by June Shaw
“And that man killed my perfect Cero,” he said, his tone solemn.
I touched his shoulder and said, “I am so sorry.” I had no idea what he was talking about, but his face had creased with wretchedness.
Wren shook his head. “He knocked her down.”
“Couldn’t you have just put her back up?”
His face snapped toward me.
“Mr. Wren?” A weepy-eyed teenage girl stood at the door. “Can I talk to you?”
He nodded and gave a final glance to his cactus garden.
“Nice plants. You know a lot,” I said, ready to walk away but deciding to touch what looked like hard stickers on some wide leaves. They pricked my finger. I drew my hand away.
Harry Wren stopped walking toward the distraught girl. He stared at me, looking haughty. “I have been an active member of the Cactus-Growers Society for many years. I study the online malls, view all the galleries.”
“Wow,” was all I could say as I strolled out. The girl sulked in, and his door shut.
Since Mr. Wren was a counselor, maybe I should ask him for suggestions about keeping Kat in classes. Possibly after he spoke to that troubled student. And after he got over his misery about somebody killing his plant. I ambled away, wondering whether Minnie got lonesome while she was alone at the condo. Lots of pets became lonely. Did plants?
Harry Wren had made me feel guilty, acutely aware that I needed to learn more about my sidekick, Minnie, if she was going to accompany me on my current journey toward locating myself. Minnie was my acquiescence to keeping loved ones with me. Of course I’d only bought her a few days ago, so we hadn’t yet totally connected. But that was coming. Minnie and I were friends, I mentally asserted, striding to the end of the rear office hall. She listened as well as my dearest neighbor I’d left behind. If I pampered her enough, maybe one day she’d learn to love me as much as Gil had, and all the members of my family.
I stopped, overcome by a tremendous sense of loss.
What price was I paying for my newfound freedom? Was it worth what I gained?
“Yes,” I said, nudging aside the self-doubts. I couldn’t remain around my family members, hoping I could solve each of their troubles, which in turn would make my life feel more meaningful. I had finally begun to discover what made me unique and why Cealie mattered. I’d shrugged off that image of myself as a wounded half of what had once been a happily married couple. Then Gil had added to my joy. But Gil knew exactly what he wanted from his life. I wasn’t certain about mine yet, but I kept learning. If I gave up my independence to stay with him, I’d never get to totally know me.
A burnt-coffee odor inundated my space. Clack-clack-clack came from a room across the way. I headed for it, remembering that my final teaching day was almost over. The last bell would soon ring. I passed four students with a teacher. Even the grimaces they all wore couldn’t stop my smile from appearing. TEACHERS’ LOUNGE said bold letters above the door up ahead. My own instructors used to disappear into mysterious rooms labeled with those words. Clearly, students were never allowed entrance.
I’d always wondered what was in such forbidden rooms and what our adored teachers did inside. Did they plan all the marvelous lessons they’d teach us? My child-mind had imagined them sharing stories of all our splendid deeds. When I taught, we did speak kindly about our students while we took breaks in the lounge that was nicely decorated with pictures of landscapes and new comfortable furnishings. Now, as I opened the door and entered this teachers’ private space, I hoped to find adults who might lead me to understand more about Kat’s behavior and any connection to the dead man.
A slim woman in a long purple dress hunched over a noisy copy machine, running off papers. Her snarled hair needed washing. Another woman with a double chin and a black lightweight jacket sat at a round table, using a red pen to grade papers. Her opposite hand held a sandwich. She absently ate and purposefully graded.
The coffee stench came from an empty carafe sitting on a burner, the red light still on. Another copy machine stood near the one being used. Two long tables resembled dumping grounds for unwanted cups and magazines. Mail cubbyholes flanked a far wall. A bulletin board posted notices from earlier in the year. Mismatched stuffed chairs and a pair of old sofas cluttered the room. A hand reached up from the sofa I stood behind. The hairy-knuckled hand waved back at me.
I rounded the sofa and found a large man with sparse graying hair stretched across it. “You’re new,” he said. I introduced myself, and he scooted over, flinging a hand out to shake mine. “Brad McClellen.” His twang said he wasn’t from around this area. “That’s Millie at the machine and Deidre at the table.”
