Fixer-Upper (Spinning Hills Romance 3) (6 page)

Whatever they were planning, it was big. The very act of having a group of students enter a national competition had the potential to boost school pride and morale, and both went a long way in improving student engagement.

When he walked out, Marissa was standing at her door, smiling brightly, obviously eager to meet her new students. Two boys came in and one of them said, “Dang, she hot,” loudly, while looking Marissa up and down. He had a round, friendly face, but his eyes held a small spark of defiance. The second boy halfheartedly smiled and high-fived the first boy, while carefully avoiding looking at Marissa. Marissa threw Johnny a warning glance, silently telling him not to intervene.

Johnny caught her look and said, “It’s your classroom. I wouldn’t dream of it,” before continuing down the hall. Seeing Marissa again pulled him back into confusion. Dozens of thoughts raced through his head, but now wasn’t the time to catch and study them. Kids were filling the hall and filing into both Marissa’s and Amy Jared’s classrooms, and Johnny was focused on zigzagging through them, making him feel as if his head was playing catch-up with his body.

The first thing he did when he got to his small office was to close the glass door, lean against it, and try to get his thoughts in order. The girl at the masquerade party was Marissa! How had he gotten everything so confused?

And could Marissa put the past aside and trust him to do his job?

He pushed off the door and made a quick, firm decision. He’d give himself five minutes to process everything that had happened so he could get past it and get down to work. He walked over to the narrow window beside his desk that looked out onto green space. A bright sun shone down on overgrown grass. Leafy oaks and maples towered over a few peeling, blue metal mesh picnic tables. A half-formed idea that he and his brothers could sand and repaint the tables burned behind other, more pressing thoughts.

He wound back to Saturday night. The first thing he’d noticed about Melinda was that her eyes lacked the happy light he’d seen in Dulcinea’s eyes. That was the moment he’d known Melinda wasn’t the girl.

Mrs. Medina was an American of Italian descent, and Mr. Medina was Puerto Rican. Their kids had inherited a similar mix of their parents’ traits. The three of them had tanned skin, dark blond hair, and brown eyes, and were of average height, although he guessed Marissa was a little taller than average. And where Melinda had the killer curves and gorgeous face to rival any
Sports Illustrated
swimsuit model, Marissa had subtler curves and a more interesting beauty. Large, dark eyes, upturned nose, and round, button lips. He remembered she’d once caught him looking at her, and she’d shrunk away and laughed a fake laugh, remarking that she looked like a waif, all skin and bones. But he’d been thinking something else all together. He’d been thinking he’d never seen eyes that radiated that much warmth and hope.

As he thought back to the night in the elevator, he realized she’d grown into a beauty mainly because she seemed happy and comfortable in her skin and body.

Her soft skin and warm body.

Johnny hung his head. His very first day on the job as the school’s psychologist . . . and he was hot for a teacher. He swallowed hard, making an effort to push away the memory of those subtle curves and soft, clinging lips, and to think of her as simply a coworker.

Marissa had also been the only one of Rosa’s grandkids to learn Spanish. It had made Rosa insanely proud and happy that at least one of them had taken an interest.

He couldn’t even remember the last time he’d seen Melinda. Probably the summer after she’d finished high school, sometime before she’d headed off to Los Angeles to try her hand at acting and modeling. That had probably been part of the confusion. Melinda was four years younger than him. They’d rarely talked and had probably never hung out.

But there was no way he could tell everyone he’d confused the two sisters after what happened Saturday night. Rosa would gut him, Marty would throw him in the oven . . . and Michelle Medina would bury his remains.

The only thing he could do was let everything run its course. Not only had Marissa not been happy to see him, she also hadn’t shown the least bit of attraction or interest. And she’d been dating Brian Golden for the past year . . .

He slapped his forehead. Brian was probably Don Quixote! Johnny had never been a fan of his. If everything he remembered about Brian still held true: he was an okay guy, but he was all wrong for Marissa. Although, maybe he’d changed.

