A Hole in Juan (15 page)

The sight was a strong reminder of my own fragile financial sta-bility. If I left this job in a huff, I might soon have to find a begging corner of my own.

I wondered how much the man took in in a day.

As frightening as that idea was, this latest impasse felt like the proverbial
it,
as in “this is!”

Or the final straw.

The one that broke the camel’s back.

Or whatever cliché that meant too much, I’ve had it, can’t take it anymore. Those were shopworn because countless brethren had understood how simultaneously furious and bereft a person can feel.

It wasn’t as if I was being royally—or even adequately—

compensated for a job that deserved hazard pay.

But I did not want to go gently, either. I yearned to express my reasons as loudly as possible then flounce right out, but that seemed a breach of ethics. I might leave students cheering for my principles, but I’d also be leaving them in the lurch, which negated the worth of any high-minded dramatic exit.

I fumed and huffed and rehearsed speeches I knew I’d never give and circled the block half a dozen times. On one pass, I realized that Juan Reyes’s car was still parked behind the school. I didn’t know the protocol. Who removed a car in such a case? And should I feel guilty that I failed to remember the monogram and the broken headlight with either the paramedics or the obnoxious detective?

Changing my route, I studied the groups in the Square while I walked around it. As the weather cleared, more and more students had emerged from wherever they’d been waiting. I wanted to watch and feel heartbroken that I would soon sever my ties 117

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with them. I soon found myself observing their comings and go-ings, as if they were animals on the veldt and I was preparing a
National Geographic
documentary.

The subphylums kept to themselves, grade by grade, most often, girls and boys in separate clumps, but emissaries crossed the lines—scouts, spies, messengers, siblings, girlfriends, and boyfriends. I saw Ma’ayan hobnobbing with three girls in the junior class, Ben watching her and trying to keep his surveillance under her radar; a senior boy bear-hugging a sophomore girl who giggled the entire time; and two junior girls flirting so outrageously with classmates I could read their body language from across the street where I paced.

Visually eavesdropping distracted me from thoughts of hate-ful Havermeyer. I’d read that 65 percent of communication is nonverbal, done through posture, gestures, and facial expression; that seemed on the mark across the street.

The body language of the seniors who’d been giving me grief was languid, self-assured, and the occasional pokes and pushes were light and clearly meant as jests. They weren’t tightly grouped, but were placed so that they’d be aware of where everyone was, and of what was going on. And somehow, each seemed the prince of his fiefdom, each owned his share of the park.

When my eyes wandered from the boys, I saw the party mavens, Nita and Allie, interacting intensely once again. I wasn’t sure when I’d seen what, but I knew I’d seen tension between them lately.

This looked more acute. If I hadn’t known better, I’d have thought I was watching the prelude to a catfight. Allie leaned close to say something and Nita turned away while Allie’s mouth was still going. Allie grabbed Nita’s arm. Nita whirled, shrugging off the hand as she said something, her forehead wrinkling, her chin pushed out pugnaciously.

Allie’s hands flew up to her head, as if to contain the pain inside of it. Her shoulders rose, her mouth opened, and she looked GILLIAN ROBERTS

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to be shouting, although I couldn’t hear over the din of traffic and people. Her hair shook a
no-no-no-no
and she was the very picture of barely controlled rage.

Jimmy Manasco—he who was so proudly “the norm”—

strolled over to them. He wasn’t the easiest-to-love student. He’d been kicked out of parochial school for vague reasons I never knew. He passed his classes, but did little more, and he was a fine athlete. That, plus his parents’ wealth, would get him where he wanted to be.

His normal expression was petulant, and he spread a fog of vague unhappiness as he moved through life. He seldom participated in class, preferring to slouch in his seat, a mocking expression on his face, as if those who did speak up and contribute were his inferiors by virtue of their attempts.

But he was attractive and he’d scored the winning basket the week before, and that kept his virtual crown on his head.

