The finalists would attend an interview with a panel of judges. There were small prizes for second and third place, but the winner would receive an all-expenses-paid trip to Washington, D.C. to meet with legislators and tour the capital city with other winners from across the nation. In short, it was a fabulous opportunity, and Ellie was thrilled to present the idea.
Ellie couldn't wait to introduce the idea. This year, the farmer's guild had put together a snazzy video showcasing previous winners having fun in D.C. She played the video, barely able to contain her excitement.
"What a wonderful opportunity," Ellie started. "It's a chance to travel outside of Stusa, fly on an airplane, stay in a hotel, see fabulous museums and monuments, meet teenagers from around the nation." She was relieved to see a few girls talking about the cute boys in the video. Maybe that would move them to enter the contest.
Rejuvenated, Ellie focused on writing skills over the next several days. On the day of the deadline, she requested their entries. Blank stares and sideways glances answered. No entries. Whatsoever. Not even one attempt to win the contest.
"You do realize that if you turned in an essay to me by the end of the day, you would have to be chosen as the finalist since you would be the only entry from our school." She tried to guilt someone into it. "Why would you refuse to try? This is such a fabulous opportunity!"
No one responded. Next, she tried shaming them. "C'mon! Don't you want to travel and see the world? Don't you want to know what life is like outside of Stusa?" Ellie was not a very persuasive speaker.
By three o'clock that day, Ellie realized no one was going to enter the contest. Her administrators were angry, mostly because they were embarrassed to be caught empty-handed by the community leaders. Ellie was embarrassed, too, for the students. If a free trip to the capitol couldn't motivate them, what chance did she stand? The only "prize" she could offer was a good grade and the future rewards of being a deep thinker. She didn't have anything tangible.
What could she possibly say to them to encourage them to try? Life is not a spectator sport? You have to get dirty to get diamonds? Trying and failing is better than never trying at all? She didn't know which cliché would motivate them.
Ellie dove into the problem, determined to find a solution. The next day she started a new unit. They discussed various famous people with "rags-to-riches" stories, and each student was assigned a successful figure to research. Ellie wanted them to see that effort could make a difference. If money was to be their only motivator, then she would discuss money-makers. She started with Benjamin Franklin and moved up through history.
Ellie included one of her personal favorites -- Oprah. She showed video clips of Oprah talking about her life growing up in a poor community. They examined several celebrities over the next few days. They read about Bill Gates, Condaleeza Rice, Steve Jobs, Barack Obama, and Walt Disney. Finally, Ellie asked students to write a poem or a rap about what they had learned from the unit.
Ellie's surprise was genuine and bitter when most of the poems were about the Illuminati and how the professionals they'd studied had "sold their souls to the devil" to get where they were. It horrified Ellie to discover that her students could not believe the celebrities had earned their success. Rather than recognizing hard work, her students explained their success by supernatural contracts with demons!
Really, she thought, where am I? She was so disturbed that she spent her entire planning period venting, writing her own rap on what she'd learned from the unit. In her disgust, she was tempted to post it on her blog, but the bell rang for lunch, and Ellie decided to leave it on her desk and think about it before posting anything rash.
School is wack.
Students are slack
Give them love - they attack
Stab each other in the back
No ambition, no hope
Everybody's smoking dope
Hung by their own rope
Looking for a way to cope
Teachers don't care
Act like it's not their
Responsibility to share
Or help the students prepare
For the trials that they'll face
Just living in this place
Constant worries, too much strife
Bullet, drug deal, or a knife.
Inspiring kids' dreams
It's harder than it seems
With no money, no means
Trying to help today's teens
So before you criticize
Just know I won't apologize
For tryin' to solve the situation
Facing youth and education.
CHAPTER SEVEN
THE SHADOW
The Shadow slipped into Ellie's classroom during lunch. She had stolen a master-key weeks ago. No one realized it was missing, so the theft had not been reported. Now, she needed to search Ellie's classroom and get a copy of Ellie's key to Julien's studio, a building that locals simply referred to as The Jewel.
It would be easy enough to break into the old building, but for her plan to be most effective, The Shadow needed to search it without anyone knowing. She approached Ellie's desk and started rummaging. Sure enough, there were Ellie's keys in the top drawer. Predictable.
The Shadow pocketed the keys and straightened the papers she'd ruffled. She stopped when she saw the poem Ellie had left lying on top of her desk. What was this? She picked it up skimmed it.
It was a rap. Was Ellie ridiculing the community? Probably not, she realized as she got to the end, but The Shadow could easily make it seem that way if it were taken out of context. And if she deleted the ending.
This was just too easy. What would Principal Danvers do if he knew what his shiny, happy teacher thought about the school and its students? The Shadow paused for a moment. If she hurried, she could return Ellie's keys before the end of the day, and Ellie would never know they'd been missing in the first place. But what about the rap?
Would Ellie notice its absence? Although it might be fun to watch Ellie panic. That sickly-sweet mask Ellie wore needed to be torn off for the school to see what lay beneath. The Shadow knew that no one could be that optimistic, that naive.
