Chapter One

Macon, Georgia

2012

I walk alone in this hallway, my assigned morning duty, like my sister before me. Every day at dawn, before the buses arrive, I patrol, humming a tune as I wait for the first children to come in. Outside, a rainstorm whips the Georgia pines. The overhead lights flicker, strobing on institutional cinderblock walls, painted a dreary battleship grey. Not the best choice of color, if you ask me. Who would do such a thing?

Lightning flashes. Thunder cracks. It’s close; I can tell. Growing up in New Jersey, I knew all about storms. My mother told us not to worry, it was just the angels. They were opening up their heavy trunks to get their bathing suits out. Every time it rained in our town, the angels would all get together and go swimming. God liked that, watching the angels swim.

Mom considered swimming a sacrament. She worshipped Esther Williams. Whenever Million Dollar Mermaid showed up on our black-and-white television set, she oohed and aahed over Esther’s beauty and grace. Most of all, Mom loved the showmanship. With violins playing a rousing waltz in the background, Esther glided on the surface of the water like a dragonfly. She reached into the air and flicked her hand. A fountain sprang up. She reached again and flicked her hand. Fire spouted from inside the fountain. Then, together with the music, Esther lay back in the water and did a backward somersault, submerged, then swam toward the camera.

“That girl can smile underwater!” Mom exclaimed.

When summer came, my little brother Bobby joined the team at our pool and won meet after meet with his athletic stroke. Mom signed me up for the Junior Group of her Water Ballet Club. Again and again, I tried the submerged back-swan-dive stunt, which Esther did with a bright, lip-sticked smile. Chlorinated water got up my nose and in my ears. I choked every time. “I want to quit,” I said.

“Practice makes perfect,” Mom said, “Go work on your moves.”

I hate swimming. Fuming, I doggie-paddled into the shallow end, away from Mom and the other water ballet ladies, and practiced the one move I liked, Dead Man’s Float. Facedown, hanging serene and motionless in the cool water, I could stay there forever, staring at the aquamarine light patterns dancing on the bottom of the pool. I bet I could make a beautiful painting of this with my new set of watercolors. I wondered if that’s why they called them watercolors? I felt the water lapping at the back of my head. My fingers wrinkled up like raisins. I was hungry, I thought. The sun beat down so hot on my back. I flipped over.

Then, I floated on my back, facing up into a summer sky so bright. I closed my eyes tight. There on the inside of my eyelid, a phosphorescent image of the sun changed from one electric color to another. Blue-red-green. Yellow. Yellow. The sun began to pulsate. I leaned my head way back and submerged my ears. There, I heard the thrum of my own heartbeat. The sun turned a bright green, with a pink corona, changing color to the beat of my pulse. I wondered if Esther Williams found the same inspiration I did, lying here in the pool. In my mind’s eye, I imagined flicking my hand to command great towers of water and fire with a Strauss waltz playing in the background. Maybe I should quit piano lessons and learn to play the violin instead.

Off in the distance, I heard the faint sounds of another world, the real world. I could hear boys roughhousing and pushing and splashing the girls, who squealed and shrieked. I am not like them. If I kept my head back, ears underwater, I could hide in my dream world, safe from the chaos. No one would ever find me. I could float inside my private world forever, conjuring magic and music until the end of time. The thrum of my heartbeat gave way to a deeper sound. A rumble.

Screech! A whistle blew it all apart. I startled to attention. I kicked my feet and flapped my arms until vertical in the water. I shook the water out of my ears. All around, lifeguards blew their whistles and clapped their hands.

“Get out of the pool,” they shouted. Above, a booming crack. Thunder.

“Out!”

I paddled to the side, push-upped onto the edge, and hauled myself out onto the hot, wet cement. Grabbing my pink towel from a webbed lounge chair, I headed for the snack bar, where dozens of kids pushed and shoved and shrieked while they scrambled for chairs, scraping metal against cement.

Mom came to our table, dripping wet in her Cleopatra costume; the ladies had planned a “Queen of the Nile” ballet. She wore a sparkly sequined tulle skirt over a black tank. On her head, the gold bathing cap she’d spray-painted herself. And around her neck, Mom wore the ever-present nose clips which identified her as the master swimmer she always wanted to be. While other kids at our table loaded up on burgers and fries and ice cream, Mom shook her head and rejected our pleas. She didn’t even think about it.

