Never Too Late (9 page)

“Hey, yourself. I heard you called Maggie. That was nice of you.”

“It made the paper—the accident. Jesus, Clare—that was an awful wreck.”

“I came through it pretty lucky. You have a couple of minutes? To talk?”

“Sure,” he said. But he stayed right there, the railing safely separating them and, with him standing on the ground and her sitting on the bleachers, he was looking up at her.

“I took a teaching job at this high school,” she said. “English. Sophomore English.”

His face brightened, no question about that. That gave her encouragement if not courage. So maybe he didn't hate her so much anymore?

“Wow,” he said. “That's great.”

“So—we'll be running into each other.”

He smiled happily. “I wouldn't mind that a bit.”

He was such a fine-looking man. Not like Roger, who was too handsome for his own good. But in so many ways Pete's good looks appealed to her more. His light brown hair was cut so short it wouldn't even need combing, and he had stayed fit—flat belly, strong shoulders and arms. Sweat stained his torn T-shirt and dirt and grass marked up his sweats, but he looked good like that. As though he'd been working hard. And there was rough stubble on his cheeks and chin—he hadn't shaved before coming to practice. Rugged looking, that's what he was. All man. She remembered. She shivered.

“Look, this is hard, but I want to talk about something. Something I know you don't want to talk about.”

“Take your time. I'm not going anywhere.”

“You know what it is. Nineteen years ago. We have to put that to rest.”

He ducked his head uncomfortably for a moment, then looked back at her. “I'm sorry, Clare. I've been meaning to say that for nineteen years. I'm sorry for what I did to you—it was entirely my fault.”

She was brought up short by that. “I…Ah…It's just that, I thought I did it to you. Put you in that position of hurting your brother. I know how much you worshipped him.”

“You didn't do it to me,” he said.

“Okay, maybe we were both at fault. And, I think, carrying around that guilt and pain all this time. I really
want to let go of it now. I've been having trouble since it happened. Enough is enough.”

“I'm sorry,” he said again.

“Stop saying that, it was both of us.” She took a breath. “Have you been struggling with the guilt, too?” she asked.

“Oh yeah,” he said, with a chuckle that did not come from being amused. “But I don't think the same way as you. This isn't going to get me any points, I'm pretty sure, but I didn't have that much guilt over what I did to my brother. Some, sure, especially right after he died. I felt like a real slimeball, you know? But then he was gone and missing him was so much more real than feeling guilty about anything. The thing that worked on me for nineteen years was that it hurt you so much.”

“I'm still not sure how it all happened,” she said. He looked away briefly so she hurried on. “Wine, opportunity, loneliness—whatever.” Then more quietly. “I'm sorry, too.”

“There you go,” he said. “We're both sorry.”

Something about that was odd. She didn't understand. She said, “Every time I ran into you, you looked so damn uncomfortable, I thought you couldn't stand to look at me.”

He looked totally shocked. “Me? No! No! I thought it was the other way around, that you hated me.”

“Oh, no, I never did, Pete. In fact, you don't know how many times I thought if that hadn't happened between us, we might have been so much help to each other when Mike died. As it was, we avoided each other like the plague.”

“Well, I doubt I'd have been much good to you…or anyone. I was pretty useless for a few years there. Later,
though, when I got myself straightened out a little, I thought about you a lot, and how I never did anything to help you get through it. I hated myself for that, too. But honest to God, I thought if I even approached you, you'd freak out and snap. You…you seemed so hurt. So damaged by it. I knew I had to give you time. Space. And then—”

She waited for him to finish and when he didn't, she prodded. “And then?”

“You got married.” He shrugged. “It made sense for me to keep my distance.”

“I'm getting a divorce now,” she said, and looked down as if she was ashamed of that, too.

“Oh damn, I'm so sorry! I went through that a few years ago. Me and Vickie—it was terrible.” He put his foot on the bleachers' floor and hoisted himself up, leaping over the rail. Then he leaned back on it, facing her. “That's tough, Clare.”

“Well, so it goes. This is for the best. So—you and Vickie now?”

“She remarried almost right away.” Then he laughed. “Seemed like it to me, anyway, but I guess it was over a year later. Okay,” he said, laughing again. “Two. Two years later. We do fine now. In fact, we're better with the girls than we were when we were married. And get this—I actually sort of like the guy. But don't tell anyone. I don't want to seem soft.” And to that he added a large grin.

“That's good to know. So there's hope.”

“Can I ask you something personal?”

“Sure, why not? I can always blush and run.”

“You were never the blush-and-run type. It's just…Is there…Do you…Well, do you have someone else in your life?”

“Like a man?” she asked, astonished.

