The morning of June nineteenth dawned bright and beautiful.
It was the last school day of the year, but more important than that, it was Hannah’s birthday. She was nine years old today. Nine years old and this was going to be her first party. There had never been anyone to invite before.
As I ate breakfast I listened carefully to the weather report: 80 per cent chance of rain and thunderstorms by afternoon. But now, at eight in the morning, there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. It seemed like a good omen; the sun should shine on Hannah’s birthday.
She might never have had a party before, but this one was going to make up for it, in size anyway. The whole school was coming. A picnic on the last day was a tradition at the school, and now fate conspired to have Hannah’s birthday fall on that same day. All I had to do was help it along a little.
We had three cakes baked, all saying HAPPY BIRTHDAY, HANNAH in pink letters. We had candles, balloons, paper tablecloths, party hats, and presents. Patty and I had bought out Woolworth’s, and now we had a stack of brightly wrapped presents two feet high: bubble bath, crayons, pencils, paper, a colouring book, a jump rope, a pair of socks, a new shirt. I had been tempted by the goldfish and the gerbils but, remembering Cougar, I’d passed them up in favour of a small gold heart on a thin gold chain set with a red stone to match Hannah’s ring from the dentist.
The rest of the presents could wait till lunch, but I handed her the little package with the necklace as soon as she came to school.
‘Happy, happy birthday, Hannah,’ I said, hugging her and then fastening the chain around her neck.
‘Is beautiful, teacher. Just like dentist doctor ring.’
‘Just like your heart,’ I said. ‘Only yours is bigger.’
But Hannah couldn’t bear to get a present and not give one. She searched the room for something to give me – until she spotted the little bottle of teeth that still sat on my table. Happily she trotted to get them and brought them back to me.
‘Here. My tooths from dentist doctor. You keep.’ Her smile lighted the whole corner of the room. ‘Forever,’ she said.
Everyone gathered in the parking lot at eleven o’clock. There were thirty or forty of us: children, teachers, volunteers, the Director, even some of the mothers and younger brothers and sisters. Henry was there with a bunch of his prettiest roses.
Mrs Rosnic was meeting us at the park with Helen and the ice cream.
‘Boy!’ I whispered to Hannah. ‘What a party you’re going to have!’
Hannah was radiant, her cheeks flushed with excitement, her eyes bluer than ever, matching her new dress. The boys were almost as excited as Hannah.
‘Did you bring the cake, Mary? Did you?’
‘Shh, it’s a surprise. Of course.’
‘And the candles? Did you get nine candles?’
‘Yes. Even more. Stop worrying, Bri. We’ve got everything.’
And it truly seemed as if we did. When we got to the little state park, the children tumbled out of the cars and ran across the grassy fields down to the lake. Wild ducks had made the lake their own reservation and now they squawked in surprise at the arrival of the children. But we had brought bags of bread crusts and the birds quitened as the children fed them.
Mothers and teachers took turns watching the children and unpacking the food. Brian, Rufus, and I sat on one of the picnic tables blowing up balloons, handing them out to whoever wanted one.
I loved to see the children running free, some down by the lake, some across the fields, some just carrying food from the car. The green fields were splashed with the colours of the children’s clothes and the bright blue sky was dotted with balloons. I blinked my eyes to focus, to snap the shutter of my mind; it was a picture I would like to keep forever.
At lunch we ate our sandwiches. Hannah ate, too – daintily, almost elegantly. We toasted Hannah with our lemonade and then carried in the birthday cakes – all three, each with ten candles. Nine for each year and one to grow on.
Ah, Hannah. One to grow on.
Hannah blew out the candles, one cake at a time, and Mrs Rosnic stood beside her dishing ice cream into paper bowls. It was hard to tell which one looked happier. I suddenly realised that in all the times I had seen Mrs Rosnic, I had never seen her smile before. Now, wreathed in happiness, their faces were amazingly alike, and I went and stood beside them.
Hannah’s hair was soft and clean and shone like a polished penny. The skin on her arms, neck, and face was smooth and creamy and just now her cheeks were pink with excitement. Her eyes were the same startling combination of blues – a light cornflower blue on the surface, then darker layers underneath, down to a vivid deep blue. Hannah had always had an easy, airy grace, but now her new slenderness and new clothes added a delicacy and charm. Hannah seemed prettier to me than any Blue Fairy could ever be.
Mrs Rosnic touched my arm, still smiling, and gestured towards Hannah, whispering, ‘Who could have thought! Is so pretty!’
I smiled too – who could help it? – and whispered back, ‘Yes, she is, and so are you.’
After lunch we rode back to the school packed between balloons, remnants of potato chips, paper, and ribbon. Hannah had folded each piece of paper and ribbon, refusing to give up even the tiniest scrap.
Mrs Rosnic left for home directly from the picnic. I had said to Hannah, ‘You can leave now too, lovey. You don’t need to come all the way back to school.’
