Jay and Rosie (A Tale of the Tired)

Lunch

At J.C. Foster High School, Rosie works as a French teacher. Since the school was in their second semester, she was teaching French II to her French I students. It was getting towards the end of the third quarter, meaning midterms were coming up. It was a trying time since French was a teacher made exam and she has yet to go through all the content.

The bell rang, signaling that 3rd block has just begun. "Bonjour et bon mercredi," she said as she closed the door. "Go ahead and get out your notebooks because we are gonna do a vocab practice," Her students all sighed, opening their bags to get their notebooks out. "Oh we don't like vocab practice? We can learn new vocab instead," she proposed. "Nah we good," Myla called out, getting her paper ready. The rest of the students agreed. "I thought so." Rosie rolled her eyes, sitting in her rolling chair.

"Madame Bradley?" Treyvon raised his hand. "En quoi puis-je vous aider?" "Can we go over the daily life vocab first?" Rosie rolled her chair to the opposite side of the whiteboard. "Why the hell not?" She erased last block's work from the board and began to write sentences. "This is something you would see on your midterm. Your paper would have a phrase along the lines of: 'Décrivez votre routine matinale', which will then be answered with a paragraph of at least five sentences."

She wrote the sentence on the board, then heard the front office workers on the intercom. "Mrs. Bradley?" "Yes ma'am?" "Can you come to the front office for just a moment?" "I'm on my way." "Thank you."

"Jayla, you're in charge. Answer this prompt and behave."

Jay on the other hand, clocks into work later on Wednesdays. While he was eating the sandwich Rosie made for him before she left for work, he noticed her lunch bag in the fridge. He checked his watch, '11:05', the lunch bell went off at 12:05 at school. He still had time to deliver her lunch.

He put on his white tank top, then his red t-shirt on top of it. He looked through his drawer and found his jeans, putting those on over his boxers. He traced a belt through the loops and tightened it around his waist. He decided to keep his durag on over his head and put his yankee hat on over it. He grabbed his keys, his wife's lunch, then headed over to the school.

He parked in one of the visitor spaces and made his way to the front office. Walking in, he saw two ladies in their mid 30s sitting behind the desk.

Angela and Brenda looked at James as if he was he was a steak dinner. The both of them silently fawned over the tall, muscular man that stood in front of them.

Before it got weird, Angela spoke up. "Good morning. Is there something I can help you with?" She made her voice sound low, then leaned in to hear what he had to say. "Yes ma'am. My wife Mrs. Roseline Bradley left her lunch. I'm just dropping it off." Hearing that he was married made her back away. "Oh sure." Her voice went back to normal as she looked up her room number on the computer. Finding it, she dialed the number on the white phone. "Mrs. Bradley?" She paused. "Can you come to the front office for just a moment?" Another pause. "Thank you!" She hung up the phone, then faced James. "She'll be down here soon." She then went back to her computer.

Brenda then spoke up. "So, Mr. Bradley. You have any siblings?" The question made him laugh. "No ma'am, I'm an only child." He said, still chuckling. "Damn." Brenda muttered.

Rosie walked in. "You wanted to see- oh. Hey Jay. What brings you by?" She was surprised, yet happy to see her husband. "You forgot this." He handed her the pale green bag that contained her lunch. "Oh thank you!" She took the bag then kissed his cheek. "Alright, imma head out. Bye everyone." He waved, walking off. "Bye Jay!" Angela and Brenda said siamotainously. Once he was out of sight, Rosie shook her head. "Shame on you two." Angela laughed. "Can't help it!" Brenda chimed in. "Girl where did you find him?" Rosie just rolled her eyes and went back to her class.

She unlocked the door to see two boys getting real close, like it was a stand off. "Tyler and William, it would be in your best interest to put your assses back in those seats. You wouldn't wanna bother Officer Slocumb again now would you?" She threatened, already over the whole situation. "No ma'am." They both said, then sat down. "Now, what could have happened in the six minutes that I was gone?" Rosie asked, looking over her students. Tyler spoke up first.

"I was just trying to get some help from someone to answer the phrase, but Willy and his big mouth thought it was funny to call me a dumbass. Even though his paper is blank."

"William." Rosie said sternly. "I did say that, but my paper was not blank. At least it wasn't until he ripped it up and threw it away." Rosie sat in her rolling chair, and spun towards the boys. "That's it? I've fought people over things that were way worse than that. If you get butthurt for being called a dumbass or if you get mad because you are paying the consequences for what you did, then both of y'all look pretty stupid to me."

The room was silent. Neither of them knew what to say. Rosie placed her chair back behind the desk and sat behind it. "Go to lunch."

Each student got up from their seats and headed towards the cafeteria. "Except you two." Tyler and William turned from the door, facing her desk. "You two are gonna have lunch with me today. Asseyez-vous et mettez-vous à l'aise."