Language Arts

by Stephanie Kallos

  Mrs. Braxton went on to explain that a small number of fourth-graders—“only the very best and brightest children, you understand, from each of the two fourth-grade classes”—would be leaving their classrooms each day for a period of thirty minutes; they would spend this time in the library with her.

  Charles understood that this was meant to represent some kind of award, another rung on the ladder toward academic heights, but he was concerned. Who will be teaching everybody else? he wondered.

  In answer to this unspoken question, Mrs. Braxton added that Mrs. Hurd, the other fourth-grade teacher, would be working with the remaining students on learning to diagram sentences. Charles had no idea what that meant, but it did sound less appealing than Language Arts.

  Rita Marlow, by this point, had all but left the premises. Her eyes were glazed, her teeth were clenched, and the quieting effects of smoking had abated; she’d begun jiggling and circling her foot, frequently switching the cross of her legs, the way she habitually did when Charles’s father was late or, as in this case, a no-show. All that was missing from this portrait was her martini glass.

  But upon hearing the phrase diagram sentences, she roused herself to quasi-attentiveness. “Sentence diagramming,” she said. “We learned that in parochial school. Isn’t that important?”

  “Well, yes, indeed, it is true that in the past, sentence diagramming has been a feature of elementary-school education”—and now it was Mrs. Braxton’s turn to glance at the clock—“but this new curriculum gives children the chance to absorb the mechanics of language in an intuitive manner. The thinking is that by reading excerpts from literature, they will come to understand what constitutes good writing, well-crafted sentence structure; this will enable them to be better thinkers and more expressive and creative writers.”

  “I liked diagramming sentences,” Charles’s mother said. “It was … direct.”

  Mrs. Braxton grinned. “Well …”

  Rita Marlow stood up and extended her hand. “Thank you for your time, Mrs. Braxton. I’m glad to hear that Charles is doing well.”

  Mrs. Braxton began walking them to the door. “Oh, and there is one last thing you should know.”

  “Yes?”

  “Charles has taken on quite an unusual and heroic role within the classroom.”

  Both parent and student looked puzzled. Rita Marlow glanced at her son. “Charles. Heroic,” she repeated dully.

  “Oh, yes. Without any prompting from me, Charles has become quite a help to Dana McGucken.”

  Rita Marlow shook her head. “I’m sorry, I don’t understand.”

  Mrs. Braxton looked at Charles and cooed affectionately, “You haven’t said anything, have you?” She placed one of her puffy, sharp-nailed hands on Charles’s shoulder, a gesture that froze him to the spot. “I suspected as much. That’s very like you, Charles, to be so humble.”

  She addressed the rest of her remarks sotto voce, as if shielding Charles from potentially upsetting information. “Dana is one of our special children, Mrs. Marlow. Thanks to Charles’s attention and friendship, Dana has shown tremendous improvement. You have a lovely boy there, Mrs. Marlow.”

  “Ah. Well, thank you again for your time, Mrs. Braxton. Good night.”

  Mrs. Braxton stood in the doorway, smiled her toothiest smile, and waved. “See you tomorrow, Charles!”

  Rita Marlow walked briskly down the hallway toward the exit door that led to the school parking lot; Charles had to jog slightly to keep up. As soon as they were out of hearing range, she reached into her purse for another cigarette and hissed, “Where the hell is your goddamn father? And who was that boy your teacher was talking about? Some friend of yours?”

  Before she could inquire further, the door swung open and there he was, wearing an impeccably clean suit that made him seem to shine against the dark autumn night.

  “Hello, Char-Lee!” Dana bellowed, rushing toward them willy-nilly but coming to a full stop at the last possible moment. He began bouncing excitedly on his toes. “Mom! Look!” he called. “Look at this boy! It’s Char-Lee Mar-Low! Come on, Mom! Say hi to Char-Lee!”