The ladies gave me an unenthusiastic hi, barely missing a beat with their papers.
“Everybody always seems so busy here,” I said, settling down beside Brad. At the machine Millie nodded, her moving lips indicating she was counting pages. “Have you been at Sidmore High long?” I asked Brad.
“Much too long, mainly teaching some math classes.”
“Do you happen to know my granddaughter, Katherine Gunther?”
“Absolutely. But never had the pleasure of teaching her.”
“I did.” At the table, Deidre smiled. “I had Kat for American history. Wonderful girl.”
Millie’s mouth recited silent numbers. Apparently the counter was broken.
“Did Kat get close to any of the staff?” I asked, hoping to bait anyone who might give me more information than I’d been able to glean thus far.
Millie glanced toward me, her pale eyes widening. I looked at Brad. He was giving away nothing. “Marisa,” Deidre said, her lips tightening.
“Marisa Hernandez,” I said. “Yes, I met her. She seems like a pleasant person.”
The women’s heads swiveled toward each other. The copier stopped. It started clicking again. Deidre’s red pen made angry marks. Brad McClellen smoothed his thin hair and looked at me. “Have the police talked to you?”
“Should they?”
His noncommittal gaze held on me. “Brad,” Millie called. “This damn thing is stuck again.”
“Patience, Millie.” Brad sauntered to her silent machine and opened a side panel. “Just another paper jam.”
“That’s all we do around here,” Millie snapped, “try to be patient. With the office. With the kids and the cops—” She noticed me staring and then hurled around to her papers. Muttering curses, she dared the machine not to work again.
“Some people get frustrated,” Brad said, joining me on the sofa. He repositioned himself, spreading his arms and legs.
“But you don’t,” I observed.
“No use. Nobody’d listen anyway.”
“You can say that again,” Deidre uttered. Millie’s harrumph, I figured, was a ditto.
“What can the administrators do?” I asked. “Do they have enough clout to make much difference?”
Brad shook his head. “Not much they can change.”
“Not much,” Deidre commented, red ink smearing those papers.
“And the police,” I said, determined to turn this talk back around. “About the dead man.”
“Aw, him.” Brad shifted on the sofa. “That was bad.”
“But that was one guy who couldn’t even empty a trash can,” Millie said.
“Oh now, Millie.” Brad’s drawl made this almost one word.
“It’s true, Grant did a crappy job of cleaning up around here.” Millie turned from the machine. “He left spitballs between desks and paper on the floor. And all he had to do was push a dust mop.”
“And empty our trash cans,” Deidre said. “And half the time, he missed that.”
Millie stomped over to Brad McClellen. “You tell me, did he always get your can empty?”
“Maybe he missed it a time or two, but we all forget some things.”
“Right,” Millie said, “nobody’s perfect. But that man missed his profession. It certainly wasn’t being a janitor.” She returned to the ma
chine, slapped a button, and pages spit from the copier. Some flew to the floor. “Damn machine,” Millie sputtered. She must’ve had on one of those shove-up bras because when she leaned forward, her cleavage shoved up to her throat.
“That fellow hadn’t been around here long,” Brad said to me. “He was friendly, a nice-looking youngster.”
Millie scooped up her papers. “But all those people from that warehouse church are crazy.”
I wondered what she meant and surmised something else. “Grant Labruzzo must have been the person who knocked down Harry Wren’s plant,” I said.
“Harry Wren. The man’s nuts about his stupid cactuses,” Deidre said.
A fighting instinct surprised me. How dare she call cactuses stupid? I forced myself to calm and addressed Brad. “Do you know why the plant died?”
“Yeah, everybody heard about it. We were out for spring break. Grant passed his mop in Harry’s office, and the handle knocked that thing over. Grant scooped up the dirt and the plant, and he threw ’em away. The damned thing just looked like a bunch of vines anyway.”
Deidre snorted. “It was the one time Grant really cleaned.”
