Just Kitty
The lamps were low, throwing a soft gold across the wallpaper. Loraine sat at the edge of her bed, smoothing cream into her hands, the faint scent of rosewater drifting in the quiet. Across the room Ernest tugged at his suspenders and set them over the chair, then lowered himself onto his bed with a grunt. He lay back a moment, staring at the ceiling, then turned on his side so he could see her. “Put in my slip today” he said with a small grin. “Week after next, I’m off. Whole week. Just us.”
Her head lifted, eyes bright. “Truly?” She reached to set her hand cream on the nightstand, then looked over at him, pleased.
“It’s all booked. The hotel will send the confirmation. Can you imagine, Lo? A whole week away.” He gave a low laugh. “Feels strange. Like playin’ hooky.”
“It’s proper” she said, folding the coverlet back. “Every couple ought to have a honeymoon.”
He propped himself on one elbow, watching her settle. “That so?”
She nodded, her hair catching the lamplight. “No work, no chores, no interruptions. Just the two of us.”
She reached for the switch and the room dropped into quiet darkness. Only the sigh of the summer night pressed at the open window. From his bed, Ernest murmured, almost to himself “A whole week.”
And Loraine, already drowsing, answered with a contented hum.
~
Kitty wore a calf-length skirt in a soft dusty rose, pleated neatly. The fabric was crisp from ironing, the hem freshly pressed and falling just right under her knees. Her blouse was pale ivory with short cuffed sleeves and a small rounded collar, buttoned all the way up. A navy ribbon pulled her hair back neatly, matching the stiff canvas satchel that swung at her side.
The sidewalk was already warm under Kitty’s shoes, even though the sun barely had scaled the roofs. Behind the hedges the town was waking, slow and dusty-eyed. Kitty walked through it like someone who hadn’t yet been invited.
Two blocks down she saw them. Three girls and a boy walking in a loose line along the edge of the pavement. Their chatter carried on the still air, light and quick, as though it belonged more to summer than to school. One of the girls glanced back, elbowed another. A wordless understanding passed between them before they slowed their steps just enough for Kitty to close the gap.
“You’re Loraine’s girl, right? From out west?” one of them asked.
Kitty felt her cheeks grow warm under their attention. She pressed her fingers tighter around the satchel strap “I’m Katherine” she said. “But people call me Kitty.”
“Kitty” one girl repeated “Johnny’s your brother then?” she didn’t bother to hide the interest in her voice. The name hovered in the air like something they’d been waiting to bring up. The others looked at Kitty with sudden brightness.
Kitty kept her gaze on the sidewalk ahead. She didn’t like the way his name hung in the air, easy on their tongues. “I guess” she said. The words felt sour in her mouth, but it was easier than explaining. Stepbrother, not brother. Nothing to her if she could help it.
One of the others gave a little laugh, eyes bright. “He is hard not to notice.”
The boy gave a low scoff, kicking at a pebble on the sidewalk. “Don’t see what’s so special. He don’t say much.” he muttered. “That makes him interesting now, huh?” he shoved his hands deeper into his pockets, giving her a sidelong glance.
“Maybe it’s just the jawline” the tallest girl said “Or his arms.”
That only made the girls giggle again, trading glances that said plenty without a word. Kitty pretended not to hear. It was easier than answering and thankfully, the subject changed to dresses in the shop window and to a movie one of them had half a mind to see Saturday night.
The shortest girl nudged Kitty when they passed the corner store, whispering that the clerk was mean as a rattler but his penny candy was worth the risk. Kitty gave a brief smile. “I’m Sally, by the way.” she said “That’s Nora and Ruthie is the one lagging with her sock halfway down” she gestured with her chin toward the boy. “Calvin’s the one pretending he doesn’t want to listen. He shares his gum, though, so don’t knock him.”
By the time they reached the school gates, the lines between stranger and companion had blurred enough that she didn’t feel the need to hover at the edge. Maple Hill High sat square and serious, its red brick front baking in the sun. The front steps gleamed with wear and the tall double doors stood open, inviting in a trickle of warm air and a steady stream of students. She could hear it in the clang of locker doors, in the hum of voices, in the steady rhythm of footsteps that all seemed to know where they were going. She didn’t.
