January 2nd 2023

Chapter 2
We Discover a New Order

She'd been taking refuge from this moment, all along these final days of summer with Lucas and their girls, with her brother, with everyone. She'd known about this situation they were heading toward, and she'd very 'maturely' plugged her fingers in her ears. It wouldn't have changed anything if she hadn't done that, things would still have been as they were about to be, but then she would have been wading in the thoughts, the questions, and the uncertainties, and she had much preferred pressing pause on all of that. She could face it when school started again, not a minute before. And now here they were…

Even as they'd still been settling Wyatt into his room and into the household, Maya had been called in to the school along with the rest of the teachers. None of them had known or could have expected what the summons were about, but they soon learned… There had been a shake up in the administration. The principal had decided to retire earlier that year, and none of the teachers had been aware of this or of the process that had gotten underway to find him a replacement. The first they all heard of it was on that August day where they were presented with his replacement. It was the same time when they discovered that, rather than continuing on in her post alongside the new principal, Vice-Principal Ríos had been given severance, with someone new taking her spot, too.

That might have been the part where Maya and, frankly, most of the other teachers had started to feel just a bit apprehensive. There had been no reason to set her aside. If anything, having her there would have been a major asset in making for a smooth transition with the new principal. Instead, now, they were about to have two strangers stepping in to lead a school they knew nothing about and… Maya had a bad feeling in her gut. It would still be their school, but she feared that some things would be made to change, not for the better.

She needed to be optimistic… she was trying to be. She had barely interacted with these people since they'd been introduced. Maybe they would be alright, and she was just dreading change… or maybe her gut was as true to her as it been all her life.

"You good?" Lucas asked as he helped stack the diary boxes on the Grandpa cart.

"I'll let you know. I'll text you, so if I start sounding like I need some cheering up…"

"Heard," he chuckled, taking a step forward so he might embrace her. She wasn't about to say no to that. She held to him, breathed him in… Yes, this would help. "Want me to drop in for lunch?" he offered. "Afternoon break?"

"No, I'll be alright," she promised, smiling. "I'll just look forward to tonight… a lot."

After some kisses and cuddles from her baby girls to top up that feeling as far as it would go, she waved them and Lucas off and turned to her cart. The friendly honking of horns made her look up and see that Dylan was coming into the lot, passing by the minivan, so she paused and waited for him to park and emerge.

"You've got the same look on your face as I've got on mine, huh?" Maya called to him as he jogged over.

"Probably, yeah," Dylan chuckled dryly. They shared a quick hug before he nudged himself into position to guide the cart for her. Maya squinted at him, but it came matched to a smile, so it was all in good spirit.

They exchanged tales of their respective households, of their children and the first day back, as they went inside. When they got to the art classroom, he stuck around and helped her with the set-up, the better for them to keep on chatting a while longer. He finally bowed out as the first of the seniors started to arrive. And the seniors, these seniors…

Her gold stars were graduating this year. They would start her days with the same feeling they had brought into her classroom for the past three years, and if it wasn't that she knew it was their final turn around the track, she might have been a hundred percent thrilled at the thought. Her gold stars… which included a very notable presence as far as kids she knew out of class, yes, but very particularly included her little sisters.

Little… It still didn't seem right to think that Nellie and Gracie Hunter were eighteen years old. They had been babies a minute ago. Maya still vividly remembered holding them, remembered rushing up from her room in the basement in the middle of the night because she'd heard them crying and taking a tumble… Now here they were, taller than her! Fine, fine, that wasn't a hard feat to achieve, but did they have to do it? It was strange enough that her firstborn was firmly on track to do the same…

"Hey, don't get too comfortable," Maya told her first new seniors when they arrived. They looked at her, curious. "We'll be headed to the gym soon."

As promised, Maya saw her group out to find seats up in the stands, joining the rest of the student body as they slowly but surely pooled in. It was the first day back, and voices were piling over one another as friends and classmates were reunited, so most of them probably didn't notice when the new people came along, but Maya saw them, and she could pinpoint each of her colleagues doing the same. Slowly but surely, the friendly chatter was dotted with larger clusters of curious voices. Who were these people? What were they doing here? And where were the principal and…

"Good morning, good morning," the woman came up to the microphone.

Maya wanted to give her a chance, she really did. But in the brief encounters she'd so far had with Sandra Davenport, the leading feeling she'd had was that she wasn't going to like this woman. Their former principal may not have been some jolly, joyful presence, but for as much as their new one smiled, not one of these smiles appeared genuine. She was putting on a show of mannered hospitality… and all Maya found was a performance, a display of authority slipped inside a lacy glove: she could see through the holes. Right here, as she addressed the gym's occupants at large, it didn't matter to her that everyone was talking and might need a moment to quiet down. She was speaking; they were going to stop.

