October 17th 2020

Chapter 291
Their Work With Students

"You know what I was thinking?" Morgan Stewart asked as she walked into the art class with a bag full of Ma Maggie's, another gift just dropped off by her boyfriend, Paul. Maya spotted it and smirked at once.

"How much you and I have become such good friends in the past year, being new teachers, that you've decided out of the kindness of your heart that you just could not eat all that on your own so you thought of me?" she innocently suggested. The music teacher chuckled.

"Oh, you know how I feel about you," she played along.

"Woman after my own heart," Maya pressed a hand to her chest before moving to pull the extra chair to her desk. She'd just been about to head to the teachers' lounge to grab her lunch and join her colleagues, but now, well… "So, assuming that wasn't actually what you were about to say, what were you thinking about?"

"Right, well, I had this thought about the festival. Now and again, there'll be a new thing, to freshen things up," Morgan started as the bag was opened and the contents divvied up. Maya did not fail to notice Paul had packed enough for two lunches, which left her to wonder if he had packed for his girlfriend's friend, too, or if Morgan had asked him to put in an extra order she paid for herself. Knowing them both, it really could have been one or the other.

"Sure, yeah," she nodded, accepting the container offered to her along with utensils. Morgan sat down, with very 'wait for it' hands. Leave it to the music teacher to have a flare for dramatics.

"We need a talent show." Maya grinned at once. "Yeah?" Morgan nodded.

"Hey, it's me you're talking to. I built a whole program to help people take the stage, you know I'm on board."

"Great," Morgan beamed, opening up her own lunch.

"Did you ask Lindsay about it?"

"Not yet. I wanted to run it by you first. But she'll say yes, right?" Miss Alcott was once again leading the charge with the fall festival this year, and for what Maya knew from experience, she saw no issue in her liking the idea. The only thing that might put bars in Morgan's wheels would be whether they were able to fit it into everything else, find a spot to hold it and a timeslot…

"See, I'm going to say this while holding on to this bowl real tight so you can't take it from me, but you really might have given her the pancake treatment." Morgan laughed. "Do you want me to ask her?"

"No, no, I can do it… Wouldn't say no to a buddy though."

So, once they'd finished eating, they'd headed over to the lounge, where they tracked down Lindsay Alcott and made the pitch. As soon as she knew this was about the festival, she'd reached into her bag and pulled out a binder marked FALL FEST 2028 and opened to what had to be a note section before grabbing her pen. She wrote a few things down as they spoke and finally looked up at the young teachers across from her.

"I will let you know on Monday, I promise."

That was as far as they could take it for now, so they thanked her and headed off, back to their classrooms so that they might get ready for the start of their Friday afternoon classes.

Maya wondered where the week had gone by. One moment ago, she'd been walking in for her first day back, and now a whole week had just about gone by. She would have imagined that, by now, she would have gotten used to seeing her groups in their new order, but she wasn't there at all and would still have a moment of 'wait, what are you doing here?' when some student or another would show up in the morning instead of the afternoon and vice versa. She could only hope that none of them picked up on it.

The one time when she didn't have to think about this was after lunch, when her new freshmen came along. She'd had four days with them now, and while she was starting to get a handle on what most of them were about, there were still a few who evaded her.

Roman Day was not one of those, not in the slightest. The kid walked through life being one hundred percent himself, no space for being anything else. And aside from being a motor mouth, which was not exactly a fault, depending on who you asked, he was very much like his big brother Dakota, just a genuinely and openly nice guy. Some people may have been able to mask some faults, until they had the world fooled into thinking they were good, but that wasn't the Day boys. No, those two exuded an unmistakable lack of a mask.

Maya wished he could pass some of those good vibes on to Rochelle McNeil. The girl had been making it very clear all week, in not so many words, that she absolutely did not want to be here. She did not act out, and Maya recognized this would not have been her style. But just because she was polite did not mean that she would flip a switch and act like she wanted any part of this.

After the second day, where she'd watched the girl seem to have some sort of existential crisis as she and the rest of the class were tasked with an activity and she was left with either doing as she was told or risking some kind of 'incomplete' mark in her record, Maya had gone and visited the counselor. Miss Potts fell in the category of people who'd come along in the time after her graduation and her start as a teacher, so she didn't know her all that much, but she was generally someone who seemed to know what she was doing and care about the students, so there had to be a reason why she'd gotten Rochelle to take up art, although seeing as she was only starting here, it might have gone back to Mrs. Whitley at the middle school, and her she knew, mostly from when Lucas used to have to see her every week back in seventh grade.

