Zoey saw the chat come to life on her phone. "World's Worst Sleepover". Her stomach sank to a the same weird spot reserved for expected bad news. Not a spot of pessimism but the same feeling she had her junior year of undergrad when she spent a summer taking her aging childhood dog, Brownie, to the vet. It was a series of dwindling returns that just announced his eventual passing, which happened after she had returned to school. That semester she took a Latin American Literature class and they read Chronicle of a Death Foretold, a story she can't remember but whose title stuck with her. Chronicle of a day wasted evening made furiously awkward.
She hoped the snow would miraculously stop. Or, at least, relent. Enough for her to creep home after hanging in her room. She had changed, which maybe was her way of silently acknowledging the reality, but, in the moment, it felt natural. Like taking off your coat when sitting down at a desk.
Outside it was the Arctic. Her classroom could see the tops of two red maple trees planted her first year on even dreary Cleveland days. Today, it was just blanks. Not sterile or calm. It was the snow that felt menacing. The snow that absorbs all the light around it until its more a slate gray. Snow that pours when you are already boarded for your flight. Snow that falls like powder but acts like concrete.
"You should stay. This storm will kill you!" Her mother texted her that when Zoey first mentioned "Waiting it out for a bit" at the school. Her mother then followed with snowflake, snowman and stop sign emoji.
If she had to stay then Zoey wanted to hunker in her room. Treat it like the active shooter situations that the guys in black polos, tucked into their jeans, trained her every return to school year. She would lock the door and then pile chairs and furniture by the door. She would drag the vintage two drawer file cabinet to the door ("Sorry, not sorry about the marks on the floor, John Johnson!) and let its steel core heart keep everyone out. She would be ready to fight except without the ersatz weaponry the trainers asked her to master ("Hit them with a Chromebook. The old ones are heavier!" was a dark joke at March Meadow. A sort of cultural meme that no one could remember the origins of) but excuses.
Sandy would come knocking at her door asking to gather in the Tower and tell stories and Zoey would be ready with excuses.
She had decided against being tired or not feeling well. If that were true then why would she want to be in her room. There were actual cots and couches in the building. if you turned a school upside down and shook it, you would get a lot from the miniature world within it but one thing for sure would be a pharmacies worth of varying medications. Beyond anything that needs to be injected, you could find it in a school. Plus, saying not feeling well reminder her of putting off advances of a horny boyfriend. It felt too much like "I'm not in the mood"
She could pretend to be busy. Zoey was a Pinterest teacher in her first years at March Meadow, when she had homerooms. Every year had a different theme. Under the sea. The universe. Local history. That was the biggest lift but luckily Lebron James was part of local history so that was a layup. However, in latter years, and when she moved to reading intervention, she became a "piles" teacher. Not messy but a "working" space with miscellaneous mugs filled with mismatched markers, pens, and pencils. She had hundreds of books spread across varying shelves, most inherited, but some newer, (Ikea pieces bought with her own money), holding them in a controlled chaos. She knew where everything was but maybe she could say she was organizing. Never waste a crisis. She would be too busy if deciding to organize alphabetically by author or title. Maybe by series. Whichever would take the longest.
What she couldn't do is ghost them. Just pretend like she is not home the same you do when a Jehovah's Witness knocks on the door. People would think she is dead on the floor of her room or dead within a half mile of the school, having tried to get home. Or, people would think she is mad at them, which would then make them mad at her and spiral the collective anxiety into its own superstorm. She imagined if it was Carlos at the door. He had a doomed crush on her that made her feel guilty she didn't reciprocate but then made her angry that she thought that way. He would be (he is actually) OK, but would not want to just ignore him. She would be more comfortable if it was Sandy herself. Or John. Alexis could get her to do it pulling the "rank" card even in this liminal time and space.
The chat buzzed. She ignored it but saw another text from her mom "Please stay at the school! They told me not to come to the clinic for my shift. That has never happened in 15 years. Stay!"
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