Inside, the ceiling fans dutifully stirred the air. As they walked, Kitty glanced at the corkboard flyers, the trophy case, the smudged footprints on the tile. Sally paused and nodded toward a side hallway. “You’ll need to check in first” she said. “Main office’s down the left hall. I’ll come with you.”
Kitty didn’t object. She was grateful, though she didn’t say so aloud. Instead, she matched Sally’s pace. She noticed how someone had scratched a heart and initials into the edge of the water fountain. Already the place had history, grooves worn in from years of passing through. She had a strange feeling again. Like the world was already moving without her. Like she was slipping into something mid-sentence.
The office sat tucked just past the stairwell. Sally opened the door and stepped aside. “She’s new here, ma’am” she told the secretary. Her cat-eye glasses caught the shine of morning light as she looked up. “Name?”
Kitty stood a little straighter. “Kitt… Katherine O’Callaghan” she said. The secretary flipped through a folder, pulled a pink slip and handed it over without looking up. “Room twelve. Miss Lark’s on the second floor. And we expect promptness here, Miss O’Callaghan. No gum, no nonsense.”
Kitty nodded. “Yes, ma’am.”
As she stepped back into the hallway, slip in hand, Sally fell into step beside her again. The bell hadn’t rung yet and the corridor was still filling up. Boys with shirt sleeves cuffed to the elbow like James Dean, girls with blouses already sticking to the backs of their shoulders.
“O’Callaghan” Sally said, casual, like it had just come to her. She raised a brow, but she didn’t slow. “Thought you were livin’ with the Haynes family.” Curiosity brimming in her eyes, the kind small towns bred in abundance.
“I am. Ernest’s my stepfather.”
Sally made a soft “huh” sound, then offered a polite smile, like she was just sorting things out in her mind. “It’s just… I thought your name’d be Haynes, too.”
Kitty didn’t look at her. “It used to be just Mama and me” she said after a moment. “I kept my father’s name.”
Sally didn’t press. But something in her expression shifted, just a flicker behind her eyes and Kitty knew she’d filed the detail away. Maybe not out of malice, but in a way people did when they noticed things that didn’t quite match.
They reached the stairs and turned up toward the second floor. Sally walked ahead now, her ponytail swinging with each step. “Miss Lark’s not so bad” she said as they passed a cluster of chattering girls. “You keep your lines straight and don’t mouth off, she won’t give you any trouble.”
“I’ll try” Kitty said, offering a faint smile.
In truth, she wasn’t worried about the teacher. She was used to rules. She was used to sitting still and keeping her eyes down and writing neatly in the margins. It was the rest of it that gnawed at her. The part where people noticed you were new. The part where they asked questions.
They reached the door just as the bell rang. Sally held it open. Kitty stepped inside without hesitation. Miss Lark looked up briefly, gave a nod and pointed her to the row near the window. As she moved through the room, she felt the brief hush, the small glances. She took her seat without flinching, set her notebook on the desk and uncapped her pen.
~
Chalk dust clung to her skin by mid-morning. She learned the names of the girls beside her desk. Daisy, who chewed on her pencil ends and Joanie, who whispered answers in a voice too low for the teacher to hear.
At lunch Sally cut through the noise of the cafeteria without hesitation, weaving between tables until she stopped at one where a gang had already claimed half the bench, two boys and three girls, lunch trays spread wide like territory.
She waved Kitty forward and after a pause, Kitty slipped onto the bench beside her.
“Scoot over, fellas. This here’s Miss Houston.” Trays scooted, elbows drew in and for a moment the chatter dipped.
The name caught the table at once, a laugh from one of the girls, a low whistle from a boy leaning back. Heads turned, interest sparking. “Houston?” one of the boy asked, leaning forward. His voice was steady, curious without being nosy. He wasn’t loud like the others “That’s a far piece from Maple Hill.”
