Bob’s High School English Teacher: Alicia McDaniel

Alicia was tired. Since the accident last year she’d had to start using a cane and she knew pretty damn well that that was only the harbinger of things to come. Her own mother had eventually succumbed to the one/two punch of Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s the previous year, and she was certain that that’s what lay ahead of her.

The new school year starts tomorrow. My last year.

The thought of retirement would have been abhorrent even six months ago, but now she found that she was actually excited to not have to get up in the morning. Running a hand through her pixie cut salt and pepper hair, she returned her attention to finalizing lesson plans.

After ten minutes of staring at the page and making no headway, she got up and went to the kitchen to pour herself a drink. Three fingers of Bushmill’s White label.

It’s five o’clock somewhere.

The first sip of the golden fluid was all it took to notice something off.

Her last conscious memory was the glass shattering on the floor as darkness overtook her.

Now that’s how you age well.

Heidi looked over her newest charge and could understand what Bob had seen in her all those years ago. The handsome near-senior citizen must have been a very attractive woman when the new Master had known her.

Three down. Four to go.