School of the Dead (3 page)

Mom patted my hand. “Now that we're in San Francisco, how about some cheerful thoughts?”

“I like remembering him,” I said, and turned to my oatmeal and raisins.

Dad punched out a number on his smartphone. “We'd like a cab.” He gave our address and looked a question at Mom.

She answered, “Twenty minutes.”

Into the phone, Dad said, “Twenty minutes.”

Mom said, “Your dad and I will be at work, so at the end of the day you'll need to walk home by yourself. Okay?”

I said, “Uncle Charlie will come with me.”

Mom, exasperated, said, “Tony, Uncle Charlie is no longer with us.”

“For you, maybe.” I pushed my empty bowl away and gulped some milk. “I don't ever intend to forget him.”

Dad said, “Let me do your tie.”

I stood before him.

Dad said, “Nervous?”

“No,” I lied.

“You'll have a great future there,” said Mom.

“‘The distinction between past, present, and future is only an illusion.'”

“Where'd
that
come from?”

“Albert Einstein. One of the last things Uncle Charlie said to me.”

Mom sighed. “For the present, please get ready.”

I grabbed my empty backpack, flung in my cell phone, and was ready to start at the Penda School.

As Mom and I stood inside the apartment-building lobby waiting for the cab, Uncle Charlie looked on.

“You coming to school with me?” I asked him.

Mom said, “I'll make sure you're settled. Then I'll have to get to work.”

The taxi pulled up. As if to announce its arrival, there was another leap of lightning. Rain strafed the pavement.

Mom, her umbrella open, said, “Go!”

I ran to the cab, yanked the door open, and jumped in. Mom followed, swiveled to close down the umbrella, got in, and slammed the door.

“Penda School,” she said to the driver, who, already tapping
into his meter, looked around. “I know. Only six blocks but you'll get a good tip. It's this young man's first day.”

“What about lunch?” I asked Mom.

“There's a school cafeteria. We were told it's good.”

“School food always sucks.”

“Someday you might actually
like
something.”

“Uncle Charlie said people used the word
someday
like it was a wish.”

“Tony, please . . . Uncle Charlie is just a memory.”

“Exactly,” I said. The window on my side being steamy, I rubbed it clear and peeked out. Uncle Charlie was standing across the street, watching and smiling. I gave him a quick thumbs-up.

The cab ride was very short.

I looked out at Uncle Charlie. “Thanks for coming,” I told him.

“You're welcome,” Mom said, and reached out to smooth my hair and adjust my tie. “You're going to love it.”

I said, “People in marketing want everybody to love everything.”

Mom muttered something, handed seven bucks to the cabbie, unlatched the door, poked her umbrella out, opened it with a snap, and stepped from the car. I messed my hair,
pulled my tie crooked, and followed. Outside, I paused to gaze at the school. The rain had turned its redwood siding the color of dark blood.

I must have looked like a new kid, because a few polite students held the main doors open for us.

“Here we go,” said Mom as we went in.

To which I replied, “That's what Uncle Charlie said right before he died.”

We stepped into an enormous reception hall. No cement-block walls painted tan and plastered with
NO BULLYING!
posters. No school-spirit streamers. No kids' bad art. No bulky display cases full of fake silver trophies or soft footballs with winning scores stenciled in white.

Instead, walls were paneled with fancy dark wood, each section framed by carved moldings. A tiled floor of deep sea blue was covered by a water-absorbing red carpet. The carpet made me think of a scab. In one corner stood a clump of potted plants with large glossy leaves, a reminder of long-gone summers.

In my old school, kids charged in as if it were pizza-giveaway day. Here the kids were quiet, self-controlled, like at a school dance with too many chaperones. Overhead, a large chandelier was hanging from a high ceiling, its million glass bits
shivering like a delicate wind chime.

The hall extended to a place I couldn't see. But forty feet in, left and right, were massive, matching curved stairways. Built wide like a wrestler's arms, the steps met at the second floor. Right under where the steps joined, brass letters proclaimed:
RESPECT THE PAST—PROTECT THE FUTURE
.

