29 DAYS UNTIL GRADUATION
O L L I E
I set a stack of papers down on top of the desk as the door to the classroom opened. I looked up from behind my glasses and my eyes were met with Luke Hemmings.
"Long time no see, Olivia." He said in an extremely cocky voice.
He was definitely enjoying my pain and suffering.
I rolled my eyes as I turned around to grab a very messy work of art from a four year old who was waving it dangerously close to my khaki pants.
"Wow Madeline! This is so beautiful!" I gushed. I kneeled down so that I was at her eye level. "Your parents are going to love this!
"Tanks Miss Owwie!" Madeline smiled as she raised her arms and smiled.
"Luke, can you hold this please?" I asked as I blindly handed him the paper that was dripping paint.
I untied the little apron that Madeline was wearing which just so happened to be coated in paint as well.
"Go wash your hands and wipe your face please." I said as I pointed in the direction of the bathroom.
She nodded and skipped away. I sighed as I stood up. I looked over at Luke who was holding the painting over the sink with a terrified look on his face.
"It's just paint, Luke." I called to him over the laughter of ten small children. He kept the same terrified and disgusted look on his face as he spoke.
"This was an expensive shirt!"
I narrowed my eyes at him as I approached him and snatched the painting from his grasp.
"This is a daycare, Luke. Rule number one: Never wear expensive clothing." I hung the painting up with a clothespin on a string that covered the whole span of the very colorful and highly decorated classroom.
"So that's why you're wearing your school uniform?" He chuckled as he gestured to my sweater and khaki pants that were now covered in paint.
"They asked if I could start my shift right after school and I didn't have time to change." I turned around to grab another painting from Jake, the only five-year old in the class who was definitely not as messy as Madeline was.
I hung his painting of a firetruck up on the line and was surprised at the sight I saw when I turned around.
Luke was on his knees helping Jake get his apron off, Jake had an enthusiastic smile on his face as he talked to Luke.
"You play baseball?" Jake asked, his eyes got wide as he smiled his signature toothless grin.
Luke chuckled and nodded his head.
"Yeah, I'm the catcher for my team! Do you play?" he asked. His hands folded the apron as he maintained eye contact with Jake.
"Jake don't forget to wash your hands!" I called, I didn't want him to forget. I felt a little bad interrupting their conversation but it's better than him spreading paint and germs all over the classroom.
"Uh yeah! I'm the pitcher for my team! I wanna play in the major weagues some day!" Jake pretty much yelled as he ignored me, his arms flailed as he talked. Jake always got excited when he talked about baseball.
"Really? Me too! Maybe I can come to one of your games and you can come to mine, little dude." Luke smiled as he put out his fist for Jake to bump. Jake happily bumped fists with him and nodded his head. "Go wash up, good baseball players always listen to what their teachers tell them."
I slightly smiled at Luke's words. That was sweet of him.
Jake turned around and zoomed off to the bathroom.
"Who would've thought," I started as I walked towards him with my arms crossed, "that Luke Hemmings is semi-good with children."
"Are you complimenting me, Olivia Reed?" He asked as placed his hand on his chest, a look of mock disbelief spread across his face.
I rolled my eyes and shook my head as I stood next to him and leaned my back against the cabinet. My eyes wandered over all the children, half of them were messily painting and the other half were sitting on the carpet playing with toy cars.
"Okay class!" I said loudly as I clapped my hands together, drawing the attention of the ten children. "This is Mr. Luke. He is going to be helping us out for the next month. Everyone say 'hi.'"
"HI MR. LUUUUUUUUUUUKE!" They all yelled in response.
Luke had a goofy smile on his face as he looked down at his shoes for a moment.
"Hi everyone!" He smiled as he waved to them. They all averted their attention back to what they were doing before I interrupted them.
Luke nudged me in the shoulder.
"What?"
"So are you like a teacher or something?"
"Unofficially yeah." I replied.
"That's cool, is that what you're going for in college?" He asked turning to face me.
"What is this? Twenty questions?"
He shrugged in response.
"I've wanted to be a teacher ever since I can remember."
"So where are you going to college?"
Seriously why was he asking me all these questions? I was already on edge because he was here in the one place I loved the most in this world. Now he was making everything worse by not leaving me alone.
"I'll tell you that when you finally decide on a school." I retorted, raising my eyebrows at him.
"Dam-"
"No curse words here. Also, see those red bags over there?" I asked as I pointed over to the three bags that were hanging by the door that led to the playground outside.
Luke nodded his head.
"Those have allergy medicines, inhalers, and epi-pens for Jake, Benny, and Louisa in them. I'll show you how to do that all tomorrow."
"Have you ever had to use an epi-pen on one of them?" Luke questioned as Eric, a little brunette boy tugged on his pant leg. Luke pointed to the toy cars on the carpet and Eric left him alone to go back and play with them.
"Thankfully no. Jake has asthma and is extremely allergic to peanuts and tree nuts. Louisa is allergic to shellfish so hers is just a precautionary measure just in case and Benny is deathly allergic to bees. We have to keep a special eye on him when he's outside because he likes to antagonize the bees when he sees them."
"Wow, that would be so scary." He said as he stared blankly into space.
I nodded my head.
"So that's all the allergies I have to worry about in here?"
"Uh, yeah." I lied because I was not ready to tell him about the huge stash of epi-pens that were currently stuffed in my backpack.
"Good."
Author's Note:
LONG TIME NO POST! Seriously it's been since 2015, I am SO sorry omg. But I'm back & have been thinking about this fic a lot, so thank you for reading this!
ALL THE LOVE,
Jenna
