I'm trying to focus, I really am. But there's only so long I can listen to Principal Rivers drone on and on about policy and procedures regarding my probationary period before I'm not hearing anything he's saying anymore.

I'm grateful when he slides the contract over his desk, towards me.

His desk is small, I note, especially given the tuition this place charges. The kids are in Kindergarten for fuck's sake - eighth grade at most, and it costs thousands a year to send them here. And yet, the school seems full, the drop-off line long and slow this morning.

My fingers tap against my black jeans, my teeth gnawing at my inner lip.

Hell, Beau and Emma are probably looking up schools just like this one to send Maggie to next year for Kindergarten. For fuck's sake, my parents sent me to a school like this. And Peyton and Peter before me.

Still. Thousands? To teach kids colors and shapes and letters and shit? That's wild to me.

"The final page is an agreement to our code of conduct - do read it carefully, Mr. Larson." Rivers graying brows shoot up to his thinning hairline in warning.

"Parker," I mutter reflexively, reaching for the contract and flipping through it absentmindedly. My attention is again drawn to the smallness of his desk, of his office.

It doesn't make much sense for his office to be so small. Shouldn't it be big and impressive to lure families in? Why would parents drop thousands after being brought into this man's closet-office?

Maybe he takes them somewhere else.

I don't know why I care. I skim through the document quickly, eyes scanning the code of conduct briefly before snagging on one line, font big and bolded.

And underlined.

Someone's trying to make a point, it seems.

Relationships of any kind beyond those of a professional nature, including sexual, romantic, and otherwise, are prohibited among the faculty and staff.

I must be an asshole, because my mind immediately conjures Summer's face. Her pretty turned up nose and full, pink lips. My cock stiffens against my leg a little when I think of her mouth. I shift in my seat to hide the evidence.

But then I'm thinking about what I saw in the parking lot the other night. I was supposed to get a ride from Peyton, to join him and the kids at family dinner over at our parents house. But he called last minute with an emergency - one of the kids, Everly, I think he said, had a bad fever. They were going to the ER.

Seems a bit dramatic, but I don't have kids myself, so what do I know? Then again, it's Peyton, and if anyone worries too much, it's him.

Anyways, I called Beau instead, like a fucking toddler stranded at the playground. He said he'd definitely be there to get me, he just had to finish up with Maggie's dentist appointment.

The idea of Beau in some pediatric dentist office where big teeth with weird smiles decorate the walls made me laugh.

But that's how I ended up waiting outside the school building after everyone else had gone home.

That's how I saw Summer Davis break down in tears when she thought no one was looking.

And it's been the only thing I've thought about since.

Principal Rivers clears his throat, arthritic fingers tap, tap, tapping his tiny desk. "Do you have any questions, Mr. Larson? Can I clarify anything for you?"

I look from him, to the contract again, the correction to my first name on the tip of my tongue.

This rule is bullshit. And I can't shake the feeling that it's oddly targeted. But I'm in no position to make demands.

"No, sir. Thank you." I mutter, signing my name clumsily at the bottom.

Parker Larson. Twenty-four-year-old, ex-addict, former fuck-up made temporary, maybe even indefinite, janitor at a goddamn children's school.

My parents must be so proud.

I sigh, pushing the contract back towards the principal.

He signs just below my name before calling in his secretary so she can make us both copies. "For our records," Rivers huffs, fidgeting at his desk.

I roll my eyes inwardly to myself. How exciting, maybe I'll hang my copy on my refrigerator.

His copy, I know, will be in the top drawer of this small as shit desk, so it's nice and accessible when he takes it out later to fire me, listing everything I signed up for but somehow managed to screw up.

The secretary, an older woman with the perfect old lady name I just can't remember right now - Martha? Gloria? - sets the copies on the desk without a word. Rivers narrows his eyes as I tuck the paper into my pocket, but makes no other remarks about policies, procedures, or the insane no-dating rule.

Instead, he stands, struts towards the door, and opens it for me. "Let's go find Mr. Gomez. He'll show you the ropes from here."

I follow, my smirk only somewhat sarcastic as I stuff my hands in my hoodie pocket and trail after him, wondering what "ropes" there are to really show me.

⊱⁜⊰

Mr. Gomez, as Principal Rivers called his head custodian this morning - Mark, according to what he called him when we first met - sticks his hand out to me after wiping it haphazardly against his khaki overalls.

