by Kate Gray
The corner of the whiskey bottle fit well in my hand, the glass cool in my fingers. I twisted off the cap. The smell was spicy, and I almost sneezed. My glasses were juice glasses from the dining hall, the little ones that fit inside the green squares of the dishwasher trays. I tipped the liquor down my throat. The Jack Daniel’s was fire down my throat, and I tried to spit what I could into the kitchen sink.
But it spread. The next glass didn’t burn so much. And the next tasted great.
And after the next, I called you at the boarding school where you taught, but the phone rang and rang.
Song / Pressure in
Contained Area
The hall to his office reeks. His smell happens way before he happens. Wyatt White, Mr. Head Honcho and his damn pipe.
“Mr. Song, thank you for joining us,” Wyatt White says. Big voice. Puts his pipe in a tray on his big mahogany desk. The leather armchair gives Donny Zurkus a stage facing the headmaster. King of the Bullies Zurkus.
“I’m glad you asked.” I can do polite. I can do rude better.
“Mr. Zurkus was telling us about his English experiment, weren’t you, Donny?”
“Yes, sir,” Donny says. Mr. Bully transforms into Mr. Goodness, smiling deferentially, maintaining eye contact. Gag me.
“Go on.”
Facing Wyatt White, two leather wingback chairs. The kind with studs down the arms, the kind I see only in school administration offices. Persian rug. Dark built-in bookcases. Pressure in this office builds at an exponential rate.
“Yeah, so consequently,” Donny says, “we figured there’s no way someone could die by pouring something in his ear, you know? Unless it was acid or something. But that’s not what Shakespeare said.”
Wyatt nodded. His elbows on his desk, his hands together, big fingers touching each other.
“Just curious about the reality of it,” Donny says. Like this is a good thing. Like Wyatt White might reward him. There is no end to the shallowness of youth.
“Give me a break,” I say. Donny and Wyatt are vectors at forty-five degree angles from me. Connect the three bodies, and you have isosceles. The arrows are pointing toward me. Wyatt’s eyes are packed with nothing, and Donny’s are packed with shit. Layers of shit compressed in his dark eyes. Too many times Donny has gotten away with his big-man antics, Mr. Muscle Mean, because teachers are afraid of his donor dad, the big money the big man brings. Too much. Bad-Boy Zurkus has done too much.
“Mr. Song,” Wyatt says, “let the boy explain.” Wyatt’s neck is red. Back to my corner. Maybe he’s playing Donny. Back, back away from the bully, everyone entitled to fairness, a hearing. My eye.
In five years at St. Timothy’s I’ve never seen a student more raw. Kyle, Mr. Embryo.
One hundred yards beyond the windows behind Mr. Headmaster-with-Oral-Fixation is the lake. Practice time. Carla. Perfect sport for her. Not much drag on a rowing shell, almost all that work converted to uniform motion, balanced energy.
In five years at St. Timothy’s, I’ve spent three years bumping into Carla after crew practice. Not since the couch. Folded a dinosaur for her after that night, but never heard back. No looks at dinner. No letters. What happened with touch caused an equal and opposite reaction: no contact. Sometimes I see her in the dining hall, and her shape, the muscle of her, is more a visceral recognition than cognitive. I sweat. Mr. Obvious. But no one notices, and now that I’m Mr. Indiscretion, I walk away. Damn the body. Praise the mind.
“You know, Kyle said we could. He volunteered. Absolutely, he asked us to let him play the king.” Donny looks at Wyatt, looks at me, looks back at Wyatt. Donny likes this idea. He’s practically wagging. King of the Lapdogs. “We didn’t hurt him. We did what he wanted.” I about clock him.
“So, Donny,” Wyatt says, “it is your contention that young Kyle wanted to have molten wax poured into his ear while pinned to the lab table?” Wyatt presses his hands flat together, palms touching, brushing his index fingers to his chin. Surprising he doesn’t put his fingers in his mouth.
“Yes, sir,” Donny says.
“And is it your contention that you were trying to apply literature to everyday reality?”
“Exactly,” Donny says. He presses the knot of his tie, smooths the tie flat against his chest.
