The Teacher(34)

“You got it.”

Mr. Bennett winds up helping me clean out the rest of the shaving cream, and we devise a way to put the books back in the locker to optimize them drying out. It all kind of feels like a geometry problem I don’t know how to do, but it will be fine. I’ve done the best I can anyway.

“Thanks,” I tell Mr. Bennett as we get my locker closed. I have to remove the broken lock, and I replace it with the one from my gym locker. “That would have been tricky.”

“No problem.” He arches an eyebrow. “You need a ride home?”

I wince. Mr. Tuttle drove me home a few times, which was one of the examples of “inappropriate behavior” that the principal cited. “No, thanks.”

“It’s pouring though,” he points out. “And you don’t have a car, do you?”

I snort. “I don’t even have a driver’s license. Just a stupid permit.”

“Well then. Maybe you shouldn’t turn down a perfectly good ride.”

I don’t know what to say. Obviously, I would rather get a ride in Mr. Bennett’s nice, dry car than have to attempt to ride my bike home, or worse, walk it home in the rain. My mom is still at her shift at the hospital, so there’s no chance of her picking me up for at least another couple of hours.

“I don’t want to get you in trouble,” I finally say.

He nods soberly. “I appreciate that. But honestly, it will be fine. I’ve driven other students home, and I haven’t lost my job yet.”

When he says it like that, it doesn’t sound like such a big deal. It’s just a ride from one human being to another. Just because he’s my teacher, he can’t give me a ride home? That seems ridiculous.

“Okay,” I finally say.

This is not a big deal. Nothing bad will happen.



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Chapter Twenty-Nine

ADDIE

MR. BENNETT IS PARKED CLOSE to the back entrance of the school, but he still produces an umbrella, and I huddle close to him to keep from getting wet. But not too close, obviously.

His car turns out to be a gray Honda Accord. It’s weird because I expected something flashier, like a bright red convertible or something, which is weird because it’s not like Mr. Bennett is flashy. But this car just seems so much like an adult car, even though Mr. Bennett seems like one of the kids.

Also, the inside smells like him. I don’t know what exactly the smell is, maybe a cologne or aftershave or something, but I have noticed that he has a nice smell. I can’t smell it when he’s at his desk, but when he comes around the side of his desk and I am in my seat in the first row, I get a whiff of it.

“Sorry it’s messy,” he tells me as he clears a few papers off the passenger’s seat. It’s not that messy, though, especially compared to my mother’s car. In all the time I have been getting into her car, I have never seen it without fast-food french fries on the floor.

I slide into the passenger seat and buckle my seat belt. When Mr. Bennett gets into the driver’s seat, that feels even more weird. It doesn’t feel like we are teacher and student anymore but more like two friends going home together. The only person I ever ride like this in the car with is my mother, and she is much older than Mr. Bennett. Like by at least ten years, maybe more.

And he’s not like any other adults I know. I rode in the car with Mr. Tuttle, but he was old, like my father or even kind of like my grandfather or something. But Mr. Bennett isn’t like that. He is really handsome—more handsome than basically all the boys in our class—and it’s hard not to notice that.

Of course, if we were friends, I wouldn’t call him Mr. Bennett. His first name is Nathaniel. Nathaniel Bennett. It makes me think of Nathaniel Hawthorne, who wrote The Scarlet Letter, which I had to read in last year’s English class. There’s something poetic about the name Nathaniel.

Nathaniel and Adeline. We sound like a couple from hundreds of years ago.

I’ve heard other teachers refer to him as Nate. If we were friends, that’s probably what I would call him. But since we’re not actually friends, I will still be calling him Mr. Bennett.

“Thank you again,” I tell him as he starts the engine.

“No problem.” He pulls out of his parking spot, the wiper blades furiously swishing back and forth. “Couldn’t let you walk home in this mess. And I’m not in any rush. Eve is going out with a friend tonight.”

I sit beside him as he navigates onto the road. I told him my address, and he seems to know how to get there without his GPS. So I sit there, playing with a loose thread on the seam of my jeans. I’m trying to think of something to say conversation wise, but everything in my head just seems so completely lame. I mean, I’m sixteen years old. I don’t think there’s anything interesting I can say to him. Usually, when we talk, it’s about poetry, but that conversation seems out of place here.

“So,” he finally says, “is the person who put shaving cream in your locker the same one who ruined your clothes?”

I hesitate for a moment before nodding. I submitted my letter to Kenzie in lieu of an assignment, although to be honest, some of the angry thoughts were aimed at Mrs. Bennett as well. Mr. Bennett never graded it or returned it to me, but when I handed it in, he said to me, I bet it felt good to write that.