Be True To Yourself...Book 1 of the Silver Moon Shifter Series

Gabriel, The Teacher

Gabriel POV

“Mr. Davis?” I called out to one of my students as the bell rang and he was packing up his bag to go home.

“Yes Mr. Gabe?” The kids call me Mr. Gabe, I try to be a cool teacher, someone they can be friends with and talk to without feeling like they will get into trouble or judged.

“I need you to give this to your father, it’s for a parent teacher conference.” I handed him the envelope with paperwork for his father. He was on vacation when I did the ones for the other students. 

“Am I in trouble?” He asked as he put it in his bag.

“Not at all, I just want to talk with him about how you’re doing, how your grades are and how you are in class. I promise you aren’t in trouble nor did you do anything wrong Caleb.” I assured him and he nodded.

“Ok, I will bring this back tomorrow. Have a good evening Mr. Gabe!” He said and waved as he ran out of the room.

“No running!” I said chuckling and I heard him groan and went to see if he was ok. I couldn’t help but chuckle when he was looking up at me with a red face.

“That’s why you don’t run. Are you alright?” I asked and helped him up off the floor.

“Yea, tripped over my own two feet and I play soccer!” He groaned and walked this time down the hall.

“See you tomorrow Caleb.” I called after him and he smiled back at me. I shook my head and went into my classroom and gathered up the papers I needed to grade into my bag along with my laptop and shut the lights off, closed my door and left school. 

I have been a science teacher for four years, seventh grade is the year I love teaching, the kids are interested in learning and they know the rules by now on how to act in class but most of my kids are great, I had some who needed more guidance over the four years but I would do my best to help them. I don’t believe in calling a misguided student a bad child, you don’t know what is going on in their lives for them to act out or cause issues with another student. We don’t live with our students so I try to keep that mindset with all of my kids who walk through my door. I teach that way solely because I didn’t have that growing up. 

I never knew my father, my mother was a single mother working three jobs and during a rough patch in my life, I began to act out hanging with the wrong crowd and being labeled as someone who’d never be anything because I was the poor kid of the school even if my mom worked so hard. 

It wasn’t until high school that I did ROTC for a while and joined the air force as a mechanical engineer but an injury to my hand and a grenade thrown my way, ended my career, I had several months of therapy and multiple surgeries to fix my appearance. It was hard looking at what I had become and hated myself. My husband left me taking my kid because I was giving him ‘nightmares’ but our relationship was never easy and he wanted to spite me so he took my son God knows where and haven’t seen him in three years. I miss him every day but being a teacher has helped with the loss of my family and I pray I can meet someone who will love me for me, despite my past and help me build a future I wished for. 

I get home and it’s so quiet, I hate the quiet. I am around kids all day long hearing their laughter and many conversations so the silence, it’s not for me. I put my bag on the kitchen table and opened the fridge and grabbed a beer and grabbed my bag, sat down on the couch turning on the TV. I got out the papers and my pen and spread the papers on the coffee table and started grading the papers as Jurassic Park III played as background noise. 

Once I got through the papers I decided to just order a pizza, not in the mood to cook another meal to eat alone. I need to get out there and find a man to date or something, I don’t like being alone, I never really have.