And Justice for Most

Things were different. I remember not long ago when I could walk into a public school building with nothing impeding my entrance aside from the occasional student not aware of their surroundings, probably listening to their headphones way too loud to notice anyone around them. That was the Before Times, before politicians lost control of society, and elected officials that changed every thread in the tapestry of the United States. It was like someone took Lady Liberty’s torch and gave her a semi-automatic weapon, installed facial recognition on every tine on her tiara and erased Emma Lazarus’s words and outlawed The New Colossus from having autonomy over her own body. As I clutched my shoulder bag ready to go through the detectors that searched for metals, organic materials and minerals, I had a twinge of fear that I had left my half pack of cigarettes in my bag from the day before. I assuaged myself by realizing the necessary pre-work cigarette was smoked in the car on the way to work. I handed my bag to the surly security guard, I never knew his name because he only spoke in grunts and eye rolls. His name tag was always turned around so I couldn’t see his name or his position. I had always just assumed a generic security guard with no real name or personality. Just a gun and a grunt. In the Before Times, the school security was effective, cordial, and a part of the patchwork of the teaching staff. Now they were outsourced through defense companies. They were efficient, but not friendly.

Well, not that efficient. Time after time students and people from the outside would breach these doors to create violence, chaos and trauma. Psychologists said that this was a way people dealt with their own trauma. I could never wrap my mind around what kind of trauma would send anyone into a school with a weapon, it was beyond the comprehension of what a human being could do. But humans have always had a knack for being disappointing and disgusting, that still hadn’t changed. Seeing those reports on the news of another school shooting always made my hair stand on end and I could feel the saliva and bile forming in the deep corners of my mouth. Strangely, I longed for those days when it was just guns. When they started bringing in large predatory animals and setting them loose in a school, that’s when chaos really turned on its head. You don’t know fear until you see a pack of starving, enraged, and abused African hyenas patrolling school grounds looking for their next meal. Guns suddenly seemed so much simpler, so trite.

It was easy to keep the hyenas away, and the lions, and the wolves. Big animals were easy to see coming. It was when they started chemical warfare, pumped into the water supply or vented through the cooling system, that’s when we realized we lost control. Now, the government had installed mineral, organic and metal sensors at every entrance and exit for every building: public schools, private schools, business, concert halls and theatres; any building that housed any people for any length of time. Concerned parent groups thought they were so clever when they named the mineral, organic and metal sensors “MOMS.” The newer the building the fancier the sensors got, but parents and guardians still wanted there to be a personal touch to the entry and exit for students. So we had security guards. Although I’m not sure how secure or how well guarded the school was under the supervision of Mr. No-Name-Tag Grunty-McGee III. Of course it was a generational nickname, there’s no way someone became this surly naturally. This was nurtured into him, through a long line of grunters.

I handed him my shoulder bag, he unceremoniously opened it and began to empty all the contents. Teacher-issued laptop, lip balm, water bottle, can of high caffeine energy drink, a sad looking lunch, a notebook, and pens rolling around the bottom. He shook the bag once he thought it was empty, but there was a small jingle, a clanging of metals. He reached his grubby fingers into the depths of my bag only to pull out my keys, the source of the jingle. They were very basic: house keys, car keys, technology cart key, whistle and a small keychain. A heart-shaped locket that was once a necklace, but now lived its life as a hand-held decoration.

“This isn’t regulation. It can be used as a weapon.”

He grunted under his hat. I don’t think I had ever heard him use real words strung together in any kind of coherent manner. Surely he’s seen my keys before, or, maybe I had always put them on the table myself. And, of course, it couldn’t be used as a weapon in its current state, not an effective one. Maybe I could repeatedly poke someone with the pointed end until they got some skin irritation. Certainly, it wasn’t on the same threat level as a bloodthirsty hyena or an airborne pathogen.

“I’ll remove it tonight, and leave it at home. It has sentimental value.”, I said in one breath, hoping he believed me. He grunted and put them back into my bag, which I’m assuming was an affirmative and forgiving grunt.

