Thea took her place in her usual seat next to Ronan, a quiet, lanky boy, almost as skinny as her, with glasses and sandy-colored hair; she pulled her name card out of her desk console and set it atop her tan, smooth desk, facing outward. They each had a Spanish name—if the English name could be translated fairly logically into Spanish, that was the name they went by in class, if not, they got to pick an entirely new name in Spanish. Thea’s card read Téa. Boring. She looked at Ronan beside her, a bit enviously, as he adjusted his own name card, which read Javier.
“Where’s Señora Pilas?” Thea whispered, though she didn’t need to whisper; the other students were only getting louder and more animated. By way of replying, Ronan nodded his head toward the chalkboard, grinned, and started drawing in his notebook. Thea looked up. Big cursive letters filled the chalkboard.
Your substitute teacher’s name is Mr. Redmond.
Thea had never seen anything more beautiful. She glanced at the clock above the door of the classroom. 2:45 p.m. It was already five minutes past the start of class and there was no sign of the sub. No wonder the room felt like an amusement park—the only thing better than a substitute teacher was no teacher at all. Thea turned to Ronan/Javier and said in a normal voice this time, “Nice.” Then she reached into her book bag and pulled out Stargirl, the novel she’d started the night before for book club. She tuned out the jabberings and squawks of her classmates and immersed herself in the world of the strange girl who captures the boy’s heart. Thea wished, for the hundredth time, that the book had been written from Stargirl’s point of view, instead of the boy who loves her, but she understood by now that oftentimes girls’ stories were written by men.
“Hi, guys, sorry I’m late. Got a bit turned around in the hallways.” Thea looked up from her book. The voice was young and smooth and she half expected to see a boy her age striding up to the front of the classroom. The voice came from a man, in fact, though one on the younger side, at least compared to Mr. Jeffries, her math teacher, and Mr. Connor, her English teacher, who had frizzy white hair and halitosis, respectively. He stood with his back to them for a moment, looking at the chalkboard; Thea could only see the side of his face, but he looked just as surprised and out of sorts as her classmates to see his name written in authoritatively looping cursive letters.
“Well, I’m Mr. Redmond,” he said, nodding at the board for confirmation and turning, finally, to face them. He was young. Probably just out of college. He had straight light brown hair, an oval face, and a patrician nose. He looked like royalty, Thea thought; his face was made up of fine, delicate lines.
“I’ll be your substitute teacher today.” He looked again at the board. “Ms. Pilas is. Ms. Pilas has been having—” He stopped. Blood ran into his cheeks and Thea leaned forward in her desk, rapt. “Well, she’ll be out for a while. Indefinitely. I’ll let Principal Teaman fill you in on the details.” He looked down at his shoes. “If she sees fit. In any case,” Mr. Redmond continued, “my name is Mr. Redmond. I mean Señor Redmond.” He smiled here, as if making an inside joke. Thea caught his eye and smiled back, encouraging him: You can do this. “I guess I’ll start by telling you a little bit about myself.” Mr. Redmond leaned back against the chalkboard and then quickly righted himself, brushing white dust from his back awkwardly. “Whoops, I messed up my name. What was I saying? Oh, right, I graduated from the University of Vermont. I worked for Teach for America straight out of school and now . . .” He lifted his hands, palms to the ceiling. “I’m here. So— Oh yes, you, uh, sorry, I don’t know names yet, but, go ahead—”
“Rachel,” a girl in the back row with jet-black hair and blunt bangs said, keeping her hand in the air as she spoke her name. Of course Rachel is the first to ask a question, Thea thought with a silent groan. Rachel looked like a young Cleopatra and had the confidence, and a slightly haughty demeanor, to match, which was apparently very appealing to boys in the sixth grade. Thea, on the other hand, appealed to exactly zero boys at school, and as she slunk lower in her chair, she wondered what it would feel like to have that kind of natural magnetism.
“Rachel. Go ahead, Rachel,” Mr. Redmond said with a smile.
“I have two questions. One. How old are you?” Snickers wafted through the room like wind blowing through leaves. “And two. Are you from Spain? You don’t look Latino.” More snickers. Thea rolled her eyes at Ronan.
Mr. Redmond laughed. “I am twenty-four years old. And no, I’m not from Spain, which is a European country, by the way, but I spent my junior year abroad in Bogotá, which is where I learned Spanish. I also tutored kids, during my senior year and the past two years, to keep my language skills sharp.”
“Do you still give private lessons?” Rachel whispered just loud enough and cupped her hand over her mouth at her own audacity, and the other girls in class tittered and the boys groaned and someone said, “Gross.”
The rest of class passed quickly. They went around and said their names and three things about themselves, at Mr. Redmond’s request. Mr. Redmond seemed genuinely interested in each student’s revelations, nodding vigorously and asking follow-up questions. When it was Thea’s turn, she stated her three personal facts quickly and without emotion, hoping to pass the spotlight to Ronan as soon as possible. “One. I was born in New York City. Two. I am an only child. Three. My mother is a therapist.” She followed the formula of several of the other students and sat still, willing her heart to slow.
“All right, a New Yorker!” Mr. Redmond put his hand up and leaned toward Thea’s desk. Thea felt a surge of blood rush into her face and reached her hand toward his, clumsily, managing to only half connect with his open palm. “Where in the city did you live? I grew up about an hour outside the city, so I made the trip in all the time when I was a teenager.” He leaned back on the chalkboard and smiled at Thea.
“I didn’t really live there,” Thea replied quickly. “I was born there, but my mom and I moved to Vermont right after I was born.” Her hand went to her scalp automatically, a nervous tick, searching for the stitches that had been long healed. She realized that no one in this new school knew about her “episodes” or her surgeries or all her time spent in the hospital. She pulled her hand through her hair in what she hoped looked like a confident, cool girl gesture.
“Ah, gotcha, ok. Well, hey, if you ever decide to visit your hometown, make sure to let me know. I’ll give you a list of places to see.” His mouth spread into a big grin and Thea nodded.
“Ok. I will.” She bent her head over her desk and pretended to write something in her notebook. Her heart beat in her ears. He moved on to Ronan. She missed the rest of her classmates’ answers, replaying in her head their exchange, the way he lit up when she said she was born in New York.
“Thee, you’re pink. Do you feel hot?”