In the Real World

by Nōnen Títi

  Mariette seems satisfied with that proposal. “We’ll call Kathleen tonight,” she says to me on the way out.

  As soon as we’re out the gate we’re confronted by Charlotte’s group. “What’s this about you and the teachers making a petition together?” Charlotte demands.

  Mariette explains Mr Shriver’s idea to send in a request signed by the whole school community: students, teachers and parents.

  “So now you’re working with the enemy?”

  Mariette denies that and stresses that we need to be united. She downplays yesterday’s invasion as an emotional reaction.

  “Traitors,” Lindsey says.

  “We’re trying to help the expelled students; all of them,” Mariette repeats.

  “You, maybe, but your buddy here isn’t doing anything, even for Fred. He’s a coward.”

  “Why? Because he doesn’t like fighting? That’s not being a coward, that’s being a pacifist. Ghandi didn’t defend himself and he was one of the bravest people ever.”

  “You’ve spent too much time in the history room, Mariette. Don’t you see that they’re attacking us one by one with bribery until there’s none of the ten percent left?”

  “I’m sorry PM went behind your back to take you out, Charlotte and I appreciate that you didn’t let it scare you off, but I’m not taking PM’s side and I am not being forced.”

  “You’ve been brainwashed.”

  “Don’t be stupid.” Mariette explains, again, that she needs cooperation. She admits that she was asked for peace negotiations and agreed. That doesn’t mean she’s walked over to the other side. “They’re neutral, they’re not with PM.”

  Of course, there’s no reasoning with Charlotte, who calls us both enemies. Her group is crowded around us and I feel what I have so often before; I’d like to help Mariette, but after the first word I get insults thrown at me – the same ones I’ve heard all week.

  “You’ll never understand. Just let us go,” Mariette says.

  “Are you scared now? Can’t stand up for yourself without Kathleen?” Lindsey asks, giving Mariette a push.

  “No.”

  “You are too, chickenshit.”

  “Just leave us alone,” Mariette says when more of the girls start touching her.

  “Do you know what they do to deserters in a war?”

  “Please, Charlotte, I’m with you, just let us go.”

  I more feel than see Mariette look towards me at the memory of using those words. She needs my help. Mariette fights with words, she can’t deal with this pushing, but I’m no good either.

  “Prove it. Call the police and put in a complaint about abuse,” Charlotte says.

  “I can’t.”

  “So, you’re not with us. What did he make you do to say this?”

  “I’m with you in student rights but not in everything. Please stop,” Mariette begs when they start shoving her again, now all six of them. I hate myself for just standing by.

  “You’re scared,” one of the girls says to Mariette.

  “So maybe I am, but I’m still trying to do what I can to help the students and I still hate PM.”

  “You scared of us?” Lindsey asks, sounding more surprised than derisive.

  “Yes,” Mariette replies, and that may be the bravest thing she’s ever done.

  They start laughing and joking, but no one pushes her anymore. “You had better watch your backs on Monday if the abuser is still there,” Charlotte says and orders her gang to back off. We watch them go.

  “I tried, you know,” Mariette tells me.

  “I know.” I should tell her how much I appreciate what she said to them, but I feel tired and sad all of a sudden. Everything in this school that seemed better is gone. Now it’s the same as everywhere else.

  When we get home Aunt Karen asks me if everything is okay.

  “Yes, it’s fine.”

  “Fred called for you.”

  “Thanks.”

  I call Fred back right away, glad for a friendly voice. “I wish you were back.”

  “I’m not coming back. At first Dad said yes, but then all the rumours about the police came and now I have to go to this all-boys school.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  He wants to meet up at Bellevue tomorrow with Mariette and Kathleen. Yes, he says, he heard about the arrest.

  Kathleen agrees to come, so the next morning we head for Bellevue together and sit in a coffee shop.

  “So how come they have no case but they still don’t have to let you back?” Mariette asks Kathleen.

  “Power baby. That’s what Dad says. PM had to get my dad off the council or he can’t kick Mr Fokker out, so they used us. What about you, are you giving up?”

