Prologue
Two Years Ago
Callie
It was another beautiful Thursday in Seattle, with the rain pouring down. I walked between the chairs, toward the front of my classroom to start class. Homeroom, first class of the day. The class that would set the tone for how the rest of their day would go.
Kids were talking, laughing, and whispering about other kids. Whispering about a fight that had broken out the day before. All typical teenage stuff.
It wasn’t a large class, roughly twenty students. Homeroom was generally smaller than my regular English classes.
My room was the size of your typical high school classroom, the main difference, it was sloped like a college lecture hall. I loved it for an English room, drama belonged on the center stage after all.
As I started calling the class to order, getting us on track, there was a knock on the door.
I wasn’t surprised, there were always a few last-minute stragglers in the mornings. I couldn’t blame them really. Mornings could be hard to get up and get moving; no matter how old you were.
Then, of course, there were the ones that had to take care of their younger siblings and make sure they got off to school on time as well. Not everyone had parents or paid childcare providers in the home every minute of the day.
With a nod of approval, Kennedy stood up from her desk to open the door for me, so I could keep talking. How I wished I had been the one to open the door instead of her, a lesson I wasn’t soon to forget.
My life, and everybody else’s in that room, would be so different. We were all forever changed after that morning, some of us more than others.
Some wouldn’t even get the chance to see another day or even another hour.
That would be my first failure of the day.
As soon as Kennedy had the door opened, Scott shoved his way past her, knocking her out of the way. His black hair was wet from the rain and sticking to the side of his head. He was taller than most his age, hard to miss.
He took one look around the room, then paused when he saw Victoria and Todd sitting next to each other.
Todd, who would barely reach Scott’s nose if they were to stand next to each other, immediately put a protective arm around her. Scott’s face, which was already in a deep and angry scowl when he walked in, somehow got deeper when he saw them together.
I hurriedly walked up the small incline to him to try and calmly have him leave the room. If I could just get him outside, away from the two of them, I could talk to him.
I didn’t make it that far, maybe half a dozen small steps, before the gun came swinging out of his jacket pocket.
Chaos swiftly ensued.
Many of the kids ran out of the still open door, mainly only those who he couldn’t see.
The ones in his line of sight knocked their desks over and hid behind the tabletop, too afraid to make the run for it. Fortunately for them, Scott was mainly focused on Victoria and Todd, so quite a few decided they were brave enough to try.
I kept my focus on him, not wanting to bring any attention to anyone else. I wanted him to focus on me and only me. I could handle this better than the kids in this room, that was my hope at least.
“Scott, calm down, let’s talk about this. Why don’t we sit down, and we can talk?” I softly said to him, with my hands partially raised in front of me.
I tested out a few more baby steps, trying to block his view.
My movement got his attention, and Scott’s eye rolled over to me, just as I had wanted. We had always gotten along well. He had come in many times for one-on-one help. Oftentimes he would feel comfortable enough to talk to me about things going on at home.
Oh, how I wished he had felt that he could talk to me about Victoria as well. How much would I have been able to change?
Scott was determined to get a scholarship to Seattle U. He only had this year left, and it was looking good. Mainly due to all the hard work he had put in during those extra study times.
I didn’t want him to mess that up now. He was so close to getting out of here and making something of his life. He worked so hard, came so far, and he was about to throw it all away!
“I’m done talking, Miss C. Nobody listens anyway. They only hear and see what they want to.” He calmly stated. It was the calm tone that worried me. The tone that said he had made his decision and no longer had any doubts about what needed to be done. A tone of acceptance. The calm tone of resolve.
I shook my head slowly, maintaining that eye contact. “That’s not true. You know I always listen to you. I always have, and I always will. So, why don’t we sit down and talk about this?” I pleaded with him.
While I had his full attention, more kids ran out the door and some ran for better cover. Victoria and Todd ran towards my desk in the front corner. Somewhat behind me.
