Stupid woman.

I want to beat some sense into her and hug her at the same time.

She's so stubborn and weird.

But, on the other hand, just standing by her side and looking at her feels like home.

It hurts me to see her so upset. I wish I could touch her hand and calm her. That always works with other women, and, believe me, I've had my fair share of volunteers to refine the method. I'm an expert in being gentle and firm at the same time.

But I'm afraid it would only make things worse. She doesn't like to be touched without warning. Or even after a warning, from what I've noticed. But it might just be Mint she hates. That would be logical of her. She is the most rational person in the world, after all.

So it's decided. It's just Mint.

Still, I don't dare to try, but at least I take the child from her hands. She will have a delayed onset muscle soreness from rocking such a big boy for such a long time, I'm afraid.

She allows me, and she also tells me that he's called Tobey. I think that's a good sign. She trusts me with one of her lambs, as if we were a family. Mother, father, and... a lamb. Or two? Okay, let's not go into unnecessary details. It's confusing.

Her classroom seems like a cozy place. The furniture is arranged in a special way, and I'm a hundred percent sure that it's the safest place in the country for children. I nod appreciatively. Gabriel notices, and she rewards me with a faint little smile.

I almost drop poor Tobey. It feels like being in one of those movies, all slow-motion, in a very long, miraculously extended, meaningful moment. Not in one of those stupid Bonds, where bullets fly for minutes so that they can duck them, rather in an even more stupid romance, where people just look at each other, and their fate is intertwined for eternity.

"Nice place. I bet the kiddos like it here."

It's Mint. The slow-motion stopper asshole. The plot-wise unnecessary third wheel. I need him around as much as a warm shit in my pocket.

Gabriel smiles at him, too. As if he was a person, not a plague, more dangerous than the virus itself.

It's time to make her see what he is. What he has become.

"I doubt their new teacher would keep it like this," I say.

"What do you mean?" Mint asks.

The man has some nerve. What a hypocrite!

"After you killed Gabriel," I answer nonchalantly. "That's why you came here, right?"

"I didn't kill her in the end," he points out.

"But you tried," I remind him. "You targeted her!"

"You targeted her too, just a day ago!"

"But I didn't really want to kill her!

"Anyone can say that," he retorts.

"Exactly. No one believes you!"

"I threw up," he says, sounding positively proud of his performance.

"Yeah," I snap. "Maybe I would throw up too if I was serious about killing her! Because you were serious. And I wasn't!"

I see Gabriel rolling her eyes.

"You two are so much worse than my class," she complains. "Hey Miss, Tobey bit Zoe, but hey, Zoe pooed on his shoes first, but no, it wasn't Zoe, it was Bob's invisible friend, and so on. Do you know what I usually do to bickering children?"

Mint gulps visibly. He probably has ideas. And I have too. But Tobey doesn't let her keep us in suspense.

"She makes us sit on the thinking chair!" he informs us.

Gabriel rolls her eyes again. The little snitch really should be more careful with her.

"I send them to the gym," she tells us. "To rectify their problems with each other."

"In a peaceful way?" I guess. "Do you tell them to talk it over?"

"No," she says, sounding absolutely serious. "I tell them that there can be only one."

"So that's why you took our guns," Mint sighs. "Clever."

"You're clearly unable to talk like civilized people do," she says. "So I expect you to be back when you can."

Mint nods, and I follow him to the gym. It's quite big for such a small kindergarten.

When he hits me, it feels almost nostalgic. No one can hit like Mint. His right uppercut is unequaled. Then, I kick him in the knee. It slows him down a bit. That's his weak point. He was injured there when we went against that Thai weapon cartel.

He loses his balance for a second but still doesn't fail to land another devastating blow to my stomach. I can't help but bend. If he had his gun, I would be dead at this point. But Gabriel would never let us kill each other, so he doesn't have one. And neither do I.

I leap without straightening. Mint wasn't expecting this, I can tell. It's closer to his fighting style than mine.

The next moment we're rolling on the ground, trying to strangle each other, exchanging blows, and cursing profusely, using words that are certainly not suitable for the place. It's fucking exhausting. In a few minutes, we slow down, and in a few more, we're lying side by side, panting, beaten up, feeling too worn down to continue.

"You're still good," Mint admits.

"You're not exactly out of trim either, bro," I tell him.

We practically crawl back to the classroom. To avoid the shame of walking on all fours, we need to lean on each other.

"You look much calmer now," Gabriel praises us in a gentle tone when we arrive back. We don't thank her.

By the way, I couldn't say the same about the children. They're still running around like crazy.

"When will they sleep?" I ask Gabriel, trying not to sound like the total unbeliever I am. But it's still quite evident that my only honest guess would be never.

"It takes time," she says.

"Why don't you use that incomprehensible codeword on them?" I ask her.

She looks at me as if I've advised her to send them to the gym, in all seriousness, like us, to beat each other to a pulp.

"Code words are for emergency," she explains.

"This looks like an emergency situation to me," I retort.

"The only emergency I detect is your acute lack of basic geographic knowledge. I needed a codeword that is rarely said by chance and incomprehensible for the children. Not for someone who has finished elementary school. You did that, didn't you?"

Okay, I must admit that she's better at comebacks. And idiot Mint enjoys seeing me burn a little too much.

"Managua is the capital of Nicaragua," he chimes in. "I've been there."

"Were you recruiting?" I sneer at him.

He loses his arrogant smile at once. He takes a deep breath.

"Another round in the gym?" Gabriel offers.

"Um... how do you plan to make them sleep?" Mint asks, a little too fast. It's my turn to smirk with my nose in the air.

"I'll sing," Gabriel answers as if it was understood.

And she does. Hakuna matata.

She has a terrible monotone voice.

It feels so good to listen to her. Like being home. Like being safe again.

I nearly fall asleep myself.