CHAPTER EIGHT | DESIREE
“Ray Bradbury. Ayn Rand. Anthony Burgess. George Orwell. Aldous Huxley….”
I recited each of the names out loud as I spelled them out on the whiteboard. When I had finished my list, I capped my Dry Erase marker and turned to face the classroom.
“Can anybody tell me what these authors all have in common?”
Silence.
“Nobody?”
My eyes darted around the room, surveying the students in my first period AP English class. They were all wearing the same bored expression, and none of them made a peep.
“Ok. Maybe this will help…”
I turned back to the list of authors on the whiteboard, then I uncapped my marker and raised it towards the first name on the list,
“Ray Bradbury wrote ‘Fahrenheit 451,’” I said, scribbling the book title next to the author’s name. “And Ayn Rand wrote ‘Atlas Shrugged’...”
I worked my way down the list, until I had scribbled a book title next to each of the names on the whiteboard. Then I capped my marker and turned back to the class.
“What about now?” I asked. “Anyone want to take a stab at it?
Someone cleared their throat. A few students shifted around in their seats, and a girl sitting in the front row smacked her gum loudly.
Seriously?! I had just about lost hope for my AP English class, when I saw a hand shoot up from the back of the room.
“Yes!” I pointed at the student eagerly. “Go ahead! What do you think all of these authors have in common?”
The poor kid looked like he instantly regretted raising his hand, and he slid down into his desk before he mumbled, “They were all on the summer reading list?”
My shoulders slumped, and I pressed my lips together firmly to hide my disappointment.
“That’s technically true,” I said gently. “But that’s not the connection that I’m looking for…”
There was a murmur of giggles, and the volunteer slid down further in his desk and buried his face. Across the classroom, I heard another student mutter under his breath, “What a fucking idiot…”
My eyes flicked towards the source of the insult, a kid with a bad Justin Bieber haircut and a Boston Bruins jersey.
“I didn’t catch that,” I glared at him pointedly, crossing my arms. “Could you say that again?”
“I didn’t say anything…” he mumbled.
“Are you sure about that? It sounded like you had an idea that you’d like to share with the rest of the class,” I crossed my arms over my chest. “Come on, let’s hear it. What do you think these authors all have in common?”
He glared at me, then glanced up at the whiteboard.
“Uhh….” he shook his head absently, drawing a blank. “They’re all dudes?”
“Not quite,” I said. “Actually, Ayn Rand is a female author.”
There was more snickering, and Cody Wyatt leaned back in his desk and mumbled,
“Even I knew that!”
I sighed and rubbed my forehead. This is going to be a loooong school year…
I was about to head back to my desk, when I saw Callie Watson hesitantly raise her hand.
“Callie!” I perked up. “What’s your guess?”
“Well…um…” she bit her lip nervously, “They’re all famous examples of dystopian literature?”
“YES!” I pumped my fists into the air enthusiastically. “EXACTLY!”
Callie slumped forward with relief, and I flashed her a grateful smile.
“Callie is absolutely right!” I told the class as I turned back to the whiteboard. “Above the list of authors and book titles, I wrote,
DYSTOPIAN LITERATURE
“We’re going to spend the next few weeks focusing on dystopian literature,” I announced to the class. “By the end of this unit, you should all be familiar with the authors on this list, as well as the themes and--”
I was cut off mid-sentence by the loud wailing scream of the fire alarm.
The classroom buzzed with a murmur of mixed responses, annoyance, amusement, and confusion. Some students laughed and cracked jokes; others clasped their hands over their ears and winced at the loud ringing sound…
“Is the school on fire?!” the gum-smacking girl in the front row squealed hysterically.
“Chill out, dude! It’s just a fire drill,” a male student bellowed behind her.
It was standard procedure to have a series of scheduled fire drills at the beginning of the school year… but I hadn’t gotten any notifications about a drill scheduled for today.
Either way, I knew the procedure by heart, and I jumped into action.
“Alright, listen up!” I shouted over the siren. “I need everybody to form a single-file line by the door!”
I heard a few annoyed groans, and then one by one the students began standing up and packing their bags.
I grabbed the attendance list from my desk and wedged it under my arm, then I made my way towards the door.
“We’re going to exit the building together, then assemble at our designated meeting point!” I called out to the class. “It’s very important that you follow me, and that we all stick together. Understood?”
I heard an affirmative mumble, then I yanked open the classroom door.
“Alright, let’s go!” I gestured for the class to trail behind me as I stepped out into the hallway.
There didn’t seem to be any sense of urgency as my students meandered behind me, swapping jokes and complaints. We filed through a set of emergency exit doors, then crossed a stretch of grass to reach our designated meeting point in the student parking lot.
Other classes had already assembled in the lot, and as we got closer, it struck me that they were all staring back at the school.
They were all… silent.
Then I heard a voice from my group shout,
“HOLY SHIT! THE BUILDING IS ON FIRE!”
I froze in my tracks and spun around, and when I did, I felt my jaw drop open. Sure enough, a giant cloud of black smoke was billowing from the roof of the cafeteria.
The mood immediately changed. The snide remarks and carefree jokes were instantly replaced with a sense of somber urgency as we walked the rest of the distance towards the parking lot, then clustered together in a circle.
“Oh my God, Ms. Leduc!” one of my students sobbed frantically. “I left my purse in the classroom! I have to go back and get it--”
“Nobody is going anywhere!” I said firmly, gripping the clipboard under my arm.
“Bu-but it’s Tory Burch!” she stammered in protest.
“More like Tory Burns!” the student in the Bruins jersey cackled. I shot him a dark glare, and he immediately sulked away.
“I need to take attendance to make sure we all made it out of the building,” I announced, fixing my eyes on the clipboard. “Listen for your name!”
One by one, I read out the names of my students, and one by one, I checked them off the list. I worked my way down the roster quickly, until…
“Callie Watson?” I called out. I pressed the pen down over her name, ready to cross it off the list… but I heard nothing.
I glanced up, and my eyes scanned around the cluster of students that were assembled around me.
“Callie Watson?” I repeated, raising my voice. I stood up on my tip-toes, and I craned my neck to get a better look around.
“She’s not here!” someone called out.
“Where is she?!”
“I don’t know… but she’s not here!”
My heart started racing. Callie had been sitting in my classroom just before the fire alarm went off… she had to be here.
I dug my fingers into my hairline and clamped down as I stared back at the school, retracing the footsteps that we had made…
Could we have lost her somewhere along the way? Could she have gotten mixed up with another class? Could she still be inside?!
I didn’t want to consider that last possibility, but I knew that I didn’t have a choice. If Callie was still inside the building, she could be in danger; immediate danger.
If that was the case, she might not have time to wait until the fire crew arrived. It could be too late…
I was the only one who knew that she was missing; she was my student, and my responsibility. I had to do something.
Then a second wave of realization struck, and I felt my stomach turned into a bottomless sinkhole of dread.
Those boys…
I instantly played back the conversation that I had with Callie the other day, about the group of guys that liked to torment her.
What if they had found her in the halls? What if they had cornered her inside the building?!
The swirling sense of dread in my stomach stiffened into anger. That’s when I knew exactly what I had to do.
“Take this,” I said bluntly, shoving my clipboard into the nearest pair of hands. “Stay here and stay together.”
“Wait, what?!”
“Ms. Leduc, where are you--”
“You can’t go back!”
I could hear voices calling after me as I trudged back towards the burning building, but I tuned them all out.
I had to find Callie.