But Hannah shook her head and climbed into her usual spot in the front seat, with Rufus, Brian, and Jamie in the back. She had parted with her presents and the remains of the cake; Mrs Rosnic had these carefully stored in her car. Hannah evidently wanted one last ride with the boys before the year ended – and so did I. This was the last time I would ride surrounded by the children, and I drove as slowly as I could, savouring each second.
We were late. The buses and cars and even Brian’s taxi were already lining up in the driveway when we got back to school.
There was a distant rumble of thunder as we ran down to our room. The Director was calling, ‘Hurry up, now, children. It’s time to go. Your buses are waiting.’
I piled the children’s arms with the paintings and papers they had done during the year. Hannah had so many, she had to make two trips. Then they gathered on the little stoop outside our classroom and I kissed each one, each special one.
‘Listen, now,’ I said, ‘you have a good summer and a good year. I’m probably going to be going to school myself in the fall, so I won’t be seeing you for a while. But I’ll be thinking about you and I know you’ll be doing just fine.’
The thunder was louder; the drivers were honking; fall was a long way off. The news that I wouldn’t be back scarcely seemed important.
‘Go on now,’ I said. ‘Hurry, before the rain comes.’
The children ran for their buses, arms overflowing with papers, still calling goodbyes.
The bus drivers were jockeying for position in line, eager to have the children board, anxious to leave before the storm broke.
Rufus was in the first bus, waving happily with Jamie beside him. Brian was in a taxi, just a little farther on, his sweet, intelligent face pressed tight against the window.
I took a step out from the door. ‘Good luck, Bri. Good luck in school.’
He nodded, pressing his face tighter against the rolled-up window, almost managing a smile. And then he too was gone.
Hannah? Where was she? There were only two buses left and they were starting to move now, the other children still calling their goodbyes through half-open windows. I stood on the stoop, searching for Hannah, for one last glimpse of her. And then suddenly I saw her.
She was kneeling on a seat by the window. As she passed our door, she called out. Her voice mingled with the other children’s as they shouted their farewells: ‘Goodbye, Patty. Goodbye, Mary. Goodbye, Ellen, ’Bye, teacher …’
But I heard, or thought I did, one high sweet call above the rest, ‘Goodbye, now. Goodbye now,
lovey.’
Epilogue
I have never gone back to the school – it would have been too painful for me and unfair to the children – but I kept track of them for a long time.
Brian finished high school and got a job on a small newspaper. His memory for batting averages, names, and records was put to good use in the sports department.
Rufus grew to almost six feet tall; completed high school and got good grades. During the summers he works as a junior counsellor at a camp for handicapped children.
Jamie lived at home for a long time and went to a prevocational training programme preparing for a sheltered workshop.
Hannah moved south. Grandpa died and Mrs Rosnic sold the house and headed for Florida with the three children to join her longtime friend, Hannah’s godmother. Hannah entered a day school with a good reputation for helping children with emotional problems. At first she was put in a class headed by a male teacher, but she grew silent and withdrawn. Then she was transferred, and under the tutelage of a young, capable woman, Hannah once again began to grow. At last report, her progress was good. She has developed a talent for working with the younger children and often assisted in the primary grades, particularly the dance classes.
I finished college with a bachelor’s degree in education and then a master’s in learning disabilities. I continued to work with children, primarily those with emotional or learning problems, in both public school and private practice.
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Chapter One
There were 152 miles between the city and Falls River and from there another 23 miles to Pecking. All of it was prairie, wide flat, and open, interrupted only by the interstate. There were towns along the way, of course, although “town” was a rather grand description for most of them. The names, however, were always hopeful: Harmony, New Marseilles, Valhalla.
I’d alloted myself two and a half hours to cover the distance, setting off in the early morning darkness with an egg salad sandwhich and a thermos of coffee. Given no nasty surprises in the January weather, I anticipated reaching Pecking by eight.
For much of the way mine was the only car on the road. In and around Falls River there was the bustle of rush hour traffic, but otherwise, nothing disturbed the white emptiness of the plains for mile after mile. A faint breeze eddied powderlike snow across the highway, making the tracks of my tires disappear in a white sky. A litter of sundogs scampered in an arc around it. Passing through one small town, I peered down the main street. The time-and-temperature sign read –38°.
I was born and bred in the Montana Rockies, and my heart had remained in wide, wild places. Despite the enjoyable stimulation of city living, I found the confinement, the dirt, and especially the noise, oppressive. Consequently, what absorbed me most as I drove across the snow-covered prairie that January morning was not thoughts of the new life which lay ahead but rather a simple sense of unbridled freedom. I’d escaped from the city. I was alone with all that silent space around me, and the sense of deliverance it gave me verged on the ecstatic. I don’t believe I actually thought about where I was going at all.
Fact was, it probably wasn’t so much a case of not thinking as daring not to think. After nearly three years as a research coordinator and therapist at the Sandry Clinic, I’d thrown it all over in one wholly impulsive moment. Opening the Sunday newspaper one weekend before Christmas, I’d seen an advertisement for a special education teacher to fill a midyear vacancy in a class for the behaviorally disordered. A perfectly straightforward ad. Straightforward enough response, too. I saw it and I wanted it.
