Soul Hostage (34 page)

     “Hello, I’m Linda Gleeson. I’m going to be teaching computer science.” She held her hand out to Glen and flashed a very professional if not very friendly smile.

     Glen shook her hand lightly. “Glen Davis, sophomore and junior English teacher and on occasion amateur comedian.”

     “Well, keep your day job.” Gleeson turned   back to  unlock  the  door of  her classroom. Glen had the distinct feeling  he had been, as his students said, “seriously dissed”.

     He began gathering up the fallen textbooks. Glen felt like a scolded child and avoided meeting the teacher’s eyes. He carried the pile of books into the classroom and put them on the front table.  

     Glen had not been in this classroom for several years and was surprised to see the nice arrangement of updated computer keyboards and monitors in six rows of six desks.

     “Thank you, Mr. Davis.” Linda Gleeson’s voice communicated more dismissal than gratitude.             

     “Anytime, Miss Gleeson.” Glen tried to pack some extra cheer into the reply. If his fellow teacher noticed  the effort, she did not show it.

     Glen returned to his classroom and began unpacking his supplies of writing paper, journals, folders, pencils, pens, whiteboard markers and erasers. After about an hour, he headed over to the book room to pick up class sets of this year’s books. On his way out, he could not resist a glance into the classroom across the hall. Miss Gleeson was searching through a large white box at the front of the room. Glen moved on quickly for fear of being discovered spying on the new teacher.

     As he entered the building housing the book- room, Davis saw Terry Larson in line at the half door at the entrance to the bookroom. Larson was lecturing Tracy Bridges about something, which was probably unimportant in everyone’s mind except his own. Bridges, the mid-twenties, tall, thin, blond, second-year English teacher was listening dutifully to the ramblings of the department head. Having seen enough to change his plans, Glen spun on his heels and went back out of the building without having been noticed. He walked across the courtyard to the main office and once inside to the left down a short dark hallway to the teachers’ mailroom. Inside, it took just a moment for Glen’s eyes to make the adjustment from an unlit dark hallway to a room brightly lit with overhead fluorescent tubes.

     “Welcome back, Glen!” Even without being able to see the face, Glen knew the voice belonged to Larry Barnes, a chemistry teacher. While the two were not particularly close, he and Glen had both started teaching at Roosevelt the same year, and this fact meant that they shared at least a frail bond. Glen liked Larry but other than their place of employment he saw very little in the way of common interests.

     “How are you doing, Larry?” Glen asked.
     “Oh, you know, just ready for another year of       shaping young minds.” The chemistry teacher laughed loudly for too long.

     He instantly remembered why he and Larry were      not closer.

     Glen found a collection of memos and envelopes stuffed into the 6 by 8 inch slot, which served as his mailbox. He scooped them out quickly, said goodbye to Larry, and headed quickly back to his classroom.
     Upon entering his classroom, Glen’s attention was immediately seized by the commanding figure of his newly-acquired desk. The dark presence was imposing enough that it seemed to eclipse the remainder of  the room’s contents. Rather than replace the contents of the black wire book carousels at the corners in the back of the classroom, Glen found himself sitting at the desk staring blankly ahead. Meanwhile, the tall empty carousels stood silently looking on like a pair of skeletal sentries.

     The stillness of the room was broken by the sound of knocking on the classroom door. It took Glen a moment to react to the sound. He turned  to see Jim Fontaine looking curiously through the small glass square in the door. Glen jumped up and moved to open the door.

     “Sorry, I didn’t realize it was locked.” Glen said as Fontaine came into the room.

     “I see the reason for the added security,” he replied as he saw the new addition to the classroom. “That is certainly a lovely piece of furniture!”

      As Fontaine approached the desk, Glen suddenly felt somewhat possessive and stepped between the two. “I needed a new desk, and Tim found one in storage.” he exclaimed quickly trying to distract attention from the subject.

