Chapter Text
As the first week back to school in the new year came to a close, Gregory found himself breathing a sigh of relief. He didn’t expect that getting back into the groove of things with his first graders would be easy - and it certainly wasn’t. Somehow, just two weeks off seemed to have wiped simple concepts, like following directions, straight from his students’ minds. But it was finally the weekend, and both he and his students needed it.
On top of the craziness that was the attempt to return to routine, Gregory had definitely noticed a strange energy between himself and Janine this week. The return to school was the first time he had seen her since their surprise encounter at the hookah bar at the very beginning of break, and he wasn’t sure what to expect from their reunion. He had certainly not planned to show his hand as much as he did that night at the bar, but everything had taken him by surprise: her presence, her dress, her hair, her willingness to dance with him, her smile when he pulled her in close, the feeling of her body pressed up against him…and then he couldn’t help but call her beautiful when they were standing out in the snow. He was so used to small moments of stolen glances of Janine’s beauty when she wasn’t looking. When he was finally able to stare at her, right in front of him, uninhibited, the word fell from his lips like snow: beautiful.
Gregory thought about Janine, and that night, for the rest of the two weeks of break. He reveled in the bliss of that evening, and fretted in the anticipation of their reunion. He knew there was no going back now - he could not pretend he did not have feelings for Janine. And Janine could not pretend she didn’t think there was something more behind his wide smiles and lingering glances. He wasn’t sure what that meant for their reunion, but he knew he couldn’t take the wait any longer.
On Tuesday, January 3rd, when Janine walked into the teacher’s lounge in the morning, shining her million-watt smile, Gregory knew he was in trouble. Usually, he’d be subtle in his admiration: a smile with only the corners of his mouth, or a glance that lingered only a second too long. But on this morning, subtlety felt way out of reach. He couldn’t stop his face from melting into a full sloppy grin. He couldn’t keep his eyes off of her. And he was still on the opposite side of the room from her. His mind played a flip book between the present moment and the moment they shared out in the snow before break, unsure of where that moment ended and this moment began, unsure of where their boundaries now fell. He felt more drawn to her than ever before.
And then she took a seat at a different table, across the room.
Gregory was confused at first, and searched for an explanation. She always sat at the same table in the teacher’s lounge, in a seat next to him. Did she need to talk to someone at that other table? But no, she was looking down at her phone, not talking to anyone. Did she have an injury, was she unable to walk across the room? But no, she had seemed fine walking in. Was she…not wanting to sit next to him? Her demeanor wasn’t upset, but she had yet to say hello or make eye contact with him.
Gregory wasn’t sure how long he sat there analyzing Janine’s first movement of the morning, but before he could reach a conclusion or act on anything, it was time for them all to get going to their classrooms, and Janine left the room without looking back.
It was like that for the rest of the week - whereas before Gregory felt blessed to have many moments with Janine throughout the day, now they never seemed to be in the same place at once. He did manage to get in a wave across the hallway here and there, to which Janine would politely reciprocate, but no matter how hard he tried, he could not get more than a few seconds with her. He even tried knocking on her classroom wall when he knew her students were at music class, but he emerged from his door to find Janine hurrying out of hers, calling over her shoulder that she needed to go run an errand.
So it was to his surprise, on this Friday of the first week back to school, that he managed to catch Janine as she was leaving her classroom for the day.
“Oh, hey,” he said, falling into step with her. Despite the weirdness of the week, he couldn’t help but smile in her presence.
“Hey,” she flashed him a quick grin and refocused her eyes forward.
“I feel like it’s been so busy being back, I haven’t even had a chance to hear how your break was,” Gregory offered, testing the waters.
“Yeah no, it’s been crazy.” She spoke with an amiable tone but still lacked her usual spirit. “Crazy being back, I mean. My break was pretty quiet.”
“Nice. It’s good to have some relaxation time.”
“Yep.” They fell into silence as they continued down the hall. Gregory wasn’t used to carrying the conversation this much with Janine - she usually had so much to tell him, so much to ask, so much to celebrate. He decided to bite the bullet.
“Hey, is..uh, is everything good between us?” he asked awkwardly.
“Yes! So good,” said Janine, but Gregory couldn’t help but notice she was shaking her head as she said it. They reached the door to the school and pushed their way outside into the cold air. Gregory once again flashed back to standing in the cold with Janine two weeks prior…
“Listen, Gregory,” Janine said, breaking his reverie. “You should know…”
“Maurice?” Gregory interrupted. He didn’t think anything could distract him from Janine being finally ready to talk to him, but his non-work friend walking up the stairs of Abbott Elementary did it.