Scott saw this out of the corner of his eyes, turned his gun, and without another word shots rang out. Immediately followed by screams and the sounds of more desks being knocked over.
Todd fell first, quickly followed by Victoria, falling to the ground. I ran for her, as she was the closest to me, not even thinking.
As I ran, I felt something hot hit my leg, and I fell, landing right next to Victoria.
I heard a few more shots somewhere in the back of my mind as I crawled the rest of the way to her. My focus shifted, now it was only on trying to stop the bleeding in Victoria’s gut, ignoring everything else going on in the room.
I pulled my sweater off and held it to her abdomen, trying to talk to her, encouraging her to stay calm, and letting her know that everything was going to be just fine. She looked at me with tears in her eyes, knowing they were just empty, meaningless words.
Then they closed, never to open again.
Never again would she share her opinion on a topic, giving me a new way to think about it.
Never again would she stay late to help clean up after a particularly busy class period.
Never again would she bring me a bag full of cookies from a batch she made over the weekend, having let her six-year-old sister help with the decorating.
Never again would she ask a deep question, yearning to get more than just the basics.
Never again would she hold her new baby nephew and see him learn to walk, hear his first words, or see what he would be when he grew up.
I held her in my arms and cried, the rest of the world no longer existed at that moment. It could have all burned down around me, and I wouldn’t have noticed.
That was pretty much how it felt. Like the world stopped turning, stopped moving, it was all just gone. The moment her eyes closed; the world disappeared into a veil of blackness for both of us.
How did we get here? How did this happen? Why did this happen?
My mind grasped at straws, desperately trying to make sense of the mess that my life suddenly became.
This time yesterday, we were all laughing. Victoria and I had both braided our hair and had it laying over one of our shoulders. It had been a coincidence, something we hadn’t planned. So, we ran with it.
I played Let it go in the background, and she and I belted it together. All because Todd made a comment about us looking like Elsa. We both have light colored hair, nearly blonde.
The day had been normal. Well, most of it. I would have said the fight was normal, this was a school, kids fought all of the time. I felt my mind wander to that fight and to my complete exhaustion when I got home. When my personal life fell apart. To when the wrong Jenga piece had been removed from the tower of my life, and the walls started caving down around me.
Something so small yet so catastrophic.
20 hours earlier – Wednesday evening
Why does Wednesday always seem like the longest day of the week?
As I zombie walked through my front door, I began my own personal trail of tears to the shower.
First came my purse and keys.
Then my jacket.
Then shoes.
And so on.
If someone were to come looking for me, all they would have to do was follow the path of discarded clothing items.
All I wanted, right at that moment, was a long, hot shower.
Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely loved my job. The pay sucked, and the stress was high, like Eiffel tower high, top of Mount Everest high, student loan debt high, a freaking space shuttle to the moon high…I should probably stop now, huh? You got the gist?
Despite all that though, there were days that made all the blood, sweat, hair pulling, nail biting, and tears worth it. Mine, not the kids’.
Today was not one of those days.
My school was not exactly filled with the hard-knock life kids, or the Richie Rich kids, but somewhere in the middle, with a mix of everything.
There were days when this mix worked great, and we could help them learn to be more open-minded culturally. Those were the times when they looked beyond how much someone’s backpack cost them, or if the city gave it to them for free, filled with basic school supplies, to see who the other kid was, as a person.
We had a few groups of friends on campus that saw things that way. They didn’t care how much money their friend had, only that they were their friend and were loyal to them.
Then there were days like today.
Days where all the biases and prejudices come out of hiding, seeping out of the shadows and dark crevices. Where the size of their parent’s bank account, or lack thereof, defined who they were.
Apparently, as the rumor mill went, Scott and Victoria had been dating, secretly. She was one of the nicer, more open-minded, rich kids.
Scott’s family struggled to get by. They were decent people. They were just having a rough time the last few years. It happened to the best of us at times. Sadly, that wasn’t what the other kids saw though. Kids see someone wearing Walmart clothes and assume they were from the streets.