"Marcus." He introduces himself, and after eyeing his hand and imagining the many disgusting substances that could be coating it, I shake it anyways.

"Parker." I provide, looking over my shoulder before raising a brow, "Rivers said your name was Mark."

An eye roll. "Yeah, well. He's a last name guy, mostly. But I've tried correcting him, anyways." Marcus shrugs, thick shoulders meeting an even thicker neck. The dude is jacked. "Doesn't seem to stick."

The way he says it makes me think the problem only really exists for the custodial staff. Something about that rubs me the wrong way, but before I can note it out loud, Marcus is pointing at a man coming into the janitor's room. "That's Joel."

Joel raises a hand, before slumping over at the long, plastic table set up in the center of the room. The chair he collapses into is cheap, little more than a plastic lawn chair.

The room itself though, is more like a supply closet. A rickety fridge in one corner, a microwave on an old wooden table - maybe one made in a woodworking class by the looks of it - beside it. In the opposite corner of the room, as far away from the fridge as it can be, is a stock of supplies. Paper products and non-hazardous sprays and cleaners. Long rubber gloves and a stack of clean overalls.

Besides the door Joel just walked through, there are two others. One marked "Keep Out - Hazardous Material" and another that has keys dangling from the door handle. From that one comes a petite woman in an overall set that matches Marcus's with hair pulled in a severe bun. She looks too old to clean up after all these kids.

"That's Tiny." Marcus introduces us and she smiles, although it can't be said that it's very welcoming.

"That's the bathroom. The one for us to use, I mean. You can change in there." He tosses me a set of overalls. "We keep anything we don't want to lose in those lockers." Marcus points to a few combination safes on the bottom shelf of the supply rack. "That's about it. Any questions?"

I shake my head, tempted to ask if he's serious. It's not exactly rocket science.

"Good. Tiny, take lower school today? Joel, you've got the middle school." Marcus instructs the pair and they hop into action, Tiny already loading up a wheeling cart full of supplies while Joel begins pulling his overalls over his clothes. "I'll run Parker here through the hazardous materials and then we'll take the preschool and kindergarten wing."

Halfway to the bathroom to change, stupid overalls in hand, I break out into a huge grin that no one can see.

At the mention of the pre-school wing, Marcus finally has my attention.

Unfortunately, hazardous materials takes most of the morning. Marcus runs through all the chemicals, all the dangerous cleaners and harmful side effects. Burns, rashes, even explosions.

"I'm serious," Marcus warned repeatedly, "People think us janitors are a bunch of dummies. But mix the wrong chemicals - bleach and ammonia, bleach and rubbing alcohol, drain cleaner..."

On and on he lectured me about the potentially lethal consequences. Toxic gasses. Shortness of breath. Coma. Death.

By the end of the training, I'm almost worried I took a position as a mad scientist and not a janitor.

But mostly, I'm thinking about Summer and the preschool wing and how damn excited I am to go change the trash bags out of a bunch of waste baskets.

"You got a lunch?" Marcus asks, leaning back in one of the lawn chairs as he opens a plastic baggy. He pulls a sandwich out and I eye the legs of the chair, watching them whiten as they bend from strain.

"Nope." I shrug, recalling all the hazardous materials just beyond that closet door.

"Well, we get a half hour, anyways." Marcus bites into his sandwich, speaking with his mouth full, "A fifteen minute break, too, for whatever else when you need it."

I nod, my fingers tapping along the edge of table. "What needs to be done in the Kindergarten and pre-school wings?"

"Depends on the day. Mostly lots of vacuuming, waxing the floors, in the classrooms and the corridors, too, trash and recycling." He launches into a tirade about how it's very important to keep the trash separate from the recyclables - how this place takes it seriously, preaching about being environmentally friendly and all that.

I'm not listening. "How often is the trash changed in the preschool rooms?"

"Daily." Marcus answers immediately, before his eyes narrow at me, a grin stretching over his lips. "Miss Davis is a real pretty girl, isn't she, Parker?"

I smirk, caught and not trying to deny it. Before I can agree, Joel is joining us, grabbing a large lunch box from the fridge.

"Every male teacher in the place thinks so." He chuckles. "Some of the Dad's, too."

"Lots of single Dad's, then?" I try to play off how my skin is prickling at the thought of anyone else in this building checking Summer out. It's irrational, really, given how I oogled her that first day.

