Chapter 3: Secrets, Lies, and Broken Hearts

I wanted to know more about Mrs. Harper. I tried to ask Kyle, but he wouldn’t talk about his mom.

I could only ask other classmates, and found out Mrs. Harper was only thirty-two. I was stunned.

She was just a kid herself—fifteen, thinking she knew everything, until life smacked her sideways. She had Kyle at fifteen—not illegal, but definitely not ideal.

People make mistakes, but some mistakes cost too much.

Mrs. Harper paid a steep price. The guy ran off, her family was ashamed and cut her off.

She raised Kyle alone. She was deeply hurt by men, and for Kyle’s sake, hadn’t dated for seventeen years.

But the person who hated Mrs. Harper most in the world was Kyle.

Since we were kids, no parents ever wanted their kids to go to Kyle’s house. There was always gossip about him, so the mother and son had a rough relationship.

Her life couldn’t start over, and she could only live under everyone’s judgment and whispers.

But I wanted to be good to Mrs. Harper.

She didn’t dare let anyone know about us, always keeping it secret. Anyway, I’d already lined up a job after graduation, so every night, I went to see her.

The difference between a woman and a girl is like night and day.

While other girls my age begged their boyfriends for gifts, Mrs. Harper was already calling up garage owners she knew, asking the lead mechanic to teach me technical drawing, and helping me get certified.

She even signed me up for the ASE test, said every real mechanic needs that patch on their shirt.

It’s weird—I never liked listening to my parents, but when Mrs. Harper held my arm and told me to quit gaming and prep for the mechanical design test, all I could think was that I had to live up to her expectations.

Every night, I studied at her place until I fell asleep. Every morning, I woke up in her arms.

She didn’t want to make our relationship public. She always said she was old, and was grateful that fate had given her a sweet romance.

She’d brush my hair back and whisper, “You deserve someone who can show you off, not someone hiding in the shadows.”

She just wanted to see me become a real man, but didn’t want me to be her man.

I hated hearing her say she was old, but I couldn’t prove otherwise with words. Mrs. Harper taught me one thing: a man without skills—whatever he says is just empty talk.

The garage owner said I was learning fast, and if my mentor thought I was ready, he’d hire me.

I was thrilled. Because of Mrs. Harper, I was moving from mechanic to drafter, thinking I could finally prove myself to her. But who knew—bad luck always comes before good.

Mrs. Harper got pregnant.

She didn’t tell me.

I was at the bar, about to ask my mentor to switch my internship location, and wanted to take a photo of some blueprints for him. My phone was dead, so I went to borrow hers.

When I searched her purse, I found the ultrasound report.

My hands shook so bad I almost dropped the paper. My mouth went dry, and I could barely get the words out.

Besides the pregnancy report, there was a doctor’s note, scheduling an abortion for next Wednesday.

A grown woman is both captivating and terrifying.

She would quietly go and end our child without saying a word.

Mrs. Harper came over, smiling as she brought me a bowl of her homemade walnut pudding.

But when she saw the report in my hand, her smile froze.

Her lips quivered, and she squeezed her eyes shut like she was bracing for a punch. She tried to take it away, but I held on. I asked why she didn’t tell me, and she just turned her head and softly said one thing.

“It must’ve been that time, when the condom broke. You’re still young—I don’t want to tie you down for life.”

I stared at her, feeling like I couldn’t breathe.

She introduced me to connections, planned my life, lay in my arms, calling me ‘little man’ again and again.

But she told me she never thought about spending her life with me.

I asked, “Am I really not good enough for you?”

She bit her lip and whispered, “Dummy, I’m not good enough for you.”

I was too immature. I yelled at her.

She stood still, quietly listening to me shout.

The calmer she was, the angrier I got. I slammed the table in frustration.

She just gently said, “Are you going to hit me?”

How could I ever hit her?

My heart was breaking.

I took the pregnancy report and stormed out.

But that move ended up ruining Mrs. Harper.

Internship day—for most trade school kids—is basically graduation day. Most won’t come back to school after.

And graduation day is confession day.

A lot of parents came to help pack up. Boys and girls were confessing to their crushes, with a crowd of people cheering them on, and the parents watching with big smiles.

My parents kept an eye on me, like they wanted to see if I liked any girls.

Mrs. Harper also came, but she didn’t talk to me. She just helped Kyle pack up, quietly waiting.

Kyle went around digging through people’s stuff. Whenever he found a love letter, he’d excitedly read it out loud. He didn’t have many friends, so he liked acting goofy to get attention from classmates.

But then, he found the pregnancy report in my bag.

The paper was folded, and Kyle thought it was a love letter. He shouted, “Wow, you wrote a love letter too!”

Time slowed. The classroom chatter faded. I saw Mrs. Harper’s face drain of color, her hand flying to her mouth.

All the classmates and parents looked our way. Mrs. Harper froze, her body trembling.

I rushed to stop Kyle, but he was already standing on the desk, drawing everyone’s attention.

He opened the report. His excited face suddenly went blank, the smile vanished, his face turned pale, and he stared at Mrs. Harper in shock.

Kyle fainted on the desk. The report fell with him, landing hard on the ground.

Everyone panicked and rushed over. The report lay beside Kyle, who’d split his head open and was bleeding.

A security guard tried to push through the crowd. Someone’s backpack got trampled. The smell of floor wax and cafeteria pizza hung in the air.

Mrs. Harper rushed to her son’s side, cradling his head, begging everyone to help get him to the hospital.

Parents and classmates crowded around her. Everyone saw the name and the contents on the report.

The usually strong and gentle Mrs. Harper was now sobbing uncontrollably.

I stumbled over, wanting to carry Kyle on my back, but Mrs. Harper seemed to lose it, slapping and clawing at me.

The woman I loved most had now completely turned into someone else.

She sat helplessly on the ground, wailing, “What did I ever do to deserve this?!”

Mrs. Harper’s slaps grew heavier.

No, those weren’t Mrs. Harper’s slaps, but my father’s fists, pounding my head again and again.

My mother also rushed at Mrs. Harper, grabbing her hair, spitting all over her beautiful face, cursing her as a shameless tramp.

All around us, the principal and a couple of teachers were trying to pull my parents off her. Someone was shouting about calling the cops. I could hear the school secretary dialing 911 from the hallway, her voice shaking. Mrs. Harper screamed as my mom clawed at her, and Tanya came running in from the parking lot, yelling at my father to get his hands off me. The fluorescent lights flickered overhead. For one awful, endless minute, everything was chaos—the slap of skin, the shouts, my father’s voice breaking as he kept yelling that I’d ruined my life, and Mrs. Harper curled up on the tile, sobbing. Outside, a siren wailed closer, and I could hear students whispering, filming it all on their phones. Somewhere in the middle of it, Mrs. Harper looked up at me—her mascara streaked, blood on her lip, her eyes empty—and I knew that nothing would ever be the same again.

Somewhere, a cop’s radio crackled. I realized I’d crossed a line I could never uncross.