“Oh, please,” I say. “This kid has had it in for Kyle since day one. I’ve seen it in the halls. I’ve seen it in the dorm. Other kids have told me.”
“We can’t rely on what other students tell us, Mr. Song,” Wyatt says. He picks up the damn pipe, puts it in his teeth, keeps speaking while he puts his hands on matches. Sulfur. Flame. Sucks in the flame to the pipe. Sweet, fruity, Virginian tobacco. Makes me sick.
“Look, Mr. White, if you had seen Donny with the blow torch, if you had seen Kyle after I got the boys off him, you would know that there was nothing consensual or academic.” Kyle, the mouse of him, wild, pinned to the table, pushes me, like forces opposed, the repulsion of like negatives in the room in their isosceles. Negative Zurkus + Negative White = Anger in Me. All body.
“All right,” Wyatt says. “Mr. Zurkus, you can leave.”
“But Mr. White,” Donny says. He is not wagging any more. Both of our vectors are pointing at Wyatt White.
“We’ll speak later, after I discuss this matter with your father.”
Donny’s eyebrows are rockets. Mr. Surprise. Mr. Shit-Will-Hit-the-Fan Zurkus. He-Whose-Daddy-Is-American-Textile.
“But why?” Donny says. He’s leaning way at the edge of the wingback chair, his one leg bouncing from the ball of the foot.
“Because this offense may call for suspension. St. Timothy’s will not tolerate bullies,” Wyatt says. He takes the pipe from his mouth and sets it in a huge ashtray. His neck is sweating and red. “Now, dismissed.” Mr. Head Honcho doing the right thing. And Mr. Union Textile may want my head on a platter. Big donor, old man Zurkus.
Donny gets up from the chair. He faces Wyatt’s desk and doesn’t move. He stands there. His arms are straight down, parallel vectors. He looks in the direction of the vectors. For a moment he looks like a sail, like something shapeless. Maybe he is a boy trying on wind. Maybe he is a boy too scared of his own shape. I’m sure there is little substance to the boy. Then he raises his head so that his eyes look at me from under his brows, and he smiles a little. He turns and walks out the office door.
“That’s not the last we will hear from that young man,” Wyatt says.
Taylor / Close Call
Maybe during college after a brush against Penn we stood on the Penn dock and held hands. Maybe I had my arm around you to keep you warm, but probably we stood there, shoulder to shoulder, shaking. It was late. It was raining sideways. The wind had come out of nowhere, and the current was driving the novice guys’ four toward the falls.
Both the men’s and women’s crews had brushed that day against Penn. Too long. Too hard. Too many crews trying to get into the dock before dark made the crews more voice than muscle and bone. No lights on the boats. Just the light from inside the boathouse bays and the decorations for tourists, the white lights outlining Boathouse Row. Not much light cast from the open doors showed white caps on the water.
All of the women’s crews were in. Drenched as we were, we ran to meet every crew, grab their oars, run them into the bay, run back and help carry the boat inside. There was no time to do anything but run.
One crew was still out there in the swirling water we could hear. Even the coaches were on the dock, not on the water. The coaches called directions from their megaphones. The cox’n was new, the rowers were novices, and we hoped they didn’t really understand that 750 meters downstream something could kill them. None of the experienced rowers said anything. We knew how cold water strips breath away, wears down the muscles, gives swimmers a moment to wonder if they would be better off dead, should let go, and then the lungs kick in and everything inside craves air. Almost all of us have fallen in at some time. But none of us had dealt with cold water, wi
nd, inexperience, and a fucking waterfall.
Two years later you did.
We stood there on the dock in the Schuylkill with water dripping down our windshirts, between our breasts, soaking into our underwear. We stood there without saying anything, wanting our words to be throw-lines the rowers could grab.
And somehow they rowed against the current, against the wind, and came close enough to the dock that we could grab oars and pull them in. They threw their water bottles and shoes at us so we could get their stuff more quickly. They got one foot up and out, and we grabbed their oars. And the bigger guys grabbed the boat and lifted it up and onto their shoulders, walked it into the house. The novices huddled in the house and dripped and shifted their feet back and forth.
The only time I heard you swear was then.
“Holy shit,” you said.
