I sat very still. A kind of peace moved through me. If you do not antagonize them, if you behave exactly as they wish you to behave, they will not be cruel to you.
If you are very good, they will speak approvingly of you.
“‘Vio-let Rue’ — you are a quick study, aren’t you?”
With the other girls Mr. Sandman behaved in a similar way but you could tell (I could telclass="underline" I was acutely aware) that he did not like them the way he liked me.
Though he called them dear he did not enunciate their names in the melodic way in which he enunciated Vio-let Rue. This was a crucial sign.
Edgy and excited we bent over our desks. We did not glance up as Mr. Sandman approached, for Mr. Sandman did not seem to like any sort of flirtatious or over-eager behavior.
Leaning over, his hand resting on a shoulder. His breath at the nape of a neck. A warm hand. A comforting hand. Lightly on a shoulder, or at the small of a back.
“Very good, dear! Now turn the paper over, and see if you can replicate the problem from memory.”
Sometimes, Mr. Sandman swore us to secrecy: we were given “rehearsal tutorials” during which we worked out problems that would appear on the next day’s quiz or test in Mr. Sandman’s class.
Of course, we were eager to swear not to tell.
We were privileged, and we were grateful. Maybe, we were afraid of our math teacher.
Eventually, the other girls disappeared from the tutorials. Only Violet Rue remained.
3.
Instinctively Mr. Sandman knew: I did not live with my family but with relatives.
Though each day came the hope — Daddy will come get me today.
Or, more possibly — Daddy will call. Today.
Running home expecting to see my aunt awaiting me just inside the door, a wounded expression on her face — “There’s been a call for you, Violet. From home.”
At once, I would know what this meant.
Even Irma understood that home, for me, did not mean the tidy beige-brick house on Erie Street.
And so, each day hurrying home. But even as I approached Erie Street a wave of apprehension swept over me, my mouth went dry with anxiety...
For there would be no Daddy waiting for me. There’d been no telephone call.
In the meantime reciting multiplication tables to myself. Multiplying three-digit numbers. Long division in my head. Puzzling over algebra problems that uncurled themselves in my brain like miniature dreams.
Such happiness in the Pythagorean Theorem! Always and forever it is a fact, clutched-at like a life-jacket in churning water — the sum of the areas of two small squares equals the area of the large one.
No need to ask why. When something just is.
Math had become strange to me. “Pre-algebra” — this was our ninth-grade curriculum. Like a foreign language, fearful and yet fascinating.
“Equations” — numerals, letters — a, b, c. Sometimes my hand trembled, gripping a pencil. Hours I would work on algebra problems, in my room with the door shut. It seemed to me that each problem solved brought me a step closer to being summoned back home to South Niagara and so I worked tirelessly until my eyes misted over and my head swam.
Downstairs Aunt Irma watched TV. Festive voices and laughter lifted through the floorboards. My aunt often invited me to watch with her, when I was finished with my homework for the night. But I was never finished with my homework.
On her way to bed Aunt Irma would pause at my door to call out in her sweet, sad voice, “Goodnight, Violet!” Then, “Turn off your light now, dear, and go to sleep.”
Obediently I turned off my desk light. Beneath my door, the rim of light would vanish. And then a few minutes later when I calculated that my aunt and uncle were safely in bed I turned it on again.
During the day (most days) I was afflicted with sleepiness in waves like ether but at night when I was alone my eyes were wonderfully wide-open and my brain ran on and on like a rattling machine that would have to be smashed to be stopped.
On my homework papers Mr. Sandman wrote, in bright red ink — Good work!
My grades on classroom quizzes and tests were high — 93 %, 97 %, 99 %. Because I prepared for these so methodically, hours at a stretch. And because of the secret tutorials.
It was true, I had no natural aptitude for math. Nothing came easily to me. But much that passed into my memory, being hard-won, did not fade as it seemed to fade from the memories of my classmates like water sifting through outspread fingers.
My secret was, I had no natural aptitude for any subject — for life itself.
Keeping myself alive. Keeping myself from drowning. That was the challenge.
They would ask Why. But lifting my eyes I can see the synthetic-shiny American flag hanging from the corner of Mr. Sandman’s blackboard, red and white stripes like snakes quivering with life.
Listening very carefully I can hear the chanting. Each morning pledging allegiance. (But what was “allegiance”? We had no idea.) The entire class standing, palms of hands pressed against our young hearts. Reciting, syllables of sound without meaning, emptied of all meaning, eyes half-shut in reverence, a pretense of reverence, heads bowed. Five days a week.
Our teacher Mr. Sandman was not ironic now but sincere, vehement.
Pledge allegiance. To my flag. And to the Republic for which it stands. One Nation, indivisible. With Liberty and Justice for all.
Under his breath Mr. Sandman might mutter as we settled back into our seats — Amen.
4.
Each time was a rescue. No one would understand.
Boys had been trailing me, calling after me in low, lewd voices — Hey baby! Baby-girl! Hey cunt!
Not touching me. Not usually.
Well, sometimes — colliding with me in a corridor when classes changed. Brushing an arm, the back of a hand across my chest — “Hey! Sor-ry.” At my locker, jostling and grinning.
Because I was a transfer student. Because I was alone. Because, like Mr. Sandman, they could see something forlorn and lost in my face, that excited them.
In a restroom where I’d been hiding waiting for them to go away after the final bell had rung I’d asked a girl, are they gone yet, she’d laughed at my pleading eyes and told me yeah sure, those assholes had gone away a long time ago. But when I went out they were waiting just outside the door to the faculty parking lot.
Shouts, laughter. Grabbing at the sleeves of my jacket, at my hair — run cunt run!
Crouching behind a car, panting. Hands and knees on the icy pavement. Desperate for a place to hide trying car doors one after another until I found one that was unlocked. Climbed inside, into the backseat, on the floor making myself small as a wounded animal might. On the rear seat was a man’s jacket, I pulled over myself. Meant to hide for only a few minutes until the braying boys were gone but so tired! — fell asleep instead. Wakened by someone tugging at my ankle.
Mr. Sandman’s dark face. Steel-wool eyebrows above his creased eyes. “Vi-o-let Rue! Is that you?”
His voice was almost a song. Surprise, delight.
“What are you doing here, Vio-let? Has someone been hounding you?”
Of course, Mr. Sandman knew. All of the teachers knew. Though I had not ever told.