Page 5 of Coach Me (Boston Blues #2)

Lucie

I’m what?!

“We’re so sorry to have to do this, Miss Anderson. You’ve been an amazing educator this past year, but unfortunately, due to budget cuts…we’re going to have to let you go.”

Let go—aka fired. Jobless. Not good enough for them to find extra room in the budget for. This is absolute bull.

I stare back at Mrs. Riggets. She seems as though she hates doing this as much as I hate hearing it.

Figures our jerk of a superintendent isn’t here, I’m sure I was on the top of his list for these cuts.

I make one small suggestion for how to make the pick-up line more effective and suddenly I’m “too good” for this school.

Swallowing down my emotions, I clear my throat. “Um, how many are getting cut?”

Mrs. Riggets looks down at her folded hands. “Just one.” She sighs. “You were the last hired, my dear. My hands are tied.”

Just one? Just me ?

I can feel the tears pricking in my eyes. Oh my goodness, don’t you dare start crying. Everything will be fine.

“Again, I want to express my deepest regards. You truly are a great educator. You’ll have until the end of the week to get everything that belongs to you out of your classroom.

” Mrs. Riggets extends a piece of paper.

“A recommendation from me. I wish the best for you, Miss Anderson. I do hope it helps.”

I take the letter with shaky hands as I try to swallow down my emotions enough to speak.

“I-I, um—thank you. I enjoyed working here, despite…” I trail off because there’s no point in dragging this on.

I’ve officially been canned from my first job.

After all this money my brother spent on my education—for what?

Fired. Ugh, I’ve never been one to curse, but this might make me start.

Walking out of the office, I feel a total of five inches tall. Someone please just come out and crush me—finish the freaking job.

My hands tremble the entire walk to my classroom. The strength to even open the door feels lost to me. Fired. What is up with this week? First, my sister is leaving me and now I’ve been fired from the job I wholeheartedly loved.

When I step into my…soon-to-be former classroom, Reagan’s spinning around slowly in my desk chair.

“Hey, whose phone number is written on your—” Reagan starts, but stops as she turns to me. “Luce, what happened? You’re white as a sheet.”

“I…I—” God, I can’t even say it out loud. Voicing it makes it feel too real, but then voicing it to my successful florist of a sister who runs her business like it’s child’s play—the word that comes to mind isn’t fired, it’s failure.

“Okay, Lucie, you’re scaring me. What happened?” My sister takes me by my shoulders and forces me to sit in one of the child-sized computer chairs. “You know you can tell me anything.”

“I just got fired.” The words tumble out first, and the tears quickly follow. “They said due to budget cuts they have to let me go.”

I try to pull back my emotions as quickly as I can, but I feel so defeated.

“Oh, Luce,” my sister coos as she runs her hands up and down my arms. “I’m so sorry. I know how much this job meant to you.”

“It meant everything to me, Rea.” I push up from my chair, wiping my hands repeatedly on my cheeks.

Being a teacher is my passion. The one clear thing I know about myself.

I love these kids. I love watching them learn new things and watching their confidence grow with the things that I can teach them.

I’ve never understood the Everyone Loves Lucie bit when it comes to anywhere outside of the classroom. Outside of these four walls, I feel like the most boring person in the world.

I can’t think of any hobbies that I have to help distract me from this. I have zero dating life because I chronically get ghosted. The things that define me are my siblings and being a teacher.

Christ, I really felt like a failure telling Reagan…but telling Will…I think I’m going to have a panic attack.

“How am I supposed to tell Will?” I whisper on a shaky breath.

Reagan’s eyebrows crease. “What do you mean?”

“How am I supposed to tell him, after all that money he paid for my degree, that I just got fired! Reagan, Will pays for so much of my stuff already. All I had to do was keep my job, but now I’ve let him down!”

Reagan places her hands on my shoulders again with a small shake this time. “Okay, I know you’re feeling a lot of emotions right now, but that one is just wrong. Lucie, I know this is a lot to process and, fuck, being fired sucks?—”

“How would you know?” I yell and immediately regret it. “I’m sorry. I just?—”

Reagan chuckles lightly. “Don’t be, I liked it. You almost sounded like me for a minute there. I didn’t realize your voice could sound so angry.”

I huff, only a quarter tempted to smile at her attempt to make me feel better.

“I do know for a fact that Will won’t be angry when you tell him. The disappointed father act isn’t his stitch either. He may try to help fix the situation by making a donation to the school's budget because he’s also a millionaire!”

