The Headmaster's Wife(4)

Marta had never looked good in much of anything. She was not fat, but her thinness did not make her attractive or fashionable. If she had tried to wear black leather jeans, she would have looked like a sausage in a natural casing.

“Mark DeAvecca just went by,” she said. “I was trying to catch him.”

“Ah, Mark,” Alice said, shaking out her hair. She had long, wavy, thick hair. Marta didn’t believe for a moment that the bright red of it was Alice’s natural color, although she knew it had been once. Still, nobody cared about that, natural or unnatural. Nobody cared about anything except the special effects.

“He’s going to fail history,” Marta said. “Or he’s going to come damned close. I’ve talked to him and talked to him. Nothing seems to help.”

“He doesn’t seem to be adjusting well, no,” Alice said. She pushed the cape back over her shoulders. Black cape, black leather jeans, black cashmere turtleneck sweater, black boots—Marta couldn’t look at her; she was too ridiculous. Except that she wasn’t. She was perfect. It was hard to bear.

“I don’t think it has anything to do with adjusting,” Marta said. “I think he’s irresponsible, that’s all. He doesn’t do anything. He has reading assigned in every class. He’s supposed to take notes. He never does it. I know. I’ve asked to see the notes. I don’t think he’s ever bothered to study for history, even before he came here.”

“He had excellent grades in history,” Alice said. “He had excellent grades in everything.”

“There are ways to get excellent grades without doing any work,” Marta said. “You can have your mother do it, for instance. I don’t suppose his stepfather would be any help, but his mother—well, there’s always that. You could go to a school where it matters more who your parents are than what work you’re doing. There’s that, too. Everybody’s so hyped on how rigorous this place is. If it’s rigorous, he doesn’t belong here.”

“Doesn’t he?”

Marta flushed. She had been ranting—again. She was getting a reputation for ranting. She knew what Alice Makepeace said about her behind her back. She’s terribly earnest, that was the line she used to everybody, and now everybody used it, too. Marta was terribly earnest, and very dedicated, and of course a complete bore and an utter frump. It was, Marta thought, all true, and she didn’t care.

She turned away, back toward the inside of her office, where the papers still sat stacked and waiting for her. It was Friday night, and she wanted to be in Boston with friends, out to dinner, at a silly movie about superheroes, in a dark club listening to a band no one had ever heard of. She didn’t want to correct Mark DeAvecca’s research paper, which would be a mess, badly argued, inadequately sourced, physically disintegrating. She didn’t want to be at Windsor Academy at all, except that she had no place else to be where they would pay her enough money so that she didn’t have to worry about it.

“Well,” she said.

“You’re not adjusting too well either,” Alice said. “It’s not uncommon, really, for people who are used to more structured and traditional schools. It’s hard to get past the dominant paradigm and learn to experience something new.”

“I’m fine,” Marta said. She was still looking into her office. She didn’t want Alice to see the expression on her face, which was not the expression of a teacher dedicated to progressive ideas and the encouragement of diversity in every aspect of campus life. She could, she thought, recite the entire text of the viewbook they had sent her when she’d first applied for this job. It had been written by a good PR firm in New York that specialized in “development” materials for academia.

“I’m fine,” Marta said again, turning back to look at Alice’s bright red hair. “You’re all wet. You’ve got snow on you.”

“I should have. It’s snowing again. We’re supposed to get eight inches by tomorrow morning. Maybe you should knock off and get a little rest before you finish whatever you’re trying to finish.”

“Research papers. I’ve got a lot of them.”

“Yes, I know you do.” Alice shrugged. “I’ve got to knock off though, or I’ll miss the library. One of these days I’m going to get organized well enough to remember to pick up my books in the afternoon. Are you sure you’ll be all right by yourself?”

“Of course I will.”

“Well, you only have to go back to Barrett House. There’s that. Have a good time with your papers.”