“You are not his mother, Mary?”
And I want to say, I know, I know, and yet, part of me is. Just as I can see separate parts of me, parts that are satisfied working with the children and other parts that are man-oriented, so I also see blended centers of me. Where does the mother end and the lover begin? Which is student, which teacher? Is being a wife supposed to be a separate, isolate thing? I do not think it can be.
But before I can speak again Dr. McPhearson interrupts my thoughts. “It will be all right,” he says. “It is like grief – the guilt – you must just work it through.”
Coming in from the hot June air, I notice that the halls of the school are cool and dark, strangely quiet and empty without the children. The Director is there, though, talking on the phone, and she waves as I walk through her office on the way to my classroom.
There are books and papers I want to take with me to California, and I had thought merely to drop by the school and pick them up. I had not realized how strange the school would seem without the children, and now as I kneel in front of the small white bookcase thumbing the speech manual, images of Brian and Matthew superimpose themselves upon the pages and I cannot concentrate.
The Director’s voice floats down the hall, echoing in the silent spaces: “I think it’s going to come out all right, Arthur. I’ve just gone over the books again and I’ve made a list of the most urgent bills. Yes. I know. There are quite a few, but a lot of them we can stall until fall. We’ll be all right then; the school boards will be sending in half of the tuition.”
Arthur must be Arthur Siegal, the school’s accountant, Doris’s cohort in fighting the never-ending battle against the drain of money.
“Yes, all right. I can give you the list of the ones I’ve marked most urgent now, but I’d like to get together with you soon, get these things paid before I leave. You didn’t? Oh … Guatemala. No, no, just for the summer, teaching in one of the colleges. I’ll be back in the fall.”
Doris reads off a list of names and amounts, including bills from the phone and electric companies. “No. Skip that. Leave it until fall.”
Irritation now in her voice, no cheeriness, just irritation and weariness.
“Arthur. Look. I told you – I don’t need it. I know I didn’t get last month’s salary either; I can read the books as well as you. But I don’t need it. I’ve got my ticket in my pocketbook, groceries till the end of the week, and I’ll get an advance when I get there.
“The Board meeting is Thursday night, you know that, and I want to be in the black. I mean I want the school to be in the black. When you read the figures to the Board, I want them to look good, positive. The Board’s enthusiastic now; the fund-raising for the new school is moving right along. If they think we’ve gone in the hole they’ll let down, get discouraged.
“Mmmm. Right. Well, that’s your job, Arthur. You print up the sheets so they don’t notice my salary’s not there.
“All right. Good. Thanks a million. See you tomorrow then.”
Chris and Brad and Tom and Billy, Ivan and Jeffy, and more, more. All the children of the school join the images of Brian and Matt; all the children Doris has made room for, all the problems she faces without complaint.
Unexpectedly, she appears in the doorway of my small classroom. “Mary, how are you? Can I help you with anything?”
“No,” I say. “I’m just picking up some books to go over during the summer. Did I hear that you’re going to Guatemala?”
She sits down quickly on one of the tables; her bright brown eyes move over my face as if to read me, to see how much else I have heard.
“Yes; I’ve been there before. I’ve found it’s good to get away, get a change of scene during the summer.”
We sit quietly, Doris and I, in the dim classroom until she says, “Fourteen years now since I opened the school. We started with just four children – half a day.”
“How did you know about them? How did you think to open a school for emotionally disturbed children?”
“Well, you know, when you look back, it’s strange how it happened. The parents really began the school. They got the idea, four of them, and then came to me and asked if I’d be in charge.
“I’d done all kinds of things when I was younger. Then I began teaching and it turned out that I had a knack with the ‘problems,’ as the other teachers called them, and one thing led to another, and the next thing I knew, there we were starting the school.
“Harry … well, I wish you could have known him. He supported me all the way, baby-sat at night with Mike while I got my master’s, built furniture for the school, painted walls. I didn’t marry until late, but he was worth waiting for. I could never have started the school or kept it going without him.
“I remember right in the beginning, fifteen years ago, saying to him, ‘Harry, I don’t know anything about emotionally disturbed children,’ and him saying, ‘Well, Doris, it doesn’t sound to me like anybody else knows either, and at least you admit it.’”
I smile at Doris; she makes it seem so real. I can almost picture Harry.
“We built our own house, you know, little by little. Bought the property, then put it up a room at a time, and while we were measuring or painting or laying the bricks I’d tell him about the children. He knew each one as well as I did, and he helped me a lot more than anybody else. Had a listening heart, Harry did.”
Doris is quiet for a while; I can almost hear her listening to me, though neither of us is speaking. If Helga and I have a body language, Doris has an inner ear and she somehow knows things long before they are put into words.
Now she says, “I was a funny kid. Always bringing home sick cats or birds with broken wings; had a regular clinic in the backyard of our house when I was young. I must have nearly driven my mother crazy, but she never said a word until the summer I brought home Leland Hagstrom. He was handsome as anything, but weak – drank like a fish, couldn’t seem to leave the bottle alone. After supper one night that summer my mother took me out on the back porch and asked me how serious I was about Leland. I was pretty serious; he needed me, or said he did – and I liked that.
“I’d never lied to her and it didn’t occur to me to do it then, so I told her the truth, that we were thinking of getting married. You know what she said? ‘You’re a fool if you do, Doris. I’m not one to interfere, but remember’ – and I’ve never forgotten this – ‘remember,’ she said, ‘never do your social work at home.’”
Doris sighs and gets off the table. “Well, I didn’t marry Leland. I waited, and after a while I met Harry and we had a love affair that lasted thirty years … I don’t know what made me think of it now; I must be getting old, rambling on like this. Well now, you get to work, don’t let me keep you. Where are you off to for vacation?”
“Oh,” I say, “California, I think.”
“It’s a beautiful state; you’ll like it. Have a good summer now; I probably won’t see you until fall.” Another cheery wave and Doris disappeared out the door.
I finished gathering my books and papers, thinking all the while about Doris. Had she just been rambling on or in her own way had she been giving me advice? In any event, before I went home I drove five miles beyond the school and put a deposit on one of the new apartments that would be completed in the fall.