Read Between the Lines (29 page)

Then, interrupting her big moment, Nate Granger entered late. He waved his late pass and held up his hand as if he had a question, but on further inspection she realized he was holding it up because he had a splint on his finger. His middle finger.

Cal, sitting nearby, snickered.

“It’s Finger Boy!” someone whispered loudly as Nate took his seat.

He did look like he was giving them all the finger. She felt her mouth twist into a smirk. Good for him. She’d seen him bullied all fall. Now he had some respect. So long as he didn’t aim that finger at her.

She waited for him to sit and get settled, then looked at them all as they waited for whatever this something was she wanted to try. She felt a mixture of disgust and ownership, knowing it was up to her to change their ways. Up to her to make them respect her. Not out of fear, but because she’d earned it. She wanted, she realized, for them to like her.

But Ms. Lindsay was also realistic. She knew, at that moment, as one kid picked his nose without shame and another fiddled with her phone right out in the open even though it was against school rules and Allen Quimby mouthed the words
I want you
to the girl across the aisle — that they never would.

They just didn’t care.

“You know I have a soft voice,” Ms. Lindsay went on, trying to use a loud voice, “so from now on when I want your attention I’m going to do this.” Ms. Lindsay raised her hand in the Girl Scout pledge, just like the woman from her discipline workshop. As she did, she remembered the Girl Scout promise she made as a child.

On my honor, I will try to serve God and my country, to help people at all times, and to live by the Girl Scout Law.

If only she could remember the Girl Scout Law. Was the Girl Scout Law simply to try to serve God and her country, and to help people at all times? She wasn’t sure. She had failed as a Girl Scout, clearly. She’d only lasted two years. That was how long her mother had put up with taking her to all the meetings and sewing all the patches on her uniform sash and ironing her uniform and making sure she had the proper color knee socks. Until, in her mother’s words, it was too much, and Lynnette was “too old for that stuff anyway.”

The class continued to watch her intently, almost eagerly, as if they thought the moment had come at last when perhaps they had finally succeeded in driving her over the edge. Had they learned nothing from Mr. Weidenheff? Why was she so different? Instead of sympathy, grief, and sadness, there was satisfaction in their eyes. Glee. They were quiet. Waiting.

The moment was brief, but time had stopped.

She searched again for someone to connect with. Her eyes settled on Nate Granger.
Finger Boy.
He smiled at her, and she summoned one more ounce of courage.

She stared at her three fingers raised in the air and was surprised to have another quick childhood memory, this time of her mother, years ago, getting so upset with her father, she thought her mother’s eyes would pop out of their sockets. But even in her fit of rage, her mother could not bring herself to curse. “Read between the lines, Harold!” she’d hissed, holding up three fingers and glaring at him. Her father’s mouth dropped open first in shock, and then hilarity, as he burst out laughing at her ridiculousness. “Just say the words, you old fool!” he’d shouted back. “My God, you’re a prude.”

Her mother burst into tears. Her father made it clear he could care less. He pushed back his chair and stomped out of the room, leaving her mother sitting at the end of the table with her shoulders shaking, tears slipping down her cheeks. And quiet little Lynnette in the middle, with no idea what to do.

It wasn’t until the next day when she asked her best friend Rose what it could have meant that she learned her mother was giving her father the finger. And what giving someone the finger meant.

Ms. Lindsay looked at her three slender fingers facing the class. She looked at her students, staring back at her with curiosity and — could it be? — amazement. Slowly, she turned her hand from the pledge position to the sign her mother had used all those years ago.

Read between the lines, class
, she whispered in her head.
Ef you.

Yes, she really thought
ef
and not the F-word. Her mother had a big impression on her after all. She didn’t care that her father would laugh at her, too, if he could see her. To Ms. Lindsay, her mother had shown the greatest restraint. That was class. She stuck to her morals in the face of great adversity. And so, now, would Ms. Lindsay. She even felt some of her old Girl Scout pride. Was there a badge for that?

She held her three fingers firmly in the air and marveled at the silence and the curious looks on the faces of those who simply didn’t understand what they’d missed out on, if only they could have given her half a chance. She could have been a great teacher.
To Miss
,
with Love.
But no. They never even gave her a chance to try.

The little fuckers.

No.

No, she wouldn’t sink to Betsy’s low.

For now, she heard and repeated her mother’s words in her head instead.

Read between the lines, class.

“It means the F-word,” Rose had told her in a whisper.

“What does
that
mean?” innocent Lynnette had whispered back.