The Shadow took the rap and left the room in delight, imagining all the mayhem she could create. She'd bide her time and use the poem at exactly the right moment -- the moment when she would discredit Ellie and set the gears in motion for her downfall.
CHAPTER EIGHT
DREAM DEFERRED
Over the next few days, Ellie didn't have time to ponder Stusa's limited resources. She was invested in helping her students explore pre-colonial literature and discover the imagery in Johnathan Edwards' fiery sermon "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God." She put her frustration behind her, choosing to believe that she could make a difference.
As it turned out, she did find some success with her students as they studied the early era of American literature. The students got involved in Edwards' sermon; having grown up in a religious community, it was something they could relate to. Ellie didn't have to spend any class time at all building background. Every student there could relate to the idea of a preacher calling out sinners and scaring them into submission.
To help them connect the centuries-old sermon to modern times, Ellie had the students make posters advertising Edwards as a guest speaker at a local church revival. After all, what could be better in this conservative town than promoting biblical obedience? The students impressed Ellie with their work; she felt a moment's reprieve from her role charading as an English teacher. It was clear, after all, that the students had read the sermon because the scenes they depicted were spot-on.
Their advertisements were intense; they included Edwards' images of broken dams, deluges, arrows aiming at sinners' hearts, and insects dangling over the gaping maw of hell. Each poster included textual evidence to support the accompanying artwork. One student, JaQuandis, sketched a scene of Edwards' listeners running out of church screaming in terror as the reverend calmly
berated his congregation, showing them their worthlessness in contrast to God's Divine Mercy.
Ellie was pleased. JaQuandis must have read the historical background to have drawn that scene. Ellie was so proud of their artistic renditions that she created a hall display. She wanted everyone to see what her students could produce. Some of the artwork was flat-out amazing.
Students made a banner to place above the advertisements. Renowned Reverend holds Revival. They placed their artwork underneath and stepped back to survey their work. Ellie took a picture to remind herself of what could be accomplished when students were interested and engaged. She took a group photo of her class, as well. She printed it and placed it beside the display.
She and her students had just returned to the classroom when Principal Danvers stuck his head in, a look of bewilderment on his face and asked, "Just whut are you doin' Miz Paylaytay?"
"Teaching American Literature," Ellie smiled. "Specifically, the sermon Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God. By Jonathan Edwards." She added, in case he was unfamiliar with the piece.
"Well, tear down these posters in the hall before some kid sez teachers're tellin' 'em they're goin' to hell." He gave her a stern look and shut the door a little more forcefully than was necessary.
Ellie's smile froze. It's okay for us to pray at faculty meetings, but it's scandalous to portray religious imagery from required literature?
The class was silent. They were waiting to see Ellie's reaction. There were a few grunts of indignation at the principal's assessment of their work, but Ellie knew it was up to her to smooth things over. She needed a way to show them that while she would follow her boss's rule, she would also stand up for her students.
Hephzibah, nicknamed Zibby, recovered first and asked in a small voice, "Could we display the posters in the classroom instead of trashing them?"
"Perhaps," Ellie responded. She was still in shock that Principal Danvers didn't like the project and that he wanted to get rid of such beautiful evidence of learning. He, apparently, had never read Edwards' persuasive sermon. He missed the point entirely.
Another student, Tulina, gave a little gasp and said, "You is, like, the best English teacher. You talk real good like uh English teacher should. Hey, y'all, I made a rhyme – who's hot? Whoop, whoop!" A few students laughed, but most were awaiting Ellie's decision about their artwork.
Ellie smiled outwardly at Tulina's awkward bit of praise, but inwardly she crumbled into a wad of existential crisis. They think I'm an English teacher because I used the word perhaps? I have never been such an awful imposter!
The class was still waiting for Ellie to answer Zibby's question. The dismissal bell would ring in ten minutes. Did they have time?
"Yes," Ellie swallowed, making her decision. "That's a wonderful idea, Zibby. Let's move the entire display to the classroom. Do you think we can work together and get it done in ten minutes?"
The entire class responded by getting up and going to the hall to fetch their work. Ellie ripped down her classroom bulletin board display to make room for the new one. When an entire class cooperated without complaint or hesitation, it was a minor miracle and had to be savored. They managed to get the last staple in place as the dismissal bell sounded, and Ellie heaved a sigh of relief as her students filed out of the classroom. She knew she had made the right decision, but would Principal Danvers agree?
Later that night, when Ellie recounted the story and confessed her feelings of inadequacy to Julien, he reassured her by pointing out her strengths. He stressed her love of reading and writing and reminded her how she'd loved linguistics and literature her whole life long - just in French - so making the jump to English would be natural.
Ellie felt momentarily placated, but self-doubt reared its head and whispered that Julien had always been her biggest fan. He was looking at her through rose-colored glasses. The simple fact was that Ellie was misleading her students, breaking their trust by pretending to be someone she was not.
Ellie fell asleep that night feeling uncomfortable. She tossed and turned for a while. When sleep finally arrived, it wasn't restful.