Maybe we laughed. Maybe we slapped each other on our soggy backs as we walked into the boathouse. I wish I could remember. There’s so much I’m forgetting so fast.
Song / Inert Force
Mr. Crap on My Career. This Zurkus. Muscle-Boy, son of Union Textile. His daddy will have my head.
Carla’s keeping her distance tonight. Equal and opposite reaction. In Rehoboth we were one, strapped in, but one of us hit a wall, and bam, projectile. Bye-bye. Can’t talk to her. Can’t explain. Be the wall.
Carla and Buttons are in trouble for coming to dinner a) late and b) in sweats. Walking up to Queen Alta, right after the blessing, Carla putting her arm around the Queen, the Queen turning and brushing her arm off.
“Get off me, Carla,” Alta says too loud.
The whole dining hall stops. Carla pulls her arm away but doesn’t drop it, her way of moving, all angles. Everyone stares.
“Mr. Underwood,” I say, “what is your favorite sport?” Sports are big with Second Formers.
“Golf,” Tommy says. Of course.
“Good choice,” I say. “The game of royalty. Mr. Underwood, do you know how much work is done in the act of swinging a golf club?” The other nine faces are now turned toward me. Queen Alta and Ms. Out-of-Dress-Code Carla are out of their sight.
Tommy shakes his head, looks at the fried chicken on his plate.
“Not much, Mr. Underwood. Let me tell you.”
Dickie Trowbridge raises his hand. Like we’re in class. Next to Dickie, Marty Kraus is stuffing his mouth with a roll in one hand and french fries in the other.
“Mr. Kraus,” I say, “please try to take one bite at one time.” Dickie is waving his hand so wildly in the air, he might have to use the restroom. “Ah, Mr. Trowbridge, yes?”
“Mr. Song,” Dickie says, “the amount of work is related to the amount of force exerted on an object.” Dickie is smaller than the boys he’s sitting next to, voice higher.
“Yes, Mr. Trowbridge, that’s true. And what is your point exactly?”
“I don’t know. I thought that was the answer.” Amanda McMartin, across the table, throws a french fry at Dickie. Lands on his plate.
“We’ll have none of that, Miss McMartin.”
“It just slipped,” she says. She brings a napkin to her mouth to hide her smile.
I look up and Dorothy White is eye level with me. Didn’t see her coming, Mrs. Head Honcho, she with no authority but lots of power. Her old-lady blue eyes are right there as I turn my head. I about drop my fried chicken.
“Oh, Mrs. White,” I say, “to what do I owe this honor?” Mrs. Headmaster making the rounds? Lady Busybody come to find out about Alta, why the students dressed in sweats interrupted, why Alta ran from the dining hall? The students at the table are looking at me, at her, at me, at her. We’ll see which inert force stays inert.
“Mr. Song,” she says, “I’d like a word with you in my office after the meal.” She doesn’t make nice-nice. The gray roots of her too-red hair stand out tonight. Not enough cakey face makeup.
“Of course, Mrs. White, what a pleasure. Unfortunately, I have study hall after the meal. I’ll make an appointment.” I’m grinning. I can do nice. I do rude better. Yup, students see me grinning. Good show.
But my chest does that thing, like a big Japanese Taiko drum. The sternum is the drum, the waves of sound using the marrow to resonate. My ribs are a drum, Old Bat White holds the stick, and her words are the strokes of the drumstick hitting my ribs. Someone saw Carla leave. Carla turned me in. My indiscretion. The end of my career. “Suuu,” the drummer releases air from her lungs, and uses her whole body to strike the blow. That thing sounds in my chest when I know I’m done for.
Taylor / Simplified World
Rand McNally gave every mother in the fifties and sixties a sure thing, the Map of the Simplified World, color coded, complete. There were few contours: Antarctica had blue cliffs, Nepal gray peaks. One or two cities in each country were spelled out, like Minneapolis, like Guangzhou. Countries came in yellow, pink, purple, orange, tan, and blue, and red ran around them all.
My mother gave me a Map of the Simplified World. But in 1983, that map was wrong.
The right map had only three places: where you’re from, where I am, where we were.
