Page 19 of Writing On The Wall

I catch her by the shoulders and steady her, ready to make a joke about her being too clumsy and ending up in my arms once again. But my flirty smile falters when I see the way she’s avoiding eye contact. In all my interactions with her, she’s never backed away from an opportunity to at least throw a few eyeball daggers my way.

“Hey, you okay?” I ask tentatively while the eyes in question dart back down to the paper she was reading before.

“Ethan? What are you—Oh, yeah. I’m…uh…I need to go.” She chews on her bottom lip, barely even acknowledging me as she walks on. I watch her scurry away, her wedge heels moving in quick, short steps, and it requires more effort than I’m willing to admit to snap myself out of the trance she’s just put me in.

“Where are your minions?” I jog to catch up with her, slightly shaken by the effect she’s having on me.

“They’re at recess.” She continues ahead, her eyes burning a hole in the paper in her hand. Then she stops at a classroom and peaks her head inside, growling when she finds it empty.

Dang.

I blink away the fog of what that noise just did to me.

Whatever the effect it had on me, it evaporates when I realize whose class we’ve stopped at.

I’ll admit, this whole exchange is bruising my ego the teensiest bit. I still don’t even know what the heck I’m doing here in the first place. But I ignore my pride, because I’m still concerned about the visible distress in Ivy’s eyes.

However, it’s like I’m not even here as she whisks past me, catching another teacher as she’s walking her class down the hall.

“Hey Stef. D’you know where Toby is?”

“Uh…I think his class is doing a science thing in the gym. You okay?” Stef looks slightly annoyed as she glances over me and back to Ivy.

I watch Ivy’s hands tighten into fists. “Yup. Thanks.”

I’m once again trailing after her while she rubs at her forehead, obviously still in distress. Her muttered “frik” has me frowning, too. She rushes into a new classroom and whirls around, pinning me with another furious glance.

“Why are you here? Can’t you see I’ve got things to do?”

She’s like a vicious snapping turtle. She’s making me workfor every inch of civility, but I can tell that the stress in her clenched jaw is only disguising itself as anger.

“Gee, I dunno, Ivy,” I lift my hands then let them fall against my side. “Maybe ‘cause you clearly need help with something and I’m not a heartless monster?”

She leans against a desk while one dainty eyebrow slants with suspicion. “You want tohelpme?”

“I’m considering it. How bad do you need me?” I flash a cocky smile, trying to get a rise out of her. But the innuendo is lost on her as she glances back and forth between the sheet scrunched in her fist and the whiteboard hanging on the wall.

“Can youpleasehelp me?” she grinds the words out through slightly clenched teeth.

“That cost you, didn’t it?”

She’s back to avoiding eye contact as she ignores my question. She hands me the paper before stomping over to the whiteboard.

“I have to sub for a class in a minute while my students go to P.E. It was a last minute thing…anyway. Can you write those letters on the board, same as they are in the grids on the page?”

I hold onto the paper, but I’m still trying to catch her green eyes while she folds her arms, studying her shoes. Something about this specific task has her retreating. The evasive eye contact, lip gnawing, foot shuffling, hand hiding—I may not spend a lot of time with Ivy Marsh, but I have a feeling this is her majorly stressed out look.

I glance down at the page and find eight five-by-five grids with letters jumbled inside. It seems simple, but I don’t dare say it to her.

“This is like Boggle or something?”

“Yeah. It’s a game to test their spelling words. They’re hidden in there. The uh…the other teacher prepped it. It’s not something I’d plan.” Her eyes meet mine for a second before she’s studying the white-board. “So, will you do it?”

For some inexplicable reason, I want to scrutinize her more, to freeze this moment long enough to discover the secrets she’s hiding. But she’s obviously uncomfortable, and I don’t think stretching this interaction out will help me thaw her icy exterior. The one that only seems to ice over around me.

“Sure,” I say. Then I step closer, my gaze locked onto hers as I bend to pick up the marker beside her.

“Thanks,” she whispers from behind me after I turn and start copying the grids onto the board.

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