Iris in Bloom: Take a Chance, Book 2 (2 page)

There were six of them in the department and, according to the principal who’d hired him, they were a solid bunch. He hoped so. He didn’t have room for more drama in his life. He wanted a quiet place where he could lick his wounds. He’d liked that this was a big outdoor recreation area. He needed fresh air, low stress and to be very far from his past life in LA.

He was lucky that a teaching job had come available in mid year. The last person in this position had suffered a sudden heart attack, fortunately not fatal, and decided to retire on the spot.

He hoped the kids weren’t responsible for the heart attack.

He’d agreed to a two year contract which he thought would give himself time to get his bearings again since his marriage had so suddenly and unexpectedly imploded. Figure out who he was and what he was going to do with the rest of his life.

He was thankful to get a job mid school year, thankful for the rhythm of teaching. Didn’t matter the school, not really, kids were kids and there was an essential rhythm to a high school year that was strangely comforting.

The classroom might be a little more beaten up than in his last school, the technology older, but he’d figure it out.

He brought his poster board quotations from famous authors, his collection of literary action figures. Like a new kid trying to turn a dorm room into his temporary home, he personalized his classroom.

He had his elevens after lunch and he recalled Iris Chance’s words, “They’ll hate you for
King Lear
.” That was coming up soon, but not, thank God, today. They were currently studying poetry, talking about Emily Dickinson and Walt Whitman.

His next block was creative writing. This was his second session now with these kids and he was almost as bored as they were. How was it possible that an entire class of creative writing students didn’t seem to have a single creative idea among them?

After he listened to three students in a row read aloud stilted stories that were as lacking in drama as they were in originality, he gazed around at his action figures and his posters as though the plastic figurines of Jane Austen (weapon, her lethal wit) or Edgar Allan Poe with the removable raven on his shoulder waiting to swoop on the unwary might use their powers on these kids.

The silence of thirty kids shuffling and wondering why the teacher’s standing in a trance slowly broke in on him.

He chose a kid at random. Because he remembered his name. “Mitch, would you read the words on that poster right behind you on the wall, nice and loud for us?”

The kid was so startled he sat up straight. Turned and looked behind him. “That one?”

“Yes.”

“Uh, ‘Don't be too timid and squeamish about your actions. All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better.’ Ralph Waldo Emerson.”

“Thank you, Mitch. What do you think Emerson means there?”

Mitch shrugged his shoulders.

“Anyone?”

“That you should try new things?” a girl said, her voice a question.

He beamed at her. “Exactly. So I have to ask you why you aren’t taking any chances at all in your own stories? This is creative writing. Part of our job here is to express ourselves in new and creative ways. To create new worlds or tell a story in a way that evokes an emotion in the reader.”

The same girl put up her hand. “Yes. Was it Sarah?”

“Uh huh. Um, Mr. Bennett told us we had to follow the rules of composition. He gave us a text book.”

He’d found a copy of that text in the locker where his supplies were kept and assumed it was a piece of school history, not that anyone was actually teaching that crap.

“Okay. I know it’s always hard to have a teacher who comes in with new ideas when you’re used to the old one, but suck it up. From now on, we do things differently.”

A flicker of interest stirred like a breeze over dry leaves.

“First, has everybody seen
The Dead Poets’ Society
?”

Not a single soul had even heard of it.

He made a note. “Next class, we’re viewing the movie. In the mean time, you can bring in your copies of the composition book. We won’t be needing them again. Instead, I want you to take your stories, every single one of them. Go home and rewrite them.”

A collective groan rolled over him like an ocean wave trying to suck him under. These kids had attitude.

“How does that make you feel? Me making you redo an assignment?”

“Pissed,” Some boy yelled. Snickers erupted.

“Okay. Anger’s an emotion. Work with that. Write about how stupid it is to have to redo an assignment, turn it into a horror story about how the new teacher gets tortured by aliens. I don’t know. Even if you read your story over and love it, that’s okay. But –“ He pointed at the Emerson quote, the old gray haired dude seeming to approve of him as he glanced timelessly back. “Take a chance, like Emerson says. Experiment. In my creative writing class I am more interested in the creative than the rules. Got it?”

“Yes, Mr. McLeod.”

“Okay, next class, bring me those stories. Rewrite the story you’ve got, write something completely new, but go to the edge. Jump over the edge if you like.”

“And then we get to watch a movie?”

“And then we get to watch a movie,” he promised.

Of course, in that movie, one of the creative kids died and the teacher got fired.

Experiments, he reminded himself, involved risk.

As he walked out of his classroom at the end of the day he felt like he was making headway. He understood that the Mr. Bennett he replaced had been teaching at this school for thirty years. Geoff had a feeling the lesson plan hadn’t changed a bit in all those years.

Well, he thought, things were about to change in the English department of Jefferson High.

He was heading for the door that led to the staff parking lot, when a woman’s voice called, “Geoff.”

He turned and waited as one of the science teachers hurried up to him. Tara. Her name was Tara something. She was smiling at him in a way that made him feel slightly harried. One thing he’d loved about being married was the barbed wire fence of safety it provided. He’d been hit on a time or two and always deferred to the ring. Now he didn’t have the protection of the ring any more.

She was a nice looking woman. Hot in fact, with long stylish blond hair. He noticed she liked to wear tight clothes and clingy tops that were barely on the correct side of appropriate. Big smile. Friendly. He tried to convince himself she was only being friendly when she came right up to him and said, “Good, I was looking for you.”

She had a Texas accent. “I was
lookin fer yew
.”

“You found me,” he said, brilliant creative writing teacher that he was, so good with words.

