Page 40 of Love Lessons

But they might have noticed the way Kendall praised Finley when she was first to sound out the word “zip,” how she told her “you’re so smart!” and glanced my direction for half a second before returning to her lesson with a playful grin. And they might have observed the way I crossed my ankle over my knee and folded my hands on my stomach, too distracted by her phonics lesson to remember she’d left some laminated apple cards for me to cut out on her desk.

At the end of her lesson, she asked the children to find a quiet, independent activity until lunch and walked over to her desk. “My name is Mason, and I like red apples the best,” I said, spinning in her desk chair to face her.

Kendall flashed a smile my direction as she set her notebook down on her desk. She had on a pair of black pants that hugged her ass in the most remarkable way—it took some effort to keep my eyes on her face as she leaned over the side of her desk to reach for her coffee.

“Are you prepared for Wednesday?” she asked.

I blinked up at her in confusion until she tapped the stack of permission slips on the corner of her desk—one of which I’d signed last week. “Oh, right. Apple orchard day.”

She took a sip before saying, “I hope you’re ready for the chaos that is apple-picking with twenty-five feral kindergarteners.”

“I’m sure it’ll be—" I stopped talking when I spotted a painted acorn propped up against a pencil holder, hidden behind her coffee a moment ago.

It was the one with the eyelashes—the “mommy” one.

Kendall followed my gaze. “Oh, Finley brought me that this morning,” she said with a little laugh. “She says it looks like me.”

The words that had crushed my heart last week repeated in my mind now as I watched Kendall adjust that same acorn on her desk, wedging it between her pencil cup and a folder tray so it stood upright.

I cleared my throat as I looked up at her face, her long eyelashes more noticeable from this angle. “I mean, the resemblance is uncanny—you just need a French beret.”

She let out a sweet laugh and fiddled with her lanyard between two fingers, glancing down at her coffee to avoid my stare, which was no doubt intense. And when some boys on the other side of the room began to get a bit rowdy, and she had to set her coffee down and take care of the situation, I was still unable to tear my eyes off of her.

That woman had no idea—no idea at all—the impact she’d had on my daughter in just two weeks of knowing her.

And the effect she’d had on me was even stronger. I was already under her spell. Entranced. Obsessed. But the sight of that little painted acorn on her desk, and the knowledge of what it symbolized to Finley, set my heart on fire in an unprecedented way.

chapter seventeen

kendall

We signed up for the painting class at the winery weeks ago, when I was nearing the end of my post-Heath depressive slump and Jamie insisted I find a new hobby.

Now, as Daya, Jamie, and I sat before our canvases on a balcony overlooking a vineyard on a Monday evening, I was regretting this decision. My painting of a moonlit pumpkin patch bore no resemblance to the teacher’s example—it didn’t even come close. The instructions were pretty straightforward—a curved line here, long, sweeping strokes there—yet I managed to mess up every single step. My lines were sloppy, my pumpkins lopsided. It looked pathetic.

In fact, the painting was so comically awful that I snapped a photo of it and sent it to Mason, to which he immediately replied: Well, it’s a good thing you don’t teach art.

My giggling caught Jamie’s attention. First she looked at me, and then at my canvas. “Dude. What happened?”

“Maybe we should’ve done the pottery class instead,” I whispered, hiding my face behind my hands.

“You think you’d be any better at pottery?” Jamie shook her head. “You’d be sitting there sculpting a dick while the rest of us were making vases.”

Maybe it was all the wine samples they’d given us—or it could have been the sight of my horrible painting—but the laughing fit that followed Jamie’s words could not be stopped. I buried my face in my smock, ignoring the instructor’s commentary that “someone back there might be having a little too much fun.”

Around us, everyone was working on their finishing touches, adding highlights and shadows, but I decided I’d done enough damage. I traded my paintbrush for my wine glass and watched Jamie and Daya finish instead.

I stared at my phone, wondering how I might reply to Mason’s text—or if I even should. It didn’t feel right to flirt and lead him on, but it was hard to resist temptation. I smiled down at my screen, contemplating sharing Jamie’s dick-sculpting comment with him. Before I could think of a response, he messaged me again.

Mason: Here’s what I’m working on. Doodled this while listening to Owen’s podcast.

I’d hardly call the drawing he’d just sent a “doodle.” I gasped when it loaded. Tt was a digital illustration of the most adorable fox—a girl, I assumed, based on her long eyelashes and the little purple bow—and she was wearing a lab coat and holding a beaker.

Kendall: That is the cutest thing I have ever seen.

Kendall: Please tell me you’re going to send that to Owen? I bet he’d share it with his followers.

Mason: I don’t care about Owen’s followers. This right here is a Kendall Devin exclusive.

---