Page 5 of Slander
I’ve been manic for so long I don’t know how to be anything else.
CHAPTER ONE
Sophie
There are twenty-two name tags taped to the desks in my classroom and the same amount of folders waiting on each chair.
In nine minutes, the doors are going to open on a new school year, and all those seven-year-olds are going to walk through them and decide for themselves what kind of year they're going to have.
I stand at the window with my homemade iced coffee in my hand and watch the parent line forming in the parking lot.
This is the part of teaching I love best, more than I'm supposed to admit—the first morning, before anything has happened yet.
The bulletin board still smells like fresh felt, the pencils in the cup at the front of each desk are sharpened to identical points, and my lesson plans for the week are printed and clipped and waiting in the drawer.
Somewhere on the other side of that door is my new class, and they're all still, for a few more minutes, perfect.
I take a slow breath and press my hand flat against my skirt to settle it.
The hymn we sang at choir practice last night is in my head, and I don't realize I'm humming it until I catch myself.
I make myself stop as the bell rings.
I turn from the window, and the door bangs open into the hallway.
Small voices and backpacks and the clatter of new shoes come barreling toward me in the chaos of kids who haven't yet remembered they're supposed to walk when they’re inside.
I love them already. I haven't met them, and I already love them.
I greet them at the door one at a time, check the name tags against the faces, crouch down to be eye level, and shake small hands that are mostly sticky.
Caleb Bradley comes in with his mother.
She's a thin woman in a pressed blouse with her hair pulled back tight, and she doesn't quite look at me as she nudges him through the door.
He looks up at her and then at me and gives me a careful, considered little nod, like he's been told to mind his manners.
"Caleb," I say and bend down. "I'm Miss Crockett. I've been looking forward to meeting you all summer."
"Miss Crockett," he repeats. He has a missing tooth on the bottom right, aSpider-Manbackpack, and a serious expression that breaks open into a small reluctant smile when I tap the spider on his bag and tell him I like his backpack.
His mother says, "Have a good day, baby," and is out the door before he's all the way to his desk.
Some moms are like that on the first day. They can't bear to watch their babies walk in without them.
I get the rest of them through the door, into their seats, and through the welcome song, the read-aloud, and the first quiet bathroom break.
Caleb is good as gold all morning.
He raises his hand when he knows an answer and waits to be called on.
He shares his crayons with the girl across from him without being asked.
At recess, I watch him from the playground bench. He runs slower than the other boys, careful with his small body.
I think about him at lunch. I think about him during the math lesson after lunch.
By the time the dismissal bell rings, I've thought about every child in my room by name and habit. Caleb is one of the easy ones, and I'm already planning for him.
