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To hear Sadie Logan go on, her new teacher hung the moon. Every time Clyde entertained his young niece, she dominated the conversation with praise of Miss Dane. Miss Dane could play the guitar and speak three languages. Miss Dane told the best stories during snack time, all off the top of her head. Miss Dane had a corgi named BiBi that she sometimes brought to school, and could she have a dog, too?
Her dad, Clyde’s brother Jimmy, answered the same: ask your mom.
“The way Sadie talks,” Clyde said one day, “Miss Dane must walk on water.”
“She can fly through the air like Mary Poppins if she wants,” Jimmy said. “It’s nice to see Sadie interested in school. Her grades are getting better.”
Indeed, the little girl spent more time perfecting her homework in order to impress Miss Dane. When the teacher offered Sadie’s class the opportunity to receive extra credit for citizenship class, Sadie called the only man in Boone County capable of helping. In her view, anyway.
“I have to bring somebody to class to tell about their bravest moment, Uncle Clyde.”
“Uh-huh.” Clyde wasn’t the smartest man in town, but he was perceptive enough to see it coming. He looked down at his high-tech prosthetic forearm, in use thanks to his so-called act of bravery in Iraq. He suspected Sadie was not asking him to tell the story of how he gave Earl the Heimlich maneuver after the old man choked on a lime wedge at the Duck Tape.
“Baby girl, are you sure you don’t want your daddy to come, or Moody?” he asked, referring to the girl’s stepfather. He’d do anything for his niece, of course, but the notion of reliving one of the unluckiest days of his life unsettled him. Yet Sadie pleaded, and claimed only Clyde’s story guaranteed this much desired extra credit.
Clyde relented, and spent the rest of the night contemplating his story and how to tone it down for a class full of elementary students.
~*~
Ophelia Dane sat on the edge of her chair, not necessarily because Mr. Johnson’s story of a daring escape from a collapsing coal mine enthralled her. She wanted to be ready, and leap up to censor the man in the event of a four-letter slip. Twice in his story so far, the grandfather of the Johnson twins had to check himself as he talked. Each time, he glanced in Ophelia’s direction and winked.
“I usually tell this story at the Duck Tape,” the man said afterward. “Whole different audience.”
“I’m sure.” Ophelia thanked him and escorted the man to the classroom door. Turning to her restless class, she clapped for their attention. “Okay, thank you to Jeff and Mark for inviting their grandfather to speak,” she consulted her planner, “and up next for today is Sadie Logan’s uncle, Clyde.”
Clyde was escorted to the teacher’s lounge after checking in at the school office. Ophelia gave Sadie the hall pass to fetch her “extra credit” speaker, and hoped Clyde Logan was able to tell an exciting story without colorful language that her students might take home. Thus far, every student taking advantage of this assignment responded with fascinating subjects. Coal miners, firefighters, park rangers… yet what little Ophelia knew of Clyde Logan worried her.
“Oh, Clyde?” Mr. Johnson had said. “He tends bar at the Duck.” Ophelia pictured a heavily tatted-up biker dude telling children a tale straight out of Sons of Anarchy.
She wasn’t expecting a shy, broad-shouldered veteran with an earnest and handsome face, smiling softly as he extended his good hand to her. Clyde Logan dressed in a nice pair of slacks and a dark button-down shirt for the occasion, a severe contrast from Mr. Johnson’s coveralls. Nothing like she imagined, thank the stars.
“Sadie’s told us near everything about you that she knows,” Clyde said in greeting. Ophelia wished for the same.
~*~
The talk went better than Clyde anticipated. He didn’t want to come off sounding like a recruitment video for the armed forces, nor did he wish to glamorize war. He covered the basic details of his Iraqi tours and summarized the events up to and during the incident that resulted in his injury. He also left out how he came to possess the mechanical prosthesis, since the money paying for it had come through ill-gotten gains.
Nobody’s business but his own.
Sadie’s classmates, naturally, seemed more interested in the forearm and how Clyde functioned it. They wanted to know how he made the fingers move, and if it hurt to wear it. Could it crush steel, and was it fireproof? Clyde answered every question as best he could, and fought one particular distraction.
Miss Dane.
Clyde hadn’t seen a lovelier woman in Boone County. Her simple green prairie dress and long reddish-brown hair ought to have given her a homely aura, but Clyde found the look arousing. More so than the women who frequented Duck Tape on ladies’ nights, all pouty and contoured from video makeup tutorials. Clyde found it challenging to address Sadie’s class when he preferred to talk straight to Ophelia Dane and get lost in those soft hazel eyes.
During a lull in the question and answer session, the school bell rang the day’s dismissal. The sound triggered two dozen children to gather their books and line up for the bus. No time to thank Clyde for staying, not that he blamed them. When he was a kid, he couldn’t wait for the final bell, either.
Sadie hugged him goodbye on the way out. She took the bus to her mother’s house, and chattered happily out the door about her guaranteed extra credit.
“Thank you for your service.”
Clyde turned around to face Ophelia. “You’re welcome,” he said. “I don’t know that I was brave. Just doing what they trained me to do.”
“I think it takes a special person to give his time and life to the military. Not everybody is cut out for it. I know I’m not.” Ophelia bowed her head and returned to her desk.
“I suppose the same is said for teaching.” Clyde looked around the empty classroom. Ophelia had a nice setup with posters of historical figures and a chalkboard full of Spanish verb conjugations. “I figure any person who can handle all these kids at once can achieve anything.”
Ophelia laughed at that, in a nice way. Clyde liked that he got the woman to smile. It brightened her face and brought out the cute freckles on the bridge of her nose.
“Thank you, Mr. Logan.”
“Clyde,” he said.
“Clyde. Ophelia.” Ophelia tapped her breastbone. “Feel free to let Sadie know she has earned her extra credit.”
“Happy to do it. Her mama and Moody are coming up to the Duck for all-you-can-eat-wing night, so I’ll be seeing Sadie then.” Clyde was close to the door and turned toward Ophelia. “If you like, you can come tell her yourself.”
Ophelia paused in packing stacks of folders into her bag. “That sounds very nice. I do love wings,” she said.
“Come by around five. It’s not so crowded then.”
She smiled. “I will. Save me a seat at the bar?”
“Consider it done.” Clyde nodded his farewells and left the school, walking on air. He didn’t think he had it in him to invite a pretty lady anywhere.
Clyde congratulated himself on another act of bravery.