Free to Love

Chapter 28

Shawn

"I'm scared, Daddy," Gracie said anxiously as we walked into the brick building hand in hand.

First day of senior kindergarten in a real school. This was a pretty big deal. Honestly, I was pretty nervous, too. My mom had come over to the condo to watch Nolan so that I could give Grace my full attention.

"Nothing to be scared of, sweet pea. You're going to love school. You loved it last year, right?"

Grace had attended a small private junior kindergarten with most of her playgroup friends. This was her first venture into the public school system.

"What if I get lost in here?" she asked, looking around at the long empty hallways.

We were early. I'd asked the principal if we could come a significantly earlier than normal so that no focus was given to me. I really didn't want people coming up to me and asking for photos on Grace's big day. Even worse would be the people giving me looks of pity.

"What's your room number?" I asked.

I knew what it was, but I'd made her learn it. Gracie was very smart, so I'd also made her memorize her full name, my phone number, and our address.

"105."

"Here it is," I said, pointing to a door covered in big paper bugs, each one with a child's name on it. Grace's name was on a butterfly.

The door was slightly ajar, but I knocked before entering.

"Come in!" a cheery voice called from within.

We walked in, and Grace clutched my hand a little tighter. We both looked around the bright colorful classroom. It reminded me of my kindergarten days.

"You must be Grace!" a woman said as she approached us. "I'm Miss Finlay."

She walked over and shook my hand before squatting in front of Grace, who was being extremely shy.

"We're going to have a good day, Grace. Can you hang up your backpack and find the desk with your name on it?"

Grace nodded and let go of my hand to do as she was told. Miss Finlay stood up and looked at me.

"It's nice to meet you, Mr. Mendes. Dr. Miller told me you'd requested to come in early, and I agree that was a good idea."

"I'm sorry if it meant you had to get here before you normally do," I said.

"I'm always here really early, because I'm one of those crazy morning people. If you ever need to meet with me, before school is the best time. In fact, we'll be doing conferences starting in two weeks. Would you like to choose a time slot? We can pencil it in now."

"Um, sure."

She walked me over to her desk and pulled up a chart. I looked at it.

"I'll take that first slot on the first day."

She wrote in Grace's name and set the paper back down.

"I guess I should get going," I said.

Grace heard this and looked up at me. She gave me a weak smile. I walked over and kissed her on top of her head.