July 19th 2020

Chapter 201
Their Art of Beginning

"Maya," a voice whispered. Turning around, she found it belonged to August Matthews. The boy stood planted just inside the door, almost lurking.

"Welcome," she grinned, feeling almost relieved at the thought of his being the first of her students coming around.

She would be starting her day with the seniors, and she remembered enough of her experience being a senior to know she might be coming up against a tough group, with how they were both the eldest of her students, but also the ones nearest to her own age. She was still known to get carded in some places, and she knew how some of her former classmates tended to behave around the younger teachers. But August… She'd known him since he was a baby, which really felt strange to think about, especially right here, as he stood aged seventeen, one year off from going to college.

"I need a favor," August told her, still keeping his voice down.

"Sure, what is it?" Maya asked.

"Can you pretend like we don't know each other?" he requested. Maya blinked. "It's nothing against you, I'm happy that you're here," he quickly added. "But it's bad enough that my dad is a teacher here, if they find out about you…"

He didn't really have any friends left out here, she knew that. His best friend had moved back to Canada a couple years back, and after that he'd had Michaela and her best friends. But they had been a year ahead of him, and now they were all gone, leaving him on his own. She'd never needed to inquire or intervene, but now here she stood, his teacher… She looked at him, and already without asking a thing he gave her plenty in the way he stood, and looked back at her. He got good grades, she knew that, but it was the rest that was the problem. He was on his own, sort of awkward… a target.

"I won't lie," she told him. "That would make things worse, trust me. But I won't treat you any different than the others. I wouldn't have to begin with. Good?" August looked around for a moment, gripping at one of the straps on his bag.

"Okay," he finally nodded.

"Great," Maya smiled. "While there's no one here, I was going to say I'm really glad you're in my first group. It's reassuring. That'll be our secret." August nodded, with a small smile that showed his resemblance to his mother, before moving to take a seat. He stalled and looked at her. "Oh, anywhere you want, there's no assigned seating," she told him, and so he went to take a seat at the second station near to the window.

After August's arrival, it was no more than a minute of awkward silence before more students started to trickle in. They would already know about there being a new teacher, with how her predecessor had left ahead of the end of last year, but whether you knew it was coming or not, a new teacher was bound to be a topic of curiosity. Everyone who came into the room now did the same sort of routine. They walked in, and they spotted her standing there, looked at her for a moment before moving to take a seat, where they looked at her some more.

The reactions varied, and Maya was not surprised in the slightest for how the divide primarily existed between the boys and the girls. The boys… well, there no other way to say it. They suddenly found themselves with a teacher forty years the junior to the one they'd last had. There were some shy ones, who looked like they'd have trouble saying so much as one word to her. There were the over confidant ones, who'd think it would be so funny to make a move on her… Whoever was left in the middle would be those ones who had seen her and now wiled away the time to the start of class. Meanwhile, where the girls were concerned, it really felt like most of them were trying to figure her out, to see where she'd stand, whether that was so that they'd feel at ease to open up or so that they'd know how much they could get away with.

The one other thing she soon was left to take note of was a buzz of voices floating across the room, as some of the students looked at her and had that familiar look to them, of recognition. There was just going to be one at least, whichever group she was dealing with at the time, and that was all it would take in order for the word to spread to those 'not in the know.' A few of them were taking their phones out now, showing them to their friends.

"I'm telling you, that's her," she heard one girl tell her friend, just as the bell rang.

Here we go, class is in session. Luckily, if she could call it luck, they were already giving her a reason to speak.

"Okay, good morning, hello everyone, phones away please," Maya pressed her hands together as she addressed the room. "My name is Maya Friar, and I will be your art teacher," she introduced herself, doing her very best to keep contained everything she felt in saying those words. "I've been looking forward to meeting all of you for a while now, and that's what today is going to be about: getting to know each other."

Much as she'd wondered if her age would come and be a hindrance in some situations, she was just as aware that it would be an asset in others. For one, it had helped her get a vague idea as to who she'd be dealing with. Now, it helped her spot out one boy who looked like he was about to make some kind of comment on the possibility of getting to know her and get ahead of it.