Scott and Todd got into a fight over Victoria today. I guess Victoria did not tell them about each other, or of her relationship with either of them. This just goes to show, you never really knew a person. I never would have seen that in her.
As expected, some pretty nasty comments were said to and about the other. I was not in attendance when it all went down, so I didn’t know the whole story, and I wasn’t sure I wanted too either.
I swear teaching high school was like living in a Disney-style soap opera at times. Minus all the singing of course. That would be kind of fun though, for an hour or two anyway.
Each class after that was spent trying to get the other students’ attention back on task, while they just wanted to keep gossiping about it. Hence, the hot shower to help me relax.
A bath would be preferable. Unfortunately, I only had a generic size tub. The kind where you either had your knees and calves in the air or you sat up, with only your waist and below soaking.
That was no fun.
What I wouldn’t give for a tub large enough for me to really soak in, preferably with company of the male persuasion. Until then, the massage setting on my shower head would have to do.
I wished my boyfriend were here to help distract me, possibly even let me vent it all out on him.
Freddie and I had been dating for over a year. I really enjoyed being with him and I liked him a lot. We had a very comfortable relationship. I could maybe love him one day, possibly. His job tended to get in the way, a lot, though.
Freddie was an undercover agent with the FBI. With him being an agent and me being a teacher, you might have thought we had a cute story for how we met.
Spoiler alert, we didn’t.
Our parents set us up on a blind date, that effort that all parents with single kids nearing their 30s make to ensure they got grandbabies before they forget their own names.
Freddie and I met up for dinner one night, placating our mothers, and had been together ever since. He frequently went out of town on different assignments, so we really didn’t see each other as often as we would like. Which could be why we were still only in a comfortable phase after a year.
Undercover work was a dangerous job and I worried about him every time he left. I admired how dedicated he was to it. How driven he was to right the wrongs of the world, no matter the cost.
Even though Freddie’s job came first, he was thoughtful about it. He always let me know before he left. Not once had he ever just disappeared on me, leaving me to wonder where he was. He always warned me if he would not be able to contact me for a while. He was always considerate of my feelings.
And when he wasn’t working, he was always willing to listen to the problems and concerns of your everyday, run of the mill, high school teacher.
Really, Freddie made perfect boyfriend material… when he was around. If he were not out of town right now, I would be calling him up to come be with me and cheer me up after the day I had.
After I got out of my mediocre shower, I put on my comfy clothes (Harry Potter pajama pants and a Team Edward t-shirt, I was a book nerd, bite me), ordered a pizza and turned on my Netflix.
Normally, I would prefer to read. But even that felt like too much work for tonight. When the doorbell rang half an hour later, I jumped up, ready for my pizza.
Imagine my surprise when I opened the door to find Freddie standing there holding said pizza.
“Someone order a pizza?” He said with a tired smile as he came in. “Bad day, Sugar?”
“Long day.” I corrected him. “How did you get my pizza?”
I followed him as he carried my box of comfort food into the living room, like a dog being led by a bone.
Freddie’s black hair was slightly disheveled. Dark circles had taken up residence under his brown eyes, and a two-day stubble had taken over his slightly oval-shaped face. He looked beyond tired himself. I made a mental note to ask him about that later.
He must have just gotten back into town and not even rested yet. How sweet that he would come straight here, to see me.
From the looks of it, we both had had a rough one.
“I ran into the guy in the hall. Don’t worry, I tipped him for you.” He smiled and bent down to kiss my cheek. He didn’t have far to go. He was only a few inches taller than my five-foot-seven-inch frame. I was about to his nose when standing next to him. “Wanna talk about what happened?”
“No, not really. I just want to relax and enjoy the fact that you are home!” I sighed happily, as I wrapped him in a big hug.
Freddie held me tight with his free hand for an all to brief moment. He felt tense. Something seemed off with him. This wasn’t just his usual tiredness after an assignment was completed.
