Page 72 of Mr. Naughty List
“It is! There are ethical violations at play here, and we know from the past that you are not above violating those for your pleasure!”
Aaron sucked in a breath, gut-punched by her words. “No. That’s not true. And I owe you no explanation. But since you’re my mother, not just my principal, I’ll tell you what I’ve done. I’ve started seeing a grown man who, as I’ve only just now discovered, happens to be the stepbrother of a current student, and who I knew from the start had been a student of mine five years ago. This man was a senior then, andnothinghappened at the time. I barely interacted with him at all, which says more about my teaching skills than my morals.”
His mother’s eyes narrowed, and she spit out a question. “How long?”
Aaron tilted his head in confusion.
“How long have you been sleeping with this man?”
Swallowing hard, Aaron whispered, “Not long. It’s very new.”
“Then put a stop to it.”
“Why?”
“You know why, Aaron.” She pointed at him, her sharp nail coming close to his face as she leaned across her desk. “Parents will get wind of it and think you’re a pervert. And what will I say to that? It’s bad enough that you’regay, hard enough to defend that choice to even my friends, but to parents? This will look as if you’re a child molester, a childgroomer, and I won’t be able to say you aren’t. What? What are you doing?”
Aaron’s cheeks burned like he’d been slapped. He sucked in a breath, ready to say something—he didn’t even know what—but instead turned and walked out of the room. Rita and Jolene stared after him, buffing their nails and reeking of peppermint. The Christmas tree in the office corner with the art class decorations blinked in multicolor spasms.
“Aaron!” his mother called, her high heels clacking as she came to her office door. “Aaron Danvers, come back here! Now!”
But he didn’t. He didn’t go back to his classroom either. He went outside and used his phone to call an Uber because he’d left his car keys in his desk. He couldn’t breathe if he went back in that building. He only had to wait three minutes to climb inside the dark car.
He’d always believed his mother in the past. Believed her lies about just needing some time to accept him, about not caring that he was gay but rather how hard being gay would make his life. But in the end, the truth was she not only cared more about what people thought of her than about his happiness, but actually believed he was the kind of man who couldn’t be trusted around children. One thoughtless sentence had driven that home.
This will look as if you’re a child molester, a child groomer, and I won’t be able to say you aren’t.
The Uber took him back to his apartment, and he used the key he’d hidden beneath his neighbor’s never-used grill to get into his apartment, grateful for the waiting, comforting purrs of Constance. He’d have Lauren bring his keys, satchel, and the final papers home for him to grade. He was done for the rest of this semester. There was the entirety of the day left, sure.
But as far as he was concerned, he didn’t need to be there for it. Any substitute, even a last-minute one, could handle it as well as he could. Everyone knew the last day before break was for watching movies and eating cookies anyway.
Aaron wasn’t willing to talk to anyone right now, what with his throat still tight with unshed tears. So he texted Lauren with his requests and sent a message through the school email to Rita letting her know that he would be invoking a sick day and would not be returning until next semester.
Then he crawled into the bed where only twenty-four hours before he’d rested peacefully in RJ’s arms. He stared up at the ceiling trying to understand the extent of the bomb he’d just set off in his life. When his anger ran out, he was left tired and threadbare, so he rolled onto his stomach and fell asleep.
RJ sat downin the lounge chair across from where his mother was folding laundry, still thinking about Aaron’s request that they fuck bareback. He wanted to, desperately, and yet…fuck.
“Mom, I think I’m in trouble.”
She put aside a small swimsuit of Beau’s and pushed her blonde hair behind her ears. “RJ, what on earth have you done now?”
“I’ve fallen in love.”
His mom blinked at him from over the many, many, many pairs of underwear she’d folded and had put into carefully sorted piles on the couch. They came in all shapes and sizes for the family. “Excuse me?”
RJ ran a hand over his close-shorn hair and sighed. “I’ve fallen in love.”
“With that young man you brought by the other day? Aaron?”
“Yes.” A helpless grin spread over his face, and his mother’s skeptical expression melted into a silly grin of her own, which she promptly schooled into something much more parental.
“Oh, hon. Don’t you think it’s a little too soon? You just met him.”
“Yeah. It’s definitely too soon,” RJ said, deciding to leave aside the clarification on just when he’d met Aaron for another day. “But I also know for sure.” He lifted his hands and let them fall again. “I’m in love.”
His mother pondered him uncertainly. “That’s…that’s…well, then I’m happy for you.”
“No, Mom, it’s terrible. I’m in awful trouble.”