"I'll start, because I have a feeling a few of you have already figured out a thing or two. I was born in New York, moved to Austin when I was in seventh grade. This was my school, and this room right here was one of my favorites. The other was the gym. I was on the basketball team, captain in my senior year. And, for ten years now, I have been in a band called TXNY with a handful of my friends. Before I was hired here as a teacher, I started a program at the Silvan Hughes theater called Stage Ready. I still work there, sharing these two passions in my life, the performing arts and the visual ones, too. So, that's me. Now, I'd like to hear about all of you. I'll leave it up to you to raise your hand when you want to have your turn, but I would like to hear something from each of you before the period's over, so do I have any volunteers to start?"

There were about two seconds of silence after she finished, not enough for her to become concerned that no one would raise their hand, before a girl sitting at one of the front row stations answered the call.

"Yes, alright, what's your name?" Maya smiled.

"Milena Janacek," the girl replied, and Maya recognized her as the one whose voice she'd caught just before the bell. It was right there in her eyes, too. She was a fan of the band. To her credit, she answered the question rather than to turn this into a Q&A about the band. "I'm sixteen, skipped a grade," she started, which immediately brought a boy at one of the back stations to scoff. "That would be my brother. He's salty about it," Milena threw a look back to her brother, who frowned in response. "I'm deaf in one ear," she pointed to the left one like she wanted to get that fact out of the way. "I've lived in Austin all my life. I'm on the swim team, tried for basketball a couple of times but didn't make it. I have a cat called Muffin, and an overprotective dad, and an annoying but lovable older brother. That's about it."

"Great, thanks for that," Maya smiled back at her. "A rebuttal from annoying but lovable?" she called to the boy in the back, making the others laugh quietly. Thankfully, Milena's brother took it in stride.

"Antonin Janacek, people call me Tony," he introduced himself. "Just turned eighteen a week ago. I work at my dad's shop, we fix cars. Captain of the basketball team two years running," he revealed, and the impressed look on the new teacher's face possibly earned her points with the boy. "Mostly get by in most classes. I like to draw, started doing it because… well, my mother was an artist," he revealed, and while Maya had guessed from his sister's response that their mother was no longer in the picture, Tony's confirmed, in tandem with the look on Milena's face, that she was no longer living.

"I can't wait to see what you'll do in here then," Maya told him with an appreciative tip of the head, calling no more attention to the unspoken truth than was necessary.

After the Janaceks had done their part, the other students went ahead and started to take their turns. It was a lot of information for Maya to take in, but she handled it well enough. She could look at all of their faces and recall every detail big or small. As more and more of them took their turn, it was getting harder and harder not to look toward August, wondering when he would raise his hand. Here was this boy she had known all his life, and suddenly, in this setting, it felt like maybe she didn't know him at all. He was not shy like this, not any time she had seen him, and she saw plenty of him. This version of August Matthews felt like how it would be to compare Asher and Joey, or Nellie and Gracie, except he was just one person. He had long felt like a little brother to her, and now…

"Yes?" she nodded, trying not to sound so invested, when he finally raised his hand, third from last.

"August Matthews," he stated. "Seventeen. I moved to Texas when I was six." His pause here showed how he was having to work extra hard to edit out any connections that might establish their knowing each other. "I have a bird, a parakeet, called Daisy. She was my girlfriend's, but she went away to college this fall, so I said I'd look after her." One of the boys in the back gave an audible chuckle, only to get a warning tap to the arm from Tony Janacek. Maya stared back at the pair of them with a warning of her own. She turned back to August, picking up some more information from the pause stretching on. Finally, he started up again. "I don't know what I want to do next year," he admitted, looking back to Maya and nearly giving himself away now for the look he had when he remembered who he was making this statement to.

"Well, you've got time," she told him, holding his gaze until he quietly nodded.

By the time the last of the students had said their part, they were a minute off from the bell. Just like that, her first class was ending. She thanked them all for sharing with her, and soon they were all getting up, filing out of the room and on their way to their next class. Maya watched them go, all of these boys and girls who had been names on a page not too long ago. Suddenly, they were so much more to her. She would only have a year with this group, but she looked forward to seeing them through it as much as she did her freshmen.

TO BE CONTINUED

See you tomorrow! - mooners