing the finished salad down onto the table.
“I’ll be fine.” Booker smiled. “I have some leftover lasagna I can warm up. Cole, on the other hand, will starve.”
“I can take care of myself, thank you very much.” Cole pulled a tomato half out of the salad and stuffed it into his mouth.
“That’s right. I heard you and Ron were good friends,” Booker said innocently, the first clue a joke was coming. Booker was many things, but innocent wasn’t one of them.
Cole studied him for a moment. “Okay, I know I’m going to hate myself for asking, but who is Ron?” Cole leaned against the counter and folded his arms across his chest, looking every bit the 6’3 3/4” that he was.
“You know, Ron, as in Ronald McDonald.”
I groaned. That was bad.
“I can cook,” Cole said indecisively.
“Doc, you’re the only person I know that can burn water!”
“I have never burn– okay, once. Are you ever going to forgive me?”
“You ruined my favorite pan!”
As they continued the horseplay, I arranged the rest of dinner on the table, grateful the harassment of me had ended, temporarily anyway.
While we ate, Cole shared with us the details of a particularly gruesome bowel operation he’d observed that day. He removed a pen from his pocket and drew a diagram of the bowel on the back of his hand, something he habitually did whenever a piece of paper wasn’t readily available. Booker turned three shades of green before asking if he could talk about something else.
“Fine, someone broke into my house last night. Is that better, ol’ weak stomached one?” He added a few more details to the drawing as he spoke.
“How do you know? Did they leave something?”
“Ha. Ha.” Cole set the pen down and scooped the last of the meat onto his plate. Booker frowned at the now empty serving platter.
“The last time I was at your place you had a twin bed, a dresser, and an 11 inch TV-black and white, if I’m not mistaken, and that’s it.” Booker put his plate in the sink before scrounging up a bag of sour cream and onion potato chips from the pantry.
“I don’t spend much time there. The only reason I bought the dumb house was because you insisted I needed a tax write off.”
Cole purchased the yellow Cape Cod on Chestnut Lane after he completed his residency two years ago. He got a great deal on it because the builder had only finished the first floor before running out of money. Cole, with Booker’s help, picked it up for a song. I’d be willing to bet he hadn’t slept there more than a handful of times. Growing up with six brothers, Cole hated being alone, something that was not a problem at Port Fare hospital.
“And it’s a color TV, for your information.” Cole said, snatching the chips from Booker.
“We had better install one of my security systems. They have never been hacked into, as you well know,” Booker said, swiping the chips back.
Booker’s systems were top of the line, I’d never seen so many backup alarms. It made them a real pain to install.
“If I had something worth protecting I would. Whoever broke in didn’t take anything. They probably just needed a warm place to sleep. It’s been a brutal winter,” Cole said, walking over to the refrigerator. “You got any dessert, Seth?”
“No, sorry, ran out of time. I have a huge English Lit test tomorrow, and I’ve been studying most of the afternoon. I think there’s an ice cream sandwich on the top shelf of the freezer.”
Cole looked at me strangely before removing the ice cream. “Sounds as if you’re taking this whole school assignment pretty seriously. Studying?”
“It’s a good class,” I answered defensively. He laughed.
<
br /> “Cole, leave our hottie valedictorian alone and let’s go outside and have a game of Horse. We need to work off dinner,” Booker said. He walked over to the coat closet and retrieved the orange basketball from the back corner and one of my fleeces.
Cole actually groaned. “Not basketball. I suck, and you know it.” He wadded up his ice cream wrapper, tossed it toward the garbage can, and missed. Booker laughed. I cringed. No matter the sport, Cole somehow managed to injure himself and usually someone else during the game.
“Fine, hottie here and I will play horse, you can play pig, and we’ll even spot you the P and the I.” Booker dribbled the ball a couple of times and pretended to shoot a hoop, then stopped. “On second thought, let’s head over to Applegate Park and take a few laps around their jogging trail.”
“Good idea! I’ll get my sneakers from the car.” Cole darted out the door before we could change our minds. So far, jogging was the one activity Cole could do without endangering anyone.
