and Savannah each year, but then again, I’d never been out of Texas, so who was I to say anything really.
We had everything in the back, and I waved to Ethan before he turned and went back into the building. I sent off a text to Anderson before I left the parking lot, letting him know I was leaving for Victoria and I’d see him tomorrow. He said he was going to play golf with Professor Summers and then if he still had time, would hit the gym this afternoon. I didn’t quite understand that, but maybe his gym closed early on Sundays?
It took almost two and a half hours to get from campus to the house I’d spent the majority of my teenage years in, but could I really call it home? Chris and Agnes were important to me, but they weren’t technically my parents. They’d done so much for me though, and without their guidance, I knew I wouldn’t have just graduated.
I wasn’t even in park before I saw Chris come out the door. I waved, and when he recognized me, I knew I had a long talk ahead of me.
“Whoa. Graduation present from someone?” Chris said as he walked up and gave me a tight hug. I missed this. He was the closest thing to a father that I’d ever had, and the fact that he was still willing to give me a tight bear hug, even at twenty-two, said something to me.
“Umm, I’m not sure, really. It’s…complicated.”
“Un-huh. Something you need to tell me?”
I looked into those knowing eyes. “More like something I need to talk out with you. It’s…complicated.”
“So you’ve said. Well, come in. Agnes is still at church, so it’s just us until she gets home.”
That was a bit surprising since Chris usually went with her. “You didn’t go?”
“Not this week. I had some things that needed to be taken care of, and with us leaving next week and still needing to clean out our classrooms, I decided to stay home today.”
“Is everything okay?” I asked as I climbed the two steps up to the front step that led into the house.
“Everything is fine. We’ve just decided that maybe it’s time to do what we’ve always dreamed of doing. That it was time to start checking off those bucket list things. We’re not old, but we’re not young anymore, and we wanted to do some things before we felt we were too old to travel.”
I stared at the back of Chris’s head. “You’re what? Fifty-four?”
“Eight. But my parents are getting way up there, and they need more and more help, so we decided it was time.”
And that had things slipping into place. “You want some tea?” Chris asked as we walked into the kitchen. I smiled at the corner nook-style table. It was the same one they’d had when I was in high school. “Who made it?” I asked.
“I did.”
“Then yes, please.” I loved Agnes. I honestly did. But the woman put way too much sugar in the sweet tea. I knew that was something that I would never say to her or out in public in this state. After we both had a glass of the lightly sweetened whiskey-colored brew, I sat down at the kitchen nook and waited. It had been ingrained in my head that we didn’t eat anywhere but the kitchen, and I figured that was still the case, so I sat on the hard wood bench and waited for Chris to join me.
“Okay, so spill. Are you borrowing the SUV?”
“Kinda. But not really. It’s…” I sighed. Where did I even begin?
“Yes, complicated. You’ve said as much. So why don’t you start at the beginning and we’ll work through it like we always did.”
And that was why I’d always come to Chris in high school when I had a problem. He looked at things objectively, something that made him an amazing high school science teacher. So, I told him about Anderson and how things started, how we both quickly discovered he was my professor, and how we were like two moths and were each other’s flame.
By the time I was finished, he was laughing, which was completely unexpected. Both of our glasses were empty, so I got up and took them to the sink. I noticed that it was after noon and Agnes should have been home.
“So glad you found my story funny. Is Agnes coming? Things are okay, right?” I asked, worried.
“Yeah. She’s helping with the infants today, and then