“Maurice, man, what are you doing here? You’ve never visited me at work. I didn’t know you knew where this place was.”
“I’m not, uh…” Maurice glanced at Janine and Gregory felt a knot form in his stomach without fully knowing why. “Hey, maybe we should talk for a second.”
“I’ll leave you guys alone,” Janine offered politely, and opened the doors to return inside. Odd, thought Gregory. She was on her way out - if she wanted to give them some privacy, why didn’t she get in her car and go home?
“What are you doing here?” Gregory asked again when Janine was back inside.
“I’m here to pick up Janine,” said Maurice, shifting uncomfortably from side to side. Gregory felt like his mind was working in slow motion.
“Is her car broken?” Gregory asked, knowing at once that it was a dumb question and not wanting to recognize the real answer that was forming in his brain.
“Nah man, I’m here to take her out.” Gregory blinked at him. “On a date.”
“I didn’t know…you two…you know each other?”
“Yeah, you introduced us,” Maurice said, and Gregory felt his head spinning and his heart sinking. “I mean, sorta. At the hookah bar - I was looking for you but you had just left. And Janine was there looking all pretty and shit and we got to talking. I got her number and we’ve been texting over the past two weeks. Finally taking her out tonight.”
“Man, I didn’t know…why didn’t you tell me?”
“You were in Baltimore with your folks for Christmas and we haven’t caught up. It didn’t seem important enough to text you about.”
“Mo, are you for real?” Gregory didn’t think he’d have to spell this out to his good friend. He hadn’t said it out loud, even to himself. But he thought Maurice would be intuitive enough to pick up on it. “How many times have I told you stories about Janine? How much have I talked about her? And didn’t you see us together at the club? And now you’re gonna take her out?”
“What’s gotten into you, Greg?” Maurice challenged with a question of his own. “What about Amber? You’ve already got a girl. You can’t be holding onto one girl and reserving another.”
“Amber’s not…I’m ending that soon.” The truth was, Gregory thought about Amber so infrequently, he was sometimes surprised to hear she was still his girlfriend. But having a girlfriend, even as he knew he was falling for Janine, felt like a safety net. If he had a girlfriend, he could tell his dad not to set him up with girls from home. If he had a girlfriend, he could keep his friends from trying to hook him up with girls at bars. If he had a girlfriend, he could tell himself that not acting on his feelings for Janine was out of decency, and not out of fear.
“Soon isn’t good enough,” Maurice said firmly. “Look, when I found Janine in the snow that night, she was pretty upset. And you weren’t there to cheer her up, I was. So I’m gonna take her out and show her a good time.” Maurice paused and looked Gregory up and down. “I don’t want to be a bad friend, but you should know that you’re the one acting shitty right now, not me.”
Gregory was having trouble making eye contact with Maurice at the present moment. Mad as he was at him, Gregory knew Mo was right. At this point, he was stringing Amber along, while also trying to keep Janine from dating anyone else. It wasn’t right. But still, he didn’t want to know what Maurice meant by “show her a good time.”
Maurice opened the door to the school and shouted, “Hey Janine, ready to roll?”
“Ready!” Gregory heard Janine’s voice call, and his heart pulled into a tight knot. He heard footsteps as she ran toward the door.
“You’re looking fine,” Maurice said as she stepped outside. Gregory felt an immediate pang of jealousy that Maurice could say that out loud and receive Janine’s smile in return. His own “beautiful” confession felt so long ago now.
“Bye Gregory, see you Monday,” Janine called over her shoulder as she and Maurice walked to his car in the parking lot.
“I’ll see you…” Gregory tried to call back but his voice could barely break a whisper. All over break, as he thought about that blissful evening with Janine, he had tried to come to terms with why he hadn’t truly pursued her yet. He realized that with Taylor, with Amber, with all his past girlfriends, it felt easy to jump in and give a relationship a try, because he really didn’t care if it worked or not in the end. But with Janine, he didn’t want to jump in until he was sure it would work. He knew his feelings for Janine were the real deal, and he was terrified of messing up a relationship with her. But as it turned out, he thought bitterly as he made his way to his car, he was capable of messing it up before it even began.