A Still, Small Voice Read online

  Chapter Two

  ONE of the advantages, Noah had found, of being a computer engineer was that he was able to work from home sometimes. Citing a bad headache and a difficult night getting to sleep, Noah had called his lieutenant—something Ryan had christened himself two years ago—and explained that he would be running the new protocols from home and then he would be staying home to catch up on his sleep in order to ward off a cold or flu. Ryan had promised to handle everything himself, leaving Noah to check in only occasionally.

  Once satisfied that everything at the office was under control, Noah lay down on the comfortable leather couch in the living room and closed his eyes, his mind finally settling long enough for him to fall asleep. His subconscious took over, and he was back in the staff room on the afternoon of September 4th, the sun beating through the skylight, illuminating the most breathtaking man Noah had ever seen. …

  “Noah?” Hope, the librarian and unofficial Welcome Wagon lady, poked him in the shoulder. “Have you met Paul Lang?”

  “Huh? No, no, I haven’t.” Noah couldn’t be sure if he’d been caught staring, but at that moment, he wasn’t sure he would have minded. He couldn’t honestly remember the last time he’d seen such warm hazel eyes highlighted by such a beautiful smile. “How do you do?”

  “Noah is one of our French Immersion teachers,” Hope was explaining while Noah’s hand was engulfed in Paul’s.

  “Grades eleven and twelve, mostly,” Noah added, as if it would really matter.

  “Shane asked me to give Paul the tour. He’s replacing another teacher who crapped out on us.”

  Us? Noah got a kick out of the way Hope always included herself in all of the action, as if the administration of the school wouldn’t possibly be able to function without her. Noah had worked at the school long enough to know that Hope was the type of person who always managed to insert herself into whatever she felt she needed to be a part of. But Noah was willing to concede the point that, perhaps, the administration would be lost without Hope, although he sincerely doubted it. Of course, he was also willing to concede the point because he was not overly fond of Hope. Not only did she manage to put herself into every conversation—whether it pertained to her or not—but she was also one of the biggest busybodies he’d ever met. If there was some juicy piece of gossip or trash-talking to do, you could always rest assured that seeing Hope coming toward you meant she was just itching to share it.

  “Well, welcome,” Noah said as he headed for the door on the opposite side of the staff room, the one that led to his classroom on the far side of the school. He turned and waved one last time when Hope reminded him that it was Noah’s turn to bring treats to the staff meeting the next day.

  Noah walked back to his room, his mind still on Paul and those hazel eyes. He wondered if Paul could be gay, if he was just imagining that the handshake had lasted a bit too long. He waved and said his hellos to the various students milling about in the hallways. It wasn’t technically time for the students to be attending classes; it was the last day for them to change their schedules for the first semester, and it was always a bit of a zoo. And tomorrow would be the first day of classes, which was the first official day the zoo was open.

  As he rounded the final corner to his classroom, he noticed Shane, one of the vice principals, looking into his room. Not finding Noah, he turned and quickly saw his target. “Noah, thank God I found you.”

  Noah had mixed feelings when it came to Shane. He was a very short man and had the bravado and swagger to more than compensate for his lack of height. He liked to remind people all the time what was in his purview to do as senior administration. Noah had had to stifle a laugh during more than one occasion, resisting the urge to point out to Shane that he was not, in fact, senior anything. He was the least experienced of four vice principals in a high school of more than a thousand students.

  Noah was pretty sure that Shane suffered from what he’d once heard called “little man syndrome,” and thought the description was very appropriate. His first instinct was always to raise his voice and to spout, “It is in my purview to tell you to do….” Nothing irritated Noah more than having to constantly point out to Shane that telling a member of a teacher’s union to do this or that would one day find him with a personnel file full of complaints and letters of reprimand. But Shane was more than secure in his belief that he provided some sort of service that the school and school division could never possibly live without.

  As Noah watched him close the distance between them, he wished yet again that someone would explain to him what that service actually was. Noah resisted the urge to ask how he could possibly help Shane and continued to take his long strides to his classroom door.