  “Never.” Mariette explains the petition idea. Fred promises to sign even if it probably won’t do any good. Kathleen says it’ll be appreciated and that’s good enough. “Dad was going to have one last go at them in this council meeting but Mum’s forbidden it,” she says.

  “That’s on Wednesday right? Where and what time?” Mariette asks.

  Kathleen thinks it’s at seven-thirty in the library.

  “Ask him, Kathleen, and let me know. I’m going.”

  “They’ll kick you out, Mariette.”

  “I don’t care.”

  “She never changes, does she?” Fred asks.

  “Honestly, I’m tired of it, Fred. I just want to move back in with my dad.”

  Fred is more than happy with that idea since I’ll live nearby and we can stay in touch.

  We come home early afternoon to find Uncle Gerard on the phone. “Here they are now. Grandpa Will wants to talk to you,” he says.

  Mariette evades the handset by saying she needs the bathroom, so my uncle gives it to me.

  “And what trouble have you kids thrown yourselves into this time?” Grandpa Will asks. Apparently Aunt Karen called him.

  I tell him what I can, emphasizing the insults the other kids throw at me about Dad and how Mariette stood up for me. “I’m just afraid she’ll get in trouble for helping me.”

  “Mariette doesn’t need your help to get into trouble, Jerome. She may, however, need your help to stay out of it. Don’t let her noise and anger fool you. That’s all outside shine. You might be the stronger of the two of you.”

  He reminds me that Dad will call from Uncle Alistair’s around dinnertime. Until then the phone doesn’t get a moment’s rest. Grandpa Will talks to Mariette for quite a while, then Miranda’s friend, Ellen, calls and Miranda has only just hung up when a member of lit group calls to say that tomorrow’s meeting is cancelled and finally Kathleen calls Mariette about the petition, but I never hear the details because Dad calls right after.

  They’re enjoying their holiday and won’t be back at the farm until next weekend. Rowan says he’d like to come back with Dad and Nikos, but it’s only words. When talking about his activities he sounds like he’s totally settled.

  On Sunday I relax and help Aunt Karen and Miranda in the garden until we’re chased inside by a violent spring thunderstorm. Mariette goes to Kathleen’s and comes back with a stack of printed petition sheets. They’re titled Amnesty Educational. In the morning she’s ready before I am. We have breakfast in the kitchen nowadays since there’s no use in going to the milk bar. The doorbell rings when it’s barely eight o’clock.

  “Oh my goodness! What did she do now?” Aunt Karen’s voice exclaims from the hall.

  “What?” Mariette asks when we all look at her.

  A moment later Aunt Karen walks into the kitchen with Mr Fokker. Something’s wrong, I can feel it. Mariette frowns. “Am I kicked out?” she asks, but the lack of response silences her.

  Mr Fokker sits down in the seat Aunt Karen offers him after introducing himself to Uncle Gerard. Then he takes a deep breath and looks at me. I’m not sure what I already know at this point, but my heart freezes. “There is no good way to tell you this.” He accepts the cup of coffee Aunt Karen hands him. “Mr Shriver h
ad a heart attack on Saturday, and he didn’t survive it.”

  “You’re lying,” Mariette says, but then nothing else.

  I don’t look at him. I don’t want to know.

  After what must be five minutes of silence, Mr Fokker turns to Uncle Gerard. “With your permission I’ll take them to the cremation on Wednesday. Mrs Shriver asked me. Jerome is a friend of theirs.”

  I’m not sure if I say it, but I don’t want to go. I don’t want to think about this. It’s too quiet in the kitchen. I focus on the ticking clock. It’s wrong. It isn’t fair. “He wasn’t… I mean, he was younger than Grandpa Will.”

  “Oh sweetie, I’m so sorry,” Aunt Karen says. Her arms are warm around me, and suddenly I’m so cold.

  “I didn’t want them to hear it at school. It’s better if they don’t go at all until after Wednesday,” Mr Fokker tells my uncle.

  “Can I stay home too?” Miranda asks, for which Mariette kicks her.

