See Me After Class(53)

When my students leave my classroom and go on to college, they’re prepared, they’re educated, they’re ready to take on a college essay and excel at it, which is what my goal is as a teacher. To foster these students and make sure they’re gathering the tools they need to move on. Blair is a great example of that.

I forced her to put in the work, to speak to me during lunch, to learn a constructive way to interpret literature, and she came out better for it, so why am I questioning myself?

Shaking the thoughts out of my head, I set my bag on my desk and pull out the questions for today’s pop quiz on the reading from last night. I spent a great deal of time thinking about them. Thirty questions, each class has to answer different ones, so there’s no cheating in between periods. They have one minute per question and must answer thoughtfully.

It's challenging.

It’s what my advanced placement students need.

They don’t need frills like dressing up.

They need structure.

A schedule.

They need to be kept on their feet, never complacent.

Picking up my whiteboard marker, I uncap it and get to work on writing my questions on the board. Stop questioning yourself, Turner. You know what you’re doing. Just because it looks like you sucked the life out of one of your colleagues doesn’t mean you need to rethink your entire teaching process.





Chapter Eleven





GREER





“Oh my God, I love you so much,” Stella says, coming up to me in the parking lot. “Don’t even tell me—you’re Elizabeth Bennet, right?”

I curtsy and say, “You are quite correct.”

“God, let me get a good look at you.” Stella takes my hand and forces me to twirl. “Honestly, you could be a doppelganger for Kiera Knightley in this getup.”

“That’s what I was going for. Some of the other dresses I considered were a little too . . . booby, and I didn’t think that was appropriate.”

“Yeah, good call.” She claps. “Seriously, I love this so much.”

Despite Arlo’s reluctance to participate in today’s literature dress up, everyone else is participating. I know we’ll have at least one Harry Potter, Lennie from Of Mice and Men, Juliet from Romeo and Juliet, and a Huckleberry Finn. We’ll see what everyone else dresses up as. There were still a few teachers trying to make up their minds.

But I knew from the beginning who I wanted to be.

The queen of pride . . . and prejudice.

I found a brown frock with an empire waist and long sleeves resembling the one Kiera Knightley wore in her representation of the book. I even styled my hair to look like hers as well. Since I’ve been showing clips of the movie throughout the reading of the book, I know they’re going to understand it immediately, which puts a smile on my face.

Today is going to be a great day, even if I couldn’t count on everyone to support the idea.

“I need to get the foreign language department to participate in something like this. Have a war-of-the-countries type thing. It’d be fun.”

“That would be fun. Have you spoken to them about it?”

Stella shakes her head as we make it to the school entrance. “No, we have our meeting next Wednesday. I think after they see the English department, they’ll be into it. We’re all pretty easygoing.”

“Well, hopefully they don’t notice Arlo.”

“I can’t believe he’s not dressing up. Makes me want to punch him right in front of his students. A fist to the eye. He won’t even see it coming.”

“I’d love to see that.”

We chuckle and climb the stairs to the second floor of the school. When we reach the top, she turns left and says, “Good luck today. Enjoy it—and, hey, book club tonight.”

“Remind Keiko.”

“No need, she already texted me this morning making sure there were going to be Nilla Wafers.”

I roll my eyes. “There will be plenty.”

“It’s what I told her. See you at lunch.” She waves and we part.

Turning down the English hallway, I take a deep breath, preparing myself for the day, just as a tall, dark figure steps out of my unlocked classroom.

I pause, let my eyes focus, and then . . .

Oh. God.

Dressed in a tuxedo, hair slicked back, looking so damn sexy I might hike up my skirt right here and now is Arlo Turner.

There’s no way.

He didn’t dress up, did he?

Then again, why would he be dressed in a tuxedo?

Stunned, I close the distance between us.

He doesn’t smirk.

He doesn’t make any sort of gesture of acknowledgement as I approach him. He stands regally, just like Jay Gatsby.

“Arlo . . .” I just about whisper in shock.

“I was just leaving some donuts on your desk. Coraline wanted me to give them to you.”

Giving him a small once-over, I take him by the arm and bring him into my classroom, where I set my things on my desk.

“Why . . . are you . . . are you dressed up?”

He shrugs. “Wasn’t too hard to put on a tux.”

I cover my mouth with my hand. This man. This unruly, surly, arrogant ass dropped his guard for today and put on a tux.