Safe Passage (4 page)

Jules didn't want to seem overly eager to spend time with Gen so she suppressed her initial response of
Hell, no I don't mind
. "Sure, I could use the help."

"Yeah, right, the only thing you needed my help with was the French. You were like a wind talker over there with the codes."

"That's just an application of math. Anyone can do it if you learn how."

"Yeah, maybe, but I bet most people couldn't do it that quickly."

Jules blushed and looked down. "Thanks."

Gen smiled, "So, I brought cupcakes. If you're interested."

"Absolutely. Let's have one."

As they sat enjoying their cupcakes and coffee, Jules let Samson out of his crate. He stood next to Gen with his giant head resting in her lap as she scratched behind his ears.

"You've completely won him over now, you know that, right?" Jules said, grinning.

"Yeah, well ..."

"Don't get me wrong, he's got the right idea." Jules stopped, realizing what she said and quickly changed the subject. "So, did you grow up in the city."

Gen smiled. "Yes, I did. I went to St. Mary's. And I know you grew up here because you are a 'distinguished alumna' of our very own employer, right?"

Jules choked on her sip of coffee. After she finished sputtering, she took a deep breath. "How'd you know that?"

"You went to the Olympics, Jules, it's kind of a big deal. They have pictures of you in the gym and they inducted you into the athletics hall of fame."

Jules smiled wryly. "You know I didn't medal, right?"

"Yes, I checked."

Jules looked at her and arched an eyebrow, the look she fixed her students with when she knew that they weren't giving her the whole story.

"What? I was curious, once I found out you went."

Jules laughed. "It was great to go, Athens was fun. So it sounds like you know more about me than I know about you. That's hardly fair."

They talked for awhile, and Jules glanced at the clock in the living room and grimaced when she realized it was already almost eleven. "I hate to do this, but I have to be on the water with the girls by six, which means I wake up at 4:45—so I have to kick you out."

"I'm so sorry, Jules, I didn't think."

"It's okay. I'm a big girl, if I needed you to leave sooner, I'd have said."

Jules walked Gen to the front door. Gen turned to look at her. "I never got that tour."

Jules held up her hands in surrender and grinned. "Next time, I promise."

Gen smiled at her and leaned against the door. Jules nodded and stood stiffly, not sure what kind of goodbye to say. Gen rolled her eyes and reached up, draping her arms around Jules' neck. "Thanks for dinner," she murmured in Jules' ear.

Jules meant to say thank you for helping with the letter, she really did, but all that came out was an appreciative hum at how great Gen smelled and she shivered at the play of the warm breath across her ear. Her arms automatically started to move to snake around Gen's waist and pull her closer, but when she realized what she was doing, she stopped herself and patted her shoulder instead. Gen kissed her quickly on each cheek and then backed away. Jules was sure she was blushing, but she tried to act calm.

"Goodnight, Jules."

"Goodnight, Gen," Jules replied, opening the door.

"I'll see you tomorrow."

Jules grinned. "Yup."

Jules watched Gen get in the car, start it, and pull away from the house. Then she closed the door and turned off the porch light. She turned to look at Samson, "Well, Sam, mommy is in trouble. And she probably won't be getting to sleep any time soon."

*~*~*

Jules' alarm went off at 4:45, as usual. Not as usual, she groaned and had to fight to sit up. She'd spent forty-five minutes on her rowing machine after Gen left trying to get her out of her head. She had been unsuccessful, but had at least tired herself out enough that Gen could haunt her dreams instead of her waking thoughts.

She stood by the boathouse at 5:40, waiting for her girls to show up. Every member of her team was there by 5:50 and they had the boats in the water before six. Jules sometimes took down a single scull and rowed with them. Today, she didn't have the energy and she watched them from the shore, drinking her coffee and tracking their times. As practice was winding down, she heard a car pull up. She turned and saw Gen get out of her car with two cups of coffee and a bag.

Jules took in Gen's black pencil skirt and green top. Her hair was in another of her elegant knots, exposing her long pale neck that Jules was itching to explore. Jules realized she was staring and shook herself alert. She grinned and called out to Gen. "Are you here to join my crew, because we're full up."

