Free Joanne Dobson - Karen Pelletier 06 - Death without Tenure by Joanne Dobson

sorry I yelled at you the other day. It was uncalled for, and I hope you’ll accept my sincere apologies.” I was standing by myself in the women’s room speaking to the pale apparition in the mirror. She wore a harvest-gold silk blouse with a longish brown wool skirt, and her dark hair was clasped tightly at the nape of her neck in a large ebony barrette. Her pale lips were tight. Shadowy smudges circled her gray eyes. She looked like hell.
    Joe had been in his office with the door open when I walked by on the way back from class, but he was talking to a student and I certainly couldn’t interrupt the discussion with my mea culpa . In the bathroom combing my hair and applying a red lipstick called “Slash,” I rehearsed three or four different apologies, from just plain “Sorry, pal,” to the more dramatic, hand-on-the-heart, “ Je suis désolée …”
    Less nauseating than some and more sincere than others, “ I’m sorry ,” and “ uncalled for ,” sounded like words I might actually be able to get out of my mouth. “I’m sorry I yelled at you…,” I rehearsed again, took a deep breath, exited the women’s room, turned right in the hall and headed to Joe’s office.
    The door was shut.
    The light was out.
    Apology deferred.
    Friday 10/9
     
    Friday morning the students looked exhausted, having no doubt stayed up half the night to get their papers done. Also it was the last class before the holiday weekend and their minds were clearly elsewhere. “You can go now,” I said, when they’d all given me their mid-semester papers. I was too tired to go through the motions of teaching comatose students. “I’m sure you remember Monday is Columbus Day. No classes. See you Wednesday. We’ll be discussing Native American oratory.” I hadn’t deliberately scheduled Native literature to coincide with Columbus Day, but there was a nice irony to it, Columbus being the prototype of European oppressors who brought about Native genocide. At Enfield College, however, tradition trumps political correctness and, with much professorial protest in the more enlightened classrooms, the holiday survives. No student, as far as I knew, has ever protested; a day off from classes is, after all, a day off.
    It wasn’t until I was back in my office, checking the mid-semester papers into my grade book, that I realized Ayesha hadn’t shown up, hadn’t even submitted her essay by proxy. This wasn’t like her. In fact, after that blow-up between Joe and me in the hallway, she hadn’t come to see me about her mid-semester topic. Then that odd episode in class. And, now, no paper handed in.
    I pulled the phone toward me and dialed a number from the college directory.
    “Hello?”
    “Ayesha, this is Professor Pelletier—”
    “Oh, Professor, this is Edie Sosa, Ayesha’s roommate. Her brothers picked her up last night. She’s gone home for the long weekend. Why don’t you try her by e-mail?”
    Skipped class to go home early? Without submitting a required assignment? Well, maybe Ayesha was just like an American college kid, but I hadn’t expected such lax behavior from my diligent Moroccan student.
    I thought about her reaction to the writings of Zitkala Sa, the bitter remarks directed to her classmates, and I picked up the phone again—this time to call the Dean of Students office. Maybe Earlene could help me understand what was going on with Ayesha Ahmed.

    To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
     
So good to talk to you Monday night. I could say heavenly or fabulous or stupendous, but good covers it. Good. Good. Good.
     
I know you said you’d be out of touch for a while, but, wherever you are, maybe my love will reach you through the ether.
     

Karen
     
    Saturday 10/10
     
    The new library is a civilized gathering place for students and faculty—plus books. After decades of cramped reading rooms, echoing stone staircases, and some book stacks still numbered by the Dewey Decimal System,