     Fontaine looked at his friend a little surprised by the fervor of his statement. He then took in the lack of progress in arranging the rest of the classroom. “Good idea to pace yourself. You don’t want to finish prepping in one day.”

     Glen was a puzzled by the comment until he looked at the clock and saw the time. It was 3:25.     He had been sitting at the desk for over four hours with no idea where the time went. But the loss of time did not bother Glen as much as the throbbing pain in his head. Instinctively, he began rubbing his temples.

     “Are you feeling all right?” Fontaine’s concern was genuine.

     “Yes. I guess I just lost track of time. Spent most of the daydreaming. Don’t tell anyone, okay?” Glen made the request in seeming jest, but there was a slight touch of sincerity.

     “Your secret is safe with me. Besides, truth be known, I have spent many of my days engaged in very similar activity.” The concern of the older teacher had clearly not been completely dispelled.

     Glen avoided making eye contact and instead started toward the door. With Fontaine standing between Glen and the exit, he found himself some-what caught up in the movement and swept out the door. Glen turned off the lights and locked the door in almost a single motion.

     “See you tomorrow.” The words seemed to be all that was left in the place where the English teacher had stood just seconds before. Before Fontaine could voice a reply, Glen was out of earshot. In previous days, Glen and Fontaine could typically be seen walking together toward the parking lot and perhaps standing next to their cars continuing  their conversation. Instead, the older teacher watched as his friend hurried to his car.

     Glen felt his breathe coming hard as he sat in the dark green ’67 Mustang. Across the nearly empty parking lot, he could see Fontaine slowly loading his bag into his car all the while looking at Glen. The look of puzzlement mixed  with a dash of concern and perhaps a touch of hurt on his face was visible to Glen even from the fifty-foot distance. The pain in Glen's head pushed Fontaine out of his mind.   He looked at himself in the mirror, and the face he saw appeared tired with dark circles under blood-shot eyes. He  wondered at this exhaustion since he could not recall any particularly tiring activity during his day. Of course, there was a four-hour gap of time of which he had no recollection. This fact made him uneasy. However, losing a few hours was not the main source of Glen's unease.

     The primary thing troubling the teacher was his new desk. He pictured the deep, dark wood with his refection trapped inside. The hood of the roll top creeps slowly open. In his mind, Glen walks slowly toward the desk. He gets closer and hears some creaking sounds from the wood. Another step and he is reaching out to close the hood. His fingers near the brass handle. A few more inches and-- the hood slams shut with a bang.

     The sound shook Glen from his vision. It took him a few seconds to realize that he was sitting in his car, another few seconds to realize his car was parked in the middle of an empty parking lot, and another few seconds to realize that the parking lot belonged to Roosevelt High School. Adding to the surprise was that the place was dark. This should have been no surprise since it was 11:14 p.m. Glen looked at his watch in disbelief. It seemed to be working fine. But if it was correct, it would mean he had been sitting in his car for nearly eight hours. 
     He opened the door slowly as if hesitant to let the outside world enter his refuge inside the car. Glen stepped uneasily on to the pavement of the parking lot. He almost expected the ground to give way under his foot. The ground remained solid, and Glen stood beside the car. In the quiet night, he could hear the humming of the fluorescent light and moths fluttering wings on the light pole a few feet from him. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. The parking lot was empty aside from Glen and his car. The bushes surrounding the parking lot on three sides were back lit by a full moon and added to the shadows dancing around the dark place.

     The thought of going back to the classroom was absent from his mind until a voice from nowhere placed it there with a whisper. “Go open your desk.” The idea made no  sense to him, and Glen brushed it aside as one of those ridiculous thoughts  which pop into your head from time to time. Those thoughts like telling your boss what you really think of him or throwing a rock through the church’s huge stain-glassed window were impulses that might very well  come to anyone. However, sane people paid no attention to them. Glen certainly counted himself among the sane and paid no attention to this thought. That is, until it was repeated.

     The male voice had a slight European accent, “Go open your desk.”

