Suki Kim - The Interpreter

It is then that her eyes stop at the photo under a column called “Locker Talk,” whose caption reads, “Check it out, BMW M5! Is this dude rich enough for Miss Park?” A gossip page in which recognizable names are highlighted with photos to match. The photo reveals a car parked in a lot; if there’s a man inside, it is impossible to tell. Suzy quickly scans the article, searching for the corresponding paragraph, but the rest is the student stuff: who’s going out with whom, who was at whose slumber party, who’s likely to end up at Harvard on early decision. No more mention of Grace. No explanation of the car or the man.

“May I help you?”

Behind the reception desk sits a thirty-something redhead in a pink sweater set, holding a cup of coffee. Odd that Suzy did not even hear her come in. Which door did she appear from?

“Hi, I’m here to inquire about Miss Park,” says Suzy, rising from the sofa while discreetly shoving the quarterly in her bag.

“Yes?” Her lips curl up in a simper. She is a natural. The sort of face any school would be glad to have.

“Miss Grace Park, she teaches ESL.”

“Yes?” The parrot smile. The woman is custom-made.

“Do you have a number where she can be reached?”

“Have you tried her class?”

“Excuse me?”

“All teachers are in their classes now.”

“But she isn’t. I just checked.”

“That’s strange, I swore no teacher’s absent today.” The redhead punches a few keys on her computer and says, “Oops, sorry, our systems are down. Let me see, Ms. Gibney told me there’s a list somewhere on this desk… Oh, here it is. Park, you said her last name was… Oh, here it is, try Room 302!”

“I’ve tried and was told she’s not in.”

“I’m sure there’s been some mistake. You must’ve gone to the wrong room. Try Room 302.” Then, with a toss of her fiery locks, she chirps, “Sorry, I have to take this call,” picking up the receiver with “Fort Lee High School, may I help you?”

Useless; the redhead knows nothing. Suzy is not even convinced that she punched in the right keys before. Obviously a temp filling in for the real secretary. Room 302, exactly where Suzy just came from. What does it mean that no teacher’s absent? What is Ms. Goldman not telling her? What about the car in the photo?

Reluctantly, Suzy climbs back to the third floor. Being sent around in circles—that’s what she remembers about high schools. She was always the new girl, and the first day of a school happened too often. Soon she would be transferred to another school much like the one before. And through each step, each loop, each journey, Grace was her witness. And now this third-floor hallway of Grace’s school seems no longer unfamiliar. That’s what happens to people who keep moving homes. Everything becomes familiar; yet nothing is. It is possible that Suzy might also have attended this school at some point, somewhere between Jersey City, Jackson Heights, Jamaica, Junction Boulevard, and how many others were there? It is also possible that Grace might have chosen a school, any school, so that she could finally put a name, a face to their childhood, which seems to have gone missing in the vertigo of repetitions. Is it, then, fair to say that all of this, all that lies before Suzy—the hallway, the ESL class, the screaming sixteen-year-olds inside each classroom—might signal Grace’s mourning?

Suddenly a bell. Doors crack open and happy faces begin pouring out. They are elated. The end of a class is always cause for celebration. The end of the first period. Three more to go until lunchtime. The last one to emerge is Ms. Goldman, whose face stiffens at seeing Suzy.

“Miss, I told you I have no idea where she is, and if you’ll excuse me, I must get ready for my next class.” Ms. Goldman walks briskly, heading for the elevator marked “Staff Only.”

“Why isn’t the school notified? How come you’re teaching her class and the office knows nothing?” Suzy follows in quick steps, afraid that Ms. Goldman will disappear into the elevator without her.

Pressing the “Down” button, Ms. Goldman heaves a sigh and says impatiently, “Ms. Gibney, the school secretary, is out on maternity leave, so it’s all chaos there. But that’s not my problem.”

“Why does the secretary downstairs seem to think Grace is in today?”

“Well, I don’t know anything about that.”

“Does any of this have to do with the guy she’s seeing?” Suzy is tempted to pull out the quarterly and show it to the woman, but she decides it’s better to let the question hang.

Ms. Goldman skips a minute or two, then says wearily, “May I ask how you are related to Miss Park?”

“She’s my sister.”

Just then the elevator arrives. Ms. Goldman motions Suzy to get in and snaps, “Fifteen minutes, but that’s it, I have papers to grade.”

The door opens to a cafeteria. Empty except for the kitchen staff and a few students at the far end, either waiting for a class or just killing time. Ms. Goldman returns to the table carrying two mugs on a tray. When Suzy declines the packets of cream and sugar, she dumps all into hers and stirs quickly. She knows Suzy’s eyes are on her. She lets the coffee sit without taking a sip. Finally, she looks up and says, “It was Miss Park who asked me to keep quiet. Without Ms. Gibney keeping track, no one has to know she’s gone as long as her class is covered. She didn’t want the absence on record, ’cause, you see, she’s used up all her vacation and sick days. She was afraid she might lose the job. Don’t get me wrong. Miss Park is very conscientious. I don’t know if I should even be telling you this, since you say you haven’t seen her in a while, but she hasn’t been herself lately, not since that guy started coming around, I guess for about a month. She’s been missing classes. Then, a few days ago, this past Sunday night, she called me out of the blue.

“She was quite upset. She sounded frantic. She said that she couldn’t come in for a while, and could I cover for her? You see, with ESL, the school doesn’t provide substitutes. It’s just not in our budget. So, when she’s sick or something, we’re all supposed to cover for her, the English teachers, depending on whose schedule works best with her class. So it was not a problem, except that she said ‘for a while.’ You see, I have my own class to teach, and it wouldn’t be fair for me to teach someone else’s class ‘for a while.’ So I asked her, for how long? She said two weeks. She’ll be back by Thanksgiving. I told her flat out that it was impossible, it just wouldn’t work. I told her to try Mr. Myers from English III, or Mr. Peters, who teaches remedial English. She’s got her ways with men; I don’t mean that in a strange way, I just mean that she has her ways.”

Ms. Goldman talks fast, in nervous bursts, as though she is glad finally to be getting it all out.

“That’s when she started crying, which surprised me. You know what she’s like, she’s always polite and proper, but I’ve always found her to be, well, a bit cold. But here she was, crying into my phone on a Sunday night. I’m a woman, I can hear it when there’s trouble. She said that she didn’t want to ask the other teachers ‘cause she didn’t want them to talk, and that she was calling me ’cause she respected me more than others. Well, I never knew she’d felt that way about me, although I guess I’ve always treated her with respect, much more respect than either Mr. Myers or Mr. Peters, who both look at her in ways not exactly decent, if you know what I mean. Besides, at large schools like this, students gossip, and especially with Miss Park—you know how she is—she’s rather, well, much talked about, let’s say.” Ms. Goldman will not say it. She will not say that Grace is popular because she is beautiful. She is a woman, after all. She will not let herself go there.