Though that was what Uncle Charlie had said to me, I still didn't understand it. The school was so quiet, so plush, I was reminded of that funeral parlor where Uncle Charlie's service had been held.

Mom moved me toward a door that said
SCHOOL OFFICE
. As she opened it, she whispered, “Try to look as if you're glad to be here.”

She must have read my mind, because by then I was already thinking,
This school
is
weird.

The school office was a room cut in half by a long counter and desk. Walls were fine wood, the deep carpet golf-course green, the air smelling like fake pine air.

Sitting behind the desk was an elderly woman clutching a landline phone in her knuckle-knobbed hand. Her thin, gray, and straggly hair and wrinkled face and neck made her look as if she had been roosting behind that desk for a hundred years. Either she was using eye shadow, or she had trouble
sleeping. Her thin white lips grimaced while saying into the phone, “Thanks for calling, Ms. Morris. I'm sure Emma will be better soon.”

The second she hung up, another call rang.

“So sorry,” the woman said to us, and took up the phone again.

I gazed about the room. A big leather-covered couch—like a partially deflated rhinoceros—stood against one wall. On a nearby table, maybe a hundred school yearbooks were neatly lined up, the dates on their spines reminding me of a row of tombstones. School brochures were spread out in a fan.

On the wall over the table was a huge gold-framed painting of an old lady sitting in a bulky, throne-like chair. Her fierce, dark-eyed, jut-chinned face was long and narrow with high cheekbones. Her lips were tight and pale. Black hair was piled atop her head, while her neck was encased in a stiff collar. Black-gloved hands were clutching armrests. It was as if the chair were plunging down and the old girl was not happy about where she was headed.

Finding the image unsettling, I turned away. On the opposite wall hung another large framed painting. This one was of a boy—maybe twelve years old like me—with blond curly hair. His jacket and trousers were dark green. A white lace collar circled his neck like a fancy noose. His shoes were
high-buttoned and polished. His hands were by his sides, balled in tense, tight fists.

But what really held my attention were the boy's pale face and eyes, eyes full of dread, as if something awful was coming right at him. And oddly, I had the sensation I'd seen him before.

Not that I could recall where.

The woman at the desk hung up her phone and with sarcasm thick as old pancake syrup said, “Forgive me: bad weather, sick children. May I help you?”

Mom pulled me from the boy's painting. “I'm Ellie Gilbert,” she said. “This is Anthony, my son. He's starting school today.”

For a moment the woman stared at me with great intensity, until her face abruptly softened. “Oh yes, Tony Gilbert. Of course. Our new student. Welcome to the Penda School,” she said, as if embarrassed by her first reception. “We're
so
glad you're here. I'm Mrs. Zabalink, or Mrs. Z, as the young people have been calling me for more years than I wish to count. Dear me, what a day to begin. I assure you, storms like this are so rare in San Francisco.”

Abruptly, she stopped talking and went back to considering me as if I were a specimen on a dissecting table.

Breaking the awkward silence, Mom said, “I guess Tony needs to get to class.”

Mrs. Z yanked back to life. “Forgive me. I'm sure you're eager. But Ms. Foxton, school head, likes to welcome new students. This way, please. She's expecting you.”

I hated school officials. Back in Connecticut, after Uncle Charlie died, they'd had only two things to say to me: “Lighten up.” “Smile.” Fake cheer by the garbage-truckful.

Mrs. Z guided us into a large office with a fireplace on one side, full of fake logs. Antique-looking wooden file cabinets stood against the opposite wall. Each drawer had brass numbers for a span of years—the earliest 1897—up to the current year. Sitting on one cabinet was a red plastic flashlight. I liked that. Plastic is honest fake.

Against another wall was a long, low, and narrow wooden chest, its elaborately carved side toward me. I was sure it was empty. Fake again. Over the chest was a framed list:
FORMER SCHOOL HEADS
. The long list suggested
heads
didn't stay on for long.

On the wall behind the large desk was a photograph of joyful kids, probably models. Three empty chairs sat before the desk. Their emptiness was real. Behind the desk sat Ms. Foxton, the school head. As we walked in, she stood, smiled, came around, and held out a hand.

