Me too twivergent1! I thought she was so underappreciated. And thank you, I had a great time. *Smiles and waves back.*

Chapter Three

Ms. Matthews sets up the video for the last history class of the day as the students come in. As she does so, she introduces me and I give my usual spiel about myself and why I am here. When I'm done, she tells the class to take out their notes so they can finish the last bit of the documentary. They comply and take out whatever they were writing in and whatever they were writing with.

"I know who your niece is," I whisper when she sits back down. "Makenna."

"Very good. I forgot how perceptive you are, Caleb." I smile.

"Can you tell me anything else about her now?"

Ms. Matthews chuckles and shifts her gaze from the documentary to me. She looks amused with the slight tug at the corner of her mouth and raised eyebrows.

"Makenna is very much like her father. If you haven't noticed, she looks nothing like my sister or myself. She usually does well in school."

"Usually?" I say. "Is she not doing well now?"

"It's not that she's not doing well, it's that she spends so much time trying to help all the other failing students in class that her own work is left untouched."

"She was talking to some girl as they were leaving. She said she would help her study."

"That's Bethany," she says. "I am not allowed to play favorites in class, but she is my least fauvorite."

"Doesn't try?"

"Doesn't try, has no respect for the class or her classmates. She drives everyone crazy. I have had to take her phone away more times than documentaries I show in this class."

"Is that possible?" I ask. I mean it as a joke, but Ms. Matthews is serious.

"Every day."

"You always have troublesome students," I point out. She nods.

"I could never teach elementary school."

"Assuming no one likes this Bethany," I say, "why does Makenna want to help her? Especially since that guy said Bethany outed her in the fifth grade for liking some kid."

"Makenna is pessimistic by nature, that's one thing she inherited from her mother, and tries to look at the bright side of things. She wants to help others in hopes that she will get good karma and things will look up for her."

"But if her grades are slipping..."

"She also is very shy. She doesn't like asking for help, she sees it as a weakness. She won't let me help her and then she gets farther behind."

"What if someone went to talk to her?" I say. "Someone that wasn't actually a teacher, that wanted to help. Would she let them?"

Ms. Matthews gives me a friendly smile. She nods once toward the door. "They are welcome to try. She has study hall in the library."

The halls are familiar but have since been repainted since I last saw them. They were our school colors, but are now plain white. Stripes of red outline the sharp corners. I can actually see where this might prevent accidents. It is like a stop light. That would have been handy a few years ago.

The library doors are loud when they open and close, so I try to be as quiet as possible. When I walk in, I briefly say hi to Katherine, the librarian. I used to spend a lot of time in the library so she knows me well. She asks how I'm doing and I tell her. I neglect to mention my dateless status to my sister's wedding. Katherine seems pleased that I am Ms. Matthews's assistant.

I scan the crowd of students in study hall. I spot the dark haired, blue eyed girl sitting at a table by herself scribbling quickly on a piece of paper. I'll make my visit short.

"Makenna?" I say. She looks up at me with an unfaltering expression. Her eyes are cold and her mouth is set.

"Mr. Prior." I pull out a chair from the desk and sit.

"Ms. Matthews told me your grade in government isn't doing too well. Is there anything I can do to help?"

"Yes," she says, "let me take care of my own grades."

"You need to pass this class to graduate," I say. "Your grade is slipping closer to a D. If there is any material you need help understanding-"

"I just need to turn things in." The way her voice comes sounds when she says that, soft and delicate, makes me think she's telling the truth. But it's the chilly vibe I get from her sharp eyes that is unchanging, makes me think there is more she could be doing than just turning things in.

"All right. Well if you need my help, you can text me." I write down my cell phone number and slide it across the table to her.

"You're majoring in history, not government," she says.

"You must do well on tests." Her eyes narrow at me and I smile. "You have a good memory. Just because I'm majoring in history doesn't mean I know nothing about government. My parents work for the government."

"Not the government we're learning about," she snaps. I take a deep breath and exhale. It isn't worth getting upset.

"I remember the course when I was here."

"Was my aunt your teacher?"

The bell rings and she slams her book shut before standing and exiting the library. I stand, push in my chair, and walk back to Ms. Matthews' class silently.

"That girl is-" I start. I almost say that she's a piece of work, but I think better of it as it is her aunt I'm talking to. "Very sassy."

Ms. Matthews nods and sighs. "I understand that she's wanting to be independent, but this is not going the way it should. Grade wise. She's a very smart girl, but she's having trouble."

"She said she needs to turn in a lot of work to get her grade up. Is that true?"

"Yes. She does well on tests, but the homework assignments she receives are never turned in on time."

"Have you tried talking to her parents?"

"Yes," she says, "but I think that just makes them expect more of her."

So maybe independence isn't what's slowing her down. It's her parents' expectations of her. I was lucky enough to have parents that told me to do the best I could and the grade I got was the grade I got, of course I did well anyway. One year Beatrice got a D in math and she was very upset, but Mom just told her that it wasn't her fault she didn't understand the concepts her teacher was teaching. He thought they knew more than they did.

"I'm going to keep trying to help her," I say. "Maybe she'll come around."

"I'll talk to her too. Hopefully if I suggest she talk to you, or at least a friend of hers, maybe she will listen."