He kissed my temple softly and squeezed me back before letting go. “Come on, let’s eat while we watch a movie.”
He carried the box to the small coffee table in between the couch and television. We didn’t bother with plates. I always felt they were kind of pointless when it was just the two of us. We settled for setting the pizza back down in the open box, saving dishes and the environment (and my money).
Okay, and maybe I was just a bit too lazy to care too. I didn’t need to put on a farce for Freddie. We were comfortable together. Things always felt safe and comfortable with Freddie. He had this aura that had the ability to put people at ease.
I couldn’t help but wonder if that was why he was so good at his job.
But that wasn’t the case for tonight. Tonight, he seemed awkward and stiff. I was hoping he would relax with time, but it seemed to have the opposite effect. As the night went on, I felt him get stiffer, tenser. Like he was bracing for impact.
After the movie was over, I turned to him. I needed to know what was wrong. He was always there for me. It was my turn to listen to him now.
“Freddie, what’s the matter? Did something happen?”
Freddie took a deep breath and let it out slowly. He looked at our entwined hands on the couch between us, then squeezed mine as he played with my fingers.
“Yes and no.” He said, in a very melancholy way.
I waited quietly, knowing he was just searching for how to say whatever he needed to. Freddie wasn’t a huge talker, he always thought carefully before he spoke.
Again, this could be a product of his job. I imagined an undercover agent would always need to tread carefully with what they said. It would be bad for them to have a slip of the tongue and say the wrong thing.
It had taken me some time to learn this when we first started seeing each other. We had more than a few misunderstandings because of it.
With a deep resigned sigh, he finally started talking, a hint of excitement growing in his voice the more he spoke.
“This last job isn’t done yet. It was more of a “see if we can get a foot in” kind of thing. Which we did. This is a big deal kind of job too. I wish I could tell you the specifics. If we can solve this, if this plan works, we can clean out…” He caught himself before he said too much, shook his head, then continued. “Anyway. It’s a career-making assignment. It’s also a once-in-a-lifetime type of deal. One, most undercover agents only dream of catching one day. It’s why we get into this kind of work.”
He was silent for another moment before continuing again, with what was obviously the bad part. Which was good because I wasn’t quite following him yet.
“I have to go back soon. I was only able to get permission to leave for one day. I had to come to see you. I had to let you know.” He looked up at me, and I could see the pain and regret in his eyes.
Which was when it clicked. “This is a long one, isn’t it?” I asked quietly.
He swallowed deeply before answering. His voice, hoarse. “Yeah, sugar. I’m not even sure how long this one is gonna be. They want me to plan at least a year, maybe two.”
I felt my eyes tear up. Two years? Would he even come back after that? I didn’t just mean physically either. Would he mentally come back?
I wasn’t naive. This meant he was going deep under. The kind that some agents had a hard time coming out of, according to all my books anyway.
This was a compliment to his abilities, like he said, a career maker. But still, two years?
“This means...goodbye...for now at least. I’m not gonna ask you to wait.” He shook his head emphatically, swallowing the lump of emotion in his throat again. “That is too long and too much to ask. And I just want you to be happy. But, I promise, I will look for you the minute I’m done.” He pulled me in for a hug, holding me like he thought I was going to poof into a vapor of smoke and disappear on him.
I didn’t argue, I didn’t beg. This was an important job, and I knew it was important to him. This was his dream. Something he had always wanted. He was going to go, no matter what I said or didn’t say. And I didn’t want that to possibly be his last memory of me.
Instead, I was going to soak in his essence and make tonight something to remember. Freddie seemed to be on the same wavelength as me, a desperate need to be together tonight. For one last time.
As I held onto his neck, as tight as I could, he started kissing my shoulder and then my neck. I leaned back and met his lips hungrily, a mad need to feel every inch of him.
He leaned back onto the couch as I pulled one leg over him, to sit on his lap. His lips only left mine as he ripped my shirt over my head. Then those lips began their way down. A few minutes later he flipped us onto my back on the couch. He took possession of my body in a way he had never done before.
