That’s when I heard her voice say, “Tom, what do you think you’re doing?”
Shocked, I stood straight up. “Nothing,” I said.
She was looking up at me, still not changing her position. “How are you coming with that writing piece?”
“What piece?”
“On the Trail of Tears.”
I looked around. I was wondering where her family was. Then I started to wonder which room the fire was in.
“Well?” she said.
“Um…” I was still looking around. I looked at the window. It was open. No fire anywhere. I felt silly. Like this was all just a ruse. Yeah, but what would be the point in a ruse like this? I wondered.
“I want you to get started on that piece right away.”
I was still looking around her bedroom. Doing my best to avert my eyes. I guess out of respect, I don’t know. I have to say, she wasn’t exactly doing her best to cover herself up. I saw that she had several pictures of Paris. She did love Paris. I remembered that from class. Then I noticed the family portrait on her dresser. So I said, “Where’s your family, Mrs. Meacham?”
“Where’s that writing piece?”
Gees, was she obsessed with this piece. “I kind of don’t know where to start. I went to the library…”
“The library is a good start.”
“Yes, I went to the library and took out a bunch of books. However, I’m not sure how…”
“Tom. How many times do I tell you guys? Eye contact communicates both respect and confidence. You really need to start looking at people when you’re talking to them.”
“Yes…I know.” I finally looked back at her and she was sitting up a little bit, with the covers at her waist and her mammoth breasts sagging on her chest and on the covers. If possible, they were even larger than I remembered from school. Maybe breasts are always bigger once they’ve been let out to breathe a while, I remember thinking.
“Go on,” she said, her piercing eyes seemingly looking right through mine. Admittedly this was a bit more attention than she had ever given me in school. And yet, at the same time, it felt like we were at school and this was I felt like I was some sort of torturous detention, where she subjected boys to her natural form, for no other reason than to see us squirm.
Sometimes you can tell if a teacher favors one sex over another and that was certainly true of Mrs. Meacham. Although she tried her best in class to treat boys and girls the same, it often came off that she didn’t quite trust anything the girls were saying, as if they were incapable of speaking without being catty or calculating, obviously stemming from their undeniable jealousy, after watching Mrs. Meacham reduce their boyfriends to salivating dogs every time she came near them. And so, naturally, Mrs. Meacham tended to gravitate to the other sex, the boys, in whom, she had infinite faith in, and seemed to believe all had the potential of being Pulitzer Prize winners. It was as if, in her eyes, boys were all innocent, as sheep in wolves clothing, and it was her job to help us find our growl.
“Well. Um.”
“What’s the matter, Mr. Chalmers? Why are you stammering?”
“Um…No reason.” It was almost as if she was unaware of the awkwardness of the situation. And still, I was wondering where in the world that fire was.
“Come closer,” she said.
“Okay.” I moved in a little closer, still standing. “Anyway, um, I went to the library and got all those books, but the few times I’ve looked at them, I wasn’t able to find what I was looking for. My sister was with me when I went to the library and she only gave me 5 minutes. I guess she had a party or something to get to so I had to hurry. I guess I picked the wrong books.”
She didn’t say anything. She was just looking at me. And then down at my pants. I might have had an erection. If I did, the protrusion would have been pretty obvious. Of course, I didn’t realize this at the time, but in my dreams, I have an above average size penis. It wasn’t until later in life that realized the error of my thinking. Anyway, at the time, I was thinking if Mrs. Meacham had seen my erection, how incredibly embarrassing that would be, more than just an embarrassing gaffe. Much more. I remember wishing I could sit down.
Then she asked, “What about the class time I gave everyone to go to the library? Why didn’t you find a book then?” All of a sudden, she reached out for me, but I scooted back. That made her really mad. “Tom!” she said in a most reprimanding tone.
“Yes?” I said, rather sheepishly from a safe distance.
“The class time?”
“Oh…um…I went to the library with the class. But I pretty much just spent it passing notes with Rebecca Tolleson. She was trying to get me to go out with her friend Angie.”
“Angie Phelps?”
“Yeah.”
“Why wouldn’t you go out with Angie?”
“I don’t know. She’s kind of weird.”
“I have Angie in one of my other English 10 classes. She’s quite bright.”
“Yeah. I guess so. But she dresses in black all the time. And dyes her hair and wears dark make-up, like she’s dead already or something.”
“Oh, is that it? That’s why you wouldn’t go out with her?” She was smiling at me. “Go over to that dresser behind you. And open the top drawer.”
I did as she asked.
“Reach in.”
I did. And I came up with a bunch of skimpy underwear. I looked back at her.
“Underneath that stuff. There’s some pictures.”
“Okay.” I reached in again. Deeper this time. And pulled out the photos.
“Bring them over.”
I did.
She took them and searched through them like a stack of baseball cards. She found one in particular and held it up to me. “Check this out.”
The photo was of some weird punked-out girl with frizzy hair and shiny black clothes with safety pins pinned all over. “Why are you showing me this?” I asked her.
“You don’t recognize her?”
“No.”
“Tom Chalmers, open your eyes!”
I looked closer at the girl in the photo. Then, beneath all that crazy make-up, I saw Mrs. Meacham’s blue eyes. “Wow. It’s you.”
“Yup. During my punk stage.”
“Wow, I can’t believe you used to be like that?”
“We all go through phases. So, maybe Angie’s just in a phase. Maybe she won’t always look like a corpse.”
“Point taken.” I gave her back the photo.
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