She has a good point there. Not that I’ll allow him to, even if the idea does sound appealing.

Reagan forces me back in my chair. “Sit back down for a minute and breathe. I may not know what it’s like to be fired, but I’ve accepted Will’s money just the same as you.

So, have your pity party. Be sad about losing the job you loved, but then let’s pull it together.

I’m not trying to rub salt in your wound, but better things are out there for you, Luce.

Maybe this is your opportunity to find them.

You have time to find a new job too. It sucks, yes, but you have some time to figure it out at least.”

I let my sister’s words fully process in my head. I know she’s right, even if the only real feeling I want to feel right now is sadness.

I let out an exasperated breath. “I know you’re right, but I want to wallow for a bit. We have until Friday to clean out my stuff. Can we just get the turtles and go home?”

Reagan scrunches her nose. “Right…the turtles. No chance they’ll bring back sad memories and you choose to re-home them?”

The laugh sputters out of me. “Don’t even start with me. You tell me you’re moving an hour away from me, and now I’ve been fired from my lifelong dream job. We’re taking the turtles, and if you’re not careful, I’ll guilt trip you into holding one.”

Reagan blinks her eyes with her nose still scrunched. “Okay, the emotions are okay to feel, but now you’re being dramatic. That’s not fucking happening.”

I let out a hmph . “Touché.”

“So, is it okay now for me to ask whose number is on your coffee cup?”

I shake my head. “A barista’s, but before you get too excited, I swapped coffee cups with Dex Larsen.”

Reagan’s mouth gapes as she hits my shoulder. “I know, in light of the new development, I can see why that took the backseat. But, as your sister, you mean you didn’t immediately tell me about a run-in with the extremely yummy pitcher, Dex Larsen?!”

“It’s Coach now, remember. Ya know, our brother’s coach?

” The extremely yummy part doesn’t need correcting because that’s an absolute fact.

With his deep brown skin and espresso-colored eyes, I knew I had to keep my glances at him under control or I might have started blushing at every word out of his mouth.

Reagan cocks her eyebrow. “You mean your total baseball dream guy?”

Sure, I find him attractive, but “dream guy” sounds a tad dramatic coming out of Reagan’s mouth. In the family-first of it all, Will will always be my favorite baseball player, but it’s also kind of a lie and Reagan knows that.

I’ve always been a fan of the Blues in general, but everyone’s got a favorite player on their team and Dex was mine. He was their best pitcher by far, and again was super yummy to watch as he would strike people out consistently.

“I mean, a player I enjoyed watching. Don’t make it weird. He didn’t even realize who I was.” Even if I deep down kind of wish he did.

Reagan gives me a small nod. “Probably for the best. His retirement was why Will got traded, right?”

I shrug. “Pretty much. Not to mention newly divorced.”

I don’t know the full details of the divorce; it seemed to be so non-problematic that the tabloids only ran one story about it, and then it was just over. The only other information I have is the snippets I get from Callie when she talks about Miles hanging out with her during the games.

I’m not about to claim I know Dex in any shape or form, but I know the Blues.

I know Dex’s career and stats. He’s in the top two for fastest left-handed pitchers in the league.

And not for nothing—I know baseball, yes, but I’m also just a girl, so yeah, I have also noticed that Dex’s hair is a little more grown out than it used to be.

During the season, you’d always see him with a crisp fade, and his dark curls weren’t too short but neat on the top. But when he was standing right in front of me at the coffee shop, I could definitely tell it was longer than any other time I’ve seen over the years of watching him play.

Don’t get me wrong, he’s still beyond gorgeous, it just seems out of character for him.

Then again, I don’t know Dex. I know him as a baseball player, maybe this is him as a coach and a single dad.

But with how he responded to the barista’s blatant come-ons, paired with all of the things mentioned already, he just screamed unavailable.

I’m not exactly sure flirting is in my DNA to begin with, but between the flashing “don’t hit on me” signals and the rush they were in, I kept my eyes on him to a minimum and simply offered him my coffee.

Reagan holds out her hand to pull me back up. “Well, just chalk that up to a small bright side in your day. It’s not like you really need a man right now anyway.”

I can only manage a hummed response. Rather easy for her to say, considering she’s so in love and doesn’t even entertain men to begin with.

I take a look around my room. “I mostly need you to help me with my turtles, Rea.”

Reagan rolls her eyes but then hooks are arm around my shoulder. “Okay, okay, we’re not moving on from the turtles. I’ll come help clean out your classroom this week too.”