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“Okay, fine,” June groaned. “But I also spent a lot of time emailing with Colin planning this trip, so I still think my argument is fine.” June and Kevin continued to lovingly bicker as the two other teachers sat down and joined their group. The conversation turned to students who were struggling, students who were thriving, policies at school that were horrible, their plans for the summer - all normal teacher-related topics. The only thing they didn’t touch on was their favorite type of pen to grade with (June hated flair pens and only used Pilot G2 pens, which was a controversial opinion on her teaching team).
They had just begun to swing their conversation to betting on which student would be most sunburned at the end of the week (June often just bet on herself to make things easier), when the door to the bar opened. June’s neck snapped to the door, where Colin was walking in, tugging a soft looking winter hat off his head and shrugging out of a camp Peek-N-See sweatshirt. His sweatshirt got caught on an elbow or a shoulder, and he struggled for a second, his head disappearing and pulling up his t-shirt underneath, revealing a slice of light white skin with a faint trail of hair. June’s mouth went dry, and she took a quick gulp of her beer. Her eyes darted downward, taking in worn blue jeans and - June almost shook her head in horror - socks under his hiking sandals. For some reason, it seemed so quintessentially Colin that it was actually attractive?
“How’s your neck?” Kevin muttered to her, laughing silently, his shoulders shaking.
“What do you mean?” June said, tearing her eyes away from Colin so he wouldn’t see the evidence on her face that she had been wishing the entire shirt had been pulled up.
“You almost snapped a tendon with how quickly you turned to look at the door,” he pointed out. June groaned to herself, feeling her pale cheeks flush. She knew she was a blotchy pink - so many people she knew were able to blush in a demure way, like a Regency heroine. June had, on more than one occasion, been asked if she was having an allergic reaction when she blushed. It was an unfortunate side effect of being pale with red hair - she blushed a lot.
“Hey, y’all,” Colin greeted, slinging his sweatshirt over his arm and sauntering over to the teachers, who had managed to form a semicircle around the fireplace. “I was worried that you would have all headed home by this point.” June pulled out her phone and glanced at the time - 9:30 pm. Not too late, but later than she had been out in a long time, and, honestly, when she was usually in bed or falling asleep on the couch. Sleeping on the couch was actually one of June’s favorite ways to end an evening, followed by dragging herself to her bedroom and sinking into her perfect mattress sometime around midnight.
“Still here, but sadly we keep finding the bottoms of these beer bottles,” Kevin said, sloshing the last swigs of his beer around in his bottle. “I’ll get another round for everyone - Colin, what will you be drinking?”
“Anything is fine,” he said, his gaze finding and snagging on June. A small smile played at his lips, and he nodded his head to her in a private, personal greeting that had her heart pounding and her toes wiggling.
“You can take my seat,” Kevin said, indicating his stool as he got up to get the round of beers. “My butt is sore anyway.” June shot him a glare out of the corner of her eyes. She knew this exact move - it was the same one that she had pulled to get his now-husband to join them at happy hour one day after school. Claiming that she had an injured hip and needed to do a loop of the block to stretch a muscle, June had vacated the only seat at the bar, which was next to Kevin. When she had come back about five minutes later, June had found their hands intertwined and their lips only inches apart. It was easy to push people together who wanted to fall. Is that what Kevin was doing to her now? Was it genuine or was he toying with her, just to get her riled up?
“Thanks, man,” Colin said, crossing over in front of the fire and folding his long limbs onto the stool. He set his sweatshirt down on the stool first, as kind of a makeshift cushion, then sat down, turning his body to face June so their knees almost knocked together.
“Hey,” June began awkwardly, all of a sudden nervous about talking to Colin. “I wasn’t sure if you were actually going to show up.” Great June, she thought. Great idea to open with your lack of confidence in him.
