New Girl in Little Cove by Damhnait Monaghan (book club suggestions TXT) 📗

“Yes, and I want to see the school. Whenever I think of you down here, I imagine Anne Shirley breaking a slate over Gilbert Blythe’s head. I need to update that image. At least to the 1960s.”

She stood up and stretched. “Oh, and since I didn’t get to chat to Doug much at the party, call him and ask him to meet us for fish and chips.”

“But I’ve never called him before.”

“So?”

Who could argue with that logic? But when I called, his mother said he had gone to the cabin for a few days, hunting with a friend.

“Hunting, like, for real?” Sheila asked when I told her. I didn’t dare mention the rabbit stew.

Half an hour later, we were in the car, heading to Little Cove. When we came across two hitchhikers, I slowed down to pull over. I had recognized Sam Sullivan, from grade ten French. My heart sank when I realized he was with Calvin Piercey. Still, I couldn’t exactly pull away now.

“What are you doing?” Sheila said. “Didn’t your mother ever teach you about stranger danger?”

“Relax, I’m the only one who would qualify as a stranger around here.”

“Well, strange, anyway,” said Sheila.

The car door behind me opened and the two boys scrambled into the back seat. “H’lo, miss,” they said.

“Boys, this is my friend Miss Murphy, who’s visiting from Toronto.”

Sheila twisted in her seat. “For God’s sake, don’t call me that. Makes me sound like an old bag.”

Calvin snickered.

“It’s Sheila. Now tell me, boys,” she said. “How do you find Miss O’Brien as a teacher?”

I held my breath as Calvin spoke.

“I don’t like French.”

“What is it with boys and French?” Sheila asked.

He shrugged. “Don’t see the point of it.”

“Well,” said Sheila. “It can help you get a job with the government or the RCMP or Air Canada . . .”

“I wants to join the RCMP,” Sam piped up.

“And are you taking French?” Sheila asked.

“Oui,” said Sam.

“Good for you,” said Sheila. “French could give you a real advantage.”

“I might have to drop it next year though,” he said. “Dad don’t want me wasting time on it.”

My brain began to fizz as I remembered Doug’s suggestion a few months back that I start a French club. That might be a way to snag more students and help those who weren’t already taking the subject. A remedial English club had been a spectacularly bad idea. But a French club was a great one.

“Where can I drop you boys?” I asked.

“By MJ’s takeout please,” Sam said. “We can walk the rest of the way from there.”

“Ah, le takeout,” said Sheila. “C’est bon.” She shifted in her seat to face the boys again. “See how I used my French then? You never know when you’ll end up needing it. Like, say, if your best friend’s a French teacher and you’re trying to impress her so she’ll buy you lunch.”

They grinned. No one could resist Sheila’s charm. We said goodbye to the boys in the parking lot, then went into the takeout.

There was no sign of Georgie at the cash register. Her mother took our order, and when I asked after her, she said, “She’s after having the baby. My first grandson.”

It was hard to read her expression, so I simply asked how Georgie was doing. But Sheila quizzed her on the baby, asking for name (Alfie) and weight (six and a half pounds and “right as rain”).

After we’d eaten, we got back in the car and made the short trip through Little Cove. I pointed out the gas station, the church, the school, Lucille’s house and the wharf. I did not drive as far as Bertha Peddle’s store on principle.

“It’s cozy,” Sheila said. “I love the coloured houses. But I totally get why you moved to Clayville. Can we go to the school now?”

I turned the car around and we headed back. I unlocked the front door of the school and we went inside. Naturally, Sheila headed straight for the nearest male, rubbing the toes that protruded from his marble sandals.

“Thanks to St. Jude for favours received,” she intoned.

“Great name for a school, eh?” I said.

“It kind of works.”

“The patron saint of lost causes?”

“And hope,” said Sheila. “The patron saint of hope.”

“Says who?”

“The patron saint of nagging, also known as my mother.”

“Huh,” I said. “I guess if you think about it, hope is the flip side of lost causes.” I made a mental note to inform Patrick.

“Where’s Doug’s classroom?” asked Sheila after I’d given her a brief tour.

“Why?”

“Just want to get a better feel for him.”

“What are you, psychic?” But I led her down the hall and into the classroom. I leaned against the blackboard, while she wandered around, trailing her fingers along the rows of desks. Then she joined me at the front of the room and hovered her hands over his desk.

“I’m sensing some unresolved sexual tension here,” she said, ducking when I threw a brush at her. It bounced on the desk, sending clouds of chalk into the air.

“You saw him with his girlfriend the other night.”

“Yeah,” said Sheila. “I saw them spend every minute of the party apart. I saw him unable to take his eyes off you when you were playing the violin.”

“Fiddle,” I said.

“Fiddlesticks,” she replied. “Something is not going on with those two.”

“Sheila, she’s really nice.”

“So are you, honey,” said Sheila.

“Well, thank you,” I said. “I only wish I could say the same for you.”

“Hey!” She threw the blackboard brush back at me.

We bickered our way to the staff room, where I introduced Sheila to Patrick’s beer fridge. “Bitchin’,” she said. “Let’s have one for the road.”

“Well, it is New Year’s Eve.”

We settled in at the table and clinked bottles. Sheila shifted in her chair, took off her boots and put her feet in my lap. “You know, there’s one thing you haven’t asked me about since I got here,” she said.

I picked at the label on my beer bottle. “I know.”

“Last chance,” Sheila said. “I’m