Kitty nodded. “I moved this weekend.”
“Bet we seem awful dull after Houston” one of the girls said with a laugh.
Kitty smiled faintly. “It’s quieter, sure. But not dull.”
That seemed to win a few grins around the table. The boy smiled at that, a smile that changed his whole face. Warm, good-humored, not demanding anything from her. “Paul Turner” he said, offering his hand across the table as though the introduction were owed.
“Kitty.” She shook it briefly.
“Well, Kitty” Paul said, his tone easy, “welcome to our circus.”
He took a sip from his milk and gave a small shake of his head. “You picked a rough time to move, heat like this don’t give anyone a fair first impression.”
“She’s holdin’ up better than you” Sally teased. “You were complainin’ before the first bell.”
“Only ’cause Coach will make us run laps” Paul replied, aiming a mock-scowl her way. “Oughta be illegal in this heat.”
Sally grinned, popping the top on her milk. “You’ll live” she shot back.
The minutes slipped past almost without notice, and when the bell rang again the spell broke, chatter rising as benches scraped back and trays clattered away. By the time Kitty stepped out onto the school steps with Sally beside her, the air was already loose and full of voices. The hem of her skirt caught on a breeze warm enough to bake bread and for a fleeting moment she realized she had almost forgotten she was new.
“You got to be anywhere right off?” Sally asked, already veering toward the side path.
Kitty shook her head. “Just home.”
“Well then,” Sally said with a grin, “you’re comin’ with me to FHA.”
Future Homemakers of America. Back home it had meant hems pinned neat for the spring fashion show, table linens ironed stiff for the Mother–Daughter Banquet, carnations wired into centerpieces until her fingers ached. Back home she’d sat cross-legged on the floor with other girls stringing carnations onto wires for the centerpieces. She could still remember the smell of starch and carnations, the quick chatter in the room, the way her old teacher’s voice cut through it all with warm authority. For a moment, the memory made her ache, a reminder that those girls were still back there, carrying on, while she was here starting over.
She hadn’t thought about joining again here. She hadn’t thought about much of anything beyond getting through the day. But Sally was watching her expectantly, already certain she’d come along.
Kitty’s lips curved faintly. “They startin’ up already?”
“Not a real meeting yet” Sally explained. “Just signin’ up, lettin’ Miss Drummond know who’s in. First one’ll be later this month. But if you don’t get your name down now, you’ll miss half the fun.”
Kitty gave a small nod. She knew how it worked.
She thought of her mother’s voice that morning, urging her to keep busy, to join things, to make herself liked. “I expect most girls join” she said.
“Most with any sense,” Sally teased. “Paul’s sister was secretary last year.”
Kitty’s brows lifted slightly, her voice kept light. “Oh? He didn’t mention her.”
Sally laughed. “Boys like him don’t bring up stuff like that unless you drag it out.”
Kitty let the corner of her mouth soften into a proper smile. She had learned not to give too much away, to keep her face smooth and composed, but in this moment it slipped, just a little. They rounded the back of the building toward the Home Ec wing. The crowd had thinned, most students spilling toward the lot or the ball field. Kitty slowed her steps slightly, her shoes crunching against the cinders. A fan hummed somewhere inside, stirring the scent of starch, glue, and lemon polish into the warm September air. Sally gave Kitty a quick grin, as if to say you’ll fit right in.
~
When Kitty came in through the back door she set her schoolbooks carefully on the kitchen table, lining them in a tidy stack before slipping off her shoes. The house carried its late-afternoon quiet: the hum of the refrigerator, the faint tick of the clock, the smell of cotton that had hung all day on the line.
From the front room came the scratch of a pencil. Ernest sat in his chair with the newspaper folded across his knees, glasses low on his nose as he solved a crosswoed. He looked up when she stepped into the doorway.
“Get along all right today?” he asked.
“Yes, Ernest” she said.
He nodded, pencil poised above a half-finished clue. “Your mama’s got a basket waitin’ on her in the washroom. Best lend her a hand.”
“I will” Kitty promised.
