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REST ASSURED THIS WON’T GO AGAINST YOUR ATTENDANCE RECORD. PLEASE JUST REPLY TO THIS EMAIL AND LET ME KNOW YOU’VE RECEIVED IT. HERE’S THE COURSEWORK WE WOULD HAVE COVERED …
I paste in my carefully made notes.
AND LET ME KNOW IF I CAN HELP YOU WITH THIS WEEKEND’S ASSIGNMENT, WHICH IS BASED ON THE ABOVE.
AGAIN, MY APOLOGIES! THIS NEVER HAPPENS TO ME.
I sign off and sit back in my chair, burying my head in my hands. I wish Marcella was here. Or even Laurel. She wouldn’t have understood; she was always deathly punctual. But at least someone could have patted me on the back and told me that it’s okay, just this once, to make a mistake.
I try to tell myself that perfection isn’t a prerequisite for existing, but all I can remember is the weight of my father’s eyes as I stared at a math worksheet. He’d hold a timer next to my head, the tick-tick-tick of the second hand rendering me a failure with every revolution. One minute. Two. Pass three and I would be asked to kneel on the hard floor of our kitchen and say a Hail Mary.
God forbid I brought home less than an A.
It’s hard to shake that panic, still. The weight of crying in the back of catechism class so they’d think I was moved by the love of God instead of falling apart.
A soft knock comes from the door. When I look up, Dean Shea is standing there, his forehead furrowed.
“Lacie? We were so worried.”
Was he? I glance down at my graphite-smudged hands. “I’m so sorry, I don’t know—I can’t believe that happened. My phone…” My voice dies as he shakes his head.
He walks into the room, flicks the lights on, and sits across the table from me with a sigh. Dr. Sims and Lyle come in after him. Lyle slouches into a chair and fixes me with a level, piercing stare. He looks like he hasn’t slept since Therese died, but he’s burning inside: I can feel the heat of his anger from here. Dr. Sims gazes at me, his nose turned up, lips twisted with derision.
He doesn’t even sit. He stands at the door, his arms crossed. Fuck—I’m going to get canned. I know it.
“I need to ask you a question.” Dean Shea reaches back to Lyle, who hands him a piece of lined notebook paper.
Sniffling, I nod, panic choking my voice away.
“Are you … happy at Preston?” he asks, his eyes wandering my face, my body. I fight the urge to curl into the fetal position under the table.
“So happy,” I say, but as I do, tears spill from my eyes anew. “Sorry,” I sob, scraping my face with my hands. “I think I’m just tired.”
Dr. Sims looks at me with bald disgust. “This program isn’t for the weak, Lacie. You’re falling behind.”
“But this is the first time—”
“Yes, yes. But a first time often predicates a second, a third, and so on.”
“It won’t happen again, I promise.”
Dean Shea raises a placating hand. “We’ve gotten a few worrying emails from students. You’re distracted in class and somehow missed faculty hours? They said your assignments have been strange, unrelated to the text. Please remember to stick to the course material, and my god, Lacie, you need to get your act together. If students begin to drop your classes…” He shakes his head sadly, but his eyes have gone beady, calculating. “That won’t do, you understand. We have a very high standard in Classics. Lyle understands, don’t you, Lyle?”
“Yes, sir.”
My cheeks heat and I look away, toward the window. Outside, the sleet has turned to an icy rain. “I understand, too.”
“If this is too much for you, we can take you off the tenure track. Just for now.”
“Oh, just do it already, John, this is too much for the girl.” Dr. Sims fishes his pinky into his molars, working at something. He pulls his hand back with a wet pop. “Let the men do their work, hm?”
“No!” I’ve worked too hard for this, I want to say. I’m better than this. I killed myself to get into this program, took a knife to my old self and sacrificed her for the freedom of academia over the strictures of my family. I have never gotten a bad grade since making my decision to run.
Not before today. But by the way Dean Shea’s looking at me, I can tell he’s demoting me in his mind. Taking me down from hopeful to something less than dust. With Dr. Sims’s support, he’ll annihilate me. I know it.
He writes something on the paper, slides it back to Lyle. I don’t have time to consider before he clears his throat.
“Is there anything bothering you, my dear?” he asks, his voice grandfatherly. But beneath, there’s the slimmest razor’s edge, hidden and deadly.
