Meredith put her phone on the counter and ladled a scoop of oatmeal into a bowl. “Maybe their parents don’t know about the negative side effects of caffeine,” Meredith said. “That’s what you get for having a mom who’s up to date on medical research.” She winked at Sadie.
When Meredith herself had been a seventh grader, she’d poured gritty coffee into a perma-stained travel mug and taken the city bus to school most mornings. Her mom worked the earliest shifts at the nursing home, sometimes catching a double to cover groceries and gas. With the basics to worry about, she hadn’t had time to think about what it meant to start drinking coffee at twelve, even though she’d been a nurse.
But Meredith did consider caffeine. Even though she worked thirty hours per week as a physical therapist, she also made time to think about both Sadie’s protein consumption and her science grade. Meredith grabbed her phone again and felt her jaw drop as she looked at Sadie’s most recent test score.
“Sadie!” she shouted before she could decide whether it would traumatize her daughter.
Sadie dropped her spoon, the metal clanking against the side of her bowl. “What?”
“What the hell happened on the unicellular and multicellular organism test?” Meredith felt her forehead again, stretching the wrinkle. “Fifty-six?” Probably, Meredith thought, Mr. Robinson had made an error in reporting. And also, why did I say “hell”?
Sadie picked up her spoon again. “Yeah,” she said calmly. “I just totally bricked that.” She pushed an overflowing spoonful of oatmeal in her mouth and chewed, her cheeks puffed.
“Sorry for saying ‘hell.’” Meredith and Bill had agreed ages ago to watch their language, but the shock of the 56 overwhelmed her. “Fifty-six?” she said again to Sadie. “That’s the lowest grade you’ve ever gotten in your life. Is it a mistake?”
Once she’d swallowed, Sadie lifted her napkin to her face and dabbed at her eyes, though Meredith couldn’t see any tears. “Sorry, Mom,” Sadie said. “I’m not quite sure what happened. I saw it last night before I went to bed.”
Meredith blinked. So, Sadie had known about the failing grade and not mentioned it. “Why didn’t you tell me?” Meredith sat next to her at the table and put her hand over her daughter’s wrist.
Sadie sniffled again, but her eyes were definitely dry. “I guess I was hoping it would just go away overnight. You wouldn’t have to know.”
Meredith squeezed. “Sadie, that’s silly. It’s right here.” She waved her phone over the oatmeal bowl. “In this day and age, it’s impossible to keep a secret.”
Alice Sullivan
Alice peeked into the second-grade classroom again and tried not to frown at Miss Miller. She looked at the time on her phone, 8:52, and finally admitted to herself that it had been foolhardy to schedule a conference just ahead of her walk-through at the Kerrigans’ new house. She had precisely twenty-five minutes to catch up on Adrian’s social and academic development. Meanwhile, it didn’t look like the teacher was even close to wrapping up with Eloise and Jean-Luc Bisset, who were already over their time by seven critical minutes.
Alice texted Patrick. “Not going to make it?” She’d known his absence had been a possibility, and he hadn’t replied to her reminder.
“I’ve been Sachman’d,” he wrote back. Senior partner Alan Sachman’s whims had shaped Alice and Patrick’s life for a full nine years since Patrick had joined his law firm. She sighed. They both knew there was no way around a Sachman directive. Many a missed appointment and even one canceled family vacation to Naples, Florida had taught them that. Patrick was about to start spending weeks at a time in Cincinnati because of Sachman, handling a trial for a case he’d been working on for years. He’d only be home on weekends. It annoyed her, sure, but they agreed Patrick’s partnership at Sachman Feldstone was a solid investment in the future, a future in which they’d pay two rounds of college tuition and slowly remodel their 1925 two-story. Alice peeked into Adrian’s classroom again, this time achieving meaningful, but she hoped friendly, eye contact with Miss Miller, who held up a finger, making her wait just as Nadia had in the coffee shop.
