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Friday, Two Weeks Later
Kevinsatdownnext to June, who was staring at her beer like it held the secret to the universe. He had convinced June to skip the school-wide happy hour to head to Mountain Friend's outdoor beer garden, just the two of them. Kevin had been convincing June of a lot over the past two weeks - mostly to wake up and get to work on time or to join him and his husband for dinner. June knew what he was doing, even if he wouldn’t admit to making sure she didn't just go home after school and crawl under blankets with the lights off and a trashy Netflix reality show on her tv.
“You’re depressed,” he said, by way of greeting.
“Hello to you too,” June said.
”You should quit this job,” Kevin continued.
“Ehh,” she replied.
“You miss Colin.”
“Blargh.”
“You’re in love with him.”
June groaned and smacked her forehead on the picnic table in front of her. “I thought that the week at camp would rejuvenate me, make me figure out answers. I secretly hoped I’d find my passion again, but I just feel so empty.” Kevin placed a comforting hand on her arm, waiting in silence for her to speak more.
“You should text Phoebe,” Kevin said. June looked at him, questioningly. “Colin’s sister? We met her at camp and we all swapped numbers?” June remembered the first day, which felt like a million years ago at this point, remembered how Phoebe had been so forgiving of her verbal misstep and suggested plans to hang out in Vanberg.
“Fuck,” June said. “I had all these plans to text her because I wanted new friends - you’re great, of course, but I would like to meet new people - and then everything happened with Colin and I just forgot.”
“Well,” Kevin said, his trademark smirk appearing across his lips, “You’re lucky I didn’t forget. I’ve been texting her on and off since we got back.”
“But you always say you have enough friends,” June said skeptically.
“Yeah, but I could always use a few more quality ones,” he protested. “And, I am a meddling fool who wanted to get inside information on how Colin was doing, because I assumed he was going to be as much of a pill as you have been.” June scoffed, offended. Kevin shot her a knowing look.
“Okay, fine,” she admitted. “Maybe I’ve been in a bit of a slump recently.”
“June, I literally had to call and wake you up three days this week so you’d get to work on time.” June stopped for a moment, and considered what Kevin had said. She had told herself she was tired from camp, that's why she had been sleeping a lot and skipping workouts she had planned. And she had missed book club, too tired and too unfocused to finish the book in time for her meeting, which was usually something she looked forward to. She thought about her short temper with students, with fellow staff, the way that she spent all of her prep time and lunches at work, locked in her classroom and not venturing out to even say hello to Kevin or to see if a student needed something. She had been an asshole recently.
“Shit,” June said. “I’m really sorry. I guess I didn’t realize, I just thought I was tired.”
“You’ve taught the same unit on emotional health for the past four years as a part of sex ed,” Kevin said accusingly. “You should know better than anyone that your energy levels are tied to your mental health.”
“Ugh, you’re right,” June said. “Anyway, what has Phoebe been saying about Colin?” June hoped that she didn’t sound too eager, but she was desperate to know what he was up to. She had taken to checking the camp’s Instagram story to see if she could catch a glimpse of Colin in the back of any photos, but to no avail. Maybe he was the one posting them. His personal Instagram, which she had found on the third day back from camp after a bottle of wine, had been silent since they came back, though June wasn’t posting much on her own social media either.
“I still think you should reach out to her yourself,” Kevin said. June rolled her eyes. “But I will tell you that he’s not doing great. Which, honestly, you should have expected. You should have expected that you’d feel like shit, too.” June took another sip of her drink, silent. “But, I love you and you were there for me when I first figured out that John and I were a thing, so I’m here to support you in whatever you need.”
“I don’t know what I need,” June said, embarrassed. “I thought that major decisions just came to you. It’s how everything worked in my life up until the past few years. When I visited VU, I knew I was going to school there. When I took my first education class, I knew I was going to be an English teacher. When I finished student teaching at Herman, I knew I would be teaching there full time. I thought that’s how things worked.”
“You had to have known that’s not the way the adult world works,” Kevin said, gently. “You do have to fight sometimes, sit in that uncomfortable place of not knowing and being okay with making a potentially wrong decision. But, at least you will have made that decision.” He thought for a moment, then continued on. “It’s important that you take an active role in your life, instead of just having life come to you. If you want something that badly, it’s probably something that is going to have to be worked towards.”
“I’m ignoring the grammar of that last statement,” June said, sniffling as tears pricked the corners of her eyes. “Thank you, but are you referring to my issues with my job or Colin?”
“Couldn’t the same advice apply to both?” Kevin said thoughtfully. “As brilliant as you are, no one is going to reach out randomly through the internet and give you your dream job - which, by the way, does not exist - and Colin isn’t going to know that you fell in love with him unless you tell him.”
“Yeah, but how do you even say that?” June said without thinking. “How do you go up to someone and say ‘I know this is bizarre, but I knew you for four and a half days but feel this bonkers connection to you and I love you and want to figure out a way to make this work’?”
Kevin chuckled. “I think that’s a good start. A crappy first draft, as you would tell your students. Also, believe me when I tell you I’m noticing that you didn’t argue with me when I said that you were in love with Colin.”
“I hate having close friends that can read my mind,” June grumbled as Kevin pulled her into a bear hug, smushing her face against his shoulder.
“You love me, and you know it,” he said, squeezing her tighter. “And you just admitted it yourself. I knew you were gone for him on the second day we were at camp.”
“Really?” June said, struggling to remove herself from his tight grasp. Laughing again, Kevin released her and took a sip of his beer.