She found her mother bent over the laundry, folding pillowcases into neat squares. Loraine glanced up at once, her brow softening. “There you are. Thought you’d slipped off upstairs.” She patted the stack at her elbow. “Come lend me a hand, these’ll go quicker with two.”
Kitty dropped beside her, smoothing towels, stacking the fresh-smelling cloth into steady piles.
“I signed up for FHA” she said after a pause. “One of the neighbor girls, Sally, asked if I wanted to join.”
Loraine gave the sheet in her hands a sharp snap before folding it down the middle. “Mm. I figured you would. You were in it before, weren’t you?”
Kitty nodded.
“Well, maybe it’ll do you some good” Loraine said. “Your stitching still runs crooked if you don’t mind yourself and Lord knows you can stand to get handier in the kitchen.”
Kitty pressed her lips together, eyes fixed on the towel she was smoothing. They worked in silence letting the rhythm of folding and stacking filled the space between them.
The afternoon continued to slip past in small motions: Ernest turning a page in the front room, the sound of his pencil pausing and resuming, Loraine carrying the basket out, Kitty moving into the kitchen. She lit the burner, set water to boil, and sliced onions thin. Butter hissed in the pan, filling the room with a rich scent.
She had just bent to stir again when she heard the crunch of tires on gravel through the open window, then the slam of a car door. Kitty’s hand froze on the spoon. The screen door creaked and Johnny stepped into the kitchen, boots heavy on the floorboards, filling the doorway with his shadow.
She turned before she could stop herself. His eyes were already on her, the kind of look that made her feel small. He hadn’t spoken a kind word since she’d arrived. Only cold, mean, dismissals. Even now, with nothing said yet, she felt it in her chest, tight and uncertain.
She turned back to the stove, forcing the spoon through the pan as if the onions alone demanded her attention. It was easier not to look at him, easier to pretend she didn’t feel the weight of him filling the room.
Better to keep her head down, pretend to be busy. The silence stretched. She could feel his presence at her back, the heat crawling up her cheeks no matter how she willed it down.
Then he moved. In one motion he swept her books still stacked on the table aside with his hand. They hit the vinyl with a dull slap, skidding across the floor. “Don’t leave your junk where I eat”.
The sound made her flinch. She dropped to her knees, gathering them quickly, stacking the edges straight, her hair falling across her face. The weight of him leaned against the counter, arms folded, watching her.
The door opened again before she could rise. Loraine stepped in, brushing dirt from her apron with the back of her wrist, a basket of beans balanced against her hip. “Thought we’d make a stew” she told Johnny, setting it on the counter beside him. “Beans are coming in fast.”
Kitty scrambled up, clutching her books to her chest. Loraine didn’t notice, already stirring the pan. “Plenty enough for tomorrow too” she went on. “Kitty, put those away and then start snapping these.”
“Yes, Mama” Kitty murmured, hurrying toward the stairs, her cheeks still burning, hands still shaking. She set her books down in her room with care, though her fingers fumbled the edges. From below drifted the muffled sound of her mama moving about the kitchen, the scrape of pots, the faint hiss of steam.
By the time she came back down, the smell of beans and onions filled the house, warm and heavy. Loraine set the bowls on the table, murmured grace and started in about the garden. How the beans were running quicker than she’d thought, how she’d need to put some more up tomorrow.
Johnny sat at the head of the table, spoon turning slow in his stew. Kitty kept her eyes on her bowl, breaking bread in neat pieces.
“So” Johnny said, voice even. “First day at school. How was it?”
Kitty looked up, surprised, then back to her stew. “It was fine.”
“Fine” he echoed, as though the word didn’t say much at all. “Meet anybody worth mentioning?”
She felt her fork pause against the beans, her mind going back to the girls she’d fallen in step with that morning, their chatter light as the breeze, their giggles spilling out when Johnny’s name came up. She could still hear it. The way they fawned, trading looks, teasing each other about his jawline, his arms.