  “Cheryl asked if you could find a poem to read out,” Mr Fokker says to me.

  “No, I can’t… It wasn’t that good, he was only being nice.”

  “It doesn’t need to be brilliant literature, Jerome, as long as it means something to you, something that explains him.”

  “But I can’t… I wouldn’t know what… I can’t just go there and read…”

  Aunt Karen lets go of me and suggests that I choose a poem but let somebody else read it for me.

  “But I don’t know anybody.”

  “You know Cheryl and Jessica. You know Mariette and I. There will be other teachers.” Mr Fokker says.

  He’s making it worse. “I can’t do that!”

  “Why don’t you think about it? I’ll drop in after school tomorrow.” Aunt Karen goes along to let him out and orders Miranda to get ready to go. Uncle Gerard leaves quietly.

  Mariette moves over to sit beside me and without a word she puts her arms around me and with that she’s suddenly so like Aunt Karen. “Just tell me it isn’t true,” I beg her, unable to move or return her embrace.

  It takes a while before she replies. “You can write a poem; I know you can. I’ve read some, more than you know about. I shouldn’t have, but I did. I’m no expert, but those are good. Mr Shriver wasn’t just saying it to be nice, I’m sure of that.”

  “Will you come with me?”

  “On Wednesday? I can’t do that, Jerome. They won’t want me there.”

  Aunt Karen returns alone. “Do you have any black clothes?” she asks. “Only jeans and a t-shirt.”

  “We’ll have to go to Bellevue and get some. You too, Mariette, and we’ll order some flowers.”

  “I can’t go, Mum.”

  “I thought Mr Fokker said-”

  “He’s wrong. Jerome was their friend, not me.”

  Aunt Karen doesn’t insist, but I can’t go alone. I don’t want to go anywhere. I want to go back to bed and not know this.

  Over the next two days I notice something about this family. Both Aunt Karen and Mariette sit with me and bring me drinks without bickering. I’m starting to feel guilty about the attention. “It isn’t like he was my dad. He was just helping me with my writing.”

  “So? Does that forbid you to cry, because he wasn’t but it was like he was after all?” Mariette asks.

  It’s a soft question, a gentle nudge – at least for Mariette – but it starts me thinking and by the time Mr Fokker drops in as he said he would, I have a rough draft for a poem. “It won’t be any good. I won’t have time to perfect it.”

  “That doesn’t matter. All that matters is what it means for you and for Cheryl. Now, would you be able to read it yourself, or would you prefer Mariette or I did?”

  “You’ve got to be crazy. I’m not even going. Haven’t they suffered enough yet?”

  “Be quiet; it isn’t your fault and you are coming,” Mr Fokker tells Mariette.

  “But I can’t just go there.”

  “Yes, you can. Jerome needs you.”

  “I do, Mariette. I can’t be the only student.”

  “But you won’t go as a student, you go as a friend. That’s different.”

  “Please say you’ll come.”

  “She’ll come if Mr Fokker says she must,” decides Aunt Karen.

  MARIETTE

  “What am I supposed to write on the card?” I ask Jerome. It’s stupid to have a card without anything on it.

  “What do you remember about him?” he asks. His hands move in front of the mirror as he puts on his tie as if he’s done it a million times before. He looks so different in a suit. I can’t stop looking.

  “That last speech, I guess, on Thursday. He made me realize that I was doing exactly what I accused PM of, that I could stop it if I wanted.”

  “So write that on the card. He was a real teacher; acknowledge that.”

  I learned from you. I do my best to make the letters even on the small card that’s attached to the flowers, but I feel like a hypocrite.

  “And your name,” Jerome says.

  Mr Fokker arrives at two o’clock, also in a suit. “Be good,” Mum says.

  My legs aren’t willing to walk me to the van, but they do, and Mr Fokker introduces us to his wife and two sons, both not much older than we are. They make space for us. I have trouble straightening out the dress without squashing the flowers. Jerome fiddles with his sheet of paper. “You won’t be able to read it,” I warn him.