“It amazes me that a man so gifted at saving lives can’t manage to play a sport without killing someone,” I said while Booker put the ball away. I rubbed an aging bruise on my ribs where Cole had accidently elbowed me the last time we’d shot hoops.
“Sports? Heck, the guy can barely walk without having to get stitches.” We both laughed. “Did you see it? Left hand, little finger.” I nodded, Booker shook his head.
“So, why Applegate Park? Why not the high school?” I asked, changing out of my boots. “The track there is lit up ten times brighter than the narrow jogging trail at the park.”
“I don’t know,” he said, a little too easily. “I just got a feeling.”
10
Maggie
It was the first time I’d ever seen Bore the Snore genuinely excited, in a dull tedious kind of way. He spent the first ten minutes of class blabbering on about the facts and myths surrounding werewolves, speaking with such intensity you would have thought he truly believed in them. When Dwayne from culinary class tried contradicting him on something he’d said, Bore gave him a week of detention for disrupting the class with nonsense. Funny, I thought mythology was all nonsense.
After berating Dwayne, he settled back down into his dull mode delivering a dry lecture on the evils of SUV’s, again. What SUV’s had to do with Mythology was beyond me. You sometimes had to wonder about the man’s thought processes. I blocked out the rest of his droning and instead rehearsed my little speech for Seth.
When the bell rang, I jumped out of my seat and ran toward the parking lot in an attempt to beat Seth there, my stomach churned the entire way.
I wasn’t fast enough. There he stood, looking beautiful, waiting for me with the car door open, his usual smile was nowhere to be seen.
“Thanks.” My courage deserted me, and we slipped quietly into the car.
“You’re welcome,” he said, flipping the radio on and maxing out the volume. We rode to the elementary school listening to loud mind-numbing music. Once at the school, he bolted inside, leaving me standing in the parking lot.
On Thursday, he wasn’t in school, and Friday was simply a repeat of Wednesday. When we arrived at the school, I didn’t bother hurrying, I knew he would be inside before I was out of the car.
“Children, take your seats. There’s an assembly later today and class will be ending a little early,” Mrs. Mathews said. “I thought we could draw some pictures for Mr. Seth and Miss Maggie, thanking them for the fun activities they’ve done with us so far this year.”
They began wiggling around with excitement while I gathered the art supplies from the cupboard. Seth positioned the chairs around a big table in the middle of the room. While the children worked on their projects, we circled the table, carefully staying opposite of each other as we observed them. Many drew pictures of themselves smiling or playing with a toy, while some made pictures of the different activities we had done throughout year. Zane drew a picture of Seth and me reading books to him.
“I like to pretend you’re my mom and Seth’s my dad when you read to us. Is that bad?” A tear slipped down my cheek. Zane had been in three foster homes already in hopes of finding a permanent family, but so far nothing had worked out.
“No, Zane, that’s wonderful.” How my heart ached for these kids, these innocent victims who never asked to be born. I gave him a big hug and continued looking over the children’s artwork.
Mrs. Mathews and I started gathering up the art supplies when they’d finished. I hadn’t seen Elise’s artwork yet and listened quietly in the background as she explained her drawing to Seth.
“This is Miss Maggie,” she assured him, pointing to a stick figure with a large head and mismatched eyes. “I didn’t know which Miss Maggie to drawed so I drawed a sad Miss Maggie.”
“What do you mean?” Seth’s curiosity seemed as peaked as mine. I inched closer, looking over his shoulder as best I could from six feet away.
With her cherub face deep in thought, she began twirling a strand of her curly hair around her finger. “Before you and Miss Maggie camed here together, she looked different. Her eyes looked sad at first, but then she looked happy when she left.” Seth sat down, and she climbed onto his lap before continuing.
“But when you camed with her to class her eyes looked happy all the time. She peeks at you and smiles sometimes.”
This was becoming embarrassing. I wanted to stop her, but didn’t want it to look as if I’d been eavesdropping either.