“Some of the younger teachers head to Eugene on Fridays after work. Have a couple of drinks, sometimes do dinner. We’re going tomorrow. I wondered if you’d like to come.”

“Oh, thanks. Uh, I only got my stuff delivered yesterday. I’ll be unpacking tomorrow. But thanks.”

“Well come next time, then.”

“I will. Thank you.” Then, thinking maybe he’d been too abrupt, he said, “I already agreed to go to a vegan potluck, whatever that is.”

She stopped to stare. “You’re going to the vegan potluck?” She said it as though he were going to worship Satan. Of course, being from Texas, steak capital of the world, she probably did consider vegans to be in league with the devil.

“Yes. Ellen invited me. Seemed like a good idea to get to know the town.”

“Well that’s good that you’re not sitting home alone all weekend.”

She didn’t leave his side but walked with him to the teachers’ parking lot, chatting the whole way. How was he
lahkin
it here, did he think he’d stay
lawng
?

She was a nice woman, friendly. Sexy as hell. And he had zero interest.

He wondered if he’d ever be interested in women again, then recalled that moment earlier in the Sunflower Coffee and Tea Company when he’d felt that flicker of awareness.

Not that he’d be dating anytime soon, but maybe one day.

Chapter Three

Marguerite Chance strolled into Sunflower later that afternoon. In her hands was an earthenware pot with paper whites just coming into bloom. A second pot held a robust basil plant, bursting with fragrant green leaves. “Oh, how pretty,” Iris exclaimed as she gave her sister a quick hug. “And thanks for the basil.”

“Don't kill this one,” Marguerite ordered. Iris was sadly aware that she had killed the last two basil plants her sister brought her. “Thought I might trade them for some green tea, a veggie sandwich and,” Marguerite breathed deeply. “Oh, tell me that’s your wicked brownies I’m smelling?”

“It is. And it’s a good trade.” Marguerite was magic in the garden and absolutely useless in the kitchen while Iris was the exact opposite. Marguerite grew her herbs for her and kept her small garden tended, while she made sure her younger sister got fed. It worked.

The coffee shop wasn’t too busy. A few teenagers who’d come in after school lounged in comfy chairs sipping fancy coffees and goofing around.

An older couple sat at a table with a road map in front of them. She suspected they’d come in to use the washroom on a long road trip and then bought coffees because they felt bad. The fact that they’d ended up having paninis and two of her wicked brownies for dessert she put down to her talent in writing up her food descriptions, cooking same, and displaying it all to advantage.

Other than that, there was a quiet guy named Eric in the corner with his laptop. Eric was a budding screenwriter who worked in the horror genre. So far all he’d experienced was rejection but he’d told Iris repeatedly that he felt like the energy in her coffee shop was really creative.

He’d also taken to pouring out his troubles, both creative and personal, whenever he got the opportunity.

“What are you bringing Sunday night?” Marguerite asked, bringing her back to earth.

“Sunday night? Oh, don’t tell me it’s a family dinner I’ve forgotten.”

“No. It’s the vegan potluck and it’s at my house.”

“But I’m not a vegan.”

“So what. You’re my sister and I need you there.” She paused to sip her tea. “I also need your pot luck dish. You know I can’t cook.”

She eyed the pots sitting on the table between them. “I’ll make you a vegan dish. Probably containing fresh basil. But I can’t face all that tie-dye and hemp.”

“Be nice about our parents.” She grinned. “It’ll be fun. Scott Beatty will be there. And maybe some other single guys.”

“There are no decent single guys in this town.”

“There’s a new teacher at the high school. He’s coming.”

Now her interest was caught. “Geoff McLeod is coming to the vegan potluck?”

Marguerite put her cup down with a snap. “You know him?”

“No. He came in this morning and grabbed some coffees and muffins.”

“And?”

“And nothing. He seemed nice. He also seemed married.”

“I don't think so. Nobody mentioned a wife.”

“Maybe she’s, I don’t know, packing up the house or something and coming out later.”

“You can ask him all about his wife at the potluck. Sunday.”

The trouble with owning a coffee shop was that everyone in town knew where to find her. And, even if she tried to shut herself away in her kitchen at the back it didn’t matter. The number of people who felt they had the right to barge back here astonished her.

Her mother being the worst offender.

“Hi, darling,” Daphne Chance said, appearing at Iris’s side while she cooked up an experimental vegan dish in her kitchen. “I didn’t see you out front so I thought I’d sneak back here and see how you’re doing.”

“I’m doing fine, Mom. Trying out a new recipe for brownies made with beets. For the vegan potluck.”

“Oh, that sounds delicious. I can’t wait to try them.”

Actually, neither could Iris. She liked adding new menu items and seeing how they went over. There were enough vegans and food sensitive types in the area that she thought she might try selling the beet brownies if they turned out okay.

She also made a dish of brown rice with garbanzo beans and coconut milk and various spices (including fresh basil) that was quite delicious. At least she wouldn’t be too hungry.

When Sunday night came, she dressed with care and knew she wasn’t doing it for Scott Beatty. Even as she stood in front of the mirror to push the silver posts of her favorite amethyst dangly earrings through the holes in her ears she saw the excitement shining in her eyes.

Okay, so there was an interesting new man in town. And she liked the look of him. He’d been in again Friday morning on his way to work and they’d exchanged a quick greeting. She’d taken the time to note that he wasn’t wearing a wedding ring, not that lack of a ring was evidence of being single. She’d find out for sure tonight.

Not even the humiliation of knowing he’d overheard her assistant announcing her lack of a sex life could quite prevent the flutter of – something, when she thought of him. Maybe, if nothing else, she could sharpen her flirting skills.