Jack pushed through the inner glass door to the main foyer, a large open area set in the corner of the square building. Before him, a broad staircase led to the upper floors and the working area of the school. To the left of the staircase a long corridor formed a wing of administrative offices and support space: counselor’s offices, faculty lounge, copy room, computing services; uniform little signs stuck out over each door, marking off alternate sides to end in a large wooden door with a brass plaque that read “Principal.”
To the right, the entrance to a similar wing was blocked by glass double doors marked “Library” in plain, black lettering. A bust of Benjamin Franklin stood beside the doors. From out here, the library looked large and inviting, comfortable, a place for exploration. In Jack’s opinion the appearance was deceiving. He found it pretty thoroughly sanitized with little to offer anyone over the average intellect or the age of thirteen. That wouldn’t be so bad—it was an elementary school library after all—if there were still functioning public libraries. Jack stared at the bust of the father of the public library. “What do we have, Mr. Franklin?” he echoed the question that Franklin was asked at the signing of the Constitution, “A Republic or a Monarchy?” “A Republic, sir, if you can keep it,” Franklin had replied. Hah. What do you think now, Ben? What do we have now?
Shake it off, Jack, he told himself. Barstow’s not the enemy, she’s as trapped as you are. More so. This school isn’t really the problem either. Don’t go getting your knickers in a political twist. Be nice.
He heard bells ring on the upper floors, actually a recording of a traditional school hand bell. He remembered jumping a foot in his seat every time those old electric bells went off when he was a kid, and he smiled. This wasn’t nearly as bad and it polishes that old traditional image, too.
He heard a kid-wave form on the upper floors and moved aside to the wall of the foyer as it started to rush down the stairs. Although he had no need to speak to Billy, and no intention of pulling him away from his friends, Jack couldn’t help scanning the identically dressed figures for his son.
They grow up so fast, he thought. When they’re in bunches like this, you can actually see the one-year difference from class to class. The six-year-olds, first graders, herded together by teachers behind and beside them so they won’t get trampled, most of them double-footing the broad stairs, some holding onto the rail or each other. Second graders, visibly taller, taking the stairs with more assurance but still moving as a class unit. Third graders, Billy’s age, broken up already into little groups of six and seven kids, cliques formed by gender and interest and genetic programming. Eighth graders, in twos and threes with the more than occasional loner. That boy, there, with the rolling eyes, the self-conscious posture and the fresh-from-the-dermatologist look. Poor kid. That incomprehensible circus has started in your pants, hasn’t it? Ten is a good age. Thirty is a good age, too. Those in-between years, though… hang in there, kid. Most of us make it through, one way or another.
“Dad!” Jack felt a little embarrassed that Billy had found him first. “What are you doing here?”
“Hi, Billy.” Jack looked down at his son. “I need to see Miss Barstow, remember?”
“Oh.” A cloud passed over the boy’s face. Without looking up, Jack noticed five other boys fidgeting at the periphery, watching this interaction. He smiled for their benefit.
“Going out to play some ball?” he asked.
“If that’s all right,” said Billy, remembering the previous day’s restraint by Miss Barstow.
“Sure. I’ll see you at home, then.”
“See you!” And he was off, problem forgotten, back to his little pack.
The stairs cleared and Jack started up them to Room 210.
Two corridors led off the second-floor landing, mirroring the arrangement on the floor below. Jack turned left and paused for a moment. For all that the design of this building was a hundred years old, and the building might be pushing that age as well, he had to admit it was well maintained. The wood was unpainted, properly finished and there was a lot of it; the floors were some modern facsimile of linoleum squares and they gleamed without cracks or buckles; the windows were modern designs but fit the overall style. It made sense. This granite pile had been built as a school who-knew-when and would always look like what it was no matter how you tried to renovate the inside. Probably cost as much to demolish as to replace, he thought, looking at the deep window wells. Might as well make what you can’t change the strongest selling point. A traditional school, indeed.
He started down the corridor and rapped lightly on the “210” gold-leafed onto the glass pane of an oak door. A young woman opened the door.
“Mister Phillips?” He nodded. “I’m Miss Barstow. It’s a pleasure to meet you. Please come in.” She stood behind the door as he passed through.
Young, he thought, very young. Probably younger than Jim. Barstow stood smiling up at him, a full head shorter than he. She had shoulder-length blonde hair held back with a plain cloth band, clear brown eyes, a build that had gone past trim to thin but was in no danger of being emaciated. She wore the standard teacher’s uniform of a loose long-sleeved white blouse, floppy big bow tie under the Peter Pan collar, ankle-length blue skirt and what he only knew as “sensible” shoes—those black lace-up things with thick low heels. She could have been one of the school’s own eighth-graders playing dress up, or a nun without a wimple.
You silly old fart, he said to himself. Jim’s old enough to run his own company—you work for him, remember?—and nuns don’t wear wimples anymore, haven’t for years. Decades. Besides, see the wedding ring?
Unwilling to lose an argument even with himself, he compromised. OK, he thought, not a nun. A postulant without a cross. And with a silly clown bow tie.
“Welcome to Franklin Traditional School, Mister Phillips,” she said as if this wasn’t Billy’s third year here. “What can I do for you?” She closed the door and seated them at two straight-backed wooden chairs beside the desk at the front of the room.
He had thought out his approach carefully. Remember, Jack, you can’t prove anything and she’s not the enemy. “Miss Barstow, I received your message, you know that, and I scheduled this appointment to see what I can do about Billy’s behavior. Whatever it is you’re doing for him here, I want to support you.” Some tension in her that he hadn’t noticed before seemed to be eased by his words. So far, so good.
“Thank you, Mister Phillips.” She paused, choosing words carefully. “Understand that I am not, yet, of the opinion that Billy’s disruptions are intentional,” she said slowly. “The disturbances always take the form of making the other children laugh. He doesn’t seem to be actively creating these incidents; if he began to do that, it would be quite serious. Rather, he seems to take advantage of ordinary academic situations and uses them on a whim.”
“Are you saying that the problem is an academic one, then? That his work is so out of the norm that it disturbs the others and makes them laugh?” If we put this on an academic footing, I’ve got a chance of getting Billy out from under this, he thought.
“I thought that was the case, at first, but I’m not so sure now. Take yesterday’s incident, for example. Did Billy tell you about it?”
“Yes, he did. Divide three apples among two boys, wasn’t it?”
“Yes. It was a very simple example in fractions. When I called on him, he created an answer that was so bizarre that it made the others laugh and disrupted the class. I believe that was intentional on his part.”
Could it really be that simple, thought Jack. Could she just be so rigid that she didn’t see how Billy was thinking? She certainly sounded rigid, with her formal way of talking.