Now, his stride toward the two girls perfectly expressed his arrogance, and though nobody had asked him to, and most likely, nobody wanted him to, I knew he was going over to referee. Nita put one hand up, signaling
stop,
but he continued, and then both girls spoke at once, waving their arms. At one point, Allie simply turned her back to him and covered her ears.

Fascinating. Who needed words? No wonder the homeless man had been upset. His body language had been saying “give me money” and I got stuck on the words of the printed sign.

The rest of the tennis boys now openly watched the two girls and Jimmy. Wilson and Erik had shifted so that they were within easy talking distance of each other, and I saw them exchange glances and an occasional word. Mike Novak stood apart from them, talking to an eleventh grade girl, but keeping his body turned so that he could watch as well. And Drew and Mark, the lesser dignitaries of the team, also stood silently watching.

As melodramatic as high school students tended to be, as overblown as every life crisis became, this had the look of some-119

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thing larger, something that applied to and affected the entire group of them.

I corrected myself because the entire group wasn’t engaged. It had taken me a minute to realize that Seth, an integral part of that ruling clique, was not part of his home team. He, like the cheese, stood alone. I’m not sure I would have noticed it if I’d only glanced over, because he was near enough to a cluster of other seniors, and he’d angled himself so that he could quietly observe. But out of all the boys with their casual stances, their heads cocked to one side, their hands in their letter jackets, Seth alone looked as if he was studying each word, lip-reading if that was possible.

Nita spun around and marched off, and Allie ran after her with Jimmy waving his hands and shouting something.

Did any of this have to do with the events of the day—the injury to the teacher they’d been harassing? Or the expulsion of Cheryl Stevens?

Probably not. Too much of a stretch, and too much animation and division of opinion over there. It was, in all likelihood, domestic and boring if seen up close, another of their operatic performances when somebody’s boyfriend misbehaved, or somebody wanted to wear the wrong thing to the party. However petty the topic, they’d made it a group issue in the past.

Better off not knowing what it was this time, I decided. I stood there, feeling foolish—and hungry now as well. I put my hands into my raincoat pockets, hoping for a long-forgotten pro-tein bar or mints, but instead, my hand touched paper. No surprise.

Too often, my pockets were the handiest wastepaper receptacles, and emptying them took on the look of an archaeological dig un-earthing my life through receipts, to-do lists, and junk mail.

This was none of those. I looked at the folded orange sheet of paper and had no memory of seeing it before, of putting it into the pocket of my raincoat.

Orange paper meant another notice about Friday’s dance, GILLIAN ROBERTS

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and I was ready to trash it until a quick glance made it clear this was not a routine announcement.

The words in thick black felt-tip marker felt like a slap: IT WAS NOT AN ACCIDENT!!!!!

WORSE IS GOING TO HAPPEN

SOMEBODY HAS TO STOP IT!!!!

I stood still, the paper in my hand, the letters dark scars across the orange surface, the words like muffled, semi-intelligible shouts.

Somebody had put this in my pocket today. Somebody who knew what Juan Reyes thought I knew, or could find out.

The seniors entering my room showed no sign of the passions that had raged in the Square. I wish I could believe I’d hallucinated the whole thing, including the note.

Before they were in their seats, they asked if there was news about Mr. Reyes, and I was surprised by how quiet they became, so intently waiting for a response that the air seemed charged. “I called the hospital,” Seth said. “All they’d say was his condition was critical. Is that true?”

I told them what Harriet had told me, though it added little.

“Anybody have any idea what happened in that room?”

The silence that followed my question was nothing like the hush before I’d answered them. This was heavy, like the air before an electrical storm.

It was finally broken by a half-growled: “Why would we know?”

I didn’t like the way Wilson had asked, but I tried not to read anything into it.

“The cops said it was an accident,” Erik added.

“I’m sure it was,” I said, now sure it wasn’t. The warning note 121

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I’d gotten felt confirmed because of the speed and manner of their replies.

“So how are we supposed to know about it, then?” Erik demanded.

“I meant what might have caused the accident. You’re learning chemistry and you know the lab and Mr. Reyes. Any theories?”