  “Listen, Noah, we’ve had to cancel one of your classes due to low enrollment and assign you a grade twelve math.” Shane stopped talking and waited for Noah to unlock his classroom door.

  “Okay.” Noah pulled open the door and waited.

  “We didn’t have much of a choice,” Shane continued, and Noah wondered if Shane had even heard him—or did he just figure he had to continue to bluster along in case Noah was baiting him or only pretending to be indifferent? “There were only fifteen students registered in your Français 30 class, so we made the decision to cut that and split—”

  “Shane?” Noah wanted to reach out and shake the man or tell him to calm down. “I said okay. I don’t agree that fifteen students is a class worth canceling, but we all know that this school division doesn’t support the immersion program, so… okay.”

  “It’s not that we don’t support immersion, Noah, and I’d thank you to remember that we—”

  “Shane, I’m not interested in discussing this for the hundredth time.” Noah smiled politely and backed into the classroom. “We’ve already agreed to disagree on this issue at least a dozen times. And when those fifteen students come to me wanting to know how they’ll possibly get their immersion diploma, I’ll send them on to you.”

  “Why me?”

  Noah stifled yet another laugh at the panicked look on the smaller man’s face. “You said we didn’t have much of a choice.”

  “I didn’t make the decision; it was made by all five members of the administration.”

  “Okay, I’ll send them to the administration.” Noah waited a beat and then added, “And I’ll do the same with the parents who won’t understand the decision. Because I really don’t know how I would ever explain it to them… not being one of the five members of the administration.”

  “But you’re a department head,” Shane protested, his brow furrowing.

  “Who wasn’t invited to participate in that particular decision-making process.”

  “That doesn’t matter,” Shane protested, puffing out his chest. “It is well within your purview—”

  “To direct any and all inquiries about programming to the individuals responsible for the decisions,” Noah finished the sentence, knowing Shane would probably puff his chest out even more. “Now, I have to get ready for an unexpected schedule change, so if you’ll excuse me.” Noah grabbed the door and looked down at Shane’s foot, which was in the arc of the door’s path, and slowed slightly to give Shane time to move it. The smaller man did move his foot without another word.

  Luckily for Noah, Shane decided to drop the issue, but Noah knew full well it would resurface, probably in one of the lengthy e-mails that the vice principal sent to audible groans from all over the school. As a joke, one of the other—very seasoned—teachers had once printed off several of the e-mails, totaling some forty-odd pages, and left the booklet on the coffee table in the upper staff room, labeling it “The Bible According to Shane.” Most staff members had been unaware of it until Shane himself had decided to make a federal case out of it. Instead of letting it go, he’d brought it to a staff meeting, demanding to know who’d done it.

  Warren, the head of the math department, had very quickly confessed to it and, in front of the assembled staff of almost on
e hundred teachers, had shown absolutely no remorse for having committed what he termed his “amusing burlesque.”

  Noah adored Warren. He was very old-school and still wore a bow tie to school, even on casual Fridays. He was universally loved by every member of the staff and was well known among both community members and parents alike, since he’d taught most of them when they’d been in high school. Warren was such a fixture in the high school that he was now teaching grandchildren of students he’d taught thirty years ago. And, for the most part, the students adored him. Most serious math students tried their best to get into one of the likeable curmudgeon’s classes.

  Noah knew that he would have students in his newly assigned math class who would have preferred Warren, but Noah would be sure to explain to them that he was using the same notes as the senior teacher and would be sure to do one or two activities that pitted his math skills against whatever the students could throw at him. It was at moments like those that Noah was glad his father had thought it vacation fun to practice mental math skills. Of course, at the time, Noah had hated having to continue doing schoolwork while on vacation, but now that he could do just about any math operation in his head, including graphing of conics and their inverses and even some calculus, Noah appreciated what his father had done for him.