“You’ll spoil your appetite.” Mom never, ever let us eat between meals. And never at the pool or the beach. I was used to it by now. Besides, we’d have to wait an hour after eating before getting back in the pool. She told us plenty of stories about some poor kid who went swimming after a meal and got a cramp.

“And no one ever saw them go down. Isn’t that sad?” No way would I take a chance by swimming after eating. Not even a snack. You could get a cramp in the deep end and drown. No one would get to you until it was too late. It happened all the time.

As we played Crazy Eights in our wet bathing suits, and the boys teased the girls with ketchup squirt bottles, the Four Seasons sang “Rag Doll.” We sang along, mimicking Frankie Valli’s nasal falsetto.

Such a pretty face

Should be dressed in lace

We squealed at the thunderclaps, waiting for the storm to pass. Nothing to fear. We were safe. Nothing could harm a bunch of middle-class white kids and their tanned, Cleopatra moms at the local pool in Colonia, New Jersey.

Today in the grey cinderblock hallway, many years later, I am the oldest living brand-new teacher in a public middle school in the Deep South. A purple-black rainstorm whips the pines outside the glass doors. I greet drippy students as they come into the building on the sixth-grade hall. The Hell Zone.

After an hour on the bus, some kids walk in jubilant and bubbly. Others look miserable and defeated. Boys shove each other. Girls bicker. Thunder explodes and they all scream their heads off.

I remember what my Catholic mother told me in the snack bar all those years ago. “The angels decided to go bowling today. Hear the thunder? They got a strike!”

My students will not buy Mom’s various angel stories. Most of them live below the poverty level. They know a different world, with no room for fairy tales. Instead of spending a carefree summer at the pool, or the beach, or camp, boys join gangs and girls get pregnant. Angels have no power here.

All over this building, homeroom teachers scramble to get their rooms ready for the day. Write the bellringer on the board. Check the lesson plan. Race to the copy machines for last-minute emergency worksheets. I try to calm the kids, using my “inside” voice to get them into lines outside their respective classrooms. I refuse to yell at them or threaten them. You catch more flies with honey, Mom used to say.

I treat these children the way I like to be treated. Saying please and thank you. Always showing respect for them as human beings. As a result, they ignore me. Other teachers see my helplessness. They try to help. They tell me to get tough.

“Go ahead and yell at them. They’re used to it.”

“Some horses need to feel the whip.”

“That’s what they know.”

Why don’t we teach them something they don’t know? How did Lizzie do it? I can’t help but wonder what I’m doing here. I don’t make a difference.

I make even less of a difference at home. I can’t change things there any more than I can stop thunder. For many months now, the family has ridden tidal waves of hope and despair. We deny and accept, then deny again, over and over, in an unending cycle of emotional mayhem. Time moves forward in a jerky, push-pull fashion, with no regard for our hopes and fears. Weeks drag on. Jerk. They race by. Pull. Time stops. Push. Eighteen months. How long now? Twelve months. Six months, how long now? We don’t know. Then another month, and another.

Now we find ourselves in this new day. “A New Normal,” the doctors call it. We breathe. We surrender. Okay, okay. We can handle this. And we do our best to adjust to the New Normal. With grace and acceptance, we surrender. We say we can handle things.

Then, something else happens and we go into shock again. We fight it. This can’t happen. No. We won’t accept it. But we have to accept it. We accept this other New Normal, as best we can, bruised, but the best we can, with grace. We can’t beat this monster that came for our family. We give in, one more time. We promise ourselves and the heavens we’ll take it day by day. Life goes on.

But for how long? We don’t know.

Why did this happen? We don’t know.

What can we do? Nothing.

I open the door and greet the hurricane of sixth-graders as they come in from the black day. They pour into the hallway, bumping into each other like thunderclouds. They yell. They throw heavy textbooks down onto the floor. They slam their lockers. I try to smile. I block out the chaos and the noise by thinking about angels and bowling balls. I hum a hymn to the Blessed Virgin Mary.

Brianna rushes in with no coat, her long curly hair plastered to the sides of her face.

“My shoes are soaked,” she complains.