“That’s why I knowed she loves you and that’s why I locked you guys in the closet so you could kiss her.”
“So this picture is of Maggie before we started coming here together.”
“No, this is her today. She has been sad for two times now, and she never gets happy. I don’t like it. You should try to kiss her again. Do you want me to lock you in the closet?” She looked hopefully up at Seth. “But you have to promise not to tell Mrs. Mathews. She said if we do it again we have to wash the desks instead of going to recess.”
Seth laughed. “No thanks, Elise. Miss Maggie doesn’t want me to kiss her.”
“Yes, she does!” She looked genuinely shocked he would think such a thing. I quickly peered around for the teacher, hoping she’d break up their little chat. Elise took her small hands, wrapped them around Seth’s grown up face, and looked into his eyes with all the earnestness of a six-year-old. “She’s just scared.”
“Alright, Elise, we need to go. Our visiting teachers can leave early today.” Mrs. Mathews took her by the hand as she thanked Seth and me for coming.
Did I really look that bad? I shut the closet door and walked silently to the car, leaving Seth inside to hang the last two pictures on the bulletin board. I had to tell him about Hillary and Zack. I wasn’t sad. What Elise saw on my face was nervousness, that’s all. She misunderstood.
Seth settled into the car several minutes later. When he turned the key over in the ignition, there was a loud crackling noise, followed by a popping sound. I jumped. “What was that?”
“I just blew my speakers.” I tried hard to stifle my laugh, though I could’ve sworn I saw the tiniest grin on his face.
I took a deep breath. I had to do this. I had to let him know about Zack and Hillary.
“I acted like a big jerk on Monday, and I’m sorry for hurting your feelings.” That wasn’t what I had planned to say at all! What was wrong with me? Apparently, I had more to say because the apology continued to gush out of my mouth. “I’m uncomfortable with the flirting, and I should have told you instead of verbally attacking you. You’ve been very kind to me, and I do want to be your friend, I hope I haven’t blown that. I shouldn’t have judged you like I did either, and again, I’m sorry.”
He sat there in stunned silence looking at me. It felt like an eternity. Finally, he spoke. “I’m sorry too. I shouldn’t have said anything about Zack, if I’d known you two were dating again I wouldn’t have.”
“Zack and I aren’t together.” His eyes narrowed slightly as I ma
de every effort to tell him as gently as possible about Zack’s plan and about what Hillary had said.
“I told you, Hillary and I are just friends, although I don’t know if I want to continue with the relationship anymore. Zack can have her, and he doesn’t need to go to the Winter Fest to get her either.”
“Zack said if I didn’t go along with the plan he would tell everyone I slept with him, which is a lie.” My two fingers were tangled up around my hair again. I hadn’t notice it until Seth’s eyes followed my hand.
“I wouldn’t have believed him. You have too much going for you to throw your life away on a loser like Zack, though I would like to know why you ever dated him in the first place.” He reached over and tucked the stray hair behind my ear.
“I don’t know.” I asked myself that exact question many times. “Besides, he kisses like a wet fish. Come to think of it, his breath smells like wet fish.” He laughed at my wrinkled up nose.
I smiled. “So, we can be friends?”
“Yes, and if I slip up and start flirting just pop me upside my head,” he said with a goofy grin.
“No lecture?”
“What?”
“You know, about the way I spoke to you the other day. No lecture? No, ’Maggie, you should learn how to express yourself without acting like a fourth grader,’ or something along those lines?”
“I’m sure you’ve lectured yourself far more harshly than I ever would. You shouldn’t be so hard on yourself.” I felt embarrassed by his kind words knowing I didn’t deserve them.
“What about the Winter Fest?”
“I guess we’d better go, though popping fish boy in the mouth would be ten times more enjoyable.” I couldn’t agree more!
“Maggie.” My heart skipped as he said my name. “You don’t really think this double date will stop him from spreading lies about you, do you?” I shrugged my shoulders, not wanting to think about it at the moment. It felt too good having the tension between us resolved.
“Hey, are you hungry?”
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