  What made it fun for Noah was that there were always some students who thought Noah was somehow cheating. Over the years, he’d been blindfolded, made to turn in circles while announcing his answers, and had even been made, two years ago, to roll up the sleeves of his dress shirt to ensure there wasn’t some sort of miniature calculator embedded in his arm. Noah always laughed at their attempts to discredit his mental abilities and explained to them that the human brain was capable of great feats, but that it needed training and discipline.

  There were not many students who did eventually transfer to Warren’s math class, but occasionally Noah would find himself faced with a withdrawal slip. He signed them without hesitation and always wished the students well in Warren’s class, knowing that they would regret it soon enough. Warren did not provide movie days just before vacation, nor did he allow students the possibility of re-writing three unit tests of their choice. They were Noah’s concession to the students in an ever-changing world where teachers were expected to coddle the students and to provide them with as many opportunities to succeed as possible. They were unrealistic expectations as far as Noah was concerned; once out in the real world of university or a full-time job, the students would discover soon enough that there wasn’t too much forgiveness for screwing up or not getting it right the first time.

  As he was pulling out his materials for his new math class, the four overstuffed binders sitting on a shelf behind his desk, Noah heard a knock on the door and closed his eyes before turning, convinced that it was Shane coming back for round two. Probably took him fifteen minutes to think of some other retort, Noah thought as his eyes focused on the tall frame of Paul Lang.

  “Sorry to bother you, Noah,” Paul said, his cheeks slightly pink as he looked across the room. “Shane told me that you are the staff advisor for the student council, and I was wondering if you could use any help.”

  “Yes, always, thank you.” Noah stood from where he sat and walked toward Paul. “Sometimes with some of these kids, it’s almost a full-time job in itself.”

  “Okay, great,” Paul said, seeming to relax a little bit. “I’ve always been involved in student government since I started teaching, so….”

  “Yeah, that would be great. I’d appreciate the help.” Noah perched on top of one of the desks near the front of the classroom. “So, are you originally from here or…?”

  “No, actually, I was born in BC but then moved out here to go back to school to get my teaching degree.”

  “Out here? To get your teaching degree?” Noah smiled mysteriously. “Wouldn’t it have been easier to stay out there and go back to school?” Noah had never been good at guessing ages, but he would put Paul somewhere in his early to mid-thirties.

  “It’s complicated,” Paul said with a shrug, and Noah decided to leave it alone.

  “I hear that.” Noah rose off the desk and pushed his hands in his pockets. “Well, the first meeting won’t be until after we’ve done the elections, so you’ll have about a month to get used to everything before the deluge.”

  “You bet. Sounds good.”

  “Sometime next week, during the first full week of classes, I’ll hold a meeting for any interested students who wish to be put on the ballot. There’ll then be speeches during lunch hour over two days, and then the students will vote by ballot during their period one class so I can have the results announced by the end of the day.”

  “Okay,” Paul said, and he turned to exit the room.

  Jesus, Noah thought to himself as he watched Paul walk away, I wonder if this man knows how fucking gorgeous he is.

  Before Paul reached the door, Noah watched him turn back, at a loss as to which view he preferred; the man was gorgeous from every angle. “What happens if a student doesn’t have a first period class?”

  “They come to me during lunch or during one of the breaks between classes and vote.”

  Paul nodded and then turned to head back out the door.

  Noah found himself wondering what had brought Paul all this way from BC, and more importantly, what had made him go back to school to get his teaching degree when he must have been in his late twenties. It seemed a rather odd choice for someone who had probably already been out in the working world for more than a few years.

  As he headed back to his chair, Noah figured Paul must have been rather unhappy with the job, or jobs, he’d had and was looking for something a little more fulfilling. He’ll certainly get that in this job, Noah thought to himself as he took up his planning again. Of course, if he’s one of those who thinks the two months off in the summer are great, he’ll soon discover that ten months’ worth of marking and late nights and meetings and rude and apathetic children—not to mention parents—are hardly worth six weeks of summer holidays that invariably go by far too quickly.

