Page 74 of Small Town Swoo
A student with two long braids poked her head back into the room. “Mrs. Fletcher, can we bring the big jump ropes out?”
“Sure, honey. You can grab them from the closet.” She turned to us again, shaking both our hands. “Thanks again for coming and sharing your gift with the children.”
Dash and I signed out in the office and headed outside. “I didn’t know that about you,” I said as we walked to his car. “That a teacher got you into acting.”
He opened the passenger door for me. “Yeah.”
“Was there an elementary school play or something?”
“No.” He went around to the driver’s side and got in.
“So what was it?”
He turned on the engine but left the car in park. Staring straight ahead out the windshield to where the kids were playing on the playground, he spoke quietly. “I’d stopped speaking.”
“What?” I turned to face him. “You stopped speaking?”
“Yes. After my mom died. I stopped talking at school.”
“Oh, Dash.” My heart splintered, and I put a hand on his leg. “That’s so sad. I’m sorry. God, I just want to cry right now.”
He gave me a quick smile. “It was a long time ago. No need to cry.”
“So what did the teacher do?”
“She made up a game where I played a character, a pirate squirrel or something. I think she realized that I wasn’t talking because people kept asking me if I was okay. And that I didn’t want to answer because I wasn’t.”
“Of course not.” I rubbed his thigh.
“I knew if I started talking as myself, I would cry. So Ms. Walsh gave me this character to be, which let me feel something else. Think about something else.” He shrugged. “It felt good. I would talk as long as I was in character.”
“What a great teacher,” I said appreciatively.
“She was.” He was quiet a minute, his eyes still on the kids at recess.
“So then you started speaking at school again?”
“I don’t think it was light switch fast, but yes.”
“And the love for acting stuck?”
“Yeah. It did.” He put the car in reverse and backed out of the parking spot.
“You were amazing with those second graders,” I told him.
“I like kids.” He turned out of the school lot. “So what now, Sugar? Am I taking you home? Or do you want to hang out?”
“I want to hang out, but I should get some work done at the house. I have to work the rest of the week.”
“What kind of work at the house?”
“I need more storage for my pots and pans. I only have the one little piece of wall free right next to the door, so I thought maybe I could mount some pegboard and use hooks.”
“Pegboard?” Dash frowned. “What about something nicer? Like wood planks or something. You know what? Let’s ask Austin. We’re right by his house, and I bet he can tell us where to get some cool reclaimed wood. He might even have some scrap that will work.”
“Dash, you don’t have to spend all your time at home working on my house.”
“I don’t mind. I like a project.” He made a U-turn and headed for Austin’s house, which was just up the block. “And it’s distracting me from the fact that I haven’t heard back from my agent yet.”