Freddie had always leaned more toward the gentler side of things, which was not how he was tonight, far from it. It was as though he let go of all control in his overwhelming need to be with me.
Not that I was complaining, but why couldn’t he have done that sooner? It was never bad per se, just maybe a little boring at times.
I figured over time, as we grew as a couple, it would get better. I just didn’t realize it would take him leaving me for it to finally reach that whole new level.
Eventually, we moved to my bed. The next round was a mix of the sweet, and a desperate need. Which was even better. I fell asleep wrapped in his arms, afraid to let go. It was a rough night for us both, but he held me close to his chest for most of it.
One more night to just be us.
One more night to be with the person we felt most comfortable with.
When I woke up, he was gone. It almost felt like a dream, a bad dream that I wouldn’t mind forgetting. I got ready for work and headed out. I had no appetite for breakfast.
Little did I know, the nightmare was just beginning. And there would be no end in sight. The Jenga piece had been pulled, and my life was beginning to crumble all around me.
Hours later
Freddie succeeded with one thing last night, he made me forget all about the high school drama from the day before. I was so focused on his surprise appearance and then the bomb he dropped, that I didn’t think about school at all.
Talk about a way to remember.
I felt pressure on my upper right thigh, bringing my awareness back to the present, and somebody started moving Victoria out of my arms. I pulled her back tight, refusing to let go.
It was my job to keep her safe, I failed once. I would not fail again.
From a distance, I heard someone whispering to me, trying to comfort me now. Oddly, they were using almost exactly the same words I had just been saying to Victoria.
They were just as empty and meaningless to me as they had been to her.
When I looked up, trying to find where the voice was coming from, I realized the paramedics were here.
One was doing something to my leg, bringing an unknown pain to the forefront of my mind. It felt like fire was spreading through the veins in my leg. I really wished they would stop doing that. Victoria needed me right now. I couldn’t afford to be distracted.
The pressure on my leg intensified a hundred-fold, and the world came rushing back to me at once. It was as though someone had switched the light on suddenly, with no warning.
At the same time, another paramedic was gently trying to remove Victoria from my death grip.
I looked around the room, desperately searching, and found Todd and Scott lying still. Dark red puddles surrounded them both. Tarps were being slowly draped over each of them.
Armed cops were walking around my classroom, like this was a war zone and not a place of learning.
This room had once been my safety zone, my happy place, my true home. The only place I ever felt like I actually belonged.
Now it was tainted with the blood of kids who I loved and cared for. Kids who I had spent countless hours tirelessly talking too, guiding, tutoring, even feeding. I made this their safe place.
The hours we had spent laughing together in class, roasting each other, building relationships I hoped would last forever. I made this a happy place for them, not a boring lecture hall.
All of that was gone now, washed away with blood and bullets.
Thankfully, it looked as though none of the other kids had been injured. The nightmare had stayed contained to this one section of the classroom.
The others would have some mental and emotional scarring, things they could overcome in time, possibly with the help of a good therapist. Kids were resilient that way.
I listened carefully and tried to pick things up as the police spoke to some of the kids still in the room. It took me a great deal of effort to focus around the pain radiating through my leg. Maybe I would get lucky and turn into a vampire, like the Cullens. Then I would be able to protect my students better. And sparkle.
My brain was messed up, nothing made sense anymore. But Kennedy’s familiar voice helped me to narrow down my hearing. When Scott had first pulled the gun, she had run straight to the next room and yelled for help. Without questioning, the teacher called the office.
The school had gone into an immediate lockdown and the cops were there in minutes. When something like this happened, the word was spread to any and all law enforcement in the area, both on and off duty.
By some miracle, today happened to be the day the officer assigned to our school had been making his weekly visit. The other cops were five minutes behind him.
Who knows what else could have happened in those five minutes?
The remaining kids in my room were able to tell the cops what happened. Their voices started blurring again. But I got what I needed. The others were safe now.