“How could anyone just throw away a cactus?” I said, considering Minnie.
Brad peered at me as though I were weird. He faced the women. “Wonder why Tom’s not here today. He’s never absent.”
Neither woman responded, and I recalled the curious reaction I’d seen moments ago in the rear hall. “Brad,” I said, “was Cynthia Petre a close friend of Grant Labruzzo’s?”
Millie snickered. “Didn’t she wish?”
The bell rang, and Millie cursed in response. Deidre muttered oaths of her own. She dumped papers into her book sack. I said, “We’re done now?”
Brad shoved himself up. “One class left to go.”
“Dammit, another class,” I said without thinking. I calmed myself. I had one other question to ask. “Do the doors to any of your classrooms ever get stuck?”
“Nope,” Brad said. The women only scowled while dealing with their papers.
I walked out. Pausing to glance back, I sadly realized that disillusionment had replaced my earlier nostalgia. It seemed that as teens had changed, so had teachers. Surely some, like Brad McClellen, would still say positive things about their students. And maybe their co-workers would, too, when they weren’t harried like those I saw. But everyone in this place constantly seemed to be going at a hectic pace, all except McClellen. And maybe Harry Wren.
I made my way back through halls, my belly making little yowls. I sucked on a peppermint and stood outside my classroom, noticing Abby’s door was shut, the slit beneath it dark. Annoying questions filled my mind. Where had Abby been when someone opened my door, peered in on me, and slammed my door hard enough to make a vial break? Had that person known it would happen? Was my room safe now?
Gingerly, I opened my door.
Fresh air rushed in behind flapping mini-blinds. A wide area of floor in front of the room looked damp. The glass shards were gone. Einstein’s picture that had fallen again hung on the wall. No foul odors remained. No poisons to choke students. No signs of what had transpired.
Apprehension registered in my brain. I couldn’t hear any students or their noises approaching.
Surely I wasn’t lucky enough to have two conference periods. Where were all of the students and other teachers?
Loud voices resounded from a distance. I rushed down the hall toward them and careened around a corner to the main corridor, running smack into a mob. I shrank back. Riot?
“Get back!” a man yelled. The thick wall of students didn’t budge. Teens crowded together, facing a room that stank. I tried nudging through the young adults, and the voices surrounding me swelled. Between people’s heads, I could make out emergency workers backing from a small room.
“Everybody get to class!” Hannah called.
Anne Little motioned with her arms. “Back up! Give them room!”
Students shifted when someone forced a path to let the others get through. I’d been on tiptoe but began making small jumps so I could see above shoulders of those who’d abruptly grown quiet. Policemen and women forced spectators further away. People in uniform moved into the room that was emitting chemical smells. A strong odor of bleach filled my nostrils. “Let her through,” a cop hollered.
“Clear this hall!” others ordered, moving the crowd. I was pulled away with the wall of kids. Tears stung my eyes, and my nose ran. I was reacting to the foul smells the room gave off.
“Will she be all right?” a whimpering girl asked.
I spied the stretcher. What my limited view let me see made my whole body tremble. A blanket partially covered a woman who wasn’t moving. Her blond hair reached denim-clad shoulder.
Marisa Hernandez!
Chapter 13
Emergency workers rushed her past me. I had a clearer view of the woman, and although oxygen tubes stuck out of her nostrils and blocked part of her face, I was certain of one thing: She wasn’t Marisa Hernandez. She was the person I’d seen earlier whom I had thought was Marisa. Both of them had pale blond hair and wore denim today.
“Who is that?” I asked any of the numerous students surrounding me.
Teens jabbered to each other. “Man, she might be dead.”
“Yeah, maybe.”
“No, they’d cover her face if she died.”
I stared directly into a girl’s wide brown eyes. “Who was that?”
She sniffled. “Mrs. Peekers.”
Police blocked off the fetid room down the hall and the area outside it with yellow tape. Others joined teachers to shoo away students. In a reassuring tone, Anne Little told the teens backing up that they would learn about what had occurred, and the kids quieted to hear. “We don’t know what happened yet,” she said. There would be an investigation. Then everyone would be told. “In the meantime, you have one more class. And remember, seniors, exams start Monday.”