Gen shook her head, laughing. "I felt bad keeping you up so late after you fixed me dinner, so I brought you breakfast."

Maggie and Katie, two seniors who rowed pairs, were just coming up to the boathouse getting their boat out of the water. Maggie snorted and Jules figured she had seen her and Gen having breakfast. "Do you need to do extra dryland this afternoon, O'Connor?" Jules barked.

"No, coach," Maggie said quickly as she and Katie put their boat back on the racks.

"So, I had a thought about something in the letter," Gen said once Maggie and Katie had left.

"What was that?"

"Well, when she was talking about Vincent Bartier, she said something about how he was so far from her tastes it made her laugh."

"Yeah."

"Well, it struck a chord with me, and I remembered something. I think E might have been a woman. What she said there sounded like something I said to my first girlfriend to reassure her, before I was out to my parents."

Jules dropped the beignet in her hand and it fell into the water. "Your ..."

Gen had been watching Jules' face carefully and she laughed at her reaction. "Wow, you really had no idea? That explains a lot. I thought you weren't interested."

Jules was still having trouble with English and stared at Gen with wide eyes, only getting occasional words out. "You're ... me ... interested ... of course ... have you seen you?"

"You're cute, Jules, clueless, but cute. But you need to pull it together, your big boat is coming back and you need to get up to the school. Think about the thing about E being a woman." Running one hand along Jules' back, Gen went back to her car. Jules took a long pull on her coffee and grinned like a fool as her coxed eight team came up bringing their boat.

At 7:30, Jules pulled up to the school proper and ran to her office to change. She ran her fingers through her hair, arranging it after the wind had done a number on it, and stowed the coaching clothes in the closet, then walked to the faculty room for coffee. She knew she'd talked to people this morning, but she couldn't remember anything except Gen saying she was cute.

She walked into the staff room with her coffee mug and headed directly to the coffeepot. She looked around, but Gen wasn't there. She did see her friend Mike, who taught history and coached basketball.

"Jules," he said. "How's it going? What cup are you on, nine or ten?"

"You know, Mike, when you start having practices at six a.m., then you get to complain about my coffee intake."

"So." He handed her the coffee pot. "I heard a rumor about you, you know. And the way you're grinning like the Cheshire cat on ecstasy, makes me think it's true."

"Oh?" Jules asked as she tried to school her expression, but wound up just laughing.

Mike went to straighten his red tie, but he just succeeded in making it more crooked. "Yeah, I heard you were making a very successful play for a certain blonde French teacher who looks like a naughty librarian."

Jules shook her head and straightened the tie for him. "And who'd you hear that from?"

"Angie."

"Shit. Look, man, nothing's happened. It's ... ambiguous."

"Yeah, right, the ambiguously gay duo. Man, sometimes being your lesbro is just disappointing."

"Just, give me a few days to figure out what's going on."

"Fair enough, Jules. See you in the gym later?"

"Yeah, my girls have to weight train today. Later, man."

Jules walked back to her classroom and sat down at her computer. She glanced down at her phone and, unfortunately, didn't see a text from Gen. She wished she'd gotten her number in return. First bell rang and students started filing into her room. She opened her lesson plan for the day and started her warm-up activity.

Once her students started their practice problems to follow up from their lesson, Jules opened her faculty e-mail, and wrote a quick note to Gen.

*~*~*

Gen looked at her computer screen as it dinged with a new e-mail in her faculty account. She opened it and read:

From: Julianne Delacroix
To: Genevieve Dubois
Re: Early Morning Drive-by

Gen,

Thanks again for the coffee and beignets. Want to meet up for lunch, today?

--Jules

Gen grinned as she read the email. She had purposely avoided the faculty lounge that morning, as she didn't want to run into Jules in front of her coworkers so soon after giving the green light. She had to admit she'd been surprised Jules hadn't read the signals she'd been sending. She'd hoped when Jules showed up with the letter it was a ruse to spend time with her. She looked at her students, still working on the conversations they had to present to the class and replied to the e-mail.

