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A large ball of lead settled in Emily’s stomach as she walked down the empty hallway toward the principal’s office. Have I lost my mind? What am I even doing? She almost turned around twice, but something propelled her on. The idea of a softball team made her really excited; she didn’t know why, but it was true.
As usual, Mr. Hogan’s door was shut.
Emily looked at Julie, who was tapping away at her keyboard and staring at her monitor. Emily waited several seconds, and then, when Julie either didn’t notice her or pretended not to, Emily took a single step toward her. It was subtle and, she thought, polite, but Julie still didn’t look up. It was now obvious that the office administrator was ignoring the English teacher.
“Excuse me, Julie?”
Julie finally looked up, but she made a big show of being irritated.
“Sorry to interrupt. But do you know if Mr. Hogan’s in the building?”
“If his door is shut, he’s not here.” She returned her gaze to the screen before she’d even finished speaking.
“OK. Do you know when he’ll be back?”
“Nope,” she said, eyes still straight ahead.
Trying not to be offended, or frustrated, or discouraged, Emily turned to leave the office, but as God would have it, met Mr. Hogan at the door.
“Mr. Hogan! I was just looking for you.”
He didn’t try to hide his annoyance. “I’m actually late for a meeting right—”
He tried to brush by her, but she followed him to his door, and didn’t let him finish his sentence. “I only need thirty seconds.”
“Fine,” he said, unlocking the door with one of what looked like a thousand keys.
She followed him into his office and shut the door behind her. She wasn’t keen to let Julie overhear what she was about to say.
“I’d like to start a softball team,” she said, before he’d even sat down.
He laughed. She had expected that. “Maybe next year,” he said, as if he was telling a child maybe a new bike next Christmas.
“What about this year?”
He finally looked her in the eye. “Why?” He sounded so exasperated, she almost laughed. It brought her a shameful pleasure to exasperate her principal—this might not be good.
“I have lots of reasons. Basketball is the only real option for girls here, and that’s such an intense sport. Wouldn’t it be great to offer a more laid-back sport? It would get the kids exercising, allow more of them to be part of a team ...” She saw that she was losing him, so finished with, “And because there are girls who want it.”
“There are girls who want it? You mean you’ve already told the girls? Before you’d even mentioned it to me?”
Uh-oh. She’d gotten herself into trouble. Again. Didn’t seem to matter that she never meant to get into trouble.
“That’s not exactly how it happened,” she tried.
“You know what? I don’t care how it happened. The answer’s still no.”
“Why?” she said, even though she knew she had no grounds to ask the question, and he had no obligation to answer it.
“Why? Where do I start? The season starts in a few days—”
“A few days? It’s only March 8!”
He ignored her protest. “We don’t even have an athletic director”—he threw her a glance that suggested this was her fault—“and we don’t have uniforms, or a field, or a schedule, or a coach—”
“I’ll coach.”
He raised an eyebrow. “I’m sure you would, but we don’t have a budget to pay you.”
“I’ll coach for free. And we’ll fundraise for uniforms—”
He guffawed. “You going to be the athletic director too?”
“Sure!”
His grimace suggested he was in actual physical pain.
She sat down and leaned slightly toward his desk. “I’m sure we can just piggyback onto the baseball schedule? And so what if we don’t get a full schedule this year? What if we only have away games? Come on, Mr. Hogan. Let’s get these girls out into the sunshine. Let’s let them have some fun.”
His grimace faded. She wasn’t sure she’d ever seen that happen before. He almost looked persuaded. He leaned back in his chair and tipped his head from side to side as if trying to stretch out the kinks. “Fine,” he finally said.
“Fine?” She failed to hide her surprise.
“I’ll have to check with the superintendent and the school board. Don’t tell any of the girls yet—well, don’t tell them any more than you already have. Just keep it quiet till I get back to you.”
She didn’t like the sound of that. “But I’ll need to start on a schedule soon. And on fundraising. When will you get back to me?”
“When I do, Miss Morse. Now your prep period is supposed to be for prepping. You may go.”
She stood and smiled, sincerely. “Thanks, Mr. Hogan. Really. This is going to be a good thing. I can feel it.”
