Back to School
Ryan Bradley
Bracing against the December wind, Mark Debuse stiffly trudged through an unfamiliar part of the campus, while reliving the memory of his new boss’s voice, “Debuse, I see from your record that you’ve been here twenty years, the last six in charge of department four. I also see that you’ve turned a reasonable annual profit. Because of your record, I’ve decided to keep you. But you’ll have to get a degree, and that means going back to college or I’m sending you down.”
Through watering eyes, Mark looked up at the large, chiseled-in-stone words, Thackery Hall, above the old brick building’s main entrance. Then thinking to himself, I suppose the classroom is on the top floor -- where else, Mark pulled the folded, blue paper from his pocket and reread the inept mimeographed note.
From: Mrs. Wheelman (Creative Writing)
To: Students of Creative Writing Class 101
Mr. Holmes, the Science Fiction Writing Class Instructor, has announced that the science fiction authoress, Katherine Meese, will be giving a lecture to his students in his room which is number 412. The date when the lecture will be held will be December 9, at 10 a. m. Mr. Holmes’s old classroom used to be just down the hall and across the hall, but now it’s completely at the other end of the campus in an old building called Thackery Hall. Mrs. Meese will have a question and answer session just for all of you after her lecture. She will also have a reading just for all of you from her very first published book. (A space opera -- how exciting!) Your attendance, please.
Mark slowly climbed the steep cement stairs toward the building’s doorway his mind focused on the shooting pain coming from stiff and swollen knees. Once inside, he paused and stared at a large blue paper arrow pointin up the stairway. Thiking only Wheelman -- only an ex-gradeschool teach could have made that, Mark walked toward it. He found Creative Writing Students 101: Follow arrows to room 412, printed along its bottom edge. Mark muttered, “It had to be.” Again focusing on painful knees, he started up to the fourth floor.
After passing the last blue arrow, he found the number 412 on an already opened door and entered a dim classroom where faded green walls, disorganized desks, and a scarred, discolored lectern produced an air of indifference. Mark flipped on the lights, carefully judged the angle from the lectern to his left ear, and chose a desk, the first one in the row, just inside the door. Muttereing, “Damned ear -- twenty minutes early jsut to be sure of hearing,” he then carefully eased into the small writing desk.
Patiently waiting, he began to drum his fingers on the desk top while reliving repeating memories: the sudden vacuity of deafness. Struggling to understand the army corpsman’s soundless moving lips, “You’ve been hit -- lie still.” Long monts of pain-racked total silence. The disbelief of suddenlty awakening to sound. The old army doctor’s raspy voice, “Debuse, how, I don’t know, but your left ear had regained about three-fourths of its function. That won’t happen to your right. Your legs, especially your keens, will always have a stiff arthritic condition -- a lot of metal . . .”
Heavy clomping preceded a student with long, greasy hair and a motorcycle jacket. Mark smiled at the sudden memory of having been expelled from high school for having hair too long. He then sat silently watching as students began to file into the room. Jocks clad in sweat suits and sneakers, young girls in short skirts and designer jeans, older women in long skirts and tweed suits passed before his eyes.
Mr. Holmes, the salt and pepper haired science fiction writing class instructor, walked briskly into the room. Mark noted how Holmes’ cocksure stride and Cheshire cat’s grin not only told who he was but also displayed his satisfaction. Procuring a published science fiction author to speak had obviously made his day.
Mrs. Wheelman entered the room and slid her short, pudgy body into the seat across from Mark, fluffed her dark brown hair, smiled, then busied herself preparing to take notes.
Mark sat looking at Mrs. Wheelman wondering how he could have found himself in a creative writing class with a professor who could barely write a functioning note -- a professor who repeatedly reminded her students that she had begun her career as a third grade teacher -- a professor who still put big, blue arrows on the wall.
Mark watched Mr. Holmes’ back stiffen as the authoress, Mrs. Meese, who was tall, big-boned, but attractive in her symmetry and choice of light brown colors, walked into the room. After a stumbling introduction by Mr. Holmes, Mrs. Meese moved to the lectern and began her speech.
Surprised by her practiced, fluent presentation, Mark sat listenting until he noticed her shaking hands which she tried to conceal behind her back. He then turned to look at the faces behind him and wondered if anyone else had bothered to read her book, but suddenly knew they hadn’t -- wondered how someone who spoke so fluently could have written in a slow, awkward, meandering style -- wondered how many times he would have to listen to Mrs. Wheelman reading from her quickly taken notes -- notes which would be read with absolute authority.
Mrs. Meese completed her presentation, and a question and answer session began. After listening to the answers to: Why do you write? How long have you been writing? How did you get published? Mark abruptly asked, “Why did you come here today?” Mrs. Meese’s forthright answer, “Because I was paid,” brought a smile to his face.
The question, “What will you do when you get home?” came from a young girl whose very voice carried her fantasies of a writer’s life.
Mark noted how Mrs. Meese’s voice changed from speaker to parent as she answered, “I have a mountain of laundry to do and a three and a five-year-old to take care of.” He then watched the young girl’s eyes rapidly blinking, as her romantic fantasies were suddenly swept away.
Mr. Holmes suddenly spoke out, “I’m sorry -- but our hour has raced by. I’d like to personally thank Mrs. Meese for coming.”
Mrs. Wheelman’s shrill voice rose above the clamor of students leaving the classroom. “Students of Creative Writing Class 101, Mrs. Meese will be giving a reading just for your in this same room in one hour. Your attendance please.”
Mark tapped Mrs. Wheelman’s shoulder, “Psych II in fourty-five minutes.”
“I’ll take notes for you.”
“I thought you might, Mrs. Wheelman, I thought you might.”
Mark slowly descended the stairs thinking to himself, five more classes, a final, and I’ll never see old ‘Psych’ Linboff again. Thursday? He’ll have on his dark gray suit. He’ll walk into the room, lay his briefcase on the desk, glance around, then square the briefcase’s edges with his desk’s right-hand corner. His beginning words will be the same dry, “This course is required”.
Again bracing against the wind, Mark’s pace quickened; and his thoughts returned to Limboff: Tenure? How long ago had his students become a group of non-distinct faces? How many people had sat and watched his glazed eyes staring into empty space?
Mark opened the heavy wooden door and viewed another empty classroom. After flipping on the light, he walked across the room and chose a desk by the window -- a desk where he could watch the almost constant comings and goings of students -- a desk where his right ear would be pointed toward the speaker.
