Class Dismissed

by Kevin McIntosh

  “Total bullshit,” she said. “Those kids need you just as much.” She paused. “They need you differently.” Dorie could always be counted on to bust up his pity parties, send everybody home disappointed.

  “Good night,” she’d signed off. “St. Patrick.”

  He reaches into the banker’s box, grabs a last stack. He rips open an envelope, takes out a yellow flyer. Tired? Out of fresh ideas? Let us write your lesson plan! If only. Pitch.

  Pink office slip. Mr. Lynch, call Mrs. Strohmeyer. Re: Tiffany’s private school application. Dated January 17. Oops. Pitch.

  Pink office slip. Mr. Lynch, call your sister. Dated June 7. Oops. Keep.

  Last was a Middle School Reader’s Warehouse catalogue. Too young for Lake Minnehaha eighth graders. Pitch.

  Grabbing at the pitch pile, he notices a postcard stuck to the bottom of the catalogue. He snaps it off. Cathedral of St. John the Divine, the caption reads. Peace Fountain. Brother Sun, Sister Moon, and all the other creatures of the apocalypse. He leans back in his desk chair, traces the archangel with his thumb.

  Slowly, he turns it over. Miss you, it says, in the prettiest script he’s ever seen. Postmark February 21. Week after Valentine’s Day, he thinks. And maybe, he calculates, the night he called Dorie. And, possibly, he shakes his head, the week of the dental hygienist.

  He looks out into the courtyard, fanning himself with the postcard. The squirrel crouches on the branch, agitated, thrashing its tail. Patrick taps the postcard on his desk, sets free all the air in his lungs. He looks at the Peace Fountain, the smiling moon, and tosses it onto the pitch pile.

  The bell rings. He looks at the doorway, then the courtyard. The squirrel leaps at the feeder. Patrick runs a sweaty hand over his sweaty head. He swipes the postcard off the pitch pile, slaps it on the maybes.

  And Zachary Allen blasts through the doorway, tripping over his size-twelve sneakers into Brandon Rinehart, whose signature surfer highlights are now chlorine green thanks to swim team. And Kimberly Perkins shows off her sparkly, no-braces teeth to her best friend, Jessica Morrison, who darts a glance at Mr. Lynch before offering her pal a celebratory, rule-breaking chunk of Dubble Bubble as Cory Bettleman trudges behind her, hugging his writing portfolio to his chest, containing the poem he wrote last week about his parents’ divorce, the one true thing he’s written all year, which he will perhaps share with the class now that he can, with one foot out the door, stepping toward high school.

  Mr. Lynch stands.

  Fourth period tumbles in.

  Acknowledgments

  A sixty-two-year-old debut novelist has a lifetime of people to thank: The team at Regal House Publishing, especially Jaynie Royal and my editor, Pam Van Dyk. The Ragdale Foundation, Blue Mountain Center, Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, Hen House Arts Collective and GrubStreet for providing essential space, time, and inspiration. I am indebted to my teachers at Bread Loaf, Jennifer Egan and Andrea Barrett, and to Lisa Borders at GrubStreet, for providing just the right instruction at just the right time.

  My early readers, Shelly Matthews, Mel Glenn, David Fey, Tom Duprey, Janel Pudelka, Olive Woodward, Sharon Tehan, Julie McKee and the Tuesday Night Irregulars. Rob McKean, who read and sharpened every word in this book; Jane Hamilton and John White, who must be thanked together, for indispensible help improving this novel but even more for indispensible friendship year after year; Sheila McIntosh, for her patient help in manuscript preparation; Karla Baehr, whose deep knowledge of education administration was vital to this book and whose belief in this project made it possible.

  Steven Brill and Mara Altman, whose journalism on New York City Rubber Rooms provided a point of departure for my fictional Rubber Room. Naomi Stonberg and Glenn Pudelka, for their legal advice and background information on education and the law.

  My fellow educators at St. Benedict School in Oakland and Bret Harte Middle School in Hayward, California; Middle School 44 in New York City; and Dover-Sherborn Middle School in Dover, Massachusetts. And to my fellow educators everywhere. People think they know how hard you work. People are wrong.

  My wife, Karin, and our children, Molly and Brennan, for giving purpose to this all.