Two Alive, стр. 30

Johnathan laughed too. He heard Ms. Dottie had been taking UGEN for her Parkinson’s and hoped she hadn’t experienced any of its strange side effects. He walked into the bathroom and banged on one door to see if it was occupied. There was a bang back that told him someone was in there. Then when he banged on the next door there was a long pause. He banged again and listened closely.

“Someone’s in here,” a voice inside responded.

“Sorry Sam.” Johnathan recognized the voice.

“I’m coming out now.”

“Ok, no worries.” Johnathan wished Ms. Dottie a good day and left the bathroom, only to be greeted by an old white man in a sweater vest and khakis. Arthur had found him.

“Oh, Johnathan. I’m glad I caught you.” Arthur said, his face wrinkling from his smile.

“Good morning Arthur.” Johnathan rubbed at his eyes, hoping that this conversation wouldn’t take any more years off his life.

“I, uh…” Arthur took a breath to gather his thoughts. “I was going out with students in my class on the field trip. We just have to wait for the vans to come back from picking people up this morning. Then we’ll leave with Jasmine and she’s going to drop us off and pick us up.” He paused again to think.

Johnathan crossed his arms, waiting for Arthur to continue and get to the point.

Arthur went on, “So, I know you remember Miles got in a fight yesterday with Hector.”

“Yes, I remember, Arthur.” Johnathan started making his way to the breakroom, hoping the coffee was done and there was still some left.

Arthur followed. “Well, because Miles had a fight, his level was dropped, and he won’t be able to go to the movies with us. Abby said she was staying behind and, so he’ll be with her in the classroom, but I was wondering if you didn’t mind coming by and maybe having him help you with the stuff around the school like you normally do.”

Johnathan entered the breakroom, that was once a conference room, and grabbed a cup from the stack near the coffee maker. But when he placed the cup under the spout and pulled down the lever, nothing came out. His coworkers must have taken it all while he was stuck listening to Arthur. With a big sigh, Johnathan went to refilling the maker with fresh coffee grounds and starting the machine again. “Yeah. Arthur, if I find something to do, I’ll take Miles to come help me.”

Arthur was thrilled to hear that. Johnathan often took students from different classrooms to help him move boxes, fold up chairs, or break down old tables and throw them in the dumpster. It was a privilege to help him and students strived for the opportunity. Johnathan had been there when Miles and Hector started fighting. Although both parties were equally at fault, Miles wasn’t the aggressor. Johnathan didn’t see a problem having the small frail boy help him with boxes or something.

While the coffee brewed, Johnathan left the small breakroom, just as more staff members came in looking for java. Johnathan turned to go down the small hallway back to the front office. Justine was on the phone when he entered the office but when she saw him, she shook her head.

“Nothing from the roofers.” The pregnant woman mouthed.

Johnathan shook his head. He made his way around the front L shaped counter, passing Michelle on his left, talking with Sam about the scheduling on the white board. Johnathan looked out the front door to see the first of the yellow buses starting to pull up.

“John, could you…” Michelle started.

And Johnathan finished, “I’ll go let the classrooms and staff know the buses are here.” He went through the swinging double doors to the main hallway and went to the left side of the building where all the classrooms were. He started from the beginning of the hallway with classroom 1 then worked his way to classes 2, 4, 7 and 8. Telling all the staff in the rooms that the buses were arriving. Then Johnathan went to the last classroom at the end of the hall, classroom 12, Francine’s class. She was sitting at her desk, blazer over her chair and a handful of ungraded worksheets from yesterday.

“Oh, Johnathan. Can I help you?” Francine put her papers down, happy to see him.

“Just came to let you know the buses were just pullin’ up. You might wanna start mentally preparing for Hector.” Johnathan stood at the door and glanced at a student’s desk near him with the letters “H-E-K-T-O-R” scratched into it.

Francine let out a heavy sigh that turned into a laugh. “You know what? Somebody need to spank his little ass!”

Johnathan laughed. “I gotta agree with you.”

Francine shook her head, “Don’t tell nobody I said that. Because I need my job and I don’t want Miss Michelle to hear I said that.”

“No worries.”

Johnathan looked around the classroom at all the recent art projects and math assignments that littered the wall. High grades all around and everyone was on level for the March Madness basketball tournament. All except Hector, who had a behavior yesterday and flipped over his desk. That was before he had a small scrap with Miles in the gym. Besides yesterday though, the kid was alright and was actually doing a lot better in Francine’s classroom. Hector was smart when he wanted to be, and Francine was able to make him focus. She had only been working in classroom 12 for a year and had completely turned it around. Johnathan admired her for that, among other things.

The door burst opened behind him and he turned to see Eryanna rushing into class being chased by a lean woman, Amber; another aide in 12. “Girl you need to slow down running through these halls.” Amber said to