I let my mind blank out, blocking out the pain. And not the one coming from my leg. I allowed the darkness to envelope my mind, protecting what was left. Nothing was making sense anyway.
Elsa was bloody, and no amount of vampire venom was going to be able to turn her into a sparkly diamond.
I had a vague knowledge that I was in shock, and probably would be for the rest of the day, week, month, maybe even the year. Maybe I would get lucky, and I could slip into the blackness too.
Why should I continue when I failed to protect the ones I was responsible for?
Through the blur, I felt the paramedics lifting me onto a semi-hard surface. The sky was still dark and dreary outside. Fitting.
Soon, I felt the rolling table be loaded up into an ambulance. I heard my tour guide mention something to my new taxi driver that I had apparently been shot in the leg. Something I hadn’t noticed until the paramedic started wrapping my leg.
Guess I wasn’t going to get to be a Cullen after all then. Shame. I bet Freddie would have stayed if I was vampire pretty.
The sixty-year-old principal, Mrs. Snyder, ran out and hugged me, promising to come by and check on me later in the hospital.
I silently nodded in response. At least I thought I did. It could have all been in my head. There were a lot of things going on in there, and yet, nothing at the same time.
The taxi drivers weren’t very nice. I was just lying there, minding my own business, and they kept pushing my leg. Why would they want to hurt me? What did I do to them?
Did I lose someone they loved in that room? That would make sense.
The Knight Bus stopped suddenly, doors were thrown open, and then a new tour guide pulled my table out of the ambulance. We flew down white halls, and into a room that smelled like alcohol. They put a mask over my face, probably to help keep that butt awful smell out of my nose.
And then everything went black. Finally.
When the lights came back on, my brain wasn’t as fuzzy and the burning in my leg had died down. I wasn’t thrilled with the needle in my arm though. I had enough awareness in me to recognize that it was probably the reason the burning was hidden from me again.
I listened as a doctor explained to me that they got the bullet out, which hadn’t hit anything important, but I would always have a scar.
Both physically and mentally. He didn’t say it. But it was obvious.
My parents arrived at the hospital a few hours later, my mom crying. I still couldn’t say much. Not that they expected me to. As both my parents were teachers, they had a pretty good idea of how I must be feeling.
Well, I let them think they did anyway. I didn’t think anyone who hadn’t survived something like that would ever truly understand how I was feeling.
Words were meaningless. Why was I so obsessed with them all my life?
The doctors had to give me medicine to help me sleep, the nightmares kept me awake most nights. Therapy was suggested, and in time I would go just so it would at least look like I was trying.
In reality, I think I was waiting for Freddie to call. Surely, he would want to check in on me. He wouldn’t ignore me after this. He was easy to talk to and never judged me, he knew me better than anybody. He was the only person I wanted to talk to. The only person I wanted to tell about the darkness in my head. In my heart. In my soul. I was sure he would understand.
I received dozens of cards and letters. Colleagues and students both came to visit me in the hospital. I pasted on a smile, which was easier with the kids than the adults. I could still protect them by making them think it was possible to move on. Who knows? Maybe they would.
All these people around me, calling me, sending messages to me, but I never heard a word from Freddie.
I knew he was in deep, but why couldn’t he have at least found a way to check on me or contact me? Not so much as a postcard came from him.
I didn’t go back to work for the rest of the school year.
After months of therapy, the nightmares lessened, but never fully went away. It was okay, I didn’t expect them too anyway. I was scarred in more ways than one.
I did realize that I couldn’t teach anymore. My dream had fizzled out. I couldn’t even comprehend the idea of stepping into another classroom, facing those all too innocent faces again.
The ones who trusted me to protect them, to be there for them. The ones I had failed.
I had a new idea of what I wanted to do though. I had a new mission to fight for. Something I believed in, something that gave me a reason to wake up in the morning again. Something that would help me rebuild that tower stronger than ever. I used the wrong blocks last time. Not this time though, this time I was going to weld them in.