Groans echoed off the walls. Students moved off, wondering aloud what happened to this teacher. Hannah told a group she’d be coming to Mrs. Peekers’s room. A few teens and teachers stood talking, but most moseyed toward classrooms. I glanced at the school’s front doors, where the last white outfits turned and rolled Mrs. Peekers down a ramp.
Sirens wailed, and big girls near me cried. From the end of the corridor, I watched a man snapping pictures of what appeared to be a custodians’ supply room. Outside the room, a liquid wet the floor. Custodians thrust huge fans into the area and turned them on. Beside the room stood cardboard boxes, the flaps on two of them open.
A policeman ordered the rest of us back to classes. I hurried to my room. Students spoke loudly while they neared. I saw the girl that I’d spoken to outside Abby’s room and asked her about Mrs. Peekers.
“She teaches English. She went in the janitors’ room to get an eraser and somebody locked the door.”
Goose bumps sprouted on my arms. “Locked in—just like me.”
The child frowned. “You just didn’t turn the knob all the way.”
“Yes, I did.” My statement made the girl look annoyed. “But why was Mrs. Peekers on a stretcher?” I asked.
Another girl turned and said, “Some kind of cleaning stuff spilled under the door.”
“What cleaning stuff?”
“I don’t know, but I’ll bet whoever left those boxes there is gonna be in real trouble.”
My animated students had become too riled. I made them sit, assured them Mrs. Peekers would be all right, and gave out worksheets. It took a while for everyone to calm and get to work. Then I stared over their heads, my thoughts reeling. Was what happened to Mrs. Peekers and Grant Labruzzo related? And someone had locked me in this room. The purpose?
I envisioned the woman I’d first thought was Marisa Hernandez, lying motionless on that stretcher. Spasms jerked through my stomach. What the hell was I doing in this place? I felt weak, with a headache looming. Hunger? Or fumes from out there and earlie
r inside this room? I wanted Kat away from this school!
The final bell rang. The kids went out, and I scribbled a note for Miss Fleet. Nice students. Completed worksheets are on the side table. I let one class take theirs home to complete because a fire alarm shortened their period. A beaker accidentally broke in here. I signed the sheet, left it on her desk, and scanned the room. How different without students. With a skeleton, formulas, and scientific posters, the classroom appeared a center of learning. I noted the quiet. And then the door, making certain it had remained open.
I went out and shut it. I’d already returned the keys.
In a hall, girls wearing shorts practiced cheers. Boys wore baseball uniforms and lugged smelly canvas bags, following a coach. Teachers flocked, peering at the now cordoned-off hall area. I waved to the male and female custodians pushing wide dust mops. Two men I didn’t recognize sauntered ahead of me. Marisa Hernandez fell into step at my side. “How did it go today?” she asked, glancing at my face and my hair.
I remembered the duty hair and swept my hand across it, feeling one section patch up. “Routine, I imagine.” We exchanged small laughs that said we both knew what my day had been like. “I hope Mrs. Peekers will be all right,” I said, eyeing Marisa for her reaction.
She stared at me, making a grim nod. Her eyes showed compassion. I wasn’t afraid of this person. She touched my hand. “I’ve been so fortunate to have gotten to know Kat.”
I really liked Marisa.
She gave my hand a squeeze. “I know Kat’s worried about me.” A flicker of concern reached her eyes. Something captured her attention, and her hand slipped off mine. Three uniformed police officers were striding toward the office. Marisa looked at me. “Please tell her I’ll be all right.”
“Couldn’t you tell her yourself? Kat really misses getting to talk to you.”
Marisa’s gaze flitted toward the officers. “I’ll try. I’m glad I met you, Mrs. Gunther.”
“I’m glad, too.” We exchanged smiles with closed lips. She took off toward an exit, its doors propped wide open. I liked the way some teens yelled, “’Bye, Miss Hernandez,” and she called back to them. I truly loved the way she’d helped my granddaughter. And I hoped like hell she wasn’t a killer.