As it turned out, she was on the right track. According to Miss Potts, Mrs. Whitley had reached out to her, in anticipation of Rochelle's arrival at the high school. When she had introduced herself on Monday, she'd claimed to be the top of her class, and from what Miss Potts told her, this wasn't wrong. She was a valedictorian in the making, and if she kept it up, she would have such a bright future ahead of her. But on that same line, if she kept it up the way she was currently going, it was Mrs. Whitley's opinion that Rochelle would burn herself out, that she'd close up and find no interest in anything but racking up those top scores wherever she could, a one-woman mission which left no space for the companionship of friends or anyone else.

The two counselors had tried to come up with a solution together, and when Miss Potts had mentioned the high school's new art teacher, Mrs. Whitley had recognized the name… the names, technically, as she'd known Maya Hart, not Maya Friar, though she could guess where the Friar had come from. From there, the rest had been easy. Miss Potts had told Rochelle she would be taking art this year, and possibly the rest of her high school days, and that was that. It was their hope that Maya would help the girl find some self expression, that they would get her to see the world beyond the pages of a textbook.

After receiving this information, which, admittedly, would have been good to know beforehand, Maya had been left to figure out how to handle Miss McNeil. Treating her any different from the rest of the class would not do, would it? She had only been a teacher for a year, but she had enough confidence in herself to say that she was a good teacher. It wasn't about treating anyone differently, but with each of her students there had inevitably been a sort of level to figure out. Some of them made no splash, just came to class, did good work, and moved on. Others struggled, in one way or another, and would require assistance, depending on the case, while others thrived in this space like no other, and would be given chances to expand even further where they sought to.

Rochelle would need help, but Maya couldn't just jump in and decide to treat her as though she did without knowing the way to do it, the best way for her. So, for a couple weeks at least, she could only observe her, see what she did. So far, it was 'the bare minimum.'

Maya had half a mind to pair her with Khalil Russell. Whenever he'd show up in her class, whenever they'd gotten to draw, or paint, over this first week, he'd always looked so… at peace… like finally he was somewhere that allowed him to clear his head, and it made him happy. Yet for all that, as soon as the bell would ring, he would always be one of the first ones out, and up to now she had not gotten the chance to speak with him the way she'd been trying since Monday.

Finally, she'd decided to come in from the other side. Instead of catching him on his way out of class, she'd have to get him before he got there. After visiting Lindsay and splitting off from Morgan, and getting the classroom ready, she'd hurried over to the cafeteria, hoping to spot the boy. By chance, she didn't have to go that far, as she came around one corner and spotted him standing by his open locker, tapping at his phone.

"Hey, Khalil?" she called, and he looked up at once. "Can I talk to you for a minute? You're not in trouble," she added a moment later, when the student's eyes shifted into 'uh-oh' mode. He put his phone away, grabbed his bag, and followed her after shutting the locker door. They went all the way to the art room, seeing as the period would start in a few minutes anyway. When they arrived, Maya shut the door, so no one would interrupt as they spoke.

"Mrs. Friar, I…" Khalil spoke, like maybe he really was in trouble. Maya raised her hands to stall him.

"I just wanted to check in with you and make sure everything was alright. See, I've been meaning to ask about the slip since Monday, but you're always so quick to leave when class is over…"

"I have gym after," Khalil cut in, pausing like he hadn't meant to interrupt and he wanted her to know that manners were important to him. She nodded, allowing him to go on. "I just want to make sure I get there early so I can get changed on time." Alright, that made sense. "About why I was late on Monday…"

"The principal needed to speak with you?" Maya recalled, and the boy nodded. He looked uncertain for a moment.

"My little sister and I, we just moved here," he reminded her. "We're living with our grandparents now, and it's been hard for Desi, leaving everything, everyone. The reason the principal called me is that her principal called him. They wanted me to talk to her, to Desi, to calm her down for the rest of the day."

Maya let out a breath. If anyone could sympathize with starting over, and how hard that could be…

"How's she doing now?"

"Better, a little," Khalil nodded, with a grateful tone. "Her teacher's been really good." Even as he said this, Maya had to wonder. Desi Russell would be in the fourth grade, and if she went to the same school… What would be the odds of this teacher being one Isaiah Babineaux? If he was, then that would also mean she would count Nellie and Gracie Hunter as her classmates…

"What school does your sister go to?"

TO BE CONTINUED

See you tomorrow! - mooners