The TiMER itself doesn't belong to me, but any idea you don't recognize I gladly take credit for.
Ch 3 re-write done! 5/21/22.
"Well… Uh, hey," he finally said a moment later to the whole class. He continued to walk into the room and stood at the front of the class. I hadn't noticed it, but everyone had filled in the bleachers behind Spencer and me at some point. "I'm Mr. Jackson, you can call me coach Jackson since I'm the JV men and women soccer coach or you can just call me Jackson, and I'll be your teacher this year for gym."
"More than that for some of us," someone snickered near the back.
"Excuse me?" Mr. Jackson said, stopping his introduction.
"You heard me," the kid answered in a snide tone. I turned to look. It was Brandon Tyler. Why he had to be in my gym class was beyond me, but there he was. And there he was continuing to make my life worse.
"Brandon shut up," Spencer barked. In a couple leaps Brandon was down near him, egging him on.
"Make me little girl," Brandon growled back, getting closer to his face. Spencer stood up and closed the short gap between them. "Oh look, you are growing your hair out to match that girly frame of yours."
"Boys!" Mr. Jackson yelled. I pulled at Spencer's arm, but he brushed me off without even looking my way. "Both of you sit down now!" They weren't listening to Mr. Jackson though. I knew this wouldn't end well.
"I am NOT a little girl, and I am sick and tired of your bullshit Brandon," Spencer spit out, purposefully spitting on Brandon. Brandon retaliated by punching him in the face. Spencer barely flinched and returned a punch and then kneed him. Instantly they were out of the bleachers and in front of everyone, trying to throw punches where they could.
Mr. Jackson advanced on the situation and pulled Spencer away from Brandon. Brandon followed and tried to attack Spencer through Mr. Jackson but was stopped when Mr. Jackson put his arm up and separated the two. He was stronger than he looked. Mr. Jackson was about a third of the size of Brandon and was shorter than Spencer, so this was surprising.
"Both of you stop this now. Sit down… away from each other, while I call someone to get both of you," Mr. Jackson said as he glared at both Spencer and Brandon.
"Someone will have to come get you too, after they find out what happened when you entered class," Brandon said, laughing. Mr. Jackson paused, looking scared for a second but then shook his head and continued to dial someone on the phone that on the wall.
I stood up. "Excuse me…" Mr. Jackson started, not knowing my name.
"Kaylee," I whispered as I started walking to the door.
"Excuse me Kaylee, please stop walking to the door. Kaylee! Sorry, I-" Mr. Jackson continued into the phone.
I had to get out of there though. There was no one in the halls as I made my way to the bathroom. I pushed open the door and walked to the nearest stall and locked the door. Not only did I find my soul mate, but he was my teacher. How could something like this happen? No one warned me about this. No one told me the guy might be nine or ten years older than me… and he was my teacher. There was no way I could go back into that room. They would all stare at me. He would stare at me. I couldn't face any of them. It made it ten times worse that this guy would be my soccer coach. How could he be my soccer coach and my soul mate?
Someone entered the bathroom and I realized I had been crying. I sniffled and got quiet. It was someone with big steps. It was probably just an upper-classman. Hopefully she would just use the bathroom and move on. I didn't think I could handle an upper-classman seeing me like this. The footsteps seemed to be getting closer and closer and then they stopped.
"Kaylee?" A male voice asked. I didn't recognize the voice. "Are you in there?" There was a knock on my stall. I opened the door. The voice belonged to Mr. Jackson.
"What are you doing in the girls' bathroom?" was all I could manage to say. He laughed at me.
"You rushed out the gym and these bathroom doors take a while to close, so I followed to make sure you are okay. Luckily Mrs. Archer was walking by the room and I asked if she could watch the class for a moment," he stammered out with a half smile.
"Why?" I whispered, crossing my arms.
"Well… I, uh," he stuttered and looked down at his arm. His TiMER had gone dark.
"I don't even know your name," I admitted, trying to be strong.
"Andy," he said and put out his hand. I shook it and laughed.
"As in Andrew? Andrew Jackson? What on earth were your parents thinking?" I said, unable to control my laughter.
He rolled his eyes. "Normally people don't point that out, and when they do I just say that's why I go by Andy. Will you come out of this stall… I don't want anyone to see me in here."
"Because you're my teacher and soul mate?"
"Because I'm a guy and this is the girls' bathroom."
"Oh."
He outstretched his hand and pulled me out of the small stall. I quickly let go of his hand but smiled weakly at him as we walked out of the bathroom and back to the classroom. The class was silent when we entered and everyone, included Mrs. Archer, stopped doing whatever they were doing and stared at us. Spencer and Brandon were nowhere to be found.
"Hopefully the rest of the year won't be as crazy as the first ten minutes," Andy/ Mr. Jackson laughed and went over to talk to Mrs. Archer. The class turned their attention to me as I sat back down in the front row of bleachers. I didn't want to talk to anyone and I wasn't ready for anyone's questions. It was going to be a long year.
