Page 76 of Wanting You

In his room, he instructed his students to take their seats and Chloe’s students to line up by the cubbies. Then he talked to them all about the firefighter assembly they were going to attend soon.

“We’re going to learn about fire safety, and see how a fire truck works,” he told them. “What is something you want to learn about the truck?”

A flurry of little hands went up while shouting out questions.

“How does the ladder work?”

“How much water can the truck hold?”

“Do they have a dog?”

“Can we go for a ride in the fire truck?”

“These are some great questions,” he said enthusiastically. “And I’ll bet all the firefighters are super excited to answer them! Has anyone here visited the fire station before?”

Everyone seemed to say no to that one, so he supposed this was really going to be a great assembly for them all.

“Does anyone know a firefighter?” he asked.

They all shook their heads, and that’s when Chloe breathlessly came into his room. “Sorry about that,” she said, and then smiled at her students. “Did everyone behave for Mr. Westyn?”

“Yes!” they told her.

“Very good! Now let’s go next door and finish up our coloring sheets before the assembly, okay?” Looking over at Tanner, she smiled. “Thank you for the help. Kimmy made it to the nurse just in time. We had to call her mom to come and get her.”

“Poor kid,” he said as he walked closer. “I guess we’ll see you at the assembly in a little while.”

She nodded. “Yes, we will. And…really. Thanks again.” With a small smile, she led her class out of the room and back to hers, and it felt like a big step for them. Sure, they could be coworkers and it would be okay.

But that didn’t stop him from still hoping for more.

Chapter Thirteen

Friday afternoon, all of Chloe’s students were quietly reading.

Except one.

James Emme kept looking over at her, and she knew he had something on his mind. So, she smiled and quietly waved him over. “Is everything okay, James?” she asked.

“Miss Donovan, how come we aren’t going on the field trip?” he asked quietly.

“Field trip? What field trip?”

“My best friend Tommy is in Mr. Westyn’s class and they’re going skiing next week,” he explained with a pout. “How come we can’t go?”

She looked at him oddly. “I…I didn’t know about the field trip,” she told him, doing her best to smile again. “But I’ll tell you what, I promise to go down and talk to Principal Kincaid while you’re all in art class and see what I can find out, okay?”

He smiled and looked like he wanted to jump for joy, but then he looked over at everyone reading and reconsidered. “Thanks, Miss Donovan,” he whispered and went back to his seat.

She had ten minutes before she took her class down to art, and her mind was racing. Tanner was taking his class skiing? What in the world? How was that even possible? Or practical? Or safe? Was he using this as a publicity stunt?

The snort was out before she could stop it.

Just when she thought she was ready to test the waters with them again, he goes and pulls a stunt like this. Unbelievable. For over a week, she’d been struggling with keeping her distance. She missed him so damn much and then something like this was like a giant bucket of ice water being thrown at her.

By the time she made it to the front office, she was fuming.

“Hey, Chloe!” Susan said. “What can I do for you?”

---