Something She Can Feel

“He be with Mikayla,” she said. “He loves he

r. And we was talking about getting a place too. But he gonna have to pay for Patrice’s baby. Her mama gonna take him to court soon as he get a job. She told him.”

“That’s not just Patrice’s baby. It’s his too. Look, what are you going to do now?” I asked. “Have you told your mother?”

“No. She gonna kill me. Tried to the first time.” Zenobia bent over in her seat and started crying.

“You have to tell her,” I said, massaging her back as she cried, “so you two can come up with a plan together.”

“Why did he have to get Patrice pregnant? He so stupid. She told him she was gonna do it.”

“You can’t think about what everybody else is doing; you have to focus on what’s best for you and your baby,” I said. “And you start by telling your mother.”

“I can’t,” she said. “I can’t tell her.”

“We’re just waiting on Ms. Davis and then we’ll get started,” Mr. Williams said, sitting at the head of the table in our conference room, surrounded by chatting teachers and administrators. “I think Superintendent DeLong will be running a bit late”—he looked down at his watch—“so, we’ll get started without him.” A former art teacher who’d been promoted to principal after the last No Child Left Behind sweep came through our school and led to all of the administrators being fired due to low test scores, Williams maintained little respect from the staff and most times it seemed we were just tolerating his leadership. He was a short, sunken-in, yellow man, who always looked lost and boyish in the suits he wore. If it wasn’t for his balding head and graying beard, visitors would think he was a student and trample right past him. He wasn’t the type of person you’d expect to see leading one of the most troubled schools in the state, but as Evan said, there wasn’t exactly a list of people signing up for the low-paying, high-pressure position. So, he was it.

As we sat and waited for Ms. Davis, I noticed an attractive, dark-skinned woman sitting beside Mr. Williams. I’d never seen her before and I knew she wasn’t from Tuscaloosa because she was wearing a sharp, tailored wine-colored suit that I was certain could be found nowhere in the state. I wondered if she was from the government, No Child Left Behind again, and she was coming to fire everyone or, worse, shut down the school altogether.

“Sorry, y’all,” Billie said, running into the room with the look of a tardy student on her face. “I had tutorial.” She looked around the room; her eyes, which were filled with anger she’d managed to conceal with her voice, nearly set Clyde on fire when she saw him sitting in the back of the room, two suspicious chairs down from Ms. Lindsey. I coughed to get her attention and keep her from going back there—as everyone but Clyde and Ms. Lindsey had hoped—and signaled that there was an empty seat next to me. Billie had been doing a fine job of parading Mustafa around every place in town in just two days. And as I suspected, most of these places were frequented by Clyde. But against lady lovebird’s best wishes, he had yet to be in the right place at the right time.

“Thank you, Ms. Davis,” Mr. Williams said as Billie sat down. “Now I know no one is happy about this meeting, and we all want to get to lunch, but it’s necessary.”

“Don’t tell me we don’t have a speaker for graduation again this year,” Ms. Anderson, the history teacher, said. Everyone groaned at the thought. “We ain’t got but a lick to go.”

“No, no ...” Mr. Williams said. “Let’s not try to guess what the matter is. And also, it’s a good thing.”

“Good,” Ms. Anderson replied, “because I don’t need somebody’s uncle to go up there and put me to sleep again.”

People started laughing and the meeting was off to growing into an example of how it was equally difficult to manage adult teachers and young students. We too had prom queens, class clowns, gossip girls, a class president, and even a jock with the new girl making out in the back. We even separated ourselves like the kids: the school someone went to, the fraternity or sorority they pledged, the side of town they grew up on made the difference between close friends and associates, best friends and working enemies. The only difference between us and the students was age and the fact that we preferred to call each other “Mr.” and “Mrs.”—and even that could be done without being totally polite.

“Well, we could just have Reverend Cash speak since his daughter works here.... I mean, if he has time,” Ms. Angie Martin, the chemistry teacher, and my former elementary school enemy, said trying to sound helpful, but really more hateful. After our run-in in elementary school, she’d become even more sour on me in high school when Evan refused to make out with her in the boys’ locker room. Things only got worse when I went to Alabama and she went to Stillman and we pledged different sororities. Ms. Martin—Angie—was purely nasty to me and she had a circle of grown-up girls to help her out.

“No, as I said,” Mr. Williams went on, sounding a bit annoyed now—he was losing control, “we don’t need a speaker. I called this meeting for two reasons. And in order to get things going before DeLong gets here, I’ll just start by introducing the person next to me, who most of you probably don’t know.”

He gestured toward the strange woman from out of town and everyone got quiet, eager to discover who the new face was.

“This is Ms. Kayla Kenley. She’s here to take over Ms. Oliver’s biology class while Ms. Oliver is out on maternity leave. Ms. Kenley is a graduate of New York University. She’s taught science at the Math and Science Academy in Manhattan and while she mostly teaches teachers now in the education program at Columbia University, we’re lucky enough to have her for the last few weeks of the school year. We hope she’ll leave an indelible impression on our students and pray she’ll join us next year, as Ms. Oliver will still be out for a few weeks. Let’s welcome her.”

Everyone clapped and Ms. Kenley smiled accordingly, saying a few friendly words as Evan slipped into the room behind her.

“Oh, the man of the hour,” Mr. Williams said, his face brightening when he noticed Evan behind him. “You’re right on time.”

“Mr. Williams,” Evan said, imposing his stately voice and public demeanor. “Everyone.” He waved quickly toward the middle of the room, but to no one in general. He looked in my direction and nodded at a few people seated around me, and then finally at me, smiling and winking quickly. We noticed a long time ago when Evan first got into office that in contrast to his mostly white colleagues downtown, our being married wasn’t looked upon too positively by people at the school. Some argued favoritism, others put out rumors saying I made more than the principal, and many people blamed me for the fact that the school wasn’t getting more money, claiming I should be able to convince Evan to get more funds into the system and directed at Black Warrior High. It was a barrel of ugly crabbiness, and to avoid it, Evan decided to keep things very simple in front of people.

“First, I want to thank you all for taking time out of your lunch break to meet with me. And second, I want to praise all of you personally for the fine job you’ve been doing, working with our students this year,” Evan said. “I know it’s not an easy job, and I want you to know that your district supports you. Thank all of you. Go on and give yourselves a round of applause.” He smiled and led a mediocre, yet spirited, wave of claps.

“Now,” Evan went on, “I’ll be quick with my reason for having Mr. Williams assemble you all today. I know everyone wants to get to lunch.” He paused and a few people snickered, but there were no outbursts as there had been with Mr. Williams. “I’ve been having some discussions with a former student of Black Warrior, a Mr. Damien Mitchell, who the world knows as Dame—and I know many of you have taught him. Basically, he’s interested in coming to the school and bringing a crew from BET with him.”

“Dame is bringing BET here? To Tuscaloosa?” Ms. Lindsey called from the back of the room like one of the students.

“Whore,” Billie blurted out while coughing to cover up her outburst.

“Yes,” Evan responded to Ms. Lindsey. “Apparently, BET has a show where it

features a day in the life of an artist. They’re doing an episode featuring Dame and he’d like to bring the crew to our school—to Black Warrior High School—next Tuesday.”

“Next Tuesday?” Ms. Lindsey shrieked, touching her hair as if she was already planning a full makeover. “That’s less than a week away.”