Thursday morning
THE CRINGE-INDUCING THOUGHT OF SHOWING HER FACE AT CHAPS AND running into Ms. Hollins filled Rannie with dread…well, maybe not “dread” exactly, but definitely trepidation. So she was overjoyed when a call came from Mrs. Mac saying her morning tour was canceled. She remained at home with Josef Mengele for company.
The beauty of copyediting was getting paid to read, to do something you’d do for free. In the process she acquired all sorts of interesting tidbits. Just a moment ago she’d learned that, contrary to what she’d always supposed, only fraternal twins ran in families. Identical twins were purely genetic odds.
After putting away the manuscript, she turned to some yearbook layouts that Nate had left out for her to proofread. The layouts were for the faculty section. First, using a school directory and last year’s Chaps yearbook as reference, Rannie proofread the text, catching a couple of spelling errors in teachers’ names and changing 1895 to 1995 as the year the head of athletics started at Chaps. Next, she checked “visuals.” Each present-day portrait of a teacher was paired with the teacher’s own senior year yearbook photo.
It was a clever idea, showing what authority figures looked like way back when, and she made a mental note to compliment Nate, the editor. One of the kindergarten teachers, smiling and pert now, had been a sullen Goth goddess; somebody who taught Middle School math already had a receding hairline at eighteen. Nate’s physics teacher had been a drool-worthy hunk. Rannie felt conflicted emotions gazing at the photocopy of teenaged Ms. Hollins with the same long dark hair fanning around her shoulders like a cape.
On the coffee table, Nate had also left a stack of teachers’ yearbooks and Rannie found the one from the exclusive all-girls boarding school Ms. Hollins had attended. There were photos of her on the staff of the literary magazine, in a madrigal singing group, and as head of something called “Saturday Salon” that sounded artsy/ intellectual. In the few candid group photos that included her, she always seemed a little forlorn and on the periphery.
Mr. Tut’s sixty-something-year-old Chaps yearbook was filled with photos of Gus Tutwiler as he’d been called back then. Senior Class president. Tennis team captain. Quintessential prep school wonder boy. In his senior picture, his fierce bushy eyebrows punctuated an oversized nose. It was a vulnerable, adolescent face still in transition and oddly endearing, a face whose features needed to solidify before Tut matured into the attractive man of later years.
Sadly, the photo of Tut from the most recent yearbook showed him already in diminished health though still spiffy in a school blazer and bow tie. Rannie inspected the photo more closely. There was something wrong. It took a moment before it clicked: The school crest on Tut’s breast pocket was on the right, not the left. The photograph had been “flopped,” accidentally printed in reverse. The only time flopped images stood out as glaring errors was in cases when visible lettering—on store signs or on theater marquees—showed up as mirror writing. Or, if a famous “lefty” like Babe Ruth was shown batting on the wrong side of the plate. Something small like the Chaps crest could easily escape notice. Still, copy editors worth their salt were always on the lookout for just such glitches, and Rannie felt a familiar little “gotcha!” thrill nailing this one. She stuck on a Post-it advising Nate to find the actual photo of Tut and to ask the printer to reproduce it correctly.
A glance at her father’s wristwatch warned her that lunch at the Colony Club was fast approaching. But, Rannie lingered a moment longer, matching up the high school pictures of Ms. Hollins and Mr. Tut. Looking at them side by side, there was definitely something, an affinity between the two faces. Perhaps it was the depth and intelligence of the eyes that made their being drawn to each other understandable. Had it been an affair? The embossed numerals on the front cover of Ms. Hollins’s yearbook revealed she was not many years older than Rannie. Of course, a strictly platonic friend of a terminally ill man might stay over in case of some nighttime medical emergency. But then why lie? Why say they were merely casual friends? As Rannie closed the two yearbooks, debating what from her meager wardrobe to wear, she was left with a niggling sense that something more had gone on between this man and woman…although she was at a total loss as far as what the “something” might be or whether it had contributed in any way to Mr. Tut’s death.