  Following behind Dana was a diminutive, pale-complexioned woman wearing a dark pink coat with a matching hat, white gloves, and sensible low-heeled shoes. Her facial features were delicate, unremarkable, and almost completely overpowered by large black-rimmed glasses. But she gave off a feeling of great calm and kindness. Charles had expected something more eccentric, more flamboyant from a person who let her child wear white suits to school every day.

  “Hello,” she said as she drew near. Dana straightened his arm to its full length and pointed, his finger coming within inches of Charles’s nose. “It’s Char-Lee Mar-Low, Mom!” he announced again. “We make loooo-puh-zzzzz!”

  “It’s very good to meet you, Charles,” Mrs. McGucken said. “Dana has told me so much about you.” She extended her hand. “How do you do, I’m Sylvie McGucken.”

  Rita Marlow—who’d been caught unaware by these social niceties—struggled clumsily to resituate her handbag on her forearm and free her hands from her pack of Camels, lighter, car keys. She averted her face to exhale a cloud of smoke over her right shoulder and then took Mrs. McGucken’s hand. “I’m Rita Marlow. Nice to meet you.”

  “Charles has been such a wonderful friend to my son.”

  “Oh?”

  Dana continued to bounce on his toes and began pivoting from side to side, smiling broadly, breathing quickly, his eyes roaming the ceiling in a happy way, as if following the movements of a monarch migration. “Aaaaahhhh!” he sang. His mother touched him lightly on the padded shoulder of his white suit coat. “Aaaaahhhh,” he said again, at half volume.

  Rita Marlow kept smiling aggressively at Mrs. McGucken in a way that went far beyond mere exclusion. She wasn’t just ignoring Dana, Charles realized; she was repelling him.

  “Char-Lee is my friend,” Dana said.

  She was afraid of him.

  “Dana talks about your son all the time,” Mrs. McGucken said.

  “Me and Char-Lee make loops!” Dana added.

  “Dana has never been so excited about coming to school.”

  “We eat loops!”

  “That’s nice,” Rita Marlow offered, her smile beginning to fossilize. “Well, we don’t want to keep you. Good night.”

  “All right, Dana,” Mrs. McGucken said. “Let’s say goodbye to Charlie and his mom and go see Mrs. Braxton.”

  “Goodbye, Char-Lee, goodbye, Char-Lee mom, hello, Mrs. Brack-ton, we are heeeeere!”

  Dana resumed singing his butterfly song as he and his mother made their way down the hall. Charles turned around just before the heavy double doors of the building swung closed to see that Dana’s head was craned back toward him and he was waving.

  •♦•

  When he got to school Monday morning, Charles found that there was already another voicemail message from Alison reminding him of their appointment at the bank.

  … and I hope you’ll be willing to go out for drinks afterwards. They’re really nice people, Charles, you’ll like them when you get to know them, and besides, we’re going to be spending a lot of time together over the next few years. Maybe—actually, hopefully—the rest of our lives, if things work out, and please God, let that be the case … Oh! Nice article in yesterday’s paper. What a surprise. You didn’t tell me about that. Okay, have a good day, see you later, here we go!

  Charles wished he could share Alison’s exuberance over this whole house-buying, going-into-the-residential-health-care-industry-for-themselves business—truly, he hadn’t seen her this happy in years—but there was something about the degree of the commitment: We’re going to be spending a lot of time together … the rest of our lives, if things work out. Having failed to sustain a traditional marriage, Charles felt understandably wary about wedding himself to four other people he’d barely met—and to their sons too, for that was part of the equation. Her earnest invocation, please God, troubled him.
He’d also felt a sting of irritation when she mentioned the newspaper article. Of course he hadn’t told her about it. Why would he?

  Charles headed for the teachers’ lounge. As he was putting his lunch into the fridge, he felt a hand on his shoulder.

  “Good morning, Charles.” It was the school principal, Emmett Willoughby, an educator who’d come to City Prana by way of Cambridge and who normally exuded an aloof, monarchical presence that perfectly matched his pear-shaped tones and garnered great credibility in fundraising situations.