"I won't keep you here longer than I need to, not when you all have classes to get to. My name is Sandra Davenport and, as of today, I am the principal of this school."

The talking had been diminishing over the last several seconds since she'd begun, but it didn't quiet all the way down, not until the word 'principal' was heard, and then everything got quiet… for a second or two… Then there was a new layer of whispering. A new principal? They'd had no idea. Where was this coming from? And what about…

"I would also like to introduce you to Alastair Song, your new vice-principal."

For all the thoughts she'd formed regarding Principal Davenport, her gut had nothing to say of Vice-Principal Song except that he seemed like a nice guy. Was it hard for her not to hold him up against his predecessor, who had been perfect at her job and so wrongly dismissed? Just a bit, yes, but was it going to make a difference? It wouldn't bring back VP Ríos. The best she could do right now was to get to know the one she believed she had a shot of getting along with. At the moment, he was standing by the principal, nodding in greeting after his introduction. His smile was genuine. He was happy to be here. By the looks of him, she'd say they would have been in school about the same time, though not this one together.

They were listening now, the students, if out of nothing but curiosity or confusion. Their opinions still needed forming, but in the meantime, here were these strangers, and it didn't matter whether they were freshmen or not. This was going to take some getting used to.

"Watch her get their attention," Morgan leaned to whisper at Maya's ear, sitting in the row above. She didn't need to see the music teacher's face to know that their feelings on the new hire were aligned. And she'd called it right.

With pleasantries out of the way, the new principal was a woman of her word in saying she'd keep things short, but she ended with a bang: they were bringing cheerleading back.

"How long's it been?" Gracie asked her big sister when they got back to class. The buzz was going to be near impossible to contain all day, Maya knew and, to be frank, she was as surprised as they were. "They didn't have cheerleaders when you went here, did they?"

"You couldn't make it sound like it wasn't that long ago, could you?" Maya squinted at her, making Gracie and Nellie laugh as one. "But no, we didn't have them either. It wasn't my thing anyway, so it wasn't a big deal. I just figured there'd never been cheerleaders, didn't think anything of it," she shrugged. "Now, can we get back to business? How do you guys want to kick things off? Final year…"

They usually started off with a round of 'how was your summer?' but after the introduction of Davenport and Song, she had no expectations for keeping them focused on her. Better to give them something to do, leave them space to talk this thing out amongst themselves; the rest of their teachers today would be glad for it.

Once they were gone and she had a whole period with nothing better to do, Maya was definitely on the restless side. She could have called Lucas, but she would much rather talk this one out tonight. Put the girls to bed, and then they were in the clear to end their day the way they liked it, just the two of them.

"How's it looking out there?" Maya asked MJ when he arrived, joining his fellow sophomores. Mila Makovetsky trailed in not far behind. The Hunters had been loving having her around over the last short while, and MJ had been looking forward to finally getting to this point, leading her through his school for the coming year. Of course, with the morning's news…

"Did you know that the school used to have one of the best squads in the state? In the country?" MJ animatedly responded, looking over to his classmate and cousin-in-law. Lydia Sullivan-Reyes wore her nickname of Hypnoteyes very well that morning; she looked taken with a giddy intrigue, matching energies with MJ. Behind them, Mila looked on with a smirk like she'd been hearing them go on about this for a while already and respectfully didn't feel motivated to get into it as much as they did.

"There hasn't been cheerleading here in almost thirty years, not since 2009," Lydia revealed. "We tried to find out why, but we couldn't find anything that said. That's so weird. It's weird, right?"

"Weird…" Maya imitated her, biting back a chuckle. "Does that mean you two plan on trying out? Trade in the ball for some pom-poms?" she asked her little brother.

"You know I'd make that work," MJ smirked. "But I'm good on the team. Now this one…" he looked to Lydia. She tried to brush this off, pointing out her dedication to the quiz team, but she clearly was interested for a bit of cheer.

Morning was still coming along, so she wasn't surprised that they hadn't gotten it completely out of their system. The new administration, the return of cheerleading… Not everyone was jumping at the bits about this 'mystery' at least. Lamar Whitley was simply listening to MJ and Lydia, with an inescapable smile turned to his friend and boyfriend. Ash Bell, for their part, was of a whole other camp, this one making it clear that they cared not at all for cheerleading and just as much for their new principal and vice-principal. All they cared about was getting through this year like they'd done the previous one, no more speed bumps. That was what was going to matter to Maya, today, this week, the whole year and onward, not fake smiles and charm campaigns.

"Alright, everyone," she called the sophomores to attention. "Who wants to go first?"

TO BE CONTINUED

See you tomorrow! - mooners