Rasheed grabbed my hand and gave it a friendly squeeze. “Good luck, see you at dinner,” and with that he was off to meet his group from Banyan, Serge to the Birchton group.
I followed Joseph and the others down the hall to a door with the Pau Brazil tree stenciled on the front. Upon entering I could see my place, with the five pens on the table that mother had found and our family letterhead stamped on the top of the paper. There was an envelope on the table that I knew contained my whole future. My allocation. Everyone took their places and started opening their envelopes hungrily. There were sighs of relief, looks of confusion and sheer devastation. I opened mine. It read ‘Rosa Bianca has been allocated the Class of Construction’. Confused didn’t even begin to cover how I was feeling. It was like getting sucked down a drain hole, gripping the edge for a moment before it pulled you down a waterslide. Joseph turned around to face me. I mouthed the words, ‘construction’. He mouthed the words ‘medical’. We both looked confounded by what we had read. Though Joseph was far better off than me—I was headed for a life in the Lowers.
We were barely given time to process this new information before we were told we had one hour to write our family letters. Everyone started writing frantically. I just sat there and stared at my page. What could I say? This would be a disappointment to Paulo or maybe a triumph. I didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of knowing I had failed. My mother would be destroyed by it. I wanted to write something personal, tell my mother I missed or loved her, but nothing came, my hand was still but for the pen pecking dots on the paper. Joseph was scribbling away at a frenetic pace. In fact, so was everyone else. What was wrong with me? With about fifteen minutes to go, my hand selected a pen and wrote:
To Lenos Bianca,
I hope you are happy now.
Sincerely, your daughter,
Rosa Bianca
P.S. Thanks for the eyes.
I folded it up carefully, slowly, drawing out the last few remaining minutes. I put it in the envelope and wrote his name on the front. Then I just sat there and waited for them to call time.
Joseph was writing right up until they told us to stop. His broad shoulders hunched over his desk, his arm wrapped protectively around his precious letter to his beloved parents. I was so jealous of him and angry with him too. He could talk to me—he should. He owed me at least that.
“Please stand up and place your letters on the front desk.” We stood and Joseph’s hand shot back. He shoved a folded-up piece of paper into my hand and walked out, without turning around. I quickly stuck it in my waistband and followed. We had twenty-five minutes before we were to report to our Class rooms. I took this opportunity to walk to the gardens.
I stepped through the gate and was immediately enveloped in greenery. It was cold but my cheeks felt warm. My heart was beating so fast as I raced to find a place I could sit and read. I was hoping it was an apology or maybe even a confession. That he wasn’t going to ditch me in this place. That he was still my friend. I should have left it to my imagination.
The first part was crossed out. I thought I could read the words ‘your father asked’. But then the rest was illegible. The part that I could read was an apology. But it was not the apology I was hoping for. Joseph said that he was very sorry. That he had used me for comfort, as a distraction while he was in the waiting period and upset about leaving his family. He said he never should have let it go on as long as it did and that he felt terrible. He said he did care for me, but now that he was going to the Uppers and I was going to the Lowers, it was better for both of us that we spent time with people from our own Class. He asked me not to talk to him and asked forgiveness for his behavior.
I felt my insides turning to stone, my heart slowing, my breath taking longer and longer to go into my lungs and out.
If I didn’t know how I felt about him before the letter, then I certainly knew my feelings now. Now, when it was too late. So this is what it felt like to have your heart broken, I thought. I hadn’t even noticed that I was crying until the words on the page started to blur as the ink ran together. I knew I wouldn’t come back from this.
I stood up and scrunched the letter into a tight ball in my fist. I let the stone turn inside me, feeling the exquisite pain of love lost—before I even had a chance to hold it. I walked to my Class, feeling heavy but empty with tears still streaming down my face.
I burst into the Class on the first day. Bleary-eyed, wiping my nose with my sleeve, smearing snot across my face. I was the last one in, of course, and they all stared at me in surprise. Their wide eyes tracked me for two reasons: one, because of my disheveled and unsettling appearance, and two, because I was the only girl in the Class. I was about a foot shorter than everyone and tiny by comparison. These boys were big and burly, like Joseph, except for one. There, standing on the end of the line, was Rash. He looked concerned and motioned for me to pull my hair out of my face and wipe my eyes. I allowed myself a small measure of relief at the familiar face and stood next to him.
Our teacher slammed through the doors about two minutes after me, scanner in hand. The big, heavy doors nearly hit him in the back of the head as they hit the wall and rebounded towards him. He scanned our wrists and told us not to be late. It was so hard not to point out his hypocrisy but somehow I managed to bite my tongue. He introduced himself as Thiago Gomez. He was a strong-looking man himself, with no hair and a grimacing face. Short and stocky, I was the only person he didn’t have to look up at to make eye contact with. He hid his surprise well, but he scanned my name twice before beginning the first lesson.
Mister Gomez held a two by four in his hand, clapping it into his palm as he spoke for emphasis. “In this Class you—thwack—will learn every skill required for building—thwack—fitting out and also repairing a Woodland home—thwack.”
It sounded dreadfully boring and I was sure I would be terrible at it. Creating things, building things, was not my forte. I always thought I would be much better at destroying.
“This will range from concrete pouring to cabinetry. This is important and I expect you to pay attention and work hard.”
I rocked back and forth on my heels, thinking of how I could get out of this Class.
“It will be back breaking, grueling, and you’ll develop callouses in places you didn’t even know you had, but if you boys, er, students, listen and pay attention, you can make a good career from this Class,” Mister Gomez said, pacing in front of us, gripping the two by four plank and waving it around the class. “Don’t disappoint me.”
We all leaned back from the swaying plank as it grazed past our noses but his actions weren’t threatening. He then gave each of us a hammer and a box of nails and set us to work on framework for walls. The boys all clanged and clamored around like they had done this before. I hung back and observed. Observed nails being bent and Rash making an idiot of himself. I held the hammer in my hand—it was heavy, reassuring in a way I hadn’t expected. It was simple and aweing in its purpose and it was perplexing. What made them think this was for me? I stared down at it for a long time like I was waiting for it to tell me something. It didn’t.
I returned to the dorms after dinner, feeling lost. This was so very far from what I had anticipated. I walked through the garden with Rash, kicking dirt and playing with my hair distractedly. I could tell he was as surprised as me.
“So... construction... who’d have thought?” he said, breaking the silence.
“What were you hoping for?” I asked.