Elinor Lipman - The Dearly Departed

Mrs. Mobilio was best known on campus for looking old enough to be her husband’s mother, a genetic swindle that fueled the legend of her husband’s roving eye. She was, in fact, only three years and eight months older than Mr. Mobilio, a difference barely worth noting, she felt; still, she dyed her once-dark hair and eyebrows an unbecoming gold and swam laps so religiously that her suits never dried. Truth or fiction, the rumors were humiliating. Real life and campus life blurred at boarding schools: Dorms were your home, colleagues were your neighbors, students were your baby-sitters. Alleged girlfriends emeritae were everywhere, rookies no longer, displaced by newer and fresher blood, untouchable job-wise thanks to rumors of romance.

So it was with well-disguised delight that Nancy Mobilio listened to a committee of three ninth-graders complain that Miss Batten couldn’t teach health to save her life.

“You should hear her,” said Ogden, who already wore the haughty look and out-of-season striped wool scarf of a future society hooligan.

“She calls us names,” said Hugh.

“Such as?”

“‘You little shits,’” Rufus provided. “That was today. Yesterday I think it was …”

“‘Jerk! You jerks,’” yelled Hugh.

“Tell her that other thing,” said Rufus.

Ogden unwound his scarf and cleared his throat. “The stuff we’re learning? In health? My father saw my notes over March break and he thought it was porno.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“It was the handouts she gave us on female anatomy. It listed the words and then the definitions.”

“‘Clitoris: Female organ of pleasure!’” Ogden shouted gleefully.

“That’s quite enough,” said Mrs. Mobilio.

“My father called her up to ask what the hell she was teaching us, and she said it was science,” Rufus continued.

“Do you know if your father called the headmaster as well?”

“I think he changed his mind because Miss Batten gave me an eighty in health and it was my highest grade.”

“I see,” said Mrs. Mobilio.

“Is she gonna get fired?” asked Hugh.

“We don’t fire teachers because our students complain about them. What kind of due process would that be?”

“Huh?” said the boys.

“How fair would that be? We ascertain that there’s a basis for your charges. Then and only then would we discuss it with Miss Batten.”

“She sucks as a teacher,” said Rufus.

“For the record, I hate that word,” said Mrs. Mobilio.

“Can we go now?” asked Ogden.

“Let me ask you this: Are you speaking for the class? Are you three voices or fifteen?”

“Fifteen,” they said in unison.

“And why did you bring this to me as opposed to, for example, Dr. Lucey or Mr. Samuels?”

Hugh, who’d made the honor roll one term, spoke for the delegation. “We talked about who to go to, and we decided you’d be the most interested.” His friends nodded. “Also, we figured you’d want to help.”

“’Cause that’s your job, right?” added Ogden.

Mrs. Mobilio was not popular; she was visited by students infrequently and flattered even less. “It is one of the hats I wear,” she murmured.

“Are you going to do anything?” asked Hugh.

“The term is almost up. Do you think you can live with this situation for”—she turned several pages on her desk calendar—“three more weeks?”

“Then are you gonna fire her?”

“I don’t have any such powers, and furthermore, I explained to you about fairness and due process here at Harding.”

“His grandfather’s a trustee,” said Hugh, pointing to Ogden. “Plus, his father and all his uncles went here.”

“They could’ve named the new science building after him, but he likes to give money away anonymously,” Ogden said.

“You’re crazy if you don’t call him,” said Rufus. “I think he’d love to know that a teacher called you a shithead inside the building he paid for.”

“Are you gonna talk to Miss Batten?” asked Hugh.

“She’s fucked,” Rufus mouthed to his roommate.

Hugh added, “I mean, she’s nice sometimes, but most of the time you can tell she hates us.”

“No one at Harding hates anyone,” said Mrs. Mobilio.

“They’re lying,” Sunny told her chairman, Fred Samuels, who was sporting his trademark bow tie and buzz cut.

“More than one reported it.”

“Who were they?”

“I promised I wouldn’t say.”

“Why?”

“The usual fears—that you’d find out and they may have to face the music.”

“Me?” asked Sunny. “ I’m the music?”

Samuels picked up his pen. “I need to ask your version of events.”

Sunny looked down at her lap. She’d been called out of practice and was still wearing a glove on her left hand.

“They say you called them names,” he prompted. “They said epithets were hurled—”

“They used that word? Epithets? ”

“I need to know your version of events,” he repeated.

“This is not a version—this is the truth: I came into class and someone had drawn a naked man lying on top of a naked woman on the blackboard, and both were waving golf clubs in the air.” She took off her glove and stuffed it into the pocket of her chinos. “Not to be confused with the man’s erect, anatomically correct shaft.”

“I see. And what did you do?”

“I erased it, and then I turned around and said, ‘You’re like real-life clichés of nasty boys in movies about prep schools.’”

“They said you swore at them.”

“I called them nasty, spoiled brats.”

“Is there any chance you used the words little shits or shitheads ?”

“None.”

“And if they reported that, they’d be lying?”

“Correct.”

“Still—it’s unusual for students to go to Mrs. Mobilio and complain about a teacher not having any control over the class.”

Sunny said, “Mrs. Mobilio? That changes the complexion of this matter slightly, I would say.”

Mr. Samuels’s face reddened.

“Clearly, you grasped the significance of the golf clubs.”

“Hard not to,” he murmured.

“I don’t know what you’ve heard, but I am not having an affair with Chuck Mobilio.”

“I was quite sure of that,” he mumbled.

“It’s a stupid rumor based on the fact that he coaches varsity and I coach the j.v. and we happen to share an office.”

Samuels put his pen down and lowered his voice. “Entre nous?”

Sunny nodded.

“Chuck may have had a dalliance or two in the past, before you came here. There may be a problem between him and Nancy in the trust department.” He put his fingers to his lips. “You didn’t hear this from me.”

Sunny pictured the covert Mobilio gaze, the too-long and too-frank stare with which he punctuated their conversations when he thought no one else was watching.

“Here’s what I’m going to do,” Samuels said. “I’m going to let you off the hook as far as teaching health is concerned—”

“Are you firing me?”

“No! I’ve already talked to some people in the offices—development and admissions—about administrative jobs there.”

“And you don’t think that relieving me of my duties is the same thing as firing me?”

Samuels shook his head. “You were hired principally to coach golf and move into the varsity slot after a one-year trial. I think the students admire you for that and at the same time appreciate that you were, shall we say, untested in the classroom.”

“Who’s going to teach health now?”

“Chuck.” He coughed into his closed fist. “Mobilio.”

“Great. Perfect choice, since mine are extremely small shoes to fill.”