  Noah spent the next three hours planning and preparing for his new math course before finally glancing up at the clock and seeing that it was just before five in the evening. He left all of his materials where they were, grabbed his messenger bag, and decided to head home to make himself a nice, juicy steak before the first day of classes tomorrow. Maybe even a beer or two, he thought as he headed down the long hallway that led to the stairs by the central office.

  “Noah!”

  Noah closed his eyes and counted to ten in his head before turning around. He knew Shane’s voice, would know it anywhere, like the sound of fingernails on a chalkboard or the sound of a fax machine screaming in his ear from the other end of a phone call. He turned slowly, forcing a smile.

  “I just wanted to let you know that I’ve assigned you to be Paul’s mentor.”

  “Me? Isn’t he Humanities?” Noah was slightly confused; shouldn’t his mentor be someone in his own department? Shouldn’t it be—at the very least—someone who was at the same end of the school as Paul?

  “Yes,” Shane said with a shrug, and he kept walking past Noah and headed up the stairs. “But he requested you.”

  Noah turned quickly to watch Shane disappear up the stairs. He requested me? Noah was rather stunned. They had student council in common, but still, Noah wasn’t really sure if he would be able to help Paul with the subjects that he would be teaching. Being a mentor wasn’t just about teaching the same subjects; rather it was more helping the new teacher to acclimate to the procedures and practices of the school. But how would Noah be able to help Paul when they were practically on opposite sides of the building?

  In fact, as he walked out to the staff parking lot, Noah wondered if he’d be of any help at all to Paul. Noah wasn’t really sure why, but the new teacher seemed like one of those individuals who didn’t open up very easily.

  Chapter Three

&
nbsp; NOAH awoke to a sound he did not hear often outside of his quiet loft; the argument seemed to be getting far too heated. He glanced at the clock. It was just after four in the afternoon. He could make out two voices, one male and one female. He was pretty sure that the man’s voice belonged to Paul, but the woman’s voice, although it seemed very familiar, did not register right away. Then, as the happy memory of first meeting Paul faded from his tired brain, Noah realized why the voice sounded so familiar. It was Cherie’s voice, and she was doing what she always did best: she was threatening Paul with more legal action. It would seem that Paul was not entitled to see his son when the judge had ordered because that was inconvenient to Cherie. Typical, Noah thought as he pushed himself off the sofa. How the hell that woman ever got a job as a counselor—and kept it—is beyond me!

  He tiptoed to the door, not really knowing why, since nothing could be heard over the shrill yapping that had earned Cherie her nickname among the students, and peered out the peep hole. Sure enough, he could just make out Paul’s pained and aggravated expression over Cherie’s wild hand gestures. Barbie, some of the students used to call her, especially when she was doing hall duty or supervising in the cafeteria. The nickname had come from one of the French Immersion students who’d read a story about a rare breed of dog that was usually black, very hairy, and known for its shrill bark. And with the possible exception of the Barbet breed being likened to pictures of a 1950s B-movie wolfman, Cherie was a dead ringer for a Barbet. Her untamed frizzy black hair made her seem as if she were some sort of witch, and the shrill yelling she preferred to do from across a crowded congregation of students had provided the students with more than enough fodder to make her the brunt of far too many jokes.

  Noah leaned his forehead against the cool metal of his door and sighed, reaching out to the small table for his cell phone. He debated momentarily with himself about going out there and shutting her down, trying to convince himself that he was doing it so that he could maybe get some more rest. He wasn’t performing at the club tonight and had planned on doing some reading for pleasure before getting a good night’s sleep. But he not only knew that he would go out there, he also knew he would be doing so to help Paul. The midafternoon dream that he’d just had about meeting Paul and their subsequent fast friendship had had a bizarre effect on Noah, the old instincts to protect this man coming back in full force and causing him to conveniently forget how Paul had betrayed him. As he unchained and unlocked the door, the only thought he had was of rescuing Paul—again.