  He clapped Charles on the shoulder with fellow-crew-member camaraderie and said, “Terrific article in the newspaper, Charles! Well done. I hope you’re planning on sharing with the students …”

  More teachers came in. Everyone seemed unusually perky and loquacious—energized from Christmas break, perhaps. Many mentioned seeing the story in the newspaper and wanted to engage Charles in conversation about it. It was all very congenial and well-intentioned, but really, he just wanted to get to his classroom and have a few moments of quiet before the students’ arrival.

  As he poured another cup of coffee and looked for an escape route, Pam joined him, her hands wrapped around yet another failed pottery project, but at least this one was glazed in cheerful saffron yellow.

  “Walk me to my room?” she asked quietly. “You look like you need an out.”

  “Thanks,” Charles answered.

  As they traversed the halls, Charles was hailed again and again—by both teachers and early-bird students—with greetings like Great story in the paper; How fun to read about you in the news; You’re a star, Mr. Marlow! Charles had no idea that there were so many people who’d remained diligent consumers of newsprint.

  “Well, off to the races,” Pam said when they arrived at her classroom door. “Have a good day.”

  Charles experienced a surprising impulse to follow Pam inside and hide out among the shelves of unglazed pottery.

  After hastening to his room and closing the door—there was still a full half hour before the start of homeroom—he took up his clipboard and legal pad and sank into one of the beanbag chairs.

  Dear Emmy,

  It is with no little sadness that I am writing today to share an important news development: the demise of the Hostess Baking Company.

  You and Cody never experienced the thrill of eagerly opening your lunchboxes on a daily basis to discover which treat had been tucked inside.

  Sno Ball? Twinkie? Hostess Cupcake?

  These nutrition-free items were a beloved element of my childhood; nevertheless, I understood and supported your mother’s rejection of all things processed. The dietary deprivations we enforced so stringently with you and your brother—sugar, dairy, soy, tree nuts, peanuts, wheat, corn, eggs—sweetheart, I hope you know that they were made out of love and concern, with the best of parental intentions. However, let me go on the record and say this: I sincerely hope that by now you’ve been able to experience the joys of peanut butter. There’s really nothing like it.

  Knowing that Hostess factories will soon close, I went to the QFC late last night and purchased a substantial and varied supply of snack cakes to supplement our earthquake-preparedness kit. I don’t know why I didn’t think to do this sooner; even canned goods can go bad, but Twinkies never expire.

  •♦•

  “What was that all about?” Rita Marlow asked as she started the car.

  “What do you mean?”

  Charles pretended to look through a big construction-paper folder Mrs. Braxton had sent home; it contained a sampling of his fourth-grade work to date. He’d achieved good citizenship, commendable penmanship, a promotion to Language Arts. His report card was filled with words like exemplary, excellent, and superlative. And—although it wasn’t written down anywhere—he was, in addition, a lovely boy. So why was his mother so angry?

  “That child we met on the way out,” she prompted. “That Dana. Is he really a friend of yours?”

  “Yes. Well, kind of.”

  She glanced at him. “I’d be careful if I were you. About spending too much time with him. I mean, a boy like that.”

  Why? he wanted to ask, but didn’t.

  As anxious as his mother had been all night, Charles assumed she’d be racing to get home, so he was surprised when she asked if he wanted to stop at the Dairy Queen. “I think we deserve a little treat,” she said.

  They sat in the car in the parking lot. Rita Marlow sipped a chocolate milk shake and smoked two more cigarettes while Charles ate his Buster Bar.

  “I’m proud of you, Charles,” she said after they started home again. “Really, I am. And it’s nice about Language Arts, you being picked for that. That’s really something. I didn’t know I gave birth to a genius.”

  As they pulled into the driveway, she pushed the button on the new garage-door opener. The door lifted slowly, like a theater curtain rising to reveal the scenery for the last act: Garrett Marlow’s car.

  “But then,” she added, “I don’t know why I should be surprised.” She turned off the car, yanked the keys out of the ignition, grabbed her purse, and started getting out. “Your father is a big goddamn smarty-pants.”

  There was a bowling bag sitting in the foyer. Charles’s father came out of the TV room, holding a bottle of beer.