“Yeah, because that would mean you're leaving one relationship for another one and if you're doing that—”

She cut him off with her laughter. Suddenly it seemed so funny, after all the years of Roger fooling around, the very idea that anyone would come along and lure her away from her vows seemed ludicrous. What was even stranger was that she hadn't had an affair. Why hadn't she? “No,” she finally said. “No, there was never anyone else for me. He had all the someone elses. So I left him.” And then there was that little thing about how she'd been unfaithful once and that was so awful, she wasn't about to do it again.

“Oh,” Pete said, somewhat taken aback. “I hadn't expected you to say that.”

“Why not? It's not like it doesn't happen.”

“Yeah, I know—but it shouldn't happen to
you.
He must be nuts.”

“Thanks. I think.”

He just looked at her for a long moment, a sentimental smile on his face. Finally he said, “I guess if we're both teaching here and you aren't in a relationship, it wouldn't be inappropriate for us to be friends.”

“No, I guess it wouldn't.” We used to be such good friends, she thought. Way back when they had classes together, when he was on the football team and she was a cheerleader, when they hung with the same crowd during her last two years of high school while Mike was in college. And though she hadn't seen much of Pete after moving to Reno, she still thought of him as a friend. It hadn't occurred to her until now just how much she missed that. “You know what? It was stupid for us to not be friends for so many years.
If I hadn't been so ashamed and guilt-ridden, I could have gotten a lot of comfort from your family. And given it.”

“Mom still asks about you. You were always her favorite.”

“Tell her I send love, will you? And yeah, we should be friends.” She stood up.

“I think Mike would have wanted that. Well, he'd have wanted to kill me at the time, but now, being dead and all, I think he'd be okay with it.”

That startled a laugh out of her. “Pete!”

“What? I'm serious.” Then he grinned again and this was what she remembered, that he had a light heart, that he was so much fun.

“That's something. Are you able to do that—joke about Mike?”

“Oh yeah, we all do. It gets you through, you know? We miss him, we always will, but most of the pain of it is gone. My mom said, ‘Mike isn't hurting and we should let that part go as soon as we can and hang on to the good stuff, the fun stuff.' She's just amazing.”

I miss her, Clare thought. “So, I'll see you around campus?”

“Looking forward to it.”

She grabbed her purse and began to walk down the bleachers to the stairs. “Clare,” he called out to her. She turned and he asked, “Why did you think I wouldn't want to talk about it?”

“Why? That note. ‘It never happened. We'll never talk about it.'”

“Oh, that. That wasn't for me. You cried all night. I felt like a monster.”

“God. We put ourselves through so much,” she said. “What a sad pair.”

But he said, “Thank you for doing this. I always wanted to and didn't have the guts.”

She just smiled at him and waved him off like it was no big deal, but inside she was remembering that it was her who couldn't face him, or let go of the hurtful parts of the past.

She drove home feeling fifty pounds lighter. She felt good down to the soles of her shoes.

But then later, alone in the house, right in the middle of laying out lesson plans on the dining room table, she was suddenly in tears. Racked with sobs and feeling a sense of loss more profound than she had in many years. All that time they hadn't talked, hadn't worked through their issues. God, she thought, it was
one
night! And neither of us meant to hurt anyone! We should have forgiven ourselves and each other so long ago. Gotten back the bond we'd once had.

So now, she thought, it's going to be okay. She dried her tears and embraced that invigorating feeling of starting over. With old and treasured friends.

C
lare was awash in paperwork. It was the one thing that appeared to have increased tenfold since she had entered the teaching program eighteen years ago. It seemed there was a report to file for every phase of her program and for every student. She learned of all this in the week that preceded the first day of school; there were five days of training, one of which she missed for the doctor's appointment that deemed her physically fit to work. Two of the training days were dedicated to the new teachers. There were twenty-five of them in the district, a number that astonished her. And twenty-four appeared to be twenty-two years old. It seemed that Clare and the head of the English Department were the only two over thirty.

There was one young woman in the back of the room who attracted Clare's attention by the sheer tension she seemed to radiate. She was a tiny thing, probably a size two, and her clothes were a little too big, as if she'd recently lost weight. It was impossible to picture her holding off a class of strapping fifteen-year-old boys. Or
girls, for that matter. Some maternal instinct kicked in and Clare sat herself beside her the next day and learned her name was Reenie, short for Maureen, and she was a wreck.

“I can hardly eat, I'm so nervous,” she confessed in a trembling whisper.

“Don't get all worked up about this,” Clare said, even though she herself was all nerves. “Just take it one day at a time and be sure to ask for help if you need it.”

“I did my student teaching here. The high schoolers are brutal.”

“If they sense you're scared of them, you're cooked,” Clare said.

“We're
all
cooked,” she said. “We have a new principal. And she has a
reputation.
”

“What?” Clare gasped. “Mrs. Donaldson isn't here? She hired me!”

“I hear she got a fabulous promotion to some state board job, and had to leave suddenly. The woman they hired to replace her has only been teaching about ten years.”