The strange part was that I hadn’t been looking for a new job at the time. I hadn’t even been thinking of looking. My time at the Sandry had been thoroughly enjoyable and professionally fulfilling. Staffed by seven psychiatrists and a handful of specialized psychologists like myself, the clinic was small, private, and pleasantly situated. I’d been taken on mainly for research expertise and for my experience in treating children with language-related psychological problems. In the years that followed, I’d often worked very hard and certainly there’d been a fair share of ups and downs, but the challenges had been worth it. I really did think I was happy there. Nothing available on a conscious level had clued me in to any desire to chuck the large, airy therapy room full of toys, the genial group of colleagues, and the stimulating research for another chance to gird my loins in denim and crawl around on some dusty classroom floor for the kind of money that would have paid traveling expenses at the clinic. But the Siren called and without a backward glance, I responded.
Like so many other little communities I’d passed through on my drive from the city, Pecking was in a state of sleepy decay. The wide, tree-lined streets testified to a time before the railroad had pulled out, before the interstate had passed it by, but now it stood, a wan ghost of small-town America, its A&W root beer stand still there but abandoned, its “Drink Coca-Cola” girl still gamely smiling from her faded mural on the side wall of the savings-and-loan building. The downtown district was virtually gone, all the big stores having moved to the shopping mall in Falls River. There was still a bank and a drugstore, a couple of cafés, a real estate agent, and a gas station on Main Street, and around the corner on First Street, a ranch store that sold saddles, boots, and hats, but there was no shopping district. What was available in Pecking had relocated far out on the southern fringe in an effort to tempt drivers from the interstate. A “shopping center” had been built there a few years before, and it consisted of a supermarket, another drugstore, and a parking lot so spacious it could no doubt have accommodated every car within five miles of Pecking and then some.
The school was on a side street two blocks over from Main. Built in 1898, it had once been the Pecking high school. The beautifully carved wooden plaque attesting to this status still hung above the door, although the word “High” had long since been puttied in. I didn’t know how many schools there must have been in Pecking during its heyday, but this was all that was left now. An enormous monstrosity built from local sandstone, it housed grades K to six and the only special education classroom in the district.
“Good morning!” came a cheerful voice as I ascended the broad stone steps. One of the double doors swung open for me, and there stood Glen Tinbergen, the principal. “Getting settled in?”
“Just about,” I replied and stamped snow from my feet. “But I don’t get the keys to the apartment until Friday, so I’ve come down from the city this morning.”
“Good gracious. All the way from the city this morning?” He was a tall man, and thin, wearing a gray suit. I guessed him to be in his midforties, although he had one of those soft, mild faces that could be any age. His smile was welcoming. “Well, I do hope you get settled in all right. Hope you find Pecking just what you want. We’re so glad to have you.” We started down the hallway. “I’ll introduce you to the staff at lunchtime, but for now, I’m sure you’re anxious to get to your room. It’s all ready for you.”
My new classroom was on the second floor, last room on the left. I hadn’t seen it previously. They’d been in an understandable hurry to fill the vacancy, and I was too far away to manage anything more than the interviews and an afternoon’s apartment hunting; so I was braced for the worst, knowing only too well the penchant principals had for sticking their special classes into libraries, ex-closets, or other unaccommodating places. What a pleasant surprise when I discovered myself in a spa
cious corner room with large windows running along two adjacent walls to give a panoramic view of the snowy schoolyard and the ancient elms bordering it. The room had been laid out carefully in an orderly but welcoming fashion, and my heart warmed to my predecessor. I knew nothing about her nor why she had left so unexpectedly, just before the Christmas holidays, and I hadn’t felt I should pry, since no one offered any information; however, judging from the friendly look of the room, I was sure I would have liked her.
Adjacent to the room was an old-fashioned cloakroom with lines of coat hooks running down opposite walls and long, narrow benches beneath for sitting on to remove boots and such. The teacher’s desk had been pushed in at one end of the cloakroom, and this idea impressed me. I’d never known what to do with a desk I could rarely sit at, and this seemed a nice solution to keeping it out of the way, yet accessible. Pulling open one of the bottom drawers, I dropped my sack lunch into it.
“Of course, you can change things to suit your taste,” Mr. Tinbergen said as I removed my jacket and hung it on one of the hooks. “We’ve kept everything the way Mrs. Harriman had it, just for the kids’ sakes. And for the substitutes’. Three whole weeks of ’em. The kids. God bless ’em, have had a lot to put up with. Been hard on them. How many substitutes have there been? Eight? Nine? I’ve lost count – too many, that’s for sure. So I’ve tried to keep things familiar. But it’s your room now. If you want to change things around, feel free.”
Mr. Tinbergen had migrated back into the main classroom and was pushing chairs in around the several small tables dotted around the room to make a tidier arrangement. “Do you want me to stay? To introduce you to the kids?”
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