Alice perused the student work hanging in the hallway. She found Adrian’s stilted seven-year-old handwriting on a detailed drawing of a spider, its hairs sticking out wildly from its body. Alice smiled and raised her phone to take a photo. Adrian had always loved insects. Arachnids, she corrected herself, in the case of this black widow. Adrian had lectured her just the previous week on people’s too-common miscategorization of spiders. Alice scanned some other drawings and saw similarly wobbly lines and eraser marks on the labels for the body parts.
But as she stepped to the right to check out another row of drawings, her smile fell. Were the other kids spelling better than Adrian was? Adrian had skipped the “c” in “black,” and replaced an “e” for an “a” in “fangs.” Harriet McMillan, who always looked like she belonged in the Crew Cuts catalog, had managed “cephalothorax” on her drawing of a crayfish with nary an erase mark. Alice frowned at a cross section of a sea urchin by Esme Bisset with “cortical granules” written in neat, straight printing. She walked back to Adrian’s picture, her letters angling up and to the right, the tails of each “s” trailing off in wispy pencil snakes.
Alice touched her daughter’s writing as the Bissets finally exited the classroom, all beatific smiles and apologies for running over. At the same time, her phone buzzed with an incoming text message. Maybe, she hoped, Bea Kerrigan was running late.
“It’s okay.” Alice rushed by the Bissets and glanced at her phone. The message was not from the Kerrigans, but rather from a number she didn’t recognize. “Sorry to be awkward,” it began, “but Teddy”—Alice bristled as she slid the message open—“has got to lay off at school. Can’t you do something about this?”
“Sorry to keep you waiting,” Miss Miller said as Alice gaped at her phone. Can Teddy lay off what? And who’d sent this? She’d forward it to Meredith as soon as she made it back to the car, she decided. Meredith would know. Nadia’s warning flashed into her head then, the way she’d repeated “feud” over coffee. Miss Miller cleared her throat, and Alice plopped the phone down on the miniature table.
“Sorry,” she mumbled. “I got a little ambitious with my own schedule this morning. I’ve got about twenty minutes.” She winced then, wishing she could redo her whole entrance. If she were a second grader herself, Miss Miller would certainly correct her distracted behavior.
Alice awkwardly crossed her ankles as she shifted in the tiny chair. “Then we’ll talk fast,” Miss Miller said, smiling now. “First of all, I just want to tell you what a delight it’s been to get to know Adrian.” She looked up from her folder, eyes sparkling. For a second-year teacher, Miss Miller projected a comforting confidence. Alice settled in for another round of accolades. “Adrian is warm and hilarious, and many of the children seek her out as a playmate and work partner.”
A familiar swell of pride grew in Alice’s chest. Of course Miss Miller loved Adrian. Everyone did. In fact, none of the kids’ teachers had ever reported anything but that the Sullivans were pleasant and capable.
That was why Alice startled so visibly when the fresh-faced teacher uttered her next word: “But.” Either that word or the sudden vibration of her cell phone on the tabletop beside her made her jump.
“I’m sorry.” Alice quickly moved to decline the call and noticed that the ID read “Elm Creek Junior High.” “Shit,” she said.
“Excuse me?” Miss Miller’s smooth cheeks took on a blush.
“I’m so sorry,” Alice blurted. “It’s my son’s school.” She stared at the phone case and repeated that mystery text to herself. “Can’t you do something about this?” She rubbed her collarbone again. “I’ll call them when we’re finished. Go on.” Alice pointed to the manila folder under Miss Miller’s hands, the evidence behind the teacher’s disconcerting “but.”
“Concerns about her academic skills?” Alice repeated vacantly, a faint hum in her ears. She reached for a piece of paper from the stack the teacher had in the middle of the table. “Can I have one of these?” she asked, not waiting for an answer. Along with the paper, she grabbed a black felt-tip from Miss Miller’s wire mesh cup. Alice wrote, “Academic skills.” “What are your concerns?” She realized her tone was brusque, but she didn’t have time to correct it.
“I’m primarily concerned with Adrian’s reading.” Alice wrote “Reading” on her paper and put a little bullet point beneath the heading. She couldn’t bring herself to make eye contact with the teacher. “We’d like kids to be at level M by the end of the year, and I most recently tested Adrian at an E.”