“Well, she must have some incredible credentials to land in this job,” Clare defended. “Best to keep an open mind.”

As for asking for help—Clare soon learned it was every man for himself. She was short of textbooks and left to scrounge through the entire building, from storage rooms to boiler rooms, to find what she needed. Then there was the matter of preparing her classroom; it should be welcoming to the students. She decided on a theme—Fall Literature. She wanted to make huge letters shaped out of books and leaves that would set the stage for reading assignments with a strong sense of sea
son, but when it came to finding supplies, she was on her own.

She had met some of the teachers before, during her substituting, and those she hadn't met were not unfriendly, but clearly she was the newcomer and without a clique. As it happened, Reenie had the room next door, eleventh grade English, and it was obvious that Reenie was relieved to see her. As they compared schedules, reality hit home hard—six classes and one planning hour. Reenie's planning hour fell at the beginning of the day, Clare's at the end. There would be no honors classes for these new teachers—no getting by with the top students. Those kids, who were also the best behaved, took tenure. In fact, Clare and Reenie had two remedial classes each.

There would be lots of homework; very little time for paperwork on the job. And, with only thirty minutes, forget going out to lunch.

Right off the bat, there was whispering and sniggering about the new principal and once Clare met her she could understand why. She was a beautiful blonde and dressed in a manner very chic for Breckenridge, but she was unsmiling and cold as ice. When introduced to Elizabeth Brown, Clare frowned slightly. “You look vaguely familiar,” she thought aloud.

“Do I now?” she returned, lifting one brow, her expression chilly.

“Well,” Clare laughed uncomfortably, “in a town this size…”

“I'll be monitoring classrooms quite a lot during the opening weeks of school,” she said. “Expect to see me in yours. And I assume you got my memo about the student handbook?”

“I'm afraid I have a memo for every day of the year, and school hasn't even started yet.”

“This might be the most important memo of the first day. It's standard procedure for the students to bring a signed document from their parents saying they have read and understood the handbook, but in addition to that there will be a test that every student must pass before any other academic test is given. I'm not going to start out this year with excuses.”

They're right, Clare thought in despair. She's hateful. But she said, “Yes, ma'am,” to this woman who was younger than her. And spent hours asking herself where she had seen her before.

Clare had what she considered a great idea for her first day. She bought two crates of fresh apples; instead of an apple for the teacher, an apple for every student. Healthy and generous, in her mind. Something to warm them up a little before she threw this handbook test at them.

“Lame,” said the first boy to walk in the room. He was dressed in drooping jeans, a T-shirt and leather vest complete with chains. On his hands were driving gloves, fingers bare. Right behind him was a girl in a skirt so short it looked like a napkin, bare midriff, belly button ring and boobs bigger than Clare's. There was multicolored hair in all crazy styles, everything from high-heeled boots to sandals, gum smacking, giggling and pushing and shoving. The few apples that were taken were being pitched back and forth across the room.

Oh, there were the quiet ones who took seats in the back of the class, a couple of serious ones who sat up front, but they were so overpowered by the raucous, they were hardly noticed. And, she feared, would never be heard.

But then it was going to be a trick for her to be heard. “Attention! That's enough now! Take your seats and quiet down!”

The quiet was brief. Very brief. There was whispering, note passing, laughter and the occasional girlish squeal. She said things like, “You're stuck with me for the whole year and if you want to get on my bad side right off the bat, you're doing fine!” and, “Would you like to copy this handbook, word for word, ten times?” and, “I'm going to start taking names and assigning detention!”

It was a battleground. In reality, there were only a few who couldn't settle down or pay attention, but that twenty percent made it so impossible for the rest she was on her last nerve and her head was pounding. Four one-hour classes later she thought she might have a raging migraine, something even Roger had never managed to inflict on her. She had spent her thirty-minute lunch in her car in the parking lot fighting back tears. I'm a bad, bad teacher, she thought in horrible despair. If I make it to my planning period, it will be a miracle.

That night she had to go to bed at seven, lesson plans half-done. But what did it matter? It was going to take a month to even get to the lessons.

The second day wasn't much better. It seemed the rabble-rousers had fifteen or so minutes of control in them before the room began to agitate like an old Maytag. Through sheer dint of will, she took her lunch break in the lounge with the other teachers where she hoped she would pick up a tip or two. What she found were teachers fantasizing aloud about what they would do if they weren't teaching. They'd open boutiques, work in a travel agency, learn to fly big jets, play professional poker. “I'd dance topless,” one said, “if I had a chest.”

She looked for Pete, for any port in a storm. There was a good chance he could at least make her laugh. But he was nowhere to be seen.