“I had to wrap up some paperwork in the office and make sure my coordinators were good for the evening,” he explained. “I would have been here earlier, but there was a small incident in the cabins I had to deal with.” June raised her eyebrows, nervous about what dumb shit her kids had done. “Nothing major, just one kid accused another of taking their stuff, when it turns out they were looking in the wrong room.”
“God, kids are stupid,” June said, the words spilling out of her mouth without a second thought. Realizing what she said, how it could be interpreted, June slapped a hand over her mouth and knew her face was going blotchy with embarrassment. “Shit, I didn’t mean it that way.”
Colin laughed, causing a slow spread of warmth to blossom in June’s chest, spill down to her toes. “I know what you mean. Kids are stupid some times, but that’s what makes them so hilarious.” June nodded, though a piece of her knew that she had said the remark less in affection for kids and more in an on-going frustration at how damn oblivious they were sometimes - to each other, to themselves, to the world.
June’s self-criticism spiral was interrupted by Kevin returning, somehow managing to hold seven beers in his arms. He handed them out one by one, leaving Colin and June’s beers for the last one.
“Skal,” she said, as Kevin handed the bottles to Colin, then June. Colin gave her a raised eyebrow. “It’s Swedish! For Klarkuft and VU. It’s how we used to cheers at the bars in undergrad.”
“Well in that case, skal!” Colin repeated, clinking the neck of the bottle against Kevin’s. He turned to June and raised his eyebrows. She met his eyes, smiled, then gently touched her bottle to his, then took a larger-than-necessary sip of beer.
“So,” Kevin said, angling his body so he had closed off June, Colin, and himself from the other three teachers. Meddling, June thought, both appreciative and annoyed by Kevin doing exactly what she had done to him last year.
“How was your hike today?” Colin asked, taking initiative to begin the conversation.
“Not bad,” June admitted. “Dropped off the kids and then the two of us immediately escaped to the wilderness for a hike up to the overlook point.”
“Nice,” Colin said. “I swear, I’m still learning the paths, plus I think a lot of the hiking trails are actually desire paths from counselors throughout the years.”
“What’s a desire path?” June asked, ignoring the flare of heat that was caused by hearing the world “desire” come out of Colin’s mouth. It was official: she definitely had a crush on the new camp director.
“When a path isn’t planned, but created because people just walk there all the time,” Colin explained. “My sister - Phoebe, you met her - her college’s quad had no planned paths, they just ended up paving over whatever paths students walked the most. When you’re talking about hiking paths, they’re kind of a pain in the ass because they often encourage erosion or destroy plants we’re trying to cultivate or something similar. Like when someone decides that switchbacks on a public trail aren’t for them and just trudges up a hill.” He shook his head. “Ugh, that really grinds my gears, but here it doesn’t matter as much. Mostly, they’re deer paths anyway.”
“Were you ever a classroom teacher?” June asked. “You’ve got such a natural way of explaining concepts, it’s so accessible and you do a great job of providing examples.”
“That’s June’s oddball way of giving you a compliment, by the way,” Kevin cut in.
“Oh, well, thanks,” Colin said, absentmindedly scratching at the back of his neck. His palm lingered on the back of his neck, his arm hanging, muscles still slightly tense. "And no, I went right from college to teaching outdoor education at camp.”
“That’s still teaching,” June found herself saying. “Just your classroom is a lot cooler than mine.”
“I’m sure your classroom is really awesome,” Colin replied, with only a hint of teasing in his voice. “I get the feeling that you have the kind of classroom that kids are just always hanging out in, no matter what.”
“You’re not wrong,” Kevin interjected. Colin looked over at June, who looked down at the floor and shrugged her shoulders.
“What do each of you teach?” Colin asked, sipping his beer and bringing one ankle up to rest on the opposite quad. His pant leg had pulled up slightly, exposing a snippet of dark hair above his ankle. Oh, now you find ankles attractive? June thought to herself. What are you, a man who is just seeing a flapper for the first time?
