The Book of Lost Friends(7)

I turn a full circle beside my car, surveying the scene, befuddled by its veneer of normalcy. I tell myself to do what everyone else is doing—move on with the day. Think of all the ways things could be worse. I list them in my head, off and on.

This is how my teaching career officially begins.

By fourth period, the mental game of Things could be worse is wearing thin. I’m exhausted. I’m confused. I am effectively talking to the air. My students, who range from seventh to twelfth grade, are uninspired, unhappy, sleepy, grumpy, hungry, borderline belligerent, and, if their body language is any indication, more than ready to take me on. They’ve had teachers like me before—first-year suburban ninnies fresh off the college campuses, attempting to put in five years at a low-income school to have federal student loans forgiven.

This is another universe from the one I know. I did my student teaching in an upscale high school under the guidance of a master teacher who had the luxury of demanding any sort of curriculum materials she wanted. When I waltzed in halfway through the year, her freshmen were reading Heart of Darkness and writing neat five-paragraph essays about underlying themes and the social relevance of literature. They willingly answered discussion questions and sat up straight in their seats. They knew how to compose a topic sentence.

By contrast, the ninth graders here look at the classroom copies of Animal Farm with all the interest of children unwrapping a brick under the Christmas tree.

“What’re we s’posed to do with this?” a girl in fourth period demands, her pert nose scrunching as she peers from a bird’s nest of perm-damaged straw-colored hair. She’s one of eight white kids in an overstuffed class of thirty-nine. Last name Fish. There’s another Fish, a brother or cousin of hers, in the class as well. I’ve already overheard whispers about the Fish family. Swamp rats was the reference. The white kids in this school fall into three categories: swamp rat, hick, or hood, meaning drugs are somehow involved, and that’s usually a generational pattern in the family. I heard two coaches casually filing kids into those categories while sorting their class rolls during the teachers’ meeting. Kids with money or real athletic talent get siphoned to the district’s swanky prep academy over “on the lake,” where the high-dollar houses are. Really troubled kids are shifted to some alternative school I’ve heard only whispers about. Everyone else ends up here.

In this school, the swamp rats and hicks sit in a cluster on the front left side of the room. It’s some sort of unwritten rule. Kids from the black community take the other side of the room and most of the back. A cluster of assorted nonconformists and other-thans—Native American, Asian, punk rockers, and a nerd or two—occupy the no-man’s-land in the middle.

These kids intentionally segregate.

Do they realize it’s 1987?

“Yeah, what’s this for?” Another girl, last name…G…something…Gibson, echoes the question about the book. She’s of the middle-of-the-room variety—doesn’t quite fit either of the other groups. Not white, not black…multiracial and probably part Native American?

“It’s a book, Miss Gibson.” I know that sounds snarky as soon as the words leave my mouth. Unprofessional, but I’m only four hours in and near the end of my chain already. “We open the pages. Take in the words.”

I’m not sure how we’ll make it happen, anyway. I have huge freshmen and sophomore groups, and only one classroom set of thirty copies of Animal Farm. They look to be ancient, the pages yellowed along the edges but the spines stiff, indicating they’ve never been opened. I unearthed them in my musty storage closet yesterday. They smell bad. “See what lessons the story teaches us. What it has to say about the time it was written, but also about us, here in this classroom today.”

The Gibson kid drags a glittery purple fingernail across the pages, flips through a few, tosses her hair. “Why?”

My pulse upticks. At least someone has the book open and is talking…to me instead of to the kid at the next desk. Maybe it just takes a little while to get into the groove on the first day. This school isn’t very inspiring, in truth. Cement block walls with peeling gray paint, sagging bookshelves that look like they’ve been here since World War II, and windows covered with some kind of streaky black paint. It feels more like a prison than a place for kids.

“Well, for one reason, because I want to know what you think. The great thing about literature is that it’s subjective. No two readers read the same book, because we all see the words through different eyes, filter the story through different life experiences.”

I’m conscious of a few more heads turning my way, mostly in the center section, nerds and outcasts and other-thans. I’ll take what I can get. Every revolution starts with a spark on dry tinder.

Someone in the back row lets out a snore-snort. Someone else farts. Kids giggle. Those nearby abandon their books and flee the stench like gazelles. A half dozen boys form a jostling, poking, shoulder-butting group by the coatrack. I order them to sit down, which of course they ignore. Yelling won’t help. I’ve tried it in other classes already.

“There are no right or wrong answers. Not when it comes to literature.” My voice struggles over the racket.

“Well, this oughta be easy.” I miss the source of the comment. Somewhere in the back of the room. I stretch upward and try to see.