And Many More

"I got three questions from my students today."  a fellow teacher announced as she entered our mandated professional development session.
"How old is glass, were you alive during slavery and can time move backwards."  she continued, plunking herself in a chair.  

I snickered to myself.

"Why we here......?" she whispered lowly, looking at me from the corner of her eye.  

I hovered around the vegetable section trying to get a bell pepper while some bougie lady tried to transform the guy stocking the shelves into her personal shopper.  

Well I need blah blah and blah blah and blah blah for a recipe and I just don't see it!

That means it's not here....I found myself mentally answering.  That means you might have to go to another store.  That means you might not make that recipe.  The stocker may not know a substitute, but I bet Google does...

"Why don't you wear a mask?"  the stocker asked the woman with what appeared to be genuine curiosity instead of antagonism.

"There is no longer a mask mandate in the city."  she responded brightly.

"Besides, everyone wants to see my smile!"

"I DON'T!"  I blurted out.

"I'm with you."  another stocker seconded, giving me a nod and trucking her huge cart of vegetables down the aisle.  

I drove home with my bougie groceries, glad I didn't end up in the newspaper for getting in a mask-fight because I can't control my tongue.  I approached a huge intersection when I saw something lying in the road.  It was a person.  I glanced around furtively, looking for emergency vehicles, assuming someone had been hit by a car.  I crept forward on the green light, then stopped.   Cars whirred around me, some honking.  There were no emergency vehicles.  The person was curled up like a little cat, sleeping.  Cars continued whizzing past, many with Christmas trees on top.  I sat, frozen, while people honked and tore around me.  I inadvertently covered my eyes, knowing the person was about to be run over.  

Suddenly, another car screeched to a halt and a bleach-blond woman emerged wearing high heels and a longish gold embroidered coat.  She walked authoritatively through the congested intersection, throwing her hand up whenever cars advanced toward her.  She woke the person in the intersection, imploring them to get up before they got killed.  She got the person on their feet and slowly advanced them through the passing cars toward the sidewalk.  I again covered my eyes, as speeding cars missed them by inches.  They made it to the sidewalk and the blond woman moved her car to the side, exited and continued talking to the person she had just saved from the intersection.  I drove home.  

I walked up the hill with the students on the last day of school before winter break.  

"You fat!"  one yelled at another.

"You're fatter than me!"  she responded.

"FUCK YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"  another screamed from the front steps of her house.

Some of the kids gave us the finger from the passing school buses.

"Bye everyone, be careful going home and have a great break."  I responded and walked back down the hill to the school.  

On Our Way Home

"Level 2 lockdown."

I gripped Ku's hand tighter.

"Adrian, come with us."  I said sternly.  

He continued washing his hands.

"ADRIAN.  NOW."  I commanded.  

Level 2.  Possible threat INSIDE the building.   Get inside a classroom and lock the door and don't leave.  Continue teaching.  

We sprinted down the hallway while Ms. Porter swung the door open, ushering us in.  

I've had the creeps a lot lately.  There is a wild feel in the air, a feral, bad feel of violence.  You see it when you drive.  People flipping out, yelling at each other, swerving around, disproportionate reactions.  Threatening to shoot.  

I wake up in the middle of the night sometimes and think of the woman who was murdered with her dog in Piedmont Park.  We live next to a large park.  We have a dog.  I am a woman.  I try to quiet my mind but it doesn't always work.  When I leave in the morning, I walk through my backyard in the pre-dawn hours to our car that we park behind the house.  I've been more aware of my surroundings, noticing when I hear a crinkle of leaves or people outside of the fence.  It is early.  No one should really be out there.  If they are, I like to know that they are there before they know that I am there.  

"The suspect shot two police deputies while they attempted to serve a warrant for murder.  There is a manhunt.  Police have closed down a section of Covington Highway and are walking through the street with rifles."

I looked at the message that Alec texted with the local news article. 

"I think this is why you are on lockdown."

Our school was listed with the other schools in the Covington Highway area that were also locked down.  

"We have been cleared to continue with dismissal.  Wagner, you will take your walkers up the hill and to the neighborhood as you usually do.  One of the police will flank you."

We assembled the walkers' line inside of the building, instead of outside of the building as we normally do.  My group is huge; at least thirty children stood in front of me.  Ku stood next to me, gripping my hand, even though he doesn't walk with me.

"Sit here, baby,"  I instructed, putting him across the hallway next to the door.  

"Don't move.  I'll be back."

"Let's go." I told the rest.  

We trudged up the hill through the woods.  

I had gotten in trouble for going outside earlier in the day to get my lunch from the trailer.  Now, I was walking with thirty kids through the neighborhood.  It turns out the suspect was killed by police as we lined the children up.  

I crept through the backyard this morning, in the dark.  I opened the gate and saw the back window of the car, open.

Open?

I saw the glass glimmering on the driveway in front of the broken window.  

I turned, rushed back inside and locked the door.  

*Title, Lennon-McCartney