Chapter 3
I didn't go straight home. I sat at my desk another ten minutes after he left, listening to the heater, then I locked the front door from the inside and turned back to his office. The door was unlocked. I hadn't planned to go in, but my feet moved anyway.
His desk was clean except for a desk pad and a closed appointment book. I didn't touch anything at first. I just stood where I'd knelt that morning and looked down at the spot. There was nothing there to see, just wood. I pressed my shoe lightly against it, as if I could test whether it had actually happened.
On his shelf there was a row of identical binders labeled by year. I told myself I was looking for the filing procedure so I could prove I'd followed it. I pulled the binder for this quarter and opened it on his desk.
Inside, clipped to the front, was a single sheet of paper with my name at the top. Elena Hayes - Corrective Review. Below it, three dates, the first two initialed by me. The third date was today, blank. At the bottom, in his handwriting: In-office lesson completed. Subject responsive.
My stomach dropped. This wasn't a one-time reaction. It had a form. It had a place to be filed.
I heard the back door rattle — the cleaning crew coming in through the kitchen. I closed the binder quickly and slipped back to my desk. My heart was beating so fast I could hear it in my ears.
I finished locking up and walked to my car in the parking lot. The air outside was cold, the sky already dark, the diner across the highway lit up. I sat in my driver's seat with the heat blowing and called my sister.
"Hey," I said when she picked up.
"Hey, you okay? You sound weird."
I paused. I wanted to tell her straight. Instead I said, "Work was just long. Can we do lunch Thursday instead?"
She heard the catch anyway. "Did something happen?"
I looked at the office windows, dark now except for the little lamp still on in his office. "Can I tell you Thursday?" I asked. "In person?"
"Yeah. Of course. You sure you're okay to drive home?"
"I'm okay," I said, and I wasn't lying exactly, I was just not telling the whole truth yet.
At home in my apartment I changed out of the blouse and hung it up. The ruffle at the neck had lost its shape. I took a photo of my knees with my phone — faint red marks, already fading — and then deleted it, then took it again and kept it. I sat at my small kitchen table and wrote down what he'd said that morning, word for word, with the time: 9:47 a.m. I wrote what I'd said. I wrote about the folders, the form, the words Subject responsive. I folded the paper and put it in my old checkbook, where no one would look.
I heated soup and tried to eat. My phone lit up at 9:15. An email from Mr. Russo: Elena, thank you for your diligence today. I appreciate your willingness to learn. See you at 8:30 sharp. - M. Russo
May you like
I stared at the words willingness to learn. I typed a reply, deleted it, typed another. Finally I wrote: Thank you. I'll be there. And I'll double-check everything going forward.
I hit send before I could make it sound smaller or bigger than it was. Then I turned off my kitchen light and sat in the dark a minute, listening to the apartment building settle, deciding that tomorrow I would not kneel again, no matter what form he had waiting.