Before the bell rang I pulled out a piece of paper from the back of my notebook. "I'll come to your office after school" I wrote and signed my name. On my way out of the room I handed it to Andy. He read it and nodded, trying not to smile. It was hard fighting my own, considering how cute he was. He fact that he was wearing a dark green polo with khaki shorts made him look like a kid wanting to grow up too fast and added to the cuteness.
As students piled out of classrooms the halls got louder and louder and it was making my head hurt. Or maybe my head was hurting before then but either way it didn't feel good. It seemed as if everyone was staring at me, but that was impossible because surely not everyone could know already. Lexi hadn't been in the class.
A tap on my shoulder made me jump. "So, was he cute?" Hannah asked, catching up to walk beside me.
"Who?" I asked, a little out of it.
"The new soccer coach, was he your gym teacher?" She exclaimed in a little louder than a whisper.
"Shhh!" I hissed, looking around as I did so.
"What?" she asked innocently. She looked around with a confused face. I looked down at my arm and then back at Hannah.
"YOU FOUND HIM!? WHERE IS HE?" Hannah yelled in excitement.
"Sh!" I insisted. "Not so loud… The soccer coach is Him." Hannah's mouth dropped and I thought she was going to get run over by the traffic in the hallway. I pulled her along with me as I waded through all the people.
"But he must be like 20 something, maybe even 30," Hannah protested once we were at my locker. I was struggling to get it open. Spencer had opened it for me this morning and obviously he couldn't do that now.
"I think he's 23," I retorted.
"Still! You're 14. That's strange. Maybe there's a mistake," she pressed.
I ignored her and finally got my locker open. My books went into it and I left Hannah standing at my locker. What if she was right? What if it was a mistake? Could that be possible? This day was one big ball of confusion.
When I saw Lexi in my next class, she bee lined straight to my desk.
"Shut. Up." She said and sat down in some kid named Frank Monsieur's seat.
"That's not your seat," I claimed, knowing that's not why she sat down.
"Mr. Jackson? That is too much. Tell me the rumors aren't true? Did Spencer really fight Brandon Tyler? And Mr. Jackson ran after you, did something happen? Tell me!" I was about to open my mouth to tell her to go away when the bell rang. The kid I assumed was Frank tapped on Lexi's shoulder. She gave me the we'll talk later eyes and went to sit down. I put my head on my desk.
When the bell rang to dismiss us for the day Lexi immediately came to my side.
"Spill," she said and stared at me. So I told her everything. It was bound to be the talk of the school soon if not already, so it was best if I told my side before things got too crazy. Lexi remained quiet for the whole story. "He can't get fired for this can he? I mean, you two are soul mates. The TiMER says so. Our whole staff has them. And TiMERs don't lie. You said yourself he's really cute and you never think people are cute. Woah. How are you going to tell your parents?"
I froze. My parents. I'd forgotten about them. There was no way I could hide it from them. The moment I got home they would be asking all about him and when they could meet him. They would want to meet him today. Mom would be waiting at home for me. Dad wouldn't get home from the hospital until late, he was working an ER shift today, but he would insist on meeting the guy. I didn't know what to do. Maybe Andy would.
I told Lexi I was going to go talk to him and for her to find Spencer and not wait for me. She gave me a wink as she left. All I could do was groan.
When I entered came to his office the door was cracked open. I knocked and then entered his office. There was no one there. A sign on his desk was addressed to me. "On the pitch, come over when you get this. Andy." His handwriting was elegant. That was definitely something I wanted in a guy.
I hadn't ever been to the soccer stadium in the high school before so when I walked onto the pitch I was awe struck. Most high schools centered around football, but mine was all about soccer. Both varsity teams were constantly in the tournament and the JV teams had good records. I knew they had just built the field and stadium over the summer but I hadn't thought of what it would look like. The grandstand really was grand and there were two tunnels leading out under the stands. The scoreboard looked like it hadn't even been turned on yet it was so new looking and the press box was glass covered and shiny. I didn't see Andy so I went onto the field. It felt wonderful. Even though I had no ball or teammates with me I felt better. I looked up at the lights. They were big and looked like they could put out nice lights.
"Beautiful isn't it?" A voice said, scaring the daylights out of me. I jumped and looked around. Andy was coming up from one of the tunnels. "But you haven't even seen the inside of this place."
I followed him back to where he had come from. The tunnel opened up to a large hallway. There were two doors across from each other that had 'Men' and 'Women' on them in gold plates. Further down the hallway there was a lounging area with couches and a fridge and other kitchen amenities. There was another door that Andy was standing near. He waved me over and opened the door to reveal a large office that also had soccer balls and uniforms. It was so neat and tidy and the soccer balls smelled brand new.