The Geography classroom smelled this morning of socks crammed in the corners. After a few weeks of teaching, I should have known which map roll was which, but I still had to reach above the blackboard for the metal handles of all the real Rand McNally maps to find St. Tim’s copy of the Simplified World.
Yesterday I was in Colorado. But you weren’t.
I looked for you in your sister’s face, and she looked for you in mine. When she picked me up at the airport, she had to wipe the inside of her glasses, spotted with tears. Maybe I was a little taller than you. Maybe my glasses were tortoise shell and yours metal. Your sister thought you were walking toward her.
Your sister’s blond hair doesn’t match your hair, but her eyebrows are your eyebrows. Her eyelashes do that thing yours do, make stars when she smiles. She has your cheekbones. Maybe she is shorter than you. Definitely she doesn’t row. Her hips curve, and her shoulders are round and soft, but she has your laugh, the hands that comb her hair back from her forehead. I thought you were walking toward me.
The footsteps behind me in the classroom were fast, and then two hands came over my face, pushed up my glasses, and covered my eyes. My sight went pink. The fingers were long and cold and thin.
“Hey,” I said, “cut it out.”
“Guess who,” a girl said. Her breath came behind my ear. I twisted, but she pressed my eyes hard, and yellow and red circles filled my eyes.
“Carla, if this is you, you’re in big trouble.” I turned toward her, but she stepped in the opposite direction. As I moved, she moved.
“Oh, Miss Alta,” Carla said. “You’re doing that cute thing again.”
“Carla, stop it.” I stood still. “Take your hands off me.”
“Not until you say you missed me.” She leaned into my back, her breasts brushing. Everything about her was yellow.
“Now.”
“Hey, Taylor,” Alex said from the doorway, “sorry to interrupt. How was your trip?” Carla dropped her hands from my eyes. The room spun. When I got my balance, I saw Alex in the doorway. His hands were on either side of the doorframe, and he leaned his body in the door.
“Alex, hi.”
“So, you okay?” Whatever he thought of what he saw, his face was all concern, his eyes on me, not Carla.
Alex and Carla in front of me, the smell of the classroom where no air moves, a map with more than the places we’ve been, I couldn’t keep the air in me. There was a leak.
“The memorial?” I said. “It was hysterical.” Carla sat down at a desk. Alex took his hands off the doorframe. At St. Timothy’s everything is “fine, thank you.” I was supposed to say, “The trip was fine. Thank you.”
“No, really, think about it. There’s a coffin. There’s friends and family and teachers and Sunday school classmates, and there’s no body. There was nothing in that coffin.” The laughing shook me. Car
la’s eyes were the peaks of Nepal, and Alex’s eyes were the white Mojave. I was an ice flow separating. I was blue Antarctica.
Carla and Alex said nothing. The map of bright colors was behind my back, and I wanted to tell them that the world now had only a triangle of places you would never be. I wanted to tell them about the ice separating in me. I wanted them to tell me you were alive.
“Okay, really?” I said. “A good part was I got to ski.” Both of them dropped their shoulders a little.
“Sounds great,” Alex said. “Just thought I’d check in.” He shifted away from the doorframe. Two Second Formers appeared, ready to squeeze by him on either side. His arms raised up, and the students passed underneath with plenty of room.
“Thanks, Alex, I appreciate it,” I said.
Alex’s profile was angles, his nose, sharp cheekbones, spiked hair. With those looks, he could model. He turned and entered the flow of students getting to class.
Carla angled out from the table.
“So sorry to spoil your special moment with Mr. Jeffers,” she said. “Better get going.” Carla used one hand to pull back the curls from her forehead. They fell again.
“Make way, make way,” a Second Former said. He was a ball in a pinball machine, the doorframe a bumper. He crashed into Carla.
“Kyle,” she said, “watch where you’re going, punk.” With both arms she exaggerated shoving him away from her. The shove she gave was soft, tender in the placement of her hands. I hadn’t seen them together in the halls, but from this moment, Carla was playing tough kid and its flipside, protector.
Kyle exaggerated bouncing from bookcase to desk to person to wall to person to desk. The pocket he landed in was his usual desk in the back row. His stained backpack dropped to his feet, and he spread his arms out on the desktop. His head, with this greasy hair sticking up, landed on his arms. He pretended to pass out.