Ellie found herself seated in the cockpit of a plane. As the plane flew through bumpy clouds, the pilot collapsed. He fell forward onto the control panel with his face turned sideways towards Ellie. His eyes were closed, and it was obvious that something was terribly wrong.
The plane began to nosedive as his weight shifted the controls, and Ellie realized in stark panic that she would have to take over and fly the plane. As she fumbled with the knobs and dials in front of her, Ellie yelled at the pilot in terror trying to rouse him. Suddenly, he opened his eyes and started laughing at her.
"What is wrong with you? Stop laughing and give me a little help here!" Ellie shouted.
"You're doing it" he said, still slouched over onto the flight control panel but looking at Ellie. "You're doing it – you're flying the plane."
Startled at his proclamation that she was indeed flying the plane, Ellie glanced around the cockpit and then yelled back at him, "Well, maybe I am! But I'm not happy about it!"
The pilot continued to laugh at Ellie, cajoling her, mocking her, infuriating her; she wanted to reach over and smack him. She couldn't lash out at him physically, though, because in the dream it was vital to keep her hands on the flight controls. As he continued to laugh at Ellie, and she continued to doubt herself, he began to change shape. He morphed into a dark-haired woman covered entirely in colorful beads and shawls – Madame Margaux.
Ellie woke up drenched in sweat. The stress of flying the plane left her shaky and pensive, pondering its cause. Part of the dream was easy to interpret. She was feeling stressed about her job - flying the plane. What her dream-self said made perfect sense; Ellie was unhappy about flying the plane. But was what the pilot said also true? Was she flying the plane, without crashing?
Further sleep eluded her in her heart-pounding state, so Ellie climbed out of bed and made her way downstairs. She made a cappuccino and sipped it while sitting in the swing. Although dawn hadn't arrived, there was a full moon, bright enough to shine down on her small garden. In the moonlight, the herbs looked shriveled, irretrievable. She walked over to check. She knelt and touched the leaves of her favorite – mint. It was still dry and crumbly despite her attention.
Her head dropped. Every resource she'd consulted touted mint's indestructibility, the easiest of herbs to grow. In fact, they warned her to plant the tiny herbs in a container to prevent them from taking over her entire garden and choking out everything else.
She knelt there for a moment, despair slipping in. Things were not turning out like she had imagined. This "sweet life" was a lot harder than she'd envisioned. If she didn't watch herself, she knew she would dry out and crumble like her garden.
As she walked back inside to get ready for school, she could feel the edge of bitterness creeping in. It wasn't a feeling she enjoyed. Ellie sighed again. She and her herb garden both needed some nourishment – and soon.
CHAPTER NINE
MADAME MERETRICIOUS
The hot, humid month of August slogged on while Ellie trudged through what she was beginning to think of as The Great Deception -- pretending to be the world's best English teacher. She wondered from time to time if she were secretly being filmed as part of some ridiculous reality show, "Teacher Trouble" or "Classroom Conundrum." She couldn't imagine anyone paying to watch her flounder in her newfound profession, but she couldn't think of any other way to explain the strangeness of everything unfolding around her.
During one of their pieces of American literature, a student named Blaize decided to put Ellie on the spot in front of his classmates. He was small and insecure, always looking for ways to make himself seem macho to the bigger guys. Ellie felt sorry for him.
Blaize raised his hand halfway through their poem by Elizabeth Brown and asked Ellie, "Miz Pehlehteeair, why is yore classroom all frenchified... cuz this is Amuricuh and we is spos'd to be learnin' Amuricuhn stuff."
He looked around at his classmates seeking approval for this small challenge to authority.
Ellie gave him her best you-asked-the-perfect-question-smile. She hadn't redecorated her room from pre-planning; she'd had neither the time nor the energy. Her room still resembled the island café Le Chemise. Without missing a beat, she responded.
"I've been waiting for someone to ask that very question! We, dear students, are studying English from an outsider's perspective. We will study basic English skills as if we were all French citizens studying English for a visit to the States. No one need be embarrassed to ask for help since we're all English language learners, and we can look at American Literature, grammar, and writing more objectively, from the perspective of non-Americans."
She waited for the class's reaction as they processed the load of crap she'd hurled at them. There was a moment of silence, representing what Ellie assumed to be deep thought, while Ellie awaited their jeers. Then, to her surprise, a few girls squealed.
"Can we wear them French bahrays to class?" and "What're French boys like?"
Ellie breathed a sigh of relief. She couldn't believe that hokey answer had popped out of her mouth! They liked it, so she liked it. Maybe it would work after all.
Bring it on Mr. Smarty Pants! She thought. I am the teacher! I have all the answers! I am invincible! I am . . . a complete and total fraud.
CHAPTER TEN
THE SHADOW
The Shadow's initial concerns about her groupies blabbing had proved pointless; she'd scared them into submission. When rumors had started circulating about their foray into the forest months earlier, she pulled them into the girls' restroom, threatening them to silence. When she confronted them about the stories of their wooded adventure, the twins immediately pointed fingers at Jelly Sarka, who was a teacher's kid and a cell phone junkie.
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