“E,” Alice wrote. Then she counted across her fingers. “That’s eight levels,” she said, her breath shallow. “Adrian is eight levels behind?”
Miss Miller shook her head. “No. By the end of the year, we’d like her at M. But by now? I’d feel better if she were at least an I or a J.”
“You’d feel better?” Alice repeated. Miss Miller’s face turned a darker shade of pink. “I’m sorry.” The teacher looked like she was dressed for brunch at the Alpha Phi house, a pink cardigan over a pinstriped button-down. It was hardly this girl’s fault that she had to deliver the bad news. Unless it is her fault, Alice thought. None of Adrian’s other teachers have found her deficient. “But are you sure?”
“I’m sure about her reading level,” Miss Miller said. “Can you tell me how homework is going? Are you doing the twenty minutes of reading per night?”
Now, Alice flushed. The words “She reads fine” had risen to her lips automatically, but she realized she couldn’t remember the last time she and her daughter had actually practiced out-loud reading together. Alice knew very well this was part of the nightly homework in second grade. She had done it religiously with Teddy.
The teacher worried a paper inside her manila folder. Alice couldn’t quite read it upside down. “What level books is she reading with you?”
“Actually.” Alice backtracked, guilty. It was bad enough that Adrian was behind. Lying about it wasn’t going to improve things. She tried to imagine what Patrick, perpetually calm, would do if he were here. Certainly, he wouldn’t try to cover their parental negligence. What kind of example would that be for the children? “We’ve gotten a bit lax about practicing.” Alice glanced over Miss Miller’s shoulder at the white-potted plants the young woman had placed at precise intervals on the windowsill. “I can see now it’s necessary, what with the E.” She gestured at Miss Miller’s notes, and her phone rang again at her fingertips. “I’m so sorry.” Alice flipped it over to decline the call. Elm Creek Junior High again, she saw, and this time a cold stab of worry pinched her chest. “It’s my son’s school.” Alice stood, grabbed her notes, and moved toward the door. “It might be an emergency. I’ll have to reschedule?” She pressed the green answer button as she walked toward the hall.
* * *
IT WASN’T AN emergency at school, but rather an “incident that requires your immediate attention.”
“Can it wait an hour?” Alice asked, desperate.
“No,” the assistant principal said. She could picture the face that went with the voice—a young guy with doughy cheeks and a full head of reddish hair—but she couldn’t remember his name. She’d heard only “assistant principal” as she hustled out of Adrian’s classroom. “Unfortunately,” he said, “the severity of the incident doesn’t permit any delay.”
Alice thought about calling Patrick and making him go, but they both knew the consequences of crossing Sachman. “I’m on my way.” She stabbed the button to end the call.
“Siri, call the office on speaker,” she barked. The Kerrigans would be irritated. They’d probably already fought traffic to get to their new home, and as the daughter of Minnesota’s governor, Bea Kerrigan wasn’t used to waiting or compromising. She’d famously convinced her husband to take her family name, “to preserve the legacy,” Alice had read in the Star Tribune archives as she’d tried to woo the couple. Ramona would also be irate. The Kerrigans would elevate the prestige of the firm, and they’d been a key piece in Alice’s pitch to get the Elle Decor photo shoot. She’d already begun playing with Easter table arrangements and wall colors in her own home, preparing for her “about the designer” section, which they’d document three months in advance.
As she raced toward the junior high’s reflective front doors, Alice told their assistant to “apologize profusely.” She’d have called Bea herself, but there wasn’t time. The elementary and junior high were only a half mile apart. Once inside, Alice could see Teddy sitting against the glass wall of the office, his head tipped back, honey-blond hair smushed against the pane. Were his eyes closed? Was he crying? As she rushed toward her son, one of his friends, Landon, tapped on the glass next to his head. “Dude,” Landon said, wonder in his tone. Alice stopped, mouth open. “How much trouble are you in?”
Alice watched as Teddy turned toward Landon, an impish smile on his face. He raised a hand to his ear, indicating that he couldn’t hear through the glass.
