Tyler had just set up the ladder when Miss Martha found us. Again her gaze was anxiety provoking. “Ms. Gladwell needs you to come to her office.” She didn’t wait to see if I would follow and just immediately left.

“Okay.” I handed the poms in my hands to Tyler and said, “I’ll be right back. Ms. Gladwell is my boss.”

“I’ll be here,” he told me.

Shay was talking with one of her math students. “It’s due tomorrow. You can’t do this whole assignment the night before.”

“Challenge accepted, Ms. Simmons.”

“That wasn’t a challenge!” she called after him just as Delia asked, “Out of idle curiosity, how much nonedible glitter can a student eat before I am technically a terrible teacher?”

Shay saw me and said, “Where do you think you’re off to?”

“Gladwell wants to talk to me. Again.” I didn’t know whether or not to be concerned. I figured there was nothing she could do that was worse than assigning me decoration creation and setup.

Well, except for firing me.

So of course that became my number-one thought as I made my way to her office. This time I checked the seating area for any rogue parents, but it appeared we were alone.

“Please close the door and have a seat.” This time she wasn’t distracted. She was looking straight at me and I felt a little like how a mouse must feel just before a snake pounced and swallowed it whole.

I did as she asked and sank slowly into the chair. Her expression was so serious, so intense, that I knew this had to be bad news.

She pushed a stapled pile of papers toward me. “I would like to offer you a two-year contract, which is standard for what we extend to our first-year teachers.”

“You want to offer me a contract? Now?” This was always done at the end of the school year. Always.

“You can read over it and return it later or sign it now if you wish. But you have my word that it is the same contract given to everyone who makes it past their probationary period.”

“But . . . why?” I picked up the papers and started skimming through them. There was going to be a slight salary increase and a guaranteed job for at least the next two years. I wasn’t seeing any hidden traps or things that wouldn’t be to my benefit.

She leaned back in her chair, her arms folded. “Because if you sign it now you would have incredible leverage in case someone tried to dismiss you.”

But wasn’t she the only person who could dismiss me? And why would she fire me if she was offering me a contract first?

I tried to ask as much when she announced, “You are an excellent teacher and Millstone Academy will be lucky to have you stay on. I also will not let someone else try to dictate what hiring decisions I can and cannot make. You came highly recommended and I see that trust was not misplaced.”

My mother. My mother was trying to get me fired. This was how she was going to make me regret walking out on her. By taking away a job that I loved and was good at. Just to punish me.

I leaned over and grabbed one of Ms. Gladwell’s pens, and I signed the contract. Even if it might have some clause about forfeiting my eternal soul, I didn’t care. It was gratifying to know the headmistress was on my side and that I had just made myself safe from my mother’s attack.

Because who else could do this? Who else would do it? The two things I had going for me at the moment were that my parents were not donors to this school and Ms. Gladwell did not take kindly to being told what to do.

Once I’d finished signing it and handed it back, Ms. Gladwell also signed it and then stood, offering me her hand. “Congratulations on becoming an official full-time teacher here at Millstone Academy, Ms. Huntington.”

I wanted to squeeze her hand tightly in thanks but instead shook it a normal amount.

When I got back to the gym, I saw Shay and Delia. But I realized that the first person I wanted to tell was Tyler. I hurried over to him and his smile when he saw me was like the sun breaking over the horizon.

“What happened with the headmistress?” he asked.

“She ended my probationary period and offered me a two-year contract!”

“Madison! That’s fantastic!” He wrapped his arms around my waist, letting out a whooping noise as he pulled me up and then swung me around in a big hug.

I was laughing as he set me down. The string quartet began playing a slower version of “I’ll Be Home For Christmas,” and Tyler asked, his arms still around me, “This is our week, isn’t it? We both got promotions at work!”

We both accidentally made out with each other; we were both now standing in the middle of a school gym with him holding me tight . . . yes, this was going very well so far. I settled on saying, “It is!”

He nodded toward the quartet. “It seems to me that you still owe me a dance. Are newly hired teachers allowed to dance?”

“That depends. Are roommates allowed to ask?”

“I say yes.”

Then we were swaying gently to the music, even though I could feel almost every gaze in the room on us because the event hadn’t even started yet and we were the only ones dancing. I didn’t care who looked. It was probably a good thing that he’d collected on his dance here, in public, rather than in the privacy of our apartment, where I might be more apt to do something inappropriate. Like confess my undying love or try to make out with him.

Instead I listened to the music, trying to quell my raging heartbeat, my tingling skin. I thought about the lyrics and how I wouldn’t be home for Christmas.

But maybe that was okay. Maybe I’d found a new home.

A few nights later, we went out to a Turkish restaurant for dinner. School had ended for the semester and winter break had begun. We were only a few days away from Christmas. We’d been chatting about our holiday plans when we discovered that neither one of us had any. He let slip that his mom hadn’t even invited him home for Christmas. I told him mine hadn’t, either.

The check came and he wouldn’t let me pay for my half. Then again I didn’t really put up much of a fight. After he handed the waitress his credit card, he said, “So our plans—I propose that we resolve to hang out during the break and eat too much junk food and watch too much reality television and then we’ll get back to working on being cultured when our vacation is done. What do you say?”

“I’m definitely in.”

Then he fist-bumped me. It was kind of humiliating to be fist-bumped by the guy you were in love with.

When we got home that night, Pigeon wasn’t waiting for us in the foyer, which seemed odd.

“Do you hear that?” I asked. It sounded like whimpering.

Tyler nodded and we followed the sound. Pigeon was curled up in Tyler’s bathroom. He called her name, but she didn’t move. She didn’t even lift her head.

Exchanging glances, we both rushed to her side and crouched down next to her.

“What’s the matter, girl?” he asked, reaching for her. When he put his hand on her back, she yelped, loudly.

There was fear and despair in his eyes. I’d never seen Pigeon act this way, and apparently, neither had he.

“We have to take her to an animal hospital,” he said. “Can you drive?”

I nodded while he carefully, so carefully, put his arms under Pigeon and lifted her up. She yelped again, but this was the only way to help her. I tried talking to her soothingly, but the whimpering only got louder. Hurrying out to the car, I opened the passenger door so he could get in and hold Pigeon on the way to the hospital.