On day three there was a fight between two girls right outside her door. The teachers were told never to try to break up a fight, but to call the on-duty school police. But they were right there in her doorway! Hair-pulling, biting, spitting girls! She got in the middle of it and got scratched on the arm before she got them apart—and there on the sidelines were boys who could have easily pulled them apart, if they hadn't been getting the turn-on of their lives. And of course Clare was lectured to exercise more caution and patience and stay out of these inevitable battles. Chagrined and angry, she headed for her car again during the lunch break.

That's when she saw Pete, and had her first glimpse of their new principal's smile. She appeared to have him cornered by the locker room's back door and although Clare couldn't hear them, Ms. Brown was animatedly telling some story or joke that made her laugh, reach out and touch his forearm, pat his biceps and giggle like a girl. Pete's arms were crossed over his chest, the protective stance. It would have been nice to talk to him for a second or two, but no way was she going near the principal. She got into her car, which was facing the opposite way, so she didn't have to watch the display. Ms. Brown, so cold to the women, was not so icy when it came to a good-looking man.

Not even minutes passed when she was startled by knocking on her window. She jumped in surprise. Pete had braced both hands on her car door and gestured to her to put down the window.

“Hey there, how's it going?” he asked.

She shook her head dismally and glanced over her shoulder to see the ice queen standing by the back door, tapping her foot. “Not so good. They're eating me alive. Um, she seems to be waiting for you.”

“Can I get in?” he asked. But he didn't wait for an answer. He rounded the front of the car and let himself into the passenger seat.

Clare chanced another look back, just in time to see Ms. Brown toss her head in annoyance and stomp back into the school through the locker room door.

“Oh boy,” Clare said when he sat next to her. “You've pissed off the principal.”

“Yeah? Well I barely escaped. She was in a playful mood. So—you're having some trouble adjusting?”

“I have no control of the classroom. They're wild. We were never like that, were we?”

“You weren't,” he said. “I was pretty bad. I spent most of my life in detention. When I didn't have my assignments done, I found it distracted the teachers if I just cut up a lot. They found me hilarious. And I rarely had my assignments done. Which is why I had to redeem myself in community college before I could get in anywhere else.”

“I guess I do remember that,” she said. “Got any tips?”

“Hmm. Start out tough, demand respect, carry a bat and never turn your back.”

“What do I do with the bat?”

“Try not to kill them.” When she didn't smile he said, “They're wound up in the first days. It'll get easier.”

“I was looking for you. I was looking for any friendly face. Pete, I hate it.”

“You can't
hate
it. You're just starting!”

“I haven't had one manageable class. And her—” she
said, nodding in the direction of the locker room door. “Whew. She looks at me like I just peed on her shoe.”

He laughed at her. “I think she's trying to come on strong in the beginning.”

“You call that strong?” she asked, indicating the locker room again.

“No, I call that flirting. Big mistake. That'll get her into trouble.” He put his hand on the door. “Gotta go make sure no one's getting gang-raped in the showers,” he said. And when she gasped he said, “Kidding!”

“God, don't leave me!”

“You'll be fine. Take them with a grain of salt.”

“What did you tell her? To get away?”

“I told her I had to say hello to you, see how you're holding up. That you were an old friend. Now don't let the little devils get to you!”

And then he was gone, sprinting back to the building.

When she was on her way back to her class, she happened to see her niece Lindsey holding her books, her back against a locker, a tall and handsome senior with an arm braced against it, leaning over her. Lindsey was so beautiful, so darling. She had that sexy little girl's body and he…he was a big strong boy. A flash of her own youth came to her—Mike, leaning on the locker. Stolen kisses between classes.

The boy bent down and Lindsey rose on her toes and their mouths came briefly together, lips parted. Then he gave her a very familiar pat on the behind and she laughed. Total happiness and love. Lust. All that stuff.

For a moment she was nostalgic. Those carefree days, filled to the brim with emotion and joy. But she couldn't quite tell if she was happy for Lindsey or afraid for her. Sometimes life just didn't go as planned.

Clare didn't dare say anything to Jason about hating school; it would just get him all spooled up and complaining. But she dumped on Maggie. “They're killing me,” she said of the students. “When I'm going to work in the morning, the minute the high school comes into view, my head starts to pound.”

“It's got to get better,” Maggie said. “Doesn't it?”

“If it doesn't, I could be suicidal by Christmas…”

On day four she was to give the Handbook Test. She read the test over. It had no known author, but whoever had put this beauty together was out for vengeance, or war. The questions were impossible. The easy stuff wasn't mentioned, just the most oblique and complicated. ‘What is the grade point average under which varsity sporting team members must be suspended from the team?' The number of students who would get that one right would be equal to the number of varsity players. ‘When is a conference with the counselor mandated?' ‘Under what circumstances is absenteeism considered truancy?' And each question was followed by multiple-choice answers that all looked correct. Was that grade point average that bumped you off the team 2.0, 2.2, 2.3 or 2.4? If she were a betting woman, she'd wager half the class would fail.