*~*~*

 Jules was about to tell her students that their time was up and start having them grade their assignments when her computer alerted her to a new email. She opened it and read:

From: Genevieve Dubois
To: Julianna Delacroix
Re: Midday drive-by?

J,

Lunch would be great, I'll meet you in the faculty room.

--G

Jules nodded to herself; they wouldn't be able to talk as freely, but she'd still get to see Gen and they could talk about the letter. She started having her class grade their work.

Jules' second period class was an athletics study hall, and she had a huge group of varsity athletes in her room. All she had to do was make sure they were working and help them with assignments if she could. She opened up her chat window to see if she could catch Beth online. She was in luck.

Jules D:
Don't you ever work, Beth?

Beth S:
I could ask you the same thing.

Jules D:
Study hall.

Beth S:
God, I wish I had become a teacher.

Jules D:
Screw you.

Beth S:
Sooooooo, how was your date?

Jules D:
Confusing.

Beth S:
?????

Jules D:
She's not straight.

Beth S:
OMG your cooking really did turn her. Holy crap!

Sighing deeply, Jules explained everything that had happened from the dinner to the coffee and beignets that morning and the revelation that Gen had ex-girlfriends.

Beth S:
Score! You are so in?

Jules D:
I'm sorry, when exactly did you turn into a frat guy?

Beth S:
Sorry, I was trying to be one of the guys.

Jules D:
Yeah, thanks and all, but I have plenty of dudes in my life.

Beth S:
Fair enough. Soooooooo, what are you going to do?

Jules D:
Um, I thought I'd ask her out.

Beth S:
How?

Jules D:
Is that a trick question?

Beth S:
I'm serious. You are notoriously bad at this, Jules. The only reason you're not a sad, lonely, thirty year old virgin is because you're hot and an Olympian. You have, like, zero game.

Jules D:
WALMART SPORTS BRA!!!! Try being supportive.

Beth S:
Not a Walmart sports bra, just an honest friend. If you wanted smoke blown up your ass you should have messaged Arthur.

Jules D:
I didn't have any trouble asking her over for dinner, and we're having lunch today. The school is already buzzing with rumors, probably both the faculty and the students at this point.

Beth S:
Man, all girls schools are just pits of rumor, aren't they?

Jules D:
Yes. But I think that is just high schools in general.

Jules D:
I think it will be fine, so far things have been working.

Beth S:
Yeah, but she's made all the real moves, it's your turn Jules.

Jules D:
Thank you for calming me down so much about this.

Beth S:
Anytime. That's what I'm here for.

Jules D:
Yeah, and that was sarcasm.

Beth S:
I know, I was choosing to ignore it. Have fun with your new girlfriend, Julianna.

Jules D:
Shut up, Elisabeth, and get back to work!

Jules looked around the room, everyone was doing their work except two girls in the back who were passing a note. One of them was Maggie O'Connor, the rower who'd seen Gen bringing Jules her breakfast this morning.

"Maggie, bring that up here, now," Jules said in her most commanding teacher voice.

Maggie almost jumped in her seat and turned to Jules. Jules was sure she thought she was being sneaky by sliding the note under her textbook. "Bring what, coach?"

"If you think I am that stupid, you can be benched for the rest of the season. O'Connor, bring me the note you were passing right now and put under the left side of your textbook or I will make sure you don't compete for the entirety of your senior year. And I won't stop with the school team, I'll get you banned from any rowing club in this or any nearby parish."

Maggie stood and walked to the front of the room. She handed Jules the note and slunk back to her desk, sliding down so she couldn't be seen behind the girl in front of her. Jules unfolded the note. The first writer's handwriting was Maggie's.

So, Mademoiselle Dupois and Coach D are totally knocking boots. Mlle. Dupois brought Coach breakfast at practice today, all apologetic for keeping her up late
.

The handwriting changed to Courtney's.
How do you know that's what they're doing?

Why else would someone haul herself out of bed to get to the boathouse at 7:30? They're totally getting it on.