Finally, he sat down and took a good look at his office for the first time. Scruffy, solid oak desk. Four-drawer gray metal file cabinet. Bare, dirty, off-white walls. Small window and a glass door that looked out onto a wall.

His trained eye told him the space was eight-by-eight. It could be a comforting place. Mrs. Simmons would probably let him paint it after school. He smiled when he remembered what he’d seen of Marissa’s classroom. It was perfect. If she’d just started, it meant she’d spent the weekend working on it.

Johnny spent part of the morning poring over each summer student’s file. In all, there were thirty-two students divided between the two teachers. All of them were labeled
ELL
, which he knew was the acronym for English Language Learners. The kids in Marissa’s class all had one thing in common: They’d failed English proficiency tests. The kids in Amy Jared’s class had failed to meet state math standards for their grades.

He decided to stop by Marissa’s and Amy’s classes and introduce himself to the kids, as Mrs. Simmons had suggested. Marissa’s classroom happened to be the first one down the hallway. He stood by the door, where he wouldn’t be disrupting, and waited to see if it was a good moment.

Marissa’s shoulder-length, loose waves kept her face hidden from him. With her white crop pants, ballet flats, and an orange and white polka-dot top, she looked professional, fresh, pretty, and fun. The kids were watching something on a screen and laughing.

“Sharks and Jets, dumbest gangsta names ever,” one of the boys was saying, doubled over in laughter.

So they were watching
West Side Story
. Johnny bit back a smile.

“That’s actually great feedback!” Marissa hit
pause
on the DVD player. The earnest look in her eyes tugged at Johnny and he took a step forward. “The story you’re watching was set in the nineteen fifties, and it was based on
Romeo and Juliet
. If you want your own
Romeo and Juliet
version based on your own experiences, you need to choose names and a setting that speaks to you. I told you, it’s up to you. This is your project. I’m only here to guide you along.”

A few kids shouted out different suggestions.

“Junkies!”

“Daggers!”

“Crackheads!”

Others, whom Johnny guessed knew little English, looked somewhat lost, but animated all the same.

Undeterred by their colorful suggestions, Marissa went on in her intense, enthusiastic way, saying, “Javier will jot down the names you suggest only if you raise your hands first. And remember, we need to keep it appropriate if we want to win the race. We can vote before we break for lunch.” She stopped pacing and gave them a self-deprecating smile. “Hey, I know the movies and stories I’m showing you might seem silly to you, but I love them. They’re classics and great influences for your own musical.” She gestured as she spoke, trying to get those who didn’t know English at all to understand.

The words
win
and
race
worked like magic. The kids began raising their hands, and making suggestions. Javier, the kid who’d called Marissa “hot” and whom Johnny guessed Marissa had identified as a leader, was busy taking down names, keeping him too occupied to cause more trouble than a few inappropriate suggestions of his own. Meanwhile, Marissa went around to a few of the kids, explaining things in what sounded like Spanish, or using an app on her phone to translate into another language.

Names like Thugs, Longboards, Forties, Eightballs, Drifts, Hackers, Dime Bags, Bolts, and Strikers were quickly tossed about and either jotted down by Javier, or discarded by Marissa.

“Hey,” a boy called to him when he spotted him at the door.

“Hey.” Johnny smiled and lifted his head in greeting.

“Oh. Hello, Dr. Amador. Are you here to meet the class?” Marissa asked, her voice pleasant, but schooled into extreme politeness. Her expression was unreadable.

“Mr. Amador,” Johnny corrected and waved hello to the class. It would be another year before he was Dr. Amador.

“Whatdja think of our gangsta names, Mr. A?” Javier asked, a mischievous look in his eyes.

Mr. A
. Johnny grinned; he liked that. But he knew Javier had managed to sneak some drug terms past Marissa. “
Mucho nombre loco
,” Johnny teased, letting Javier know he was on to him. The classroom erupted into laughter and even Marissa smiled. “I also think Miss Medina should look them all up before you vote,” he added.

Marissa slanted a disappointed look Javier’s way, and he lowered his head.

“Can he stay?” a girl named Veronica asked, nodding toward Johnny.