“It means I hate you,” Rose told her. And then, seeing the look of horror on poor Lynnette’s face at the thought of her mother telling her father she hated him, Rose changed her mind. “No, I mean, it means I’m really, really mad at you.”

Sweet Lynnette had nodded. “Oh,” she said, and accepted the misinformation for two more years, until she learned the true meaning of the rude gesture.

Read between the lines, class
, she thought again, knowing full well that she was more than really, really mad at them.

They looked at her, confused.

It felt good.

Did they know what she was doing? She was sure not. They simply continued to peer at her curiously and watch.

Read between the lines.

She hesitated another moment, for effect, and then slowly lowered her hand.

“Well,” she said happily. “Good. That seems to work.”

She turned and walked to her desk, trying not to smile. Trying not to laugh.

“Everyone get out your writing journals, please,” Ms. Lindsay instructed before she sat down.

To her amazement, they did.

Now, as she sniffs the lavender-scented sleeve of her bathrobe hopelessly, Ms. Lindsay feels guilty for giving her crowded class of bored teenagers the finger. She even starts to cry. For not being able to make a difference. For not even getting close to achieving the respect she’s worked so hard for, has hoped for, all her life. She cries, and then begins to run a hot bath, emptying the entire bottle of awapuhi shampoo into the water to surround herself with the smell — forget the useless lavender — and the Hawaiian memories of one good time. Of a time full of hope and wonder and being loved, if only superficially and for selfish purposes, by her grandmother.

She settles into the tub and leans back as the warm, comforting water slowly covers her body like a blanket. The sound of the water hides the chirp of her phone ringing in the next room. It is the school guidance counselor letting her know about the day’s happenings, so that she might be prepared to help the students cope tomorrow. She explains that Stephen Holland’s father had a heart attack and is in stable condition at Mount Ivy Hospital; that Jared French (the janitor, she notes, as if Ms. Lindsay might not know who he is) appears to have had some sort of mental break and was found on the side of the highway but was also taken to Mount Ivy Hospital for observation; and that Keith Sears had been hit by a car —
hit-and-run, the poor kid
— and wouldn’t be in school the next two days because he had a mild concussion. There is a pause and the sound of a breath being exhaled. Of disappointment perhaps, that Ms. Lindsay isn’t available to gossip about all of this with her. Maybe they could have bonded over it and become friends. “What a wacky day,” she says, to end the one-sided conversation. “We’ll have a faculty meeting first thing in the morning to discuss how to handle things. Have a good night!” But Ms. Lindsay won’t get the message until the next morning, when the night will already be over.

As the water rises to her neck, Ms. Lindsay closes her eyes, surrounded by the smell of her Hawaiian vacation memories. She sees that bartender in her mind’s eye, and this time he does not morph into Jared French and his ridiculous beard. No. He remains her beautiful Hawaiian boy, with his white-toothed smile, the dark dimples in the middle of his cheeks. His green, mischievous eyes.

I remember you
, she tells him, speaking into the sudsy water.

I remember.

I remember you.

I remember how you made me feel.

And in that moment, even though it is brief, she remembers just enough to feel that way again.

When she rises out of the water, the dream will float away with the fading scent of awapuhi, replaced with the reality that she will have to go back to school tomorrow. Back to the stares and the gossip and the not listening. But somehow, Ms. Lindsay remains hopeful, despite what she knows. She will drive to school and sit in the parking lot and make the same promise she always makes, even if she doesn’t necessarily believe it.

Today will be better.

She will stand in front of the class and hold up her three fingers to quiet them down, and for a moment she will think,
Read between the lines, class.

But then, as she looks at their unsuspecting, uninterested faces, she will start to think about what that really means. That just like there is more to her than what they see, there is more inside each one of them.

What’s your story?
she will wonder as she scans the room from face to face.

And this time, when she pleads with them to read between the lines, she will try to do the same.

I am grateful to my writing partners, Cindy Faughnan and Debbi Michiko Florence, for their love and support and valuable feedback. To Robin Wasserman, who forced me to send her chapters to prove I really was still working on this project I was writing “just for fun.” To my agent, Barry Goldblatt, who didn’t laugh when I told him my dream, but instead said, “Write it!” To my husband, Peter Carini, and my son, Eli Carini, who listened to my ideas and brainstormed with me through countless dinners. I love and appreciate you both so much. And finally, to my wonderful editor, Joan Powers, who embraced this project and always inspires me to tell it true, no matter what. Thank you for giving me the courage to write the stories my heart longs to tell.