  “Where the hell have you been?” he said.

  “Where the hell have you been?” she answered.

  Charles walked down the hall, brushed his teeth, and went to bed. He closed the door himself that night.

  •♦•

  Up until the past half hour or so, the six of them had been having a pleasant enough evening over half-price drinks and small plates at a Northgate Mall restaurant—although, once again, Charles found himself on the receiving end of compliments about the Seattle Times article. After finishing his first glass of wine, he finally just gave in and started speaking more freely about the whole experience, including “Flipper Boy.”

  He kept a careful eye on Alison, trying to gauge her reaction; he’d never shared the details of his early literary fame and was, frankly, looking for some indication that she found these revelations impressive in an endearing, winning sort of way.

  “It sounds like you were quite the wunderkind,” Robbie’s mom said.

  “Remarkable,” Robbie’s dad concurred.

  Alison made no comment. She stared at Charles as if looking through a miasmic fog, uncertain whether the person in view was Dr. Jekyll or Mr. Hyde.

  Jumping in to fill the silence, the Gurnees delivered their tandem responses:

  “What a story …” (Gurnee dad).

  “So imaginative …” (Gurnee mom).

  “Oh, hardly,” Charles answered. “You know what it was like in ’63. We were all preoccupied with science …” But then, realizing that no one else at the table had even been born in 1963, he dropped that conversational thread.

  They moved on to other topics, mostly related to the boys, of course: their collective hopes for this new living situation, the things that needed to be accomplished in the next few months in order to have the house ready in time.

  Probably Charles shouldn’t have had that third glass of wine.

  But it seemed to him that if there was ever an audience to which the question could be put, a circumstance that supported a lively and informed discussion of that question, it was this one.

  “Have you ever thought about why?” he asked. “Why these children, why our children? And I’m not talking about the medical-genetic-environmental-dietary-nature-versus-nurture why, because as we all know, those kinds of questions get us absolutely nowhere. I’m talking about the deeper, more …” Running out of words, Charles gestured in a spontaneous, reflexive way; the gesture felt so right that he did it several more times, upturning his hands and arcing them away from each other, as if describing the opening of a book that got bigger and bigger with each unfolding. By the time he stopped, his hands—and the cover-to-cover expanse of the imaginary tome they descr
ibed—stretched well into the personal spaces of Robbie’s mom to his left and Myles’s dad to his right.

  “I mean,” Charles concluded, “I’m just curious: Where do you all stand on the issue of God?”

  The question had the unexpected effect of bringing all conversation to a full stop.

  “Sorry,” Myles’s dad said after a few moments. “God?”

  “Are you folks practitioners of any kind of organized … organization around all that?”

  “You mean church?”

  “Charles,” Alison said quietly. “Maybe this isn’t—”

  “Well, yes,” Charles went on. “Isn’t that what church is supposed to do? Organize our notions of God? Give us some kind of an outline, guideline, rubric?”

  Myles’s dad shrugged and smiled. “I’m not sure about that …”

  “Have you found it helpful?”

  “Found what helpful?”

  “Your belief in God. I mean, I’m sorry, maybe I’m misinformed here, but I’ve always assumed people who go to church believe in God.”

  “We’re Unitarians,” Myles’s mom put in.

  “Ah! Well, I’ll spare you my repertoire of Unitarian jokes.”

  “We’ve probably heard most of them,” Myles’s dad said affably.

  “I bet you have, but what I’m wondering is: Have you found it a comfort? Your membership in the God Club? The Higher Power Club. Or … what do Unitarians say? The Good-That-Some-Call-God Club?”

  “Charles,” Alison interjected.

  “Yes,” Myles’s dad said.

  “Really?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m sorry,” Alison said. “Charles, I think—”

  “How about you?” Charles said, appealing to the Youngs.

  “We don’t go to church,” Robbie’s mom answered, “but it’s not out of any kind of lack of faith or religious belief, we were both raised with that, it has more to do with time, really, how we want to spend our Sundays.”