We left the storage room and Andy sat down on a couch in the lounge area.
"Am I going to get you fired?" I blurted out, still standing at the door.
"Come sit down," he insisted and patted the space on the couch. I wearily walked over and sat on the opposite side of the couch, leaving a cushion between us. "I'm more worried about you."
I looked at him incredulously. "Why?"
"Well, I've had a while to think about this moment. You had six days," he said, looking at me with passionate eyes.
"How long is a while? How old are you?" I inquired.
"I just turned 22 a month ago."
"I don't know how to do this?" I admitted. He smiled.
"Do what?"
"This whole soul mate thing. I didn't even want one right now." I had never said that out loud, not even to Spencer. My hand covered my mouth. I didn't mean that against him and I'm sure he thought I did. "I didn't-"
"No, I understand. I didn't get my TiMER until college."
"How did you wait so long?"
"I'm from Hollis, which is sixteen hours from here. My hometown didn't believe in the TiMER. I grew up thinking differently from the philosophy. I believed in soul mates, but I was taught you learned who this person was through trial-and-error. And when I came to Sarthe University it seemed everyone had one. So, I got one because I… well I wanted one. I can't imagine being forced to have one at fourteen. This must be really hard for you."
I smiled at him. It looked like what they said about this whole soul mate thing was true. He was too good to be true.
"What? Why are you smiling at me like that?" he asked after a moment. I shrugged. I really didn't know what to tell him there.
"My parents are going to berate me from the moment I get home about who my soul mate is. Luckily, I don't have any siblings who will tell them before I do, but I still have to tell them. And I don't know how," I finally said to him. He frowned and looked at his watch.
"I have to tell you something," he admitted. "The principal and vice principal talked to me shortly after you left my classroom. They think it's best if all of us meet, today if possible, in their office. They don't really know how to deal with this, and I don't know what they are going to say, but they wanted me to tell you."
I stared at him with big eyes. Would I be in trouble? Would he be in trouble? What would happen? How would my mom take it?
"Well," I started, searching for words. "My mom can very easily meet today, but my dad is a doctor and is working an ER shift today into late tonight."
"I guess we should Mr. Harris this," he said and stood up. He reached out his hand to help me up. His hand was warm as I took it and he lifted me up. I lost my balance and fell into him.
"Sorry," we both said and started laughing. Andy's arm was around me. I looked up at him and realized how close I was to him. My face turned deep red and I backed up, not letting go of his hand.
"Maybe walking down the hall isn't the best yet," I said and looked at our hands. He let go slowly and looked at me with a half smile. His half smile seemed like it was his signature face. I was okay with that because it didn't look too bad.
The walk to the principals felt like the longest walk in the world. People were staring at us, whispering and pointing. I kept my head down and kept walking though, I didn't want people to have more of a reason to talk.
The principal was a short stocky man who looked like he could be one of those creepy family doctors. The vice principal was a really tall woman with a skirt that made her seem even taller. They both had TiMERs that were dark, so they both had their soul mates. That had to work in our advantage. But it wasn't fair to make any kind of decisions or do anything because I didn't even really know my soul mate yet.
My mother came and entered the office with a worried face. "Kaylee, are you in trouble already? What is this about?" She hadn't even noticed my TiMER yet. But I was sure that was going to be cleared up very soon.
"Mrs. Parker, I'm sorry to disturb you on the first day of school, but I can ensure you that your daughter is not in trouble. She has caused quite a disturbance today though. It sure has been an interesting day for your daughter I'm sure," the principal said with a cold straight face. There were no emotions in his voice. My mother looked at me and then at the principal.
"Your daughter's TiMER went off today in her gym class," the assistant principal started. "And so did her teacher's: Andrew Jackson." My mother let out a laugh and then looked at Andy.
"Oh wait, are you-"
"I go by Andy," Andy corrected with a frown.
"Are you-"
"The problem here is that mister Jackson is the gym teacher here… not to mention the JV soccer coach," the assistant principal finished. My mom's mouth dropped. Yeah, that was my response too.
Apparently, this was a rare occasion, and everyone was at a loss about what to do about it. The room was deathly silent for a moment.
"There must be a mistake here," my mom responded after a minute. I involuntarily let an ouch escape my mouth. Andy's lips twitched into a small smirk before falling. I hadn't meant to, it just seemed like that was an insult.
"Is that possible?" the assistant principal asked, ignoring my outburst.
"I- I'm not sure. My brother is a TiMER surgeon, he would know," mom said, searching for words.
"When is the soonest you can find this out?" was the next question.
"This afternoon." She sternly replied. "Kaylee, we are done here. Go to the car. I will meet you there." She said all of this without even looking at me. Didn't I get any say in this? This was my TiMER after all. I suddenly felt really angry and stormed off with no intentions of going to the car.