Kitty’s face burned at the memory. She drew in a breath and forced her voice even. “Some girls sat with me at lunch.” Sally, she thought, but didn’t want to say her name to him. The neighbor girl with her quick grin who had steered her through the hallways, made space for her on the cafeteria bench.
Johnny leaned back a little, mouth tipping as though that answer amused him. “Girls, huh.” He let the pause stretch before adding “No fellas sniffin’ around yet?”
Loraine clucked her tongue, reaching for the salt. “Don’t tease her, Johnny. She’s got enough to think about.”
“Ought to let her be” Ernest agreed, unfolding his napkin. “One day in and you’ve got her married off.” His tone was light, but his eyes flicked from Johnny to Kitty.
Johnny only smirked into his stew, not rising to it. “Was just askin’.”
“Ask about her lessons instead” Ernest said, spooning beans onto his plate. “That’s what matters.”
Kitty folded her hands in her lap. “I like English best” she said after a moment. “And history.”
Ernest smiled as she reached for the bread basket. “You’d make a fine teacher. Something steady, something respectable.”
Kitty smoothed her napkin against her knees. “I don’t think I want to teach.” She hesitated, then added, “I’d like to be a stewardess.”
The room paused. Ernest lifted his brows. “Stewardess? That’s travelin’ work, ain’t it?”
Kitty nodded quickly. “They fly everywhere. Rome, Paris, even Tokyo. They say it’s a chance to see the world.”
Loraine let out a soft laugh, shaking her head. “Child, you’re afraid of heights. You’d never make it down the runway, let alone up in the clouds.”
Kitty’s throat tightened, she wanted to protest, but the words stuck. She wasn’t afraid at all. At least, she didn’t think so. She had never been on a plane, so how could she be sure?
Ernest cleared his throat, trying to smooth the edge. “Still, takes pluck to think about it. Not every girl in Maple Hill looks past the county line.”
Kitty lowered her eyes. Loraine was already moving on, fussing about the sofa in the sitting room. But Johnny’s eyes lingered on Kitty across the table, making her stew go cold in front of her.
When the meal was done and the last crumbs pushed aside, he rose before she could reach for a single dish. “I’ll give her a hand clearing the table,” Johnny said easily, stacking bowls in his hands.
Loraine glanced up, surprised but pleased. “Well, that’s kind of you, Johnny. Lord knows I won’t turn down the help.”
Ernest chuckled, tearing off the last piece of bread. “That’s a first.”
Johnny only smiled, his hands steady as he lifted another bowl. His gaze brushed Kitty’s for half a heartbeat. To the rest of the table, it looked like a small courtesy. To Kitty, it felt like being cornered.
~
Kitty stood at the sink, the water clouded with suds. She passed him a plate. Johnny turned it in his hand, then scraped his thumb along the rim.
“You call this clean?” His voice stayed low. He shoved it back into the water, hard enough to splash her front.
Her mouth tightened, but she reached in and scrubbed again.
When she set it on the rack this time, Johnny picked up a fork, held it to the light. “You miss spots. You in such a hurry to run off, you can’t wash proper?” He dragged the tines back through the suds and let it clatter against the sink.
She fished it up, washed it again, trying not to let her hands shake.
Johnny laughed, low, mean. He caught her wrist, thumb pressing into the wet skin until she gasped. His mouth tipped, almost a smile. “See, that’s the thing, Kitten. You can sit pretty at the table, tell Mama everything’s ‘fine.’ But underneath? Same as this dish. Dirty shows, Kitten. Don’t matter how you try to hide it.
He set the plate on the counter, close enough she felt the weight of his nearness. “You leave out parts of your day, you hand me dishes half-clean. Same thing. Tryin’ to pass yourself off neat when you’re not. You follow?”
She bit her lip, eyes fixed on the water. “There wasn’t-” her voice broke thin, and she bit it back. “There wasn’t more.”
“Sure there was.” He shoved a plate back into the basin, water splashing her dress. “Who sat with you. Who looked at you. Who you looked back at.”
Her throat burned. “It wasn’t like that.”
Johnny’s voice dropped low. “You expect me to believe not a single boy looked your way? Not one? Pretty little thing sittin’ there?”