Tiny joins us next, plopping beside me with left over Chinese take out that makes my stomach rumble. "He didn't say that."

Oh. I open my mouth to speak but close it again, not sure how to take that. Surely married men don't try to fuck their kids teachers? Not when they have to attend parent teacher conferences with their wives the next week?

Marcus laughs at my stunned expression. "I'm not sure Miss Davis is looking for guys like us, buddy."

I stiffen at the too-friendly nickname, the way he compared us to one another. Then the realization hits me that I'm sitting across from him, in the same overalls, in the same supply closet of a too expensive, too preppy school, taking out trash and unclogging shitty toilets, where our boss can't even remember our first names.

We're not different at all. My shoulders slump forward.

Maybe noticing, Tiny speaks again, her voice raspy like she's smoked cigarettes her entire life. "Not a bad thing, you know. Rivers really is a prick about that no-dating rule."

Joel wipes his hand with a napkin before tossing it onto the table. "You have a job because the last guy we worked with was fired for fucking a middle school teacher."

"Oh for Christ's sake, Joel." Tiny sighs, tossing down her fork, noodles still clinging to the prongs.

"What? They were fucking." He shrugs, running a greasy hand through this greasy, dark hair.

Marcus shakes his head. "Might've been. Anyways, Rivers got wind of it and nipped that in the bud." He makes a motion across his neck, indicating the janitor was let go.

I think about that information for a moment, chewing my lip. Well, that complicates things. I really need this job.

But I really can't stop thinking about Summer.

Life is pretty bleak, what can I say?

"And the teacher?" I ask, putting my scheming aside for the time being.

I'll find a way to keep this job and date Summer, if I choose. Rivers won't stop me from making those pretty lips moan if I decide I want them to, and she does too.

"What about her?" Marcus asks, biting into a crisp apple.

"What happened to her?" I lean forward.

Joel scoffs loudly just as Tiny shakes her head sadly. "Not a damn thing."

Huh. There it is again, that nagging reminder that we're the lowest on the totem pole. Shmuck beneath their shoes.

"I've got to hit the can, and then we'll get started on trash." Marcus stands, stopping behind me, and placing a hand on my shoulder. "Look, you said you really need this job, right? So just don't do anything stupid."

"Yeah," I mutter noncommittally. But all I can think about is Summer crying in her car.

The thing about my life is that it's been pretty fucking easy, all things considered. My parents are still married, and not in the only-because-they-can't-afford-a-divorce type of way. The they-still-love-each other-and-it's-kind-of-gross type of way.

If they didn't, they'd have more than enough money to divorce and happily split everything. Including time with their three sons, all who were bright and showed so much promise when they were young.

My parents sent us all, their beautiful, well-loved and cared for sons, to private preschools, followed by private kindergartens, then elementary, middle, high schools. Boarding school, even, for the youngest, since I had the hardest time academically and they figured less distractions would be a good thing.

Two of their sons went on to make them really proud.

The youngest - me, the fuck-up that I am - did not make them proud. I got kicked out of boarding school at the end of my senior year, after being accepted to some decent colleges, actually. Why?

I realized I liked drinking a lot more than I liked studying.

Liked drinking more than showing up for one of the biggest days of my brother's life, too.

The point is, I was given everything. Anything I wanted, more than I needed.

But still, I ended up going to rehab - funded by my parents, despite their disappointment - with a drinking problem, surrounded by people with truly sad stories and difficult fucking demons to fight.

I just had a family that cared too much.

And a bad habit of making absolutely terrible decisions.

It's the common theme of my life. If the opportunity presents itself to do something stupid, I inevitably take it. If the opportunity doesn't exist, I'll make it.

But now? Standing in the corridor of the Kindergarten wing, peering into the teacher's room window, I catch sight of Summer.

I know her immediately by the long, fiery curls down her back. Which is why I stopped to look.

But the reason I'm still staring, like a goddamn idiot, is because Summer is in tight, white jeans. And the copier machine, which she is currently bent over to inspect, seems to be giving her trouble.

Which gives me not only an insanely good view of her ass... but the perfect opportunity to do something stupid.

Pushing through the door, I plaster a bright smile to my face despite Marcus's wanting.

Don't do anything stupid?

Well, fuck, if I haven't heard that before.

──────⊱⁜⊰──────

Guyyyyys! What do you think about Parker so far? He reminds me of Beau but also not. Anyways, fun to write already!