"When you two learn to get along and treat each other with respect," Sebastian says, coming up behind me, "Jamie might want to sit by you. But when you're mean to each other, you make her sad. As her friends, it's your job to make her heart happy, not to hurt her heart."
Roger and Corey share an uneasy look.
"We make your heart sad?" Roger asks Jamie.
She nods, her expression as serious as I've ever seen it. "I don't like it when you fight. It's mean. I want you both to be my friends."
Roger and Corey share another uneasy look, as if they'd never considered before that their constant bickering over her was making her sad. Little boys are kind of oblivious.
"Take your seats, kids," I murmur.
Roger looks at Jamie one final time and then does as told, hurrying down the aisle. The rest of the class fall in line behind him, taking their seats. Corey gets back into line with them, his little brows furrowed as he thinks through the problem in front of him.
I have a feeling Sebastian might have just helped Jamie find the friends she deserves.
"Hi," I whisper, turning to face him once the kids are all where they're supposed to be. I tip my head back to look up at him and smile. "Thank you for that."
"Boys are dumb when it comes to girls," he says, smirking at me. "We never know what the…heck women want."
"You aren't so bad at figuring it out," I tease him.
"That's because you're different, little owl. You're not just a woman. You're magic." He scoots closer to me to allow Lydia McCormick's class to squeeze past him down the aisle.
The auditorium is quickly filling up, hundreds of little voices buzzing with the excitement of being out of class for a little while. They're wired today.
"You're pretty magical yourself," I murmur to Sebastian, clasping my hands together behind my back so I don't reach for him. It's so hard to be this close to him and not be allowed to touch him. My hands actually twitch with the desire to touch him.
His signature, panty-melting smile works like a wrecking ball on my insides, intensifying the ache to touch him, kiss him. As much as I'm going to miss him being here every day, it's for the best. The things he makes me want to do to him are definitely not school appropriate.
"I need to get back up there," he murmurs, reaching out to touch my arm. It's an innocent gesture, one no one would really notice, but I can tell by the relief in his gaze that he needed it as badly as I do. "I just wanted to check on you."
"I'm good," I promise him.
"Yeah, you are." He smiles again, his dark eyes crinkling at the corners. "See you soon, little owl."
"Bye." I watch him turn and head back toward the stage. He stops every few feet to say hi to one of the teachers or to talk to a student. When he gets to Cadence, whose class sits closer to the front with the rest of the second graders, he murmurs something that makes her hold her hand up for a high five and laugh.
He shoots her a wink and then jogs the rest of the way to the stage.
"Miss Lassiter?" Jamie asks.
"Yeah, sweetheart?" I slide into my seat, tilting my head closer to hers so I can hear her. The auditorium echoes with so many people all talking at once.
"If you mawwy Dr. Thorne, does that make you a doctor too?"
"If I marry him?" I chuckle, caught off guard.
"He looks at you like my daddy looks at my mom," she says, pursing her lips. "You look at him that way too."
"Oh." I nibble on my lip, thinking through my answer. "Well, we like each other. But if we were to get married, I wouldn't be a doctor. I would just be Mrs. Thorne. You have to go to school for a really long time to be a doctor."
"Oh." Her eyes narrow on me behind her glasses. "Do you want to mawwy him?"
Lord, yes. But he hasn't asked me. We've been slowly moving me in with him over the last two weeks. We spend all our free time together. His siblings are coming to meet me soon, and my mom and George want us to fly to London over our next break. But we haven't really talked about marriage or the future. I just know that he's on a mission to get me pregnant. I'm not putting up much of a fight.
"He hasn't asked me to marry him," I murmur, figuring I probably shouldn't confide all of that to an eight-year-old.
"Boys are dumb," she huffs on my behalf.
I laugh quietly.
A few minutes later, Leslie steps up to the podium to call the assembly to order. The kids are harder to silence than usual. I think they sense that things have changed around here because their excitement is palpable. It has been all day.
They finally quieten down after a few warning glares from the teachers in the room.
Leslie introduces herself to the kids even though most of them have already met her. She's spent the last two weeks here with Sebastian, trying to get to know everyone. They're working so hard to make this transition as easy as possible on the kids. I'm so proud of him and the incredible, caring man he is.
I watch my class carefully as Leslie explains that Principal Johnson won't be coming back to the school. A few of my kids stare at each other with big eyes. A ripple of sound moves through the massive room like a schoolwide sigh of relief. It breaks my heart a little that Johnson didn't even see what he was doing to the kids here. We protected them as much as we could, but they were all leery of him, all a little frightened of him.
I know with Sebastian and Leslie at the helm, whoever replaces Johnson won't make them feel the same way. The next principal will be a good one, someone these kids will learn to love. Someone who will love them. They deserve nothing less.
"Miss Lassiter."
I glance up when I hear Leslie say my name fifteen minutes into the assembly. I feel everyone in the auditorium turn to look at me. Most of the teachers know something went down between me, Cadence, and Johnson, but they haven't been prying for information or details. They're just glad he's gone. It's unnerving to have the entire school focusing on me.
"Can you come up here, please?" Leslie asks, motioning for me.
I glance from her to Sebastian. He nods at me, silently letting me know everything is fine. He's smiling, mischief in his eyes. He's up to something.
I climb to my feet and adjust my shirt.