Paul’s face flickered up at once. The steadiness in his voice, the grin that had tugged at his mouth, a warmth that had changed his whole face. She remembered the firm clasp of his hand across the cafeteria table. He hadn’t laughed at her, hadn’t pressed, just smiled as though she belonged there.
Her chest tightened. If she admitted there had been boys at the table, if she spoke Paul’s name, Johnny would never let it rest. He would twist the memory of that handshake into something else, grind it into her until even the smallest kindness felt spoiled, something dirty.
She clenched her jaw, letting the water cloud around her wrists, praying he couldn’t read her face. “It was just girls.” The words tasted foul even as she said them, but they were safer than the truth.
“Mm.” He dried a glass, slow, watching her. “Won’t stay that way. Boys’ll notice. Question is which one you’ll notice back.”
Her stomach twisted, though she kept scrubbing.
He leaned close, his hand brushing hers as he plucked the plate from her grip. “Don’t you keep that from me. You hear? You hide it, you’re just a sneak tryin’ to pass for clean when you’re not.”
Kitty nodded, her hands raw from the soap, her breath tight in her chest.
He smirked, folding the towel once between his hands. “’Atta girl.”
He left the plate where it was, still wet, still streaked and stepped back, his shadow receding from her shoulder. But the words stayed lodged in the kitchen air, heavier than the smell of soap.
Even when the plates were clean, stacked neat, she kept scrubbing until her knuckles burned. She blinked hard, dragging her wrist across her eyes. The tears made the water shimmer, little rings breaking on the surface.
~
The clock ticked heavy on the far wall, each second dragging. Sunlight spilled across the tall windows, catching the chalk dust that floated like smoke in the air. Kitty sat hunched over her book, pencil idle, staring at the faint smudge where her hand had pressed too hard earlier.
Her mind wasn’t on arithmetic. It never stayed where it ought. Instead, it wound itself back to Johnny.
She tried to puzzle him out the way she might a riddle in the back of a magazine. What did he gain from it, the sly remarks, the nudges, the steady watchful way he seemed to find her no matter which corner of the house she tried to slip into? If he disliked her, and surely he must the way he spoke, then why didn’t he simply leave her be? Why did every slip, every spill, every crooked step seem to call him nearer, like she was the magnet and he was the iron?
He was always there, always watching, always finding some small way to trip her, startle her, press her back into herself until she hardly knew what she looked like anymore. Sometimes, when his eyes caught hers, it felt like he meant to burn her down where she stood. No words, no gesture, just that steady look, heavy enough that her skin prickled and her stomach twisted as though he could set her alight by will alone.
Her chest tightened as her mind slipped back to yesterday, the memory so sharp it made her grip her pencil until it bit into her fingers.
She had been walking down the hallway with her satchel slung tight over her shoulder, head bent, trying to slip past without a word. Then, sudden, a sharp nudge caught her foot. Her balance went at once. The satchel jerked off her shoulder and hit the floor with a thud, spilling pencils that rolled into the baseboard and papers that spread like a fan.
It had all happened so suddenly, but she knew he was there before she even looked up.
“Watch where you’re goin’, lamebrain” he had said, voice low but edged sharp. “You’ll break that little nose.”
The words stung because of the twist in them, like she’d been the careless one, like she’d run into him, when she could still feel in her bones that he’d tripped her. She knew he had. His boot had slid just so across her path, deliberate as anything, and still he spoke as if she were the clumsy one. As if it were her fault for not paying attention.
Her fingers fumbled over the scattered pencils. She kept her head down, wishing she could vanish into the floorboards, hoping he might grow bored. But instead the scuffed toes of his boots shifted closer until they bracketed the hem of her skirt. The leather grazed the fabric, then pressed. She felt the tug at once as the weight fixed her skirt to the floorboards.
She had gone still as stone, afraid to move. She felt the prickle of his gaze searing the top of her head. Then he crouched, one hand resting casual on his thigh, the other closing around her upper arm, not hard enough to bruise, but steady, keeping her in place as if he meant to show her who decided when she could rise.