I try to answer her; maybe she could take them off until her socks dry? We could hang her socks over by the window? But she’s already moved on. Shanice asks me for a safety pin to hide her cleavage; she doesn’t want another dress code violation from the principal’s office. Filthy and buttonless, this is her only shirt.

“In my desk,” I say. “Top drawer.”

The public address system crackles, “Bus Number One-O-Six will be late. Teachers, please send those students to the cafeteria to get their meals. They will eat in the classroom.”

Mrs. Jenkins rolls her eyes. “Great. More ants.”

In this hallway, the storm rages on. Here a stuck locker. Here, missing homework. A backpack tears open and out spills books and pens and papers.

From amidst a gaggle of kids, Mrs. Wilson, the sixth-grade math teacher, comes into view. Her seven-year-old clings to her shoulder, still in his pajamas. “He’s been throwing up all night. I couldn’t get a sub.”

O Mary we crown thee with blossoms today

Queen of the Angels, Queen of the May

Outside, rain pours down in buckets. Thunder crashes. Lightning flashes. I love thunderstorms. But my “classroom” this year, where I help kids read on grade level, does not live in the building. The decrepit rusted-out trailer sits in an open field, no match for this weather.

Most of the time, on a rainy day, I march my kids out there anyway.

“Walk between the raindrops,” I say, ignoring their complaints. I remind them how lucky they are to be alive and well and to feel the rain on their beautiful faces. I make a game of it, clothing them in black trash bags with holes cut out for their arms and heads.

Mr. Branson, the art teacher, laughs as they walk by his room in a neat row. “They look like raisins!”

Today, though, the local weather people predict severe storms. They’ve called a tornado watch. The way things look outside, I don’t doubt them. Already, the thunder and wind wreak havoc on my kids’ psyches, shredding their ability to focus. They can’t even get the right books out of their lockers. Out in that trailer, some will freak out. Others will pretend to freak out, jumping at any opportunity to join in the chaos. To my students, anything beats having to work on their miserable reading skills. I decide to find a place in the building for my classes today, even if only a corner in the library or a section of hallway. We can all sit on the floor and work in our composition books.

The bell rings for homeroom, announcing the start of the day. Come on, kids. But sixth-graders mill about in the hallway. They mingle and gossip. They fumble with locks and slam books. They screech their rubber-soled shoes on the linoleum.

Mr. Branson calls down from his domain, “Get. Out. The. Hallway!”

A few children comply.

Louder, he growls, “Get. Out. The. Hallway!”

Teachers shoo their students into classrooms. The hallway empties, except for a few usual suspects. A gorgeous young man and his two infatuated followers linger, deep in conversation.

I smile at Gorgeous. Calm and polite, I say, “Come on, time to start your day!”

But Gorgeous ignores me and turns back to his admirers, continuing his anecdote. The two girls giggle.

Why won’t they listen to me?

Mrs. Millhouse comes into the hallway and fake-snarls, “Get into that room or I’ll punch you so hard in your throat, you’ll be gasping for breath.”

Gorgeous scurries in and his admirers follow, leaving the hallway empty. Time to find a location. Go. You have twenty minutes, I tell myself.

Library? No. There’s professional development today.

Computer Lab? No. Already scheduled for use by eighth grade ELA.

Room 72? No, but I beg Mrs. Pioli. Because of the storm? Please? We can merge if you want? She agrees to merge with another special needs group so my group can have Room 72. A real room in the building, all to ourselves! I make a sign. Get tape from Mrs. Blair. Stick a sign on the glass doors telling the kids to come to Room 72.

Fifteen minutes. Out the sixth-grade hallway door. Wade through an icy river in the black void. Angels bowling. Follow the sidewalk to the trailer. Not afraid. Find keys. Fingers numb. Find the right key. Feet soaked. I don’t make a difference.

I load up the cart with laptop and power cords and the DVD and the flash drive. Pens and comp books for the kids. Ten minutes. I cover the cart with trash bags and wheel the thing out the trailer door and down the icy ramp, telling myself not to fall. I could just hear them now. Poor Mrs. South, that old white lady. She fell in the mud and broke her hip. We never saw her again. She dead.

I can power through here. They don’t need me at home anyway. Other family members have gathered for the vigil. I will do my part. I will keep going here at school because Lizzie told me to. Besides, there’s nothing I can do at home. Oh, Lizzie.

