The Love We Choose

Chapter 65

Lynne was exhausted, yet again. Pulling into her driveway, she turned off her car and just sat for a few minutes before dragging herself into the house. Her body felt heavy, not just because of the pregnancy, but the situation that she was dealing with post-meeting with Alicia earlier in the afternoon.

It had been over a week since her meeting with Strauss, and her plans to meet with Alicia had been postponed to the end of the next week after an infidelity issue between an Elementary Teacher and a member of the board of trustees came to light. The wife of the aforementioned board member showed up on campus property and confronted the 3rd Grade Teacher in the parking lot. Suffice it to say, the police were involved, and counseling services had to be scheduled for the students who witnessed it happen during their dismissal time. The fallout hadn't been pretty, and they were still sifting through the truth as the rumors of the couple meeting and conducting their affair on school grounds, in classrooms, her apartment, and his penthouse had spread like wildfire. A few mentions of the incident were covered in the local newspapers and had made it onto the nightly news. A negative PR nightmare such as this one so close to the annual gala where donation money hung in the balance was not ideal.

To top things off, Lynne had been dealing with spontaneous nosebleeds as a new pregnancy side effect. She had been walking and talking with Ava when it happened the first time in the hallway. Covering her nose with her hand, Lynne had to dash into the student bathroom, leaving a small trail of bloodied droplets in her wake. After she had gotten it under control a few minutes later, she washed her face and exited the bathroom like nothing had happened.

"What the hell was that?" Ava whisper-asked her, concern written large over her face as they resumed their walk back to Lynne's office. "You were bleeding like someone punched you in the nose."

"Well, obviously I wasn't. You were there. Come on, I gotta report this to Custodial Services so it can get properly cleaned."

"Already did that while you were in the bathroom."

"You're the best. My nasal passages are probably dried out from the heat being turned on in the building. It's been so cold outside that they have been combating the icy feel by keeping the temperature at almost 70."

"If you say so," Ava responded, leaving the subject where it was.

Since that first nosebleed, they had been happening more frequently at the most inopportune moments both at home and at work. Two nights back-to-back, she woke up with blood on her pillow. Once it happened while she was grocery shopping; she took to keeping a packet of tissues in her pocket at all times. After it happened during the weekly administration meeting, rumors started to fly around the staff about her health. Of course, this was all unbeknownst to her until Xavier asked her, on one of the lunches he joined her and Ava on, if it was true she had cancer. After she quelled his concerns, she told him the truth of the matter. He shared with her his congratulations and the extent of what had been going around the school's gossip train. Essentially, her health.

A few days later, she received a request to head to Alicia's office in the HR Department. Assuming that it was a last-minute change to their meeting scheduled for the end of the week, Lynne grabbed her files and notebook for Re-Accreditation and headed over to Alicia's office.

Unfortunately, Alicia wasn't interested in cross-checking that they were in alignment with the collection of files and information. Her focus was on Lynne. And just like Xavier, it seems that the rumor mill had made its way to Alicia. However, where Xavier had been concerned that Lynne was dying, HR had other thoughts in mind.

"Now Lynne, we can talk about Re-Accreditation later. I need to talk to you about something that has been brought to my attention. There's no way to say this other than to come out and say it. We have cause to believe that you are engaging in behaviors that are in violation of the morality clause in the Abundant Life Academy contract."