“You clown!” Landon bellowed, shaking his head. Teddy bent in giggles. “Classic.” Landon sauntered away, and Alice froze with trepidation. For the first time since she’d seen the school’s number light up her iPhone, she considered the possibility that Teddy had really done something wrong. My Teddy? She tried to remember if he’d ever been in trouble at school. There was that time in first grade when he’d refused to do the teacher’s lesson on jazz music, opting instead to sit in the office. But that was something they’d since joked about. He’d been six! And, of course, there was the block-throwing incident with Sadie Yoshida at kindergarten round-up. But since those early days? She couldn’t recall a single reprimand beyond being too chatty in class.
Alice pushed away the memories of Nadia’s warning and the anonymous text that morning, but then, the comment from Teddy’s band teacher on his midterm report crowded into her memory. Alice tried to recall the wording as she approached the reception desk. Something about being a follower and not a leader. When she’d asked him about it, Teddy had said that Mr. Petschl was extra strict. Alice did remember the teacher’s gruff demeanor at back-to-school night. He probably was strict. She’d signed the midterm and handed it back to her son.
When Alice made eye contact with Teddy in the office, she watched his face transform. The lighthearted smile she’d seen for Landon morphed into a bewildered sadness.
“What happened?” Alice rushed to him as Teddy slumped further in his chair.
“It was an accident,” Teddy said. The lanky assistant principal exited his office opposite the chairs where her son waited. The hair near the man’s temples appeared damp with sweat.
“Mrs. Sullivan.” He wrinkled his nose. “Why don’t you and I talk first?” Alice tugged at the end of her scarf and wished again that Patrick could be here. She glanced back at Teddy, wary, as she followed the administrator into his brightly lit office. The placard on the desk read Jason Whittaker.
Before she was ready, her left arm only halfway out of her jacket, he launched in. “As you may know, Mrs. Sullivan, it’s been a difficult start to seventh grade for Teddy.”
“Difficult start?” Alice pulled her arms free and shoved the down-filled jacket behind her. She blinked at the smaller letters engraved on the nameplate: Assistant Principal. “Is this about the midterm comment from the band teacher?”
Jason clicked his mouse and read off his monitor. “This is actually my third interaction with your son. His third disciplinary infraction,” he clarified, “in the last four weeks.”
The note Alice had wri
tten herself at Adrian’s conference just fifteen minutes before flashed into her consciousness. “Level E,” she’d scrawled, fear and embarrassment seizing her. And now there were three disciplinary infractions at middle school? And there’d been that aggressive text, too. Alice blinked rapidly and hot tears welled. Mr. Whittaker pushed a box of Kleenex toward her without making eye contact. “I had no idea,” she said, her voice breathy.
“Don’t you check the portal?”
“Portal?” Alice felt like a malfunctioning robot. All she could do was inanely repeat his words. Meredith had mentioned the portal, but Alice had chalked her friend’s vigilance up to overprotectiveness. After all, Meredith had cut Sadie’s grapes in half until she was in second grade. She religiously read the teachers’ Friday newsletters top to bottom. Alice and Nadia lightly mocked these behaviors. Skimming those weekly newsletters, after all, had always served Alice just fine. “Teddy has always been a great student—always As and Bs,” she said now. “I haven’t really had to track his homework.”
Jason rubbed his chin. “Well,” he said, “sometimes things look smooth on the outside, but there’s a lot happening under the surface.”
That might be true for other kids, Alice thought, but not for Teddy. He’d always been completely transparent. “Guileless,” her mother had said more than once. As Alice’s mom had a PhD in child psychology, Alice trusted her implicitly. “He’s never had any behavioral problems before,” Alice insisted.
Mr. Whittaker frowned at his computer. “He’s got both lunchroom and hallway infractions now. You can see them on the portal. That’s why we have it, so you can have an up-to-date picture of what’s happening at school.”
Alice narrowed her eyes. Her initial shock at being called into the office had given way to the steeliness she inhabited during hard-nosed conversations with contractors and suppliers. “I’m here now. Why don’t you tell me what I need to know.”
Are We There Yet? Page 2