They reverted to a third variation on silence, this one the silence of those who have emotionally left the room. They offered nothing beyond shrugs and head shakes. It wasn’t the response I’d anticipate from people who truly knew nothing about the explosion. Why weren’t they speculating? Gossiping? Wondering?

Why were so many of them reacting the same way?

“Oh, no!” Juan Reyes had said just as his world exploded.

He’d known something. And he’d told the police my name. He thought I knew something as well—but what? I looked at the stone-faced seniors, wishing for X-ray vision.

I put the lab explosion on hold for the moment. The day’s repeated adrenaline floods were exhausting me, so I tried instead to focus on the more manageable mystery of who had stolen my exam.

I complimented them on how they’d done, while scanning the room to see if anyone reacted oddly. They looked their normal selves, which is to say, anxiously belligerent when about to receive test results.

I handed the exams back and watched relief, disappointment, and stolid acceptance shape their features, but nothing that I could interpret as suspicious.

But of course, that’s how it would be. They’d known since yesterday that I’d replaced the stolen exam. Of course they wouldn’t show surprise now. My after-the-fact sleuthing was ridiculous and the bottom line was that I’d never know who’d taken the exam or why.

We went over the questions. “I was particularly interested in that last question,” I said. “The one about the relevance of the GILLIAN ROBERTS

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Oedipus cycle. Your responses were varied, and you picked different aspects—commercial, psychological, and political.”

Though I didn’t say so out loud, some of the aspects picked were too creative, e.g., the one connecting Oedipus to Japanese anime and one to golf, and one gem that consistently discussed the “ancient Geeks.”

“I’m pointing that out because we’ve talked about how many levels and meanings great works of art contain, and I think your responses demonstrated that. Works written thousands of years ago can still touch us, and ethical or psychological issues that troubled the Greeks continue to trouble us today.”

I couldn’t completely disengage from a depressed, anxious awareness of what had happened today, and I felt as if my words to the class were partially rote.

“Yeah, right,” I heard. “Like we’re going to marry our mothers!” Two boys in the back of the room slapped hands, ducked, and laughed. I let it go. Even crude and stupid jokes about Oedipus were literary efforts and in the case of those two boys, a definite step forward, especially since one of them was the author of the paper about those ancient Geeks.

No matter how I felt—no matter how they felt—we seemed back on a fairly good classroom footing as long as we weren’t talking about Juan Reyes. Somebody brought up Antigone and the issue of civil rights and of the individual versus the state.

And while that may have taken my mind off Juan Reyes a bit, it bumped me smack into my noontime encounter with Maurice Havermeyer, which still burned and rankled.

I saw the headmaster’s bloated, angry face, and heard his twisted view of what freedom of speech meant. But given that I was about to quit because of his asinine behavior, what did I have to lose if I used the episode to teach them a final, bonus lesson, bringing the point home?

“If Antigone lived today, what do you think she’d be like?” I asked.

I knew they’d be happy to answer the question and entertain 123

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me, to delay moving on to the next unit, which involved long reading assignments. All kids love it when I veer off course and seem to have forgotten what we should be doing. They think it’s the result of their devious manipulation, when, in fact, most times, it’s something I’d planned all along.

This particular instance was spur of the moment, but it didn’t feel like a detour. It felt like a live demonstration of the ideas in the play they’d just read. We’d talked about Antigone’s civil disobedience, about her probable immaturity and rashness, about Creon’s intractability, about morality versus the law, the state versus the individual, fathers versus sons, Ismene as the “good girl”

and what that meant, about assigned gender roles then and now, about fear of breaking those roles. To me, that made my confrontation with Havermeyer right on topic.

They seemed bemused by my question. “If nobody messed with her, she’d be an ordinary housewife,” Drew said. And when he was hissed at, he defended himself. “I mean that’s where she was headed, only her brother was killed and not allowed to be buried.”

“Her personality would be the same, so somebody would have made her irate, especially today,” Patti Burton said. “More so today because women are allowed more freedoms.”