I headed towards my classroom, which was as dreary as it could be: cinder-block walls that they hadn’t bothered to paint because they needed to be replaced often due to violence. There were chunks of concrete blasted out from bullet holes, at least they managed to clean up the blood spatter. I had a few minutes before my students came in, and I thought about my keychain. In the Before Times, we could decorate our rooms and go on field trips, and have the students plant gardens outside and they were engaged.

I remembered the grim day when my locket became a keychain instead of a necklace. It was a normal day, I had taught two periods and was making myself a cup of tea during my prep time, making my way back to class with hot tea and a pep in my step. The familiar clang of a lockdown bell rang in the hallway, which was a monthly occurrence, so we were prepped on what to do. I knew my class was close by, and I could make it there and lock myself in, barricade the doors and wait it out. I turned the corner, but I was wrong about everything! No matter how many times intruders came into our school, my heart fell into my pelvis whenever I saw a weapon. There she was, eyes crazy with purpose, hair that covered her face and a body that twitched with every cell. She had a machete. I had never even seen one up close. I froze in my tracks, and asked her what her name was and if I could help her. She didn’t move, but I inched closer, I had been trained for this…in theory. I watched a video on non-violent de-escalation for violent perpetrators. I was on autopilot and adrenaline, but there was no course set.

“What do you need?” I asked her, fear falling out of my mouth.

“Revenge, I need revenge.”

“I hear you, but from the looks of your blade, you haven’t hurt anyone yet, so you and I can walk out of here. You can get your revenge another way. I’ll help you.”

Her hand seemed to shift on the handle, I approached slowly, when I got a few feet from her, I slowly bent down to put my tea on the floor and narrated my intentions in a soft, firm tone. I was so close, and she looked as though she wanted to cooperate, like she knew what the end result of her quest would be, but didn’t have a map to get from here to there. My heart beat so loudly, I was sure she could hear it. I glacially reached my hand out, and put mine on top of hers on the handle. This was happening. I was going to get the blade. No one would die today.

At the end of the hall, a lumbering security guard raced around the corner and held up his pistol. I could feel her entire body tense up, and before I knew it, she had the blade to my throat, clutching my hair and the chain of my necklace. I could feel the chain cutting into my skin, it burned as she tightened her grip. The guard screamed at her, but her dominance was asserted through her whole body. He took wide steps, stride-after-stride towards us. And I could feel my neck burning, as the chain was cutting into me. Not once did her machete touch my neck.

I tried talking to him, telling him that she and I were about to walk out. That I had the situation under control, that all three of us could make it out alive, but no words could escape, the choking chain prevented me from letting out a syllable. I felt the gunshot into her shoulder before I heard it. She wretched her body back, but never loosening her grip on my hair and necklace. The chain broke, the locket flying across the linoleum floor. We both tumbled onto the ground where I could finally inhale. Before he could shoot her again, I jumped on top of her, wrangled the blade away and threw it down the hall. The guard and I were hailed as heroes, but I knew that had he not shown up, I would have been able to get the machete away from her and no one would have been harmed. I refused to attend the ceremony at the State House honoring the two of us. He was promoted to a security guard training center.

I heard the bell signal the beginning of the first period. I took a last look at the locket and the photos inside. I don’t know why I stayed in this job. Under the new elected officials who changed the landscape of education, a lot of teachers became private concierge educators for wealthy families who had built state-of-the-art classrooms in their homes. The money was exponentially better, but to me, it felt like giving up. Like I was giving up on an entire generation, and that was not something I could reconcile. It’s true that most of the students who come to school can’t afford private concierge education, but they weren’t bad kids. Even after the girl with the machete, I didn’t believe there were any bad kids, just bad environments, like a houseplant grounded in unrecyclable plastic.

“Good morning!” I said to a student who was usually the first one to arrive. I put my keys and the locket away in my bag and welcomed the other students as they descended on my ugly and lifeless classroom. As I projected their opener for the class, the loudspeaker toned to play the prerecorded updated Pledge of Allegiance:

I pledge allegiance to the former United States of America, for the republic for which it stood, one nation, under surveillance, for liberty and justice for most.