“Well . . .” Marissa looked like a deer caught in the headlights. Johnny gave her a look. The two of them really needed to talk.

“I can look up the names on the list to make sure they’re PG while you continue to watch the movie,” he offered. Some kids giggled, but most groaned. Others seemed lost, but even a few of the lost ones seemed to be enjoying themselves.

Marissa eyed them, a comical expression on her face. She must’ve realized they were trying to pull one over on her, because she agreed with a nod and then waited for Javier to reluctantly hand her his list.

“Would you mind recording us for a little while, too?” she asked, when she handed him the list. “My arm is getting tired.”

Johnny agreed, relieved he was already getting the chance to prove to Marissa he could be useful. He awkwardly folded his tall frame into a student desk while a few kids giggled again. Marissa handed him the camera and bit back a smile. Johnny grinned at her, knowing he looked like an overgrown kid.

Marissa rolled her eyes and hit
play
again, and Johnny went down the list, looking up names, saddened by how much drug terminology the kids knew, but also amused at some of the other terms they’d managed to sneak in. All in all, he knew they’d mainly been trying to get away with mischief, like most teenagers.

He shook his head when he was finished. Only three names had made the cut. The kids started laughing and teasing Marissa again, and Johnny looked over at the screen. The Jets and the Sharks were fighting it out in a dance sequence.

“Ballerina dancers, scary shi—” Javier began before glancing at Marissa, who gave him a no-nonsense look. “Shiznit,” he finished.

Marissa narrowed her eyes and tossed a questioning look to Johnny, who shook his head no and said, “It’s slang for the same exact thing he was about to say.”

“Stuff. I meant stuff.” Javier grinned.

“Stuff. Right. I need to brush up on my grasp of slang,” she fretted. The kids laughed.

“They rollin’ on the basketball court like they all into each other. I ain’t doin that,” a kid in the back, probably the only one who was still watching, said to Marissa.

Marissa looked over toward the TV with a puzzled look. Her brow cleared. “I can see why not,” she said, smiling despite herself. “And that’s a great observation! What would you do instead?”

Johnny looked around. He could tell the kids liked her despite her slightly neurotic ways. Probably they liked her partly because of that. She was being real, and it was obvious she cared.

The kid who’d spoken up shrugged and got up. Before anyone knew it, he busted out some mad break-dancing moves. The class erupted. Seizing their new enthusiasm, Marissa directed everyone to move the desks back, warned them mightily against doing anything on their necks, and had the kids who could dance step forward.

“I be gangsta,” a girl volunteered.

“I don’t wanna be no po-po,” a boy in the back said, folding his hands and leaning against the wall.

“Does anybody want to be a po-po?” Marissa asked, before shaking her head. “I mean, a policeman.”

Only one boy raised his hand. “My ma’s a policewoman,” he said, a challenge in his eyes as he looked at the other kids. He was big for his age, looked tough, and his mom carried a gun. No one said a word.

Two hours later, the first draft for the first scene was coming along. A few kids were acting as choreographers, others were arguing either over the script or how to transform music they’d found on the public domain website Marissa was using, while a few started setting a beat to some of the new lyrics the kids had come up with. They’d decided their musical would be about a competition between two dance crews from rival neighborhoods, instead of gangs.

Johnny was amazed. His admiration for Marissa grew in leaps and bounds because through it all, the kids were translating words they didn’t know, asking questions when they were stuck, and communicating. Their motive? Winning.

He and Marissa were called upon to settle arguments, help with spelling and punctuation, and approve dialogue and lyrics. It was exhausting, and the kids began to get antsy. They begged Johnny and Marissa to try out some of their choreography. They both agreed, knowing it would energize the tired kids, and they threw themselves into it, their efforts to outdo each other making the kids laugh.

Marissa won by a landslide. She was a great dancer. But Johnny went all out. His antics soon had Marissa laughing so hard, she was wiping tears from her eyes. He also tried to teach the kids a few moves, too. He did the running man, the robot, and the moonwalk.

“Mr. A can’t dance,” one of the kids declared before she collapsed into giggles.