     Without giving it a conscious thought, Glen began walking slowly back across the parking lot toward the school. Just before he reached the curb of the sidewalk separating the rough pavement of the parking lot from the smooth sidewalk and lawn of the campus, Glen asked himself what exactly he was doing. This was certainly a good question. Why was he heading back to his classroom in the middle of the night to look inside of a desk?

     Before he could find an answer to that question, Glen was surrounded by bright light.

     “Stay where you are!”

     Glen was actually relieved to discover as he turned around that the command did not come from some inner or disembodied voice. This voice had come from the police car idling behind him in the parking lot. He followed this voice without question.

     The doors opened on both sides of the car. From the passenger side, a tall black officer with very short hair and a bushy mustache emerged. He stood next to the car for a moment as he unsnapped the leather strap holding his service revolver in the holster. Through the windshield, a young white officer with red hair and freckles could be seen speaking into the radio hand piece. Glen thought that the officer looked young enough to be one of his students.

     “Keep your hands where I can see them.” The black officer barked as he approached Glen. The proximity made his height even more striking by comparison to that of the English instructor.

     “Officer, I’m sorry. I am a teacher here and needed to get something out of my classroom.” He struggled to keep his voice sounding nonchalant like standing in the parking lot of Roosevelt High School in the middle of the night was something he did on a regular basis.

      “I need to see some ID.” The officer did not seem the least bit impressed by Glen’s nonchalance. If it had any effect upon him, it seemed he was irritated by it. “Take it out slowly!” He bellowed.

     “The call was from Christine Davis looking for her husband Glen Davis.” This voice came from the officer in the car.

      Glen took his wallet from his back pocket slowly and removed his driver’s license. The black officer took the license from him and examined it.

     “We found the missing husband!” He called back to the patrol car. “You’ve got one worried wife at home. You better have a good story for her.” The officer chuckled slightly as he moved a bit closer to Glen checking for the smell of alcohol.

     Finding none, he looked at the teacher with curiosity. “So what is so important in your classroom?” Glen stared blankly at the officer for a moment and could think only of the desk. “I mean what is so important you came to school at eleven o’clock at night to get?”

     It took him a second to answer. “Oh…I left my briefcase with … uh … my phone there.”

     “Okay, let’s go get it.” the officer said as he began moving toward the school.

      It was then that Glen again heard the other voice which did not come from the officer or the police car or anyone else in sight. “Go open your desk. There’s a surprise inside!”  Every bit of Glen’s determination was needed to keep him from responding to the voice.

     “No, I’ll get it tomorrow.” Glen quickly replied and began walking back to his car. He had the strong urge to get as far away as possible from the school.

      The policeman jogged to catch up with Glen before he reached his car. “Mr. Davis.” he called.

     Somewhat agitated by the delay in getting away from the place, Glen spun around to face the officer. Despite his advantage in height, the black officer found himself stunned and threatened by the rage expressed on the teacher’s face.

     “Uh…here’s your license.” He slowly handed the card back to Glen and noticed the previous fierceness had vanished from his face.

     “Oh, thanks.” Glen answered sheepishly as he took the license. He opened the door and got inside his car. He lowered the window to hear the officer.

     “You head straight home, okay?”

     He replied quickly, “I will.” And then he raised the  window.

     The tall black officer walked slowly back to the patrol car while watching Glen. He watched  as  Glen’s  car left  the  parking lot. Back in the police car, the black officer simply observed, “Not sure what’s going on there, but I think someone is gonna be in trouble at home.”

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Jeffrey Littorno spent several years as an English teacher in the United States before taking his teaching skills to other countries including Kuwait, Australia, and South Korea. He now lives in Northern California with his wife Gye Yeol and a growing number of cats. When not working on his next novel, Littorno teaches prison inmates in Folsom, California. Jeffrey Littorno is the author of
Bloom's Desk
,
Soul Hostage
, and the upcoming
Stone Cold
.