Page 36 of Danny Hall Gets a Lawyer (Goose Run #1)

Had I cried on my first day of school? I didn’t remember.

Maybe I hadn’t. But I bet I was nowhere near as brave as Gracie was, because when I got her out of the truck, she didn’t even wait for me to hold her hand.

She just put on her backpack, squared her little shoulders, and began to stride towards the school like a motherfucking boss .

Flipping.

Mother flipping .

I was trying not to swear as much, even in my head, but it was a hard habit to break.

“Hey,” I called to her. “Hey, slow down a second.”

Gracie stopped and looked back at me, clearly exasperated. She held out her hand. “Hurry up, Daddy!”

I hurried up.

A sign pointed us in the right direction of the kindergarten classroom, and there was another one on the door.

The one on the door was painted in different colored letters on yellow craft paper and said “Happy first day of school!” The i was dotted with a smiley face and I pictured the teacher who made the sign as perky and young and sunshiney.

The guy who opened the door was young, I guessed, but he didn’t look perky and sunshiney. He looked as disapproving as Mrs. Moore had when I’d turned up on her front porch a little while ago.

“Uh, hey,” I said. “This is Gracie. We’re late.”

Like he didn’t already know that.

The guy was a little shorter than me, and had dark hair and glasses.

He was maybe around my age, which meant he couldn’t have been teaching for very long.

Behind him, in his brightly decorated classroom, a bunch of little kids sat criss-cross applesauce on the floor, craning their heads to see what was going on.

There was an empty chair in front of them, and the guy had a picture book under his arm.

We’d interrupted story time.

The guy’s disapproving look vanished as he leaned down toward Gracie. “Hi, Gracie. I’m Mr. Smith. Welcome to kindergarten. Why don’t you put your backpack in the empty cubby over there, and take your snacks out so we can see if anything needs to go in the refrigerator?”

For the first time Gracie faltered. She looked up at me, eyes wide and her bottom lip wobbling. “I don’t have any snacks.”

Mr. Smith’s disapproving look was back as he met my gaze.

“Uh,” I said. “Sorry.”

I should have checked if Mrs. Moore had packed snacks.

She was supposed to have Gracie ready with everything she needed for her first day.

Not that I’d mention this to her, since she’d find a way to make it my fault.

And while I knew it wasn’t my fault, it was still my responsibility to have checked.

“Daddy!” Gracie whispered in a too-loud voice. “I don’t have snacks!”

“I know, sweetpea,” I said. “It’s okay. I’m gonna go get some, and bring them back, if, um, if that’s okay with Mr. Smith?”

I’d already interrupted his day once, right? Why not a second time?

By his expression, he’d made the same calculation, and he wasn’t happy about it. But he showed me a tight smile I was sure was for Gracie’s benefit instead of mine, and said, “Sure. That’s not a problem.”

His mouth said it wasn’t, but his eyes told a different story.

“Go on in and put your backpack in a cubby, then sit down on the floor,” Mr. Smith said. “We’re reading a story.”

Gracie nodded, then took a deep breath and darted inside the classroom.

“I’ll come straight back,” I said, eager to escape.

Mr. Smith nodded like he wasn’t sure whether or not to believe me, and then closed the classroom door gently but firmly in my face.