I was surprised by how young she was, trim and healthy, with brown hair tied off behind her neck, ponytail fashion, and wearing a white blouse, a knee-length green skirt, and polished heels. Everything was in place, including her smile.

“Hello, Tony,” she said, “I'm Gloria Foxton. Let me welcome you to the Penda School.”

I shook her hand. Ms. Foxton didn't just take my hand; she held it and looked into my eyes as if searching for something. I had no idea what she found in me—but what I saw in her eyes was fear.

Startled, I tried to pull back, but she held on.

“We're so glad you're joining us, Tony,” she said, though her eyes said something different.

She let my hand go and went back behind her desk, saying, “Let's sit and talk a moment.”

Mom said, “We're grateful you were able to find a place for Tony even though your term has already begun.”

“An . . . unexpected student dropout,” said Ms. Foxton “A . . . sad story.” Her voice had become careful.

I tried to read her eyes, but she kept her focus elsewhere. I followed her gaze. She was looking behind me, at that carved chest.

“Here you are, Tony,” she said, and picked up a manila
folder, as if to draw my attention to her. “Your application. It will join the files of hundreds of other Penda students.” She gestured toward the cabinets. “Since 1897, we've kept track of each and every student. Some quite illustrious. I gather you're new to San Francisco. May I ask what brought you?”

Mom said, “Job opportunities for my husband and me.”

“Congratulations,” said Ms. Foxton. Even as I watched, her eyes shifted back to me, and her fear returned.

Blinking to work it away, she continued on: “Before you go to class, there are a few things we should talk over.” On she chatted about school requirements, rules, and expectations. Not interested, I kept watching her as she shifted her eyes from my mother, to me, to that chest. I looked at it again. It made me think of Uncle Charlie's casket. In fact, I liked to think of him sitting on the chest, eyes lively with delight. Whatever was making Ms. Foxton fearful, thinking of him was reassuring to me.

“Well now, Tony,” said Ms. Foxton, “shall you and I go up to room seven? That's Mr. Batalie's room. He's the seventh-grade homeroom and English teacher. I've printed up your class schedule.”

I took it without looking at it.

As Ms. Foxton led us through the outer office, I stopped in
front of the boy's portrait.

“Excuse me,” I said, pointing. “Who's that?”

Mrs. Z, the secretary, looked up, but it was Ms. Foxton who said, “That's Mrs. Penda's son. We speak of him fondly as ‘the Penda Boy.' It was his death that led his mother to create this school.”

Gazing at the painting, I had two thoughts:
Why was he so full of fear?
And again, that puzzling notion that I'd seen him before.

“Of course,” said Mrs. Z, “over there, that's Mrs. Penda, the school founder.”

I turned. “How come she's so angry?”

Ms. Foxton said, “The portrait was painted right after her boy's death.”

To which Mrs. Z added, “Mrs. Penda had been a beautiful woman but—as you can see—she was devastated.”

As Ms. Foxton gazed at the portrait, distress oozed back into her eyes. Catching me looking at her, she flipped on her smile and said, “We need to get you to class.”

As we went out of the office, she leaned toward me so Mrs. Z couldn't hear: “To be honest,” she whispered, “not a painting I would have placed there, but our board of trustees insists.”

Which painting did she mean?

In the reception hall, Mom shook hands with Ms. Foxton, then gave me a last look while mouthing the words
tie
and
I love you
. Noting her priorities, I watched her head out into the rain. Uncle Charlie, looking at me from a corner, offered a reassuring grin.

“We need to go this way,” said Ms. Foxton. She led me up one of the main carpeted stairways, wide enough for us to go side by side. As we walked, I looked around. On the other steps, a boy was also coming up.

For a half second, I thought he was the same boy whose portrait I had just seen in the school office. It was as if he was following me.

Ms. Foxton touched my arm so that I looked around as she said, “Dreadful day, isn't it? But the building is wonderfully snug and tight.”

She was right. Penda was extremely quiet, no smells of food, sweat, or old books. And clean. Not a single scrap of paper, dropped jacket, or left backpack. As for that boy, the one on the other steps, he too was gone.