Evan Hunter - The blackboard jungle

“What is it, Rick?” she asked, her voice very low, her face resigned. Her hands were clenched against the white sheet, and he knew she was bracing herself for what was coming.

“The baby is dead,” he said quickly, hoping to lessen the pain by saying it quickly. “The cord strangled him. It was nobody’s fault, Anne. It just happens... sometimes.”

She was quiet for a very long time. She did not look at him. She stared at her hands clenched on the white sheet and finally she lifted her head.

“I’m sorry,” she said, “please forgive me, Rick.”

He took her in his arms because she’d begun crying, and he wondered why this had to be a time of tears instead of a time of laughter, but he held her close and felt the sobs wracking her body.

“I’m sorry,” she kept repeating, “oh, Rick, please, please forgive me.”

“Honey, honey, don’t be silly. It was something...”

“Rick, forgive me,” she sobbed, “darling, darling, please forgive me.”

“Anne,” he said desperately, wanting her to stop crying, wanting to comfort her and not knowing how, “we can try again. We’re young,” he said, unconsciously repeating Dr. Bradley’s words. “The baby was healthy and normal, honey. It was just an accident, just...”

“And you’re not angry with me, Rick? Rick, please say you’re not angry. Please.”

“I’m not angry, darling. How could I be angry? Honey, I’m happy I’ve got you, that’s all that counts. Sweetheart, I don’t know what I’d do without...”

“Rick, I feel so ashamed of myself. The things I thought about you, and now this, I can’t even give you a baby right, Rick, I’m so sorry and so ashamed, Rick.”

“Come on now, Anne. Come on, honey, it’s all right. Believe me, it’s all right, Anne.”

“You do love me, Rick? Rick, do you love me?”

“You know I do, Anne.”

“Say it, Rick.”

“I love you, darling.”

“Even after what I thought? About those stupid notes, and Lois Hammond? Rick, I’m so ashamed I could die. Rick, please...”

“What notes, darling?” he asked gently.

She told him about the notes then, and he listened, and a tremendous hatred attacked him for a moment, a hatred for the unknown note-sender, but the hatred disappeared because he could not afford the luxury of hate now, and because the honest emotion inside him was something that hatred would never understand.

And when it was all over, when she’d purged herself of the doubt and the suspicion and the fear, she said, “Hold me, Rick. Hold me close, darling,” and he tightened his arms around her and he murmured, “There’s never been anyone but you, Anne,” almost to himself, not even sure she’d heard him.

“We will try again, Rick,” she said, “if you can forgive me.”

“There’s nothing to forgive.”

“The notes...”

“Forget them. Some bastard...”

“We’ll forget them,” she said.

“Yes.”

“And we will try again, Rick? You want to try again?”

“Yes, darling.”

“I do, too.”

They were silent then. They held hands, and they could hear the sound of laughter down the corridor, and they said nothing to each other. He thought again about the loss of the boy, and he didn’t know what he felt exactly, except this emptiness within him. He could imagine how Anne felt, because she had been the one who’d had the baby growing inside her, feeding on her blood, a part of her, and now to lose it. He kept listening to the laughter from down the hallway, and he realized Anne was listening to the laughter, too, and because he wanted to take her mind off it, he began talking, and he told her about the school, and he told her about “The Fifty-First Dragon,” but he did not tell it well because it didn’t seem to matter so much now.

She listened, and she was pleased, but he could see that she was still thinking about the baby she had lost, and he knew that they would neither of them ever forget their first experience with childbirth, even if they lived to be a hundred and had two dozen kids. So he kept talking until it was time to go, and then he kissed her and left her with her own thoughts about the boy, and he wandered down to the elevator trying not to hear the proud fathers everywhere around him.

He walked out into the street, knowing he should go home, not wanting to go home, not knowing what to do with himself. He wondered if he should go back to school the next day, realizing the next day was Wednesday, the 23rd, the day of the Christmas Assembly, knowing he should be there, but not much caring whether he went there or not, except that it would keep him occupied and give him something to do. He finally went home, and when he spoke to Dr. Bradley on the phone that night, the doctor advised taking Anne out of the hospital the next day because there would be a lot of visitors for the holidays, and he did not want to risk undue depression.

So Rick stayed out of school all day Tuesday, and he stayed out of school on that Wednesday, too, missing the Christmas Assembly completely, not knowing (and not caring, anyway) that Alan Manners filled in with his small part, not knowing that Alan Manners shared the few drinks, the few toasts, the few gifts, the big present with Lois Hammond after the assembly.

And not knowing that there was another present and that this present had been purchased for Rick by the cast of the show, and that Gregory Miller had personally supervised the collection of funds and the selection of the gift which was a black-and-gold-striped necktie.

Nor did he know that the boys had prepared a little skit of their own to accompany the presentation of the gift, or that they had — on a sudden whim — given the present to George Katz because Rick was not there and they hated to see the gift go to waste. Miller had protested strongly, wanting to hold the gift until after the holidays when Rick would return to school. But the boys voted him down, saying they’d get another gift and hadn’t Katz been a real nice Santa Claus, perhaps sincere in their desires to get another gift after the holidays, but never fulfilling their promise once the assembly had been forgotten.

Rick did not know anything about this, and he couldn’t have cared less. He was vaguely aware of the fact that he had finally broken through in one of his classes, and he felt things would be easier when he went back to school, but he didn’t think much about school now.

He took Anne home from the hospital on Wednesday the 23rd, and he didn’t think about anything but her on that day.

He didn’t go back to Manual Trades until January 4th, when the Christmas vacation was over, and by the time that Monday rolled around, everyone in the school had completely forgotten “The Fifty-First Dragon.”

It was almost like greeting his classes again for the first time. It was almost like a beginning.

It was almost exactly like starting from scratch.

The door to Room 206 was locked when Richard Dadier reached it for his fifth-period English class on January 15 th. He tried the knob several times, peered in through one of the glass panels, and motioned for Santini to open the door. Santini, sitting in the seat closest to the door, shrugged his shoulders innocently and grinned his moronic smile. Rick felt a sudden flow of anger, and then the anger gave way to the revulsion he always experienced lately before stepping into a classroom. He wondered briefly if Josh had felt this way, if Josh had...

Easy, he told himself. Easy does it.

He reached into his pocket for the large key, and then slipped it into the keyhole. Swinging the door open, he slapped it fast against the prongs that jutted out from the wall, and then walked briskly to his desk. A falsetto voice somewhere at the back of the room rapidly squeaked, “Daddy-oh!”