Wade back to the building. Find the key. Five minutes.

Room 72. Write the bellringer on the board. “Tell me about a time you faced an obstacle.” Set up the projector. It’s wet. Plug it in. Breathe. Make yourself breathe. There’s nothing you can do at home. Turn on the projector. I’m not afraid of storms.

My sixth-graders file in. It’s a movie day? Yay! They take their seats. They take out their notebooks and write their response to the bellringer. I turn to the recalcitrant Gorgeous and his friend Antwon.

“Guys? Can you help me with the electronics?”

They both jump in to set up the cart, eager to take charge of something for a change. Eager to think they have some control in this world of unknowns, where you are never safe from adversity, where lightning can strike you and your loved ones at any time, and you never had a chance because you didn’t see it coming. I know just how they feel.

“Let the kids help,” Lizzie always said. Destiny and Kenya hand out yesterday’s test papers. The boys have cued up the Midpoint of The Sound of Music. The part where the evil Baroness accuses Maria of being in love with Captain von Trapp, and Maria runs away from her problems, back to the Abbey where she can hide. She thinks she’ll be safe there. Heroes make mistakes.

But the rest of the class, in a nod to the thunder raging outside, has a better idea. “Go back, go back!” they say. “Let’s do the storm part again.”

“Good idea,” I tell them. Gorgeous cues up the scene to My Favorite Things.

My heart pounds. There’s nothing you can do at home.

My girls hand out the story worksheets I developed from decades of working with professional writers at the highest level. My middle-school kids can identify all the story beats in a classic three-act structure. They know how to create a multi-dimensional protagonist. How to write a well-structured scene with a surprising reversal.

Lizzie said, however, to be careful. In writing my lesson plans I had to address the current standards in English Language Arts set forth by the Federal Government. So I did.

ELAGSE6W3 (English Language Arts Georgia Standards of Excellence Sixth Grade Writing 3): Write narratives to develop real or imagined experiences or events using effective technique, relevant descriptive details, and well-structured event sequences.

My students enjoy writing about their personal experiences. Using my prompts, they dig deep and write from the heart. A time you cared about somebody. A time you made a mistake. A time everything went wrong. When they write about themselves and their struggles, they care about spelling, punctuation, and grammar. But even more important, my kids can learn about life itself by writing about their own journeys.

And, by learning about story structure and character arcs, they can go on the journey with classic heroes and heroines, overcoming life’s many obstacles. True, they do not share many experiences with the Austrian nun-turned-nanny Maria von Trapp. They will never leave the convent to live in a villa. They will never sing Edelweiss onstage, in front of Nazis. But they do know what it’s like to feel out-of-place and inept, like Maria. They know what it’s like to feel afraid. And useless, like me.

By going on this journey with Maria, they will see, like all heroes, she makes mistakes. They will see her learn from her mistakes. They will see her find her inner strength. If she can overcome, maybe they can overcome, too. But can I? Good question.

I try to breathe in like my yoga teacher taught me. No air will fit. My lungs have clamped shut.

Destiny turns out the lights and takes her seat. The class settles. I nod to Gorgeous. He presses “Play.” On the screen, Maria kneels by her bed, praying for the children in her care. Thunder explodes. I back out of the room.

I lean against the wall in the deserted hallway. Screaming gusts of wind shake the glass doors. Outside, branches fall to the ground. I look over to see Mrs. Abernathy with her mop and pail, cleaning up some vomit outside Mrs. Wilson’s room.

“You all right, Miz South?”

I look away. “I’m okay, thank you.” I start walking. As I head toward the front of the building, my sneakers squeak on the tiles. Where am I going? Breathe in. Breathe out.

I pass the art room where Mr. Branson yells, as he does every day.

“Where’s your pencil? Where’s your pencil? Where’s your pencil?”

I pass the computer lab where Mr. McHenry yells, “Work, work, work!” He cracks an imaginary whip. His students don’t want to write a five-paragraph essay on current events today. I pass the bulletin board with its block letters in the school colors, maroon and black.

“Today is the First Day of the Rest of Your Life!”

I turn the corner and walk through the open doorway to the school secretary’s office. Cynthia looks up at me, questioning, as if to say, “What are you doing here?”

I don’t know if I can get any words to come out.

“Home,” I croak. “I need to go home.”