Rebecca Coleman - The Kingdom of Childhood

The parking lot was crammed with cars. As Scott and I made our way down the hall, I felt a lump form in my throat as I saw the playhouse situated right in front of the main office. Parents surrounded it, making approving cooing noises. Zach stood nearby, leaning against the wall between the house and a table filled with information about the holiday bazaar. When he saw me his gaze sharpened with recognition but his expression did not change.

Vivienne, however, lit up with a smile and came toward me, a welcoming hand extended. “Judy! Have you seen it? Hasn’t he done an amazing job? I’m so impressed I can hardly stand it!”

I nodded. “He’s been hard at work.”

The shadow of a grin played at Zach’s mouth. I took that as a positive sign. When a teenager wanted to be dour, nothing could stop him.

Vivienne grasped my hand. “Thank you so much for taking so much time out of your schedule to make the workshop available. Zach can do great things when he makes an effort.”

Zach rolled his eyes, absorbing the verbal stress his mother had placed on the last few words. Scott, standing impatiently beside me, said, “I’ll see you in the multipurpose room.”

A crush of parents awaited me along the way, peppering me with questions. I worked my way around the room until I caught sight of Scott near the far corner, roughhousing with his friends. Medieval Judo—that was their name for it. The game consisted of stagecraft martial arts combined with trash-talk in imitation of Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Zach was with them, having slipped through the crowd much faster than I could. As I approached I saw Temple had Zach in some sort of a kung-fu grip. Zach twisted around to release himself, then crouched into a low spin-kick, which sent Temple flying theatrically backward. Scott rushed to Temple’s aid by grabbing Zach from behind under both arms and flailing him from side to side.

“Stop, knave!” shouted Zach. “Or I will unleash my Singaporean Fart Attack!”

Scott was unmoved. “My faith will protect me, good knight!”

“Scott,” I said loudly. I tipped my head pointedly toward the semicircle of college information booths.

“In a minute,” he called, none too friendly. He locked his hands at the front of Zach’s chest and hauled him backward. Then, as if it were nothing at all, Zach got his feet under him, twisted at the waist, and threw Scott off his balance, flipping him forward and sending him skidding across the floor on his side. My eyes widened, but Scott didn’t seem hurt. He uttered a surprised laugh and got to his feet.

“Seen anything that looks interesting to you?” I asked, more or less rhetorically.

He answered with a you-must-be-kidding-me look and brushed past me to the booths, randomly swiping brochures.

I sidled up near Zach, who lagged behind as the girls wandered off with Temple. Once alone, we both looked over the noisy room, full of excited upperclassmen chatting up perky college reps. A dozen urgent questions fought for precedence in my mind. After a silence I asked, “Did you tell anyone?”

He shook his head, not breaking his focus on the milling crowd. A shock of hair mostly covered one eye, and his mouth looked brooding, serious. He hesitated, then asked, “Did you?”

I chuckled. “Of course not. Do you think I’m insane?”

A hard sigh escaped his nose, like a noiseless laugh.

“I’m sorry for what happened,” I said quietly. “Do you want to talk about it?”

His nod was slight. “We can go someplace. I’ve still got stuff in the workshop.”

“I can meet you there in a few minutes if you like.”

“All right.” He turned and disappeared out the side door. I checked on Scott, who had regrouped with his remaining friends on the opposite side of the room, and made my way toward the workshop via a door off the main hallway.

The enormous room was dark when I stepped inside, except for a single fluorescent fixture in the far corner where the playhouse had been. Zach crouched on the balls of his feet beneath the yellow light, brushing sawdust out of a power sander. He did not look up when I came in.

“I’m sorry,” I repeated.

His shoulders twitched with a laugh that held no humor. “ You’re sorry. I’ve been waiting all week to get called down to Beckett’s office. I knew I was in deep shit.”

I frowned and came closer, stopping at the edge of the square of light. “Why would you be in deep shit?”

He looked up and grinned—at my bad language, I assumed. “Over what happened. You looked pissed . I didn’t mean for that to happen.”

“I wasn’t pissed. I was terrified. All week I’ve been waiting to get called down to Beckett’s office. So I could get fired.”

He dismissed days of mortal fear with a shake of his head. “I’m not telling anybody.”

“Well, I didn’t know that.”

He stood up and laid the sander on the shelf, then jammed his hands into his back pockets. “Trust me, getting Scott’s mom fired wouldn’t do me a whole lot of good here. All my friends are his friends.”

“I appreciate that,” I told him. “But it was my fault, and I promise you it won’t ever happen again. If you don’t want to work with me on the bazaar anymore, I completely understand. I’ll tell your mom there’s a senior who needs hours. It won’t be a problem.”

“Nah, I’m not worried about it. I’ll just keep away from confined spaces.”

My laugh held an edge of mortification. “I don’t know what I was thinking, Zach. I’m so sorry. I swear to you I’ve never done anything like that before. My husband has been a jerk lately, and I’ve been lonely, and—” I stopped, realizing Zach had never asked for an explanation. “I must have been in a mood. There’s no way to justify it.”

“It’s all right. I thought you were cool with it at first. But then the look on your face after—I figured you thought I took it too far.”

Right away I shook my head. “Oh, no. I didn’t think that at all.”

At first his eyes registered confusion. Then he looked to the side and grinned.

I winced at his interpretation. “Okay, let’s wrap up this conversation,” I suggested, to his laughter. “Crazy mistake. It’ll never happen again. Done.”

“Done,” he agreed, and in my earnest need to wish it away, I chose, with a bold enthusiasm, to believe it was true. I had, after all, made a career out of fairy tales.

“So, anyway,” he said in a louder, lighter voice, “the playhouse is done. Great, huh?”

I replied with a quick nod. “Beautiful. I’ll sign off on all thirty of your service hours. Wonderful job.”

“Jeez, Teach,” he said, and the sarcasm in his smile was infectious. “You’re paying me off? I don’t think that’s legal.”

My laughter bubbled over, but even as I laughed I felt a shadow at its edge, the giddy feeling brought on by a sense of hopelessness. The danger loomed much larger than I had feared.

Not because he might report me.

But because he would not.

When my students ran out our classroom door to the playground, they did not spread out like bees, as they usually did, but gravitated toward a single point. It didn’t take long for me to realize why. Zach’s playhouse had been moved to the sidewalk between the playground and workshop, left behind, evidently, on its way to storage. Around the side of the workshop I spotted two teenagers wrestling a metal trolley past the concrete parking barriers.

“Let’s move to the play area, boys and girls,” I said. “This is for the Christmas auction. It needs to be tucked away safe and sound.”

Max popped his head out of one of the shuttered windows and grinned at me. “Out, Max,” I urged. I pointed toward the little wooden bridge in the sand pit. “Look, your friends are playing Three Billy Goats Gruff.”