Larkin moved into the doorway and studied the room. He’d been inside public schools plenty since his marriage, but was accustomed to the bright colors and homey elements that Noah incorporated into his class layout. In contrast, Mr. Reynold’s room was about as friendly as a prison cell: off-white walls, more of the same fluorescent overheads, two large windows with the typical security grating, and a few laminated posters with generic tips and tricks of the English language, as well as one featuring phrases used today that were popularized by Shakespeare, which actually appeared to have been a student project that’d simply outlasted its classmates’ longevity on the wall. The whiteboard was a mess of half-erased talking points on two or three different subjects—previous classes, Larkin concluded—and the clunky steel desk on the opposite end of the room, with the filing cabinet to its back, would belong to Mr. Reynold.

“Yo, who’s that?” a boy asked.

Larkin glanced at the rows of desks—the sort with the blue seat, metal basket underneath that no one used, and attached arm and desktop—and the thirty-two students inhabiting them. Teenagers sat sideways in order to talk with a friend across the aisle, one sat on the desktop itself, three more heads were down and taking the opportunity to nap.

“He’s a cop,” another kid answered. “I can tell he’s packin’.”

“Everyone settle down,” Widalski said. “Tyrone, off the desk—this is a classroom, not a jungle gym.”

Larkin turned his head enough so he could speak to Doyle standing behind him, but didn’t take his eyes off the class. “There are far too many students in here.”

“Welcome to an underfunded public school,” Doyle murmured.

Widalski waited until the teenagers had settled down before asking, “Where’s Mr. Reynold?”

“He weren’t here when the bell rang,” a girl in the second row said as she ran fingers through the hair pulled over one shoulder.

“Wasn’t here,” Widalski corrected. “This is AP English, Leslie.”

Larkin took a step into the room and asked Widalski, “When did the period begin.”

She checked her watch and said, “About ten minutes ago.”

Larkin considered the answer, moved around Widalski, and approached Reynold’s desk. He scanned the content littering its surface: computer monitor; keyboard; mouse; desk phone; empty water bottle missing the cap; coffee cup repurposed to hold pens, pencils, and a variety of markers; a clipboard with nothing clipped to it; stacks of colored folders stuffed with turned-in homework; a teaching-themed page-a-day calendar that hadn’t been torn away since Friday, April 24.

—living room dark but for the fairy lights and harsh flicker of the television, Larkin stretched out on the couch, and Doyle’s longer body curled up against him, one leg hanging precariously over the side, the other tangled with Larkin’s—his once-partner fast asleep after an exhausting week—