hard.”
I rocked back and forth on my heels, thinking of how I could get out of this Class.
“ It will be back breaking, grueling, and you’ll develop callouses in places you didn’t even know you had, but if you boys, er, students, listen and pay attention, you can make a good career from this Class,” Mister Gomez said, pacing in front of us, gripping the two by four plank and waving it around the class. “Don’t disappoint me.”
We all leaned back from the swaying plank as it grazed past our noses but his actions weren’t threatening. He then gave each of us a hammer and a box of nails and set us to work on framework for walls. The boys all clanged and clamored around like they had done this before. I hung back and observed. Observed nails being bent and Rash making an idiot of himself. I held the hammer in my hand—it was heavy, reassuring in a way I hadn’t expected. It was simple and aweing in its purpose and it was perplexing. What made them think this was for me? I stared down at it for a long time like I was waiting for it to tell me something. It didn’t.
I returned to the dorms after dinner, feeling lost. This was so very far from what I had anticipated. I walked through the garden with Rash, kicking dirt and playing with my hair distractedly. I could tell he was as surprised as me.
“ So... construction... who’d have thought?” he said, breaking the silence.
“ What were you hoping for?” I asked.
“ Um, I wasn’t really hoping for anything. This is already more than I could have dreamed,” he said, not joking.
“ Really?” I was surprised.
He kicked some loose stones and a plume of dust clung to his grey pants. When he planted himself on a wooden barrier, near the pens I had picked out as animal housing from the air, his expression was somber. It didn’t fit.
The farm animals were separated, with gold plaques screwed into the fence posts of their enclosures naming them as goats, sheep, chickens, pigs, boars. Hands in his pockets, Rash looked like he wanted to say something but it was difficult for him. I sat down close, our hipbones touching. He leaned into my shoulder. He was almost as sharp and bony as I was.
Already, I felt like we were linked. Like our similarities drew a connecting line from one to the other. I didn ’t look at him but said, “You can tell me. But you don’t have to. We can go make comparisons between the farm animals and the Guardians. I think Gomez looks like that boar with the missing tusk.” I pointed to the pen, the hairy creature snorting as if he was offended. Rash laughed half-heartedly. He took my hand and told me his story. It was cool and steady, easy to hold. And if I had been in his situation, I would find it hard to laugh about anything.
His father died when he was one and with no one willing to marry his mother at her age and with no money, she turned to servicing the local law enforcement. “If you know what I mean?” he said. I nodded. Rash was her second child and his mother was old. Sometimes she would get money, sometimes a beating. She cursed Rash for her bad fortune and he copped a fair few beatings himself. One night, after a particularly bad run in with a customer, his mother crept into his room and held a knife to his throat.
“ She was crazy. I reckon she was like that because of what she had to do to survive. She used to scream for my brother.” Rash looked down at our joined hand and traced our knuckles with his other fingers. “I think she wished he had survived and not me. She blamed me for everything,” he said in a voice so small it was like Rash had been swallowed.
Then his mood switched, “She did it all the time. The same speech, different methods.” He said like it was something altogether ordinary. Like saying, ‘I like milk on my cereal.’
“ You ruined my life! she would say,” Rash yelled in a hag-like voice, throwing his fist in the air. He then went on to comically demonstrate the various methods
I rocked back and forth on my heels, thinking of how I could get out of this Class.
“ It will be back breaking, grueling, and you’ll develop callouses in places you didn’t even know you had, but if you boys, er, students, listen and pay attention, you can make a good career from this Class,” Mister Gomez said, pacing in front of us, gripping the two by four plank and waving it around the class. “Don’t disappoint me.”
We all leaned back from the swaying plank as it grazed past our noses but his actions weren’t threatening. He then gave each of us a hammer and a box of nails and set us to work on framework for walls. The boys all clanged and clamored around like they had done this before. I hung back and observed. Observed nails being bent and Rash making an idiot of himself. I held the hammer in my hand—it was heavy, reassuring in a way I hadn’t expected. It was simple and aweing in its purpose and it was perplexing. What made them think this was for me? I stared down at it for a long time like I was waiting for it to tell me something. It didn’t.
I returned to the dorms after dinner, feeling lost. This was so very far from what I had anticipated. I walked through the garden with Rash, kicking dirt and playing with my hair distractedly. I could tell he was as surprised as me.
“ So... construction... who’d have thought?” he said, breaking the silence.
“ What were you hoping for?” I asked.
“ Um, I wasn’t really hoping for anything. This is already more than I could have dreamed,” he said, not joking.
“ Really?” I was surprised.
He kicked some loose stones and a plume of dust clung to his grey pants. When he planted himself on a wooden barrier, near the pens I had picked out as animal housing from the air, his expression was somber. It didn’t fit.
The farm animals were separated, with gold plaques screwed into the fence posts of their enclosures naming them as goats, sheep, chickens, pigs, boars. Hands in his pockets, Rash looked like he wanted to say something but it was difficult for him. I sat down close, our hipbones touching. He leaned into my shoulder. He was almost as sharp and bony as I was.
Already, I felt like we were linked. Like our similarities drew a connecting line from one to the other. I didn ’t look at him but said, “You can tell me. But you don’t have to. We can go make comparisons between the farm animals and the Guardians. I think Gomez looks like that boar with the missing tusk.” I pointed to the pen, the hairy creature snorting as if he was offended. Rash laughed half-heartedly. He took my hand and told me his story. It was cool and steady, easy to hold. And if I had been in his situation, I would find it hard to laugh about anything.
His father died when he was one and with no one willing to marry his mother at her age and with no money, she turned to servicing the local law enforcement. “If you know what I mean?” he said. I nodded. Rash was her second child and his mother was old. Sometimes she would get money, sometimes a beating. She cursed Rash for her bad fortune and he copped a fair few beatings himself. One night, after a particularly bad run in with a customer, his mother crept into his room and held a knife to his throat.
“ She was crazy. I reckon she was like that because of what she had to do to survive. She used to scream for my brother.” Rash looked down at our joined hand and traced our knuckles with his other fingers. “I think she wished he had survived and not me. She blamed me for everything,” he said in a voice so small it was like Rash had been swallowed.
Then his mood switched, “She did it all the time. The same speech, different methods.” He said like it was something altogether ordinary. Like saying, ‘I like milk on my cereal.’
“ You ruined my life! she would say,” Rash yelled in a hag-like voice, throwing his fist in the air. He then went on to comically demonstrate the various methods
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