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Gregory walked down the hallway after school, embracing the quiet. It was the last quiet he was going to get before the influx of unwanted, undeserved attention at the Educator of the Year awards ceremony in a little bit.
But something was disturbing the silence. It sounded like hitched breathing - or maybe sniffling? Gregory clocked the camera crew pointing into Janine’s classroom. He turned into the room to investigate.
“Janine?” Gregory found the teacher pacing near the door, but facing away. He hoped she would turn to him with a smile on her face, laughing about how her allergies were acting up. But his hope turned to dread when she instead turned to him with a tear-streaked face. “What’s wrong?”
In the year and a half that he’d known her, Gregory had found Janine to be happy and optimistic 80% of the time, and stubbornly resilient the other 20%. He had seen her dejected and beaten down, stressed out and counted out, but this was the first time he had seen her reduced to tears. It concerned him, deeply.
Janine explained her parent conference ordeal, and Gregory listened, almost relieved that it was nothing more serious. This mom had made a completely baseless accusation, and Janine had taken it to heart.
“Look, look, she doesn’t know what she’s talking about, okay?” Gregory took a step forward and looked into Janine’s eyes, wanting her to believe his words above the parent’s. Wanting her to believe the truth. “You’re a good teacher, Janine.”
Gregory expected Janine to wipe away her tears, smile at him, and tell him that she knew he was right. But instead, she broke down into more tears.
“Janine?” Oh no. He was making it worse. Gregory looked up into the hallway and saw that the documentary crew was still taping. He knew Janine was very open with the cameras - she, more than anyone else, was always inviting them to follow her outside of school – but this felt like too much. Gregory looked right at the camera peering into the classroom, and shut the door in its lens.
He noticed that closing the door had taken him another step towards Janine, who had fresh tears streaming down her face. Every instinct in his body was telling him to bring her close, to hold her until her tears subsided. But he felt like they had just gotten out of the “awkward” stage after their kiss, and he was scared to overstep again.
“Sorry,” said Janine, and her tears began to turn into sobs. Gregory’s heart broke a little bit.
“Come ‘ere,” Gregory said, and against his better judgment, he put his arms around Janine’s shoulders and pulled her into his chest. She obliged easily, with no hesitation, putting her arms around his waist and burying her face into his shirt. Her sobs turned muffled, but now Gregory could feel her body shaking too. He brought his hand to the back of her head instinctively, trying to hold her with the utmost care.
“There’s nothing to be sorry about, you can cry all you need to,” Gregory said to her. “I’m here.” And just as he said it, he realized that his stupid awards ceremony was supposed to happen in 15 minutes. He’d skip it without hesitation, but he knew Janine would insist that he go. He couldn’t just leave her here like this.
But he had no idea what to say to make it better, to heal her heart and subsequently his. What kind of a “teacher of the year” was he? He couldn’t even support his fellow teachers. Even the one whom he admired most.
That thought did spur an idea in him though - while Gregory admired Janine endlessly, the teacher that Janine admired the most was definitely Barbara.
“Janine,” Gregory said softly to the head below him. “Let’s go see Barbara. She’s definitely gone through this before. She’ll know what to do.” Janine seemed still unable to form words, but nodded her head against Gregory’s chest. She pulled away from him, but Gregory kept his hands on her shoulders as Janine wiped a few tears on her sleeves. He once again had to fight his body’s instinct - this time the instinct to wipe away a tear with the pad of his thumb. That would definitely be too much, he told himself.
Janine took a deep, shaky breath, calming her sobs a bit, and said, “O-okay. I’m ready.” She pivoted to walk out the door, and Gregory kept his hands lightly on her shoulders, not wanting to let go, not wanting her to think she was alone in anything - even in the short walk to Barbara’s classroom.