“Say you’re sorry for bein’ so dumb.”
Her mouth opened, but no sound came. Heat surged up her throat, choking her.
His thumb pressed into her muscle of her, slow, insistent, grinding the command into her skin. “Go on.”
The word scraped out of her at last, barely audible. “…Sorry.”
“For what?”
Shame burned her throat. Her eyes locked on the scuffed toes of his boots. Her chest felt hollow, her voice smaller than she had ever heard it. “For… bein’ so dumb.” The words twisted in her gut.
Only then did his grip ease. He gave her arm a light pat, mock-friendly, as though he’d been teaching her a lesson or as if he’d just trained a dog to heel.
Then he stood and walked away, leaving her still on her knees with her satchel clutched tight in both hands, shame burning through her so hot she thought it might swallow her whole.
Her fingers tightened on the pencil until it pressed a shallow groove in her skin. She shuddered, tucking her chin lower over the page.
“Katherine.”
The sound of her name cracked through the fog of her thoughts. Her head snapped up.
Miss Dennis stood stiff at the front of the room, a line of chalk poised in her fingers, irritation etched across her face. “If you’ve finished your dreaming, perhaps you’ll answer this one for us.”
The board loomed black behind her, numbers scattered in neat rows. Kitty blinked at them, her heart leaping painfully. She hadn’t heard the question. She didn’t even know which problem Miss Dennis had written.
A ripple of amusement whispered through the desks around her. Someone snickered.
Kitty rose slowly, every joint stiff. The wood of the desk scraped against her knees as she stood. Her pencil trembled in her hand. She tried to swallow, but her throat had gone dry.
“Well?” Miss Dennis’ voice was clipped, expectant.
The numbers swam, blurring like water had spilled across the board. Kitty’s mind grasped frantically, trying to piece them together, but all she could hear was the pulse in her ears.
Miss Dennis tapped the chalk against the tray, the sharp click echoing. She sighed, crisp and cold. “Sit down. If you listened half as much as you stared out the window, you might manage it.”
Heat surged into Kitty’s cheeks. She lowered herself back into her seat, staring hard at the page before her, though the words there swam as badly as the chalk did.
The laughter had died down, but she felt the eyes still on her. She bent over her exercise book to hide her face.
Dumb.
The word reverberated in her skull, Johnny’s voice twined now with Miss Dennis sharp tone.
She gripped her pencil hard, pressing it into the page until the wood bit her skin.
A faint scrape against the desk startled her. A folded square of paper slid neatly to her elbow. Cautiously, she drew it under her palm and eased the fold open beneath the desk.
Inside was a rough sketch, lines quick and bold. The chalkboard stretched lopsided across the page and beside it a tiny stick-figure teacher with hair exploding like a thistle. Over the top, in crooked letters: Miss Dennis the Menace.
The laugh hit her sharp, bubbling up before she could clamp it down. She pressed her lips tight, shoulders jerking once. A cough, she pretended, ducking her head as if absorbed in her book.
Her fingers folded the paper again, holding it hidden beneath her hand. She shouldn’t keep it, notes were trouble, silly things that made teachers scowl and girls whisper. But she couldn’t bring herself to drop it in the wastebasket either.
When she risked a glance sideways, Paul’s eyes flicked to hers, quick but steady. Not mocking. Not cruel. Just steady, kind.
He had half-turned in his seat, just enough for her to catch the curve of a grin tugging at his mouth. It wasn’t the careless grin boys used to show off. It shifted his whole face, warming it, softening the strong lines into something open.
Kitty’s chest ached with the difference. She lowered her gaze fast, the burn in her face spreading hot to her ears, as though even noticing it was more than she ought to allow.
She pressed the folded note flat under her palm, her pencil scratching over meaningless figures in her book. Miss Dennis’ voice carried on at the front, droning through another problem, but Kitty barely heard it.
She sat very still, trying to focus, but her thoughts were rattled, caught between the sting of humiliation and the unfamiliar warmth that had come with Paul’s note.
