"Until Monday," she said. "If he doesn't have them Monday morning, he'll have to go into suspension."
I blinked at her. "It's Friday," I said.
"And I'm working late," Julie replied. "Because unlike some people who work at this school, I find it important to put in extra effort, instead of calling in sick every six-point-two-nine days. Like some people I could mention."
"Oh," I said, in a tone of sudden revelation. "You're talking about me."
Grrr.
"Yes," she said. "I only hope your attitude doesn't affect Coach Kyle's job performance."
Grrr.
"You missed my point, though," I said as politely as I could. "There's no way to get him into a city clinic before Monday morning. They aren't open before then."
'Well," she said, exasperated, "his parents will just have to convince their family doctor to help."
"Parent," I said. "Single parent, working three jobs to support the family. I promise you, they use the clinic, not a private practitioner."
She sniffed. "Then they should have gotten him to the clinic sooner."
I gritted my teeth. "Have you notified him or his mother?"
"No," she said, as if I was a moron. "I required the signature of one of his teachers before I could run through all the forms, and you're the only one left in the building. You didn't sign for it until just now. Which makes it all your fault, really."
The ironic thing is that Julie is an enormous Spider-Man fangirl.
Deep breaths, Parker. Nice, deep breaths.
"But he didn't know he needed the shots." I blinked. "Still doesn't know, in fact."
"Letters were sent to all students' parents last July," she said firmly. "He should have had them before school even started."
"But you're only telling him today?
When it's already too late!"
"It was a low organizational priority," she said. "More pressing matters have kept administration"— which was always Julie plus someone who was going to quit within two weeks—"far too busy to waste time doing Mister Larkin's parents' job."
I rubbed at my forehead. "Look, Julie. If this kid gets suspended, he'll be off the team—and it would make it more difficult for him to be accepted into a university."
Julie gave me a bewildered stare, as though I'd begun speaking in tongues. "University?"
I wondered if I'd get strange looks if I threw myself down and started chewing at the floorboards. "The point is that if he gets suspended over something like this, it's going to be all kinds of bad for him."
She waved a hand. "Well. Perhaps Mr. and Mrs. Larkin will be more careful about following immunization procedures next time," she said, and jerked her clipboard back. She tore off a pink copy of the form I'd signed and said, "This is for Mr. and Mrs. Larkin."
"Julie," I said. "Have a heart here. The kid needs some help."
She sniffed in contempt at the very idea. "I am only following the policy, rules, and law of the New York educational system."
"Right. Just following orders," I said.
"Precisely." She turned on a heel and goosestepped out of the gymnasium.
My God, the woman was pure evil.
I glanced back at Samuel, who was currently playing four-on-one and winning handily. He wasn't talking smack to them, though. He was focused, intent, moving in his natural element. The kid was a stiff-necked loudmouth, insulting, arrogant, and he reminded me way too much of people who beat me up for lunch money when I'd been in school.
But no one deserved Julie from Administration.
And since Coach Kyle wasn't around to do it, this looked like a job for Spider-Man.
Chapter 3
"Talk about disasters."
I said, as Mary Jane came through the front door of our apartment. "It's like they could smell the high school nerd on my clothes. Mister Science. They called me Mister Science. And shredded wheat. Just did whatever they wanted. And the worst one, this Samuel kid, he challenged me to a round of one-on-one. Told me if I won, they would run the practice my way."
I might have sounded just a bit sulky. My wife got the look she gets when she's trying really hard to keep from laughing at me. "The basketball practice?" she asked.
"Yes." I scowled down at the stack of papers I was grading. "It was like herding manic-obsessive cats. I can't remember the last time I felt so stupid."
"Why didn't you play the kid?" MJ asked. "I mean, you could have beaten him, right?"
"Oh, sure. If I didn't mind the kids finding out that Mister Science has a two-hundred-and-eighty-inch vertical leap." I put my pen down and set the papers aside. "Besides. That isn't what the kid needs. I'm supposed to teach him to be a team player. If the first thing I do is go mano-a-mano with him to prove who's best, it might undermine that."
"Just a bit," Mary Jane conceded. "I thought you were going to go to the faculty meeting early so you wouldn't get saddled with coaching the team."
"I was," I glowered. "Something came up."
"Who could have foreseen that."
she said tartly, and walked into our little kitchen and set down the brown grocery bag she was holding. If you'd asked my opinion when I was Samuel's age, I'd have said she looked like a million bucks. Since then, though, there's been inflation, and now I figure she looks like at least a billion. Back then, if you'd asked me to describe her, I would have handed you a laundry list of girl parts. Luscious red hair, bewitching green eyes, flawless pale skin, long and lovely legs—and I would have blushed before I got to other, ah, salient features.
And to be totally honest, I still saw all of that. Somedays more than others, but hey, I'm a man. I sometimes think primitive and politically incorrect thoughts about my wife. I'm allowed. I think it was in the vows somewhere.
But as we grew closer, I saw other things when I looked at her. I saw the woman who was willing to stand beside me through thick and thin, despite a mountain of reasons not to, despite the fact that just being a part of my life sometimes put her in danger. I saw the woman who was willing to spend many nights—far too many nights—alone while I ran around town doing everything a spider can, and leaving her to wonder when I'd be back.
Or even if I'd be back.
I might have been able to juggle compact cars, but I wasn't strong enough to do what she did, to be who she was. She was the one who had faith in me, the one who believed in me, the one who I knew, absolutely knew, would always listen, always help, always care. The longer I looked at her, the more beautiful she got, and the more thoroughly I understood how insanely lucky I was to have her beside me.
It was enough to disintegrate my frustration, at least for the moment. Honestly, if a man gets to come home to a woman like that at the end of the day, how bad can things be?
"Sorry, MJ." I sighed. "I ambushed you the second you walked in the door."
She arched a brow and teased, "I'll let it go. This time."
I started helping her with the bag. Not because she needed the help, but because it gave me a great excuse to stand behind her and reach both arms around her to handle the groceries. I liked the way her hair smelled.
She leaned back against me for a second, then gave me a playful nudge with one hip. "You really want to make it up to me? Cook."
I lifted both eyebrows. I cook almost as well as Ben Grimm embroiders, and MJ knew it. "Living dangerously tonight, are we?"
"Statistically speaking, you're bound to make something that tastes good eventually," she said. She took a frozen pizza out of the bag and passed it over her shoulder to me. "Back in a minute, master chef."
"Bork, bork, bork," I confirmed. She slipped off to the bedroom. I flipped the pizza box and went over the instructions. Looked simple enough. I followed the directions carefully while Mary Jane ran the shower.