And She Was...

Right to write. The classroom that filled her days with absolute joy and a whole lotta pain was empty. The windows shut and the computers unplugged. She contemplated taking the rolled-up rug from the corner beneath the spent vintage pencil sharpener that seemed to demand punishment from her middle school boy students. Decision made, she lightly and slowly backed out and with a skip in her step, practically slid down one flight of gray-Lego-like stairs out to the blinding sun towards Teacher Lot 2. She was spent. She was driving out to the stop sign in a paid off 2008 Passat Station Wagon with a sunroof.

Her chocolate Frosty from Wendy’s next to the school tasted so sweet. Sweeter and colder than she could remember in a long time. She wiped up the ketchup stain from her stack of personal journals that practically wept with joy at the sudden physical attention. She grinned on the way home as the back-left window unintentionally allowed a small piece of trash escape out onto 97 South. She knew that piece of decade-old slip of paper would be where she picked up when she was alone and safe with her writing- her way of developing who she was in this world and her way of carving out what she wanted her sons to know and remember. Her seat reclined ever so slightly, she eyed it in the rear-view mirror as the dust settled behind her and the blinking highway sign above alerted her of the 19 mile back up on Route 50 East towards the Bay Bridge.