  “Don’t worry, we don’t like going any more than you do,” one of the boys says. They also look uncomfortable in their suits. I’d never thought about Mr Fokker having a family. Teachers and students are strangers, our lives kept hidden from each other and separated by the borders of the school. No wonder we can’t understand each other. But today the walls are down, no longer separated by what we wear, but we’re still not quite sure what to say.

  Much too soon, we arrive at the crematorium. I’m helped out of the car by Mrs Fokker. “Just stay near us, you’ll be fine,” she says. I feel strange being near her; strange and small, but also kind of protected because of what she just said.

  Inside the room is a quiet gathering of about thirty people. It isn’t hard to guess which one Mrs Shriver is. A young couple with a baby are beside her. One of them is Mr Shriver’s daughter. Suppose Dad suddenly died? What if he had trouble at work? What if they knew who caused it?

  I get to hand over the flowers to an official who carries them behind a curtain. “Do you want to have a look?” Mr Fokker asks Jerome. To my relief he says no, but Mr and Mrs Fokker go.

  I’m supposed to be here for Jerome, but soon he’s talking to a group of other people while I retreat to the wall and watch more and more strangers come in. Then, to my horror, five of our teachers walk in together, including Mr Moralis. I turn my back so they can’t see me. Mrs Fokker rescues me when the doors to the auditorium are opened. I follow her in, grateful that she’s staying near me. We sit about halfway back and I’m as far away from the central aisle as possible. I try to concentrate on the music playing and on all the flowers, so I don’t have to think about what’s standing between them.

  Just like at Grand-maman’s cremation, there are a lot of people who have prepared speeches. Mr Shriver, who suddenly has a first name, was the organizer of several literary events. One of those was a reading group for children at the local library where he used to read stories. Two of those children, no more than seven, now read a story for him.

  Then some other people read from their own work. I don’t know how everybody can just sit here and listen. It’s choking me up and I’m not even family.

  Mr Fokker speaks as a friend and colleague without mentioning the trouble at school. On the other side of the aisle, the other teachers sit together. It’s just so wrong, all this. Last week they sent the police after us and now we’re all sitting here weeping over the casualties, the ones who tried to mediate.

  When someone says his name, Jerome takes his hand from mine and walks up to the stage. He reads from his
paper.

  Through the love for words

  you touched me,

  reached

  across a great divide;

  walked

  a bridge of symbols:

  words.

  Through a scribbled verse

  you saw me

  amid

  wordless voices;

  a single

  voiceless word

  from me.

  Through a written phrase

  you heard me

  calling

  where hands had failed;

  needing

  a parental voice,

  a word.

  Through an ageless lesson

  you taught me

  to learn

  where it wasn’t allowed;

  to love

  what could not be said

  with words.

  From a frozen heart

  I speak to you

  to keep

  your voice alive in me,

  for death

  can’t stop the words.

  Only silence can.

  I look at Mr Fokker at the same moment he turns away to wipe his eyes. Then he sees me watching and smiles. It isn’t Amun Baa who’s lost his friend. Soft music begins to play as Jerome walks back. The tears he managed to control during the reading now come pouring out and he lets me hold him. It makes me feel like I’m holding something very precious and breakable in my arms; something that is a privilege to be near.

  That feeling stays with me while many people commend Jerome on his poem when we’re in the reception room. There must be at least a hundred people here. Among them are the members of the college council, including Mr Sanders and Kathleen’s dad. That seems wrong too, since he’s being kicked out as well.

  “Mariette, come with me to say goodbye to Cheryl,” Mrs Fokker says. “It’s the right thing to do,” she adds when I hesitate.

  Mrs Shriver hugs Mrs Fokker in a way that tells me they’re more than just acquaintances. “We were finally not in a rush that day. He was mowing the lawn when I called him for coffee. He shouted back that he’d be just a minute, but then he didn’t come-” Mrs Shriver leans on her friend, while I stand by not knowing where to look. She recovers and hugs both Mr Fokker’s sons and then Jerome. “Could you make me a copy of your poem?” she asks.