Lily King - The English Teacher

He made it to the top, but there was no reward in that because he had to keep moving, even more quickly now as he’d heard, though he didn’t know exactly when, the first bell, which meant everyone in school would be changing places, glancing out windows. What would they look like, he and his mother, from one of those windows? Would they be identifiable, if not as particular, familiar individuals then even as humans? Wouldn’t they seem more like a lurching beast, shifting its shadow among the pines, barely upright, staggering so slowly to the dirt road which thankfully sloped (he’d never noticed that incline before either) down to the faculty parking lot. He just had to hope none of the teachers had scheduled midmorning dentist’s appointments or concocted some other strategy to liberate themselves.

He himself was not conscious of his mother, at this moment, as human. The pain of carrying her had changed from individual aches to a general burning so distracting that he was simply aware of her as a pressure, unlocalized, neither from within or without. Later he would wonder why he had not had to fight off thoughts of dropping her, of letting her roll off his shoulder onto the needled ground, as he did in subsequent dreams.

Finally the Dodge was within view, and the second bell rang and the faculty lot, thank God, was empty of everything but the aging cars of teachers. Peter swung open the back door and bent himself and his mother inside her car, then slumped her off his right shoulder onto the seat. He watched the extra blood that had pooled in transport drain from her face. She made no movements of her own, save breathing. He had so rarely seen her sleeping. Her expression was entirely different in sleep. He’d always thought the severity of her jaw and brow was due to the shape of her bones, but now he saw it was from the way she bore down on them.

He’d anticipated, the whole time he was carrying her, stashing her in the car, then returning to school. But now he saw he couldn’t leave her here. He’d have to drive the car off campus, to the gas station on Sea Street, then walk back to school.

He found the keys in her coat pocket. His only driving experience had been at Jason’s house when his father let them loop around the campus driveway. He thought that at the sound of her car’s engine Vida would hurl herself upright to yell at him. She’d never allowed him to so much as fit the key into the ignition. But all was quiet behind him. He knew he had to back out without drawing attention to the car. He pulled down on the gearshift, matching the red line with the R just like in Jason’s father’s truck. But he’d never driven backward before. He couldn’t manage to get it to move in a straight line. Instead the car sashayed out of its spot, knocked over a garbage can, and shuddered to a stop. In the cafeteria, Olivia and Marjorie stood in the window, looking down. What could they see from up there? He restarted the engine, threw it into D, and pulled out of the faculty lot. Now he was on the main campus drag, a long smooth strip of new asphalt. How easy it was to drive, to leave in a car. How powerless those colossal maple trunks were to stop him. Even Mr. Mayhew, still calling and clapping for his dog, now peering into the car with a scowl, could not stop him, no matter how much he waved his arms in the rearview mirror. In a car you were invulnerable.

He sailed past the hockey rink, the girls’ fields, Mr. Howells’ little house on the hill. In the mirror Mr. Mayhew was running back to the mansion, which was just a big white house, like any other place you could just drive away from.

At the intersection with the main road, Route 26, he didn’t make the left toward the gas station, toward Norsett. He turned right instead, toward the northern causeway. He was sure that the sheer unnaturalness of this turn would rouse his mother, but there was nothing but silence behind him. He pressed down on the accelerator, felt it resist a moment, then give way. The car quickly picked up speed.

On either side of him, the land, once a forest he used to trample through, had been cleared, roads had been cut, and houses — whole neighborhoods — stood in various stages of construction. It had been a long time since he’d been out this way. Signs for the mainland and the highway directed him left. He drove over the water, careful not to look at it, keeping his eyes on the space between the white lines, and soon he found himself on an entrance ramp with a brown van on his tail and a steady stream of commuters ready to sideswipe him. He tried to slow down but the van honked and he thrust himself into the fray and waited for the crash. Somehow, however, he had been accommodated, accepted into this adult workday morning as if he, too, were racing toward the city. Except that he didn’t want to go into the city, and took the next exit to the turnpike and all points west.

Driving was perhaps the most exhilarating thing he’d ever done. And he was good at it. He was a natural. So often as a child he’d pretended to be the one driving, stamping down on a pretend brake when his mother stopped. He knew how to center the car between the lines, how to pass a Sunday driver safely. “You’re doing a good job,” he whispered. It was the first time he’d ever said such a thing to himself.

Behind the wheel the world was a different place. He was nearly sixteen, and things were going to change.

By noon he needed gas. In his mother’s wallet he found several hundred dollars, more money than he’d ever seen in her wallet before, and he wondered if she’d been planning this escape all along. It bothered him that he might be doing right now exactly what she wanted, that even lumped in the backseat she was somehow pulling his strings. He filled up the tank and with the change from the twenty bought five packs of gum. She hated gum. He stuffed several pieces in his mouth at once.

The woman at the drive-through across the street was the first person to look at him quizzically. He hadn’t pulled up close enough and had to get out and walk to the window for his food. Gum bulged out his cheek.

“How long you had your license — a couple hours?”

“Yeah,” Peter said, his voice full of the defensive sarcasm he used when he had no comeback — which was all the time.

“Whatcha got in the back there?”

“My mother,” he called before he shut himself safely in the car again. The woman’s mouth broke into a laugh she didn’t expect. Peter felt his throat tighten as if he might cry for the pleasure of making a lady in a drive-through window laugh. He forgot to release the key in the ignition and the engine made a long terrible racket. He didn’t look at the lady again.

He held his breath and merged back onto the highway without a collision. He didn’t recognize the names of towns on the signs. He wasn’t sure what state he was in anymore, though it all looked the same — same food and gas logos, same plateglass office parks with their big half-empty lots. He tossed the gum out the window, peeled the foil from his hamburger, and ate quickly, ravenously. When the highway forked he alternated between west and south; he liked the sound of both. He drank from the Coke wedged between his knees. He began to shiver and realized he didn’t have a coat. He turned the heat on full blast. He drove and drove. He would never tire of driving.

A sign read Pennsylvania — The Keystone State. He whooped quietly. Pennsylvania. He looked at the clock on the dash. His entire grade would be in study hall right now, but he’d driven to Pennsylvania. Kristina would be in the back left corner of the library. He realized how hard he’d been trying not to think of her. All he’d wanted to do was help her. That’s all he’d ever wanted to do for her. When she came to Fayer in sixth grade in the wrong clothes with the wrong accent he’d felt sorry for her and chose her as his science partner. The braid down her back. The way she said Poter. Things like that hollowed out his insides, even in Pennsylvania, even after what she’d said he’d done.