Somehow it seems strange when things go back to exactly normal after a break. Back to Nonny calling Thomas every night, because he was away again, doing his dangerous job in the Florida Keys. Back to lunches in the library. Back to homework.
Back to planning and editing.
Even Talia was home. I thought I could see the sadness she was carrying in the gray around her eyes, most of all when she tried to smile and wave at me when I came to class. She didn’t talk too much, mostly stared at her pencil. And she worked on her Poetry Out Loud contest harder than ever. She passed me a note one day that said: I’m really sorry I can’t do lunch again today. Gran told me to work as hard as I can and you better believe I’m going to.
When I got the note, I nodded to her. I didn’t know a sign to say, I’m still so sorry about your grandma but I know she’s proud of you and you are going to do awesome in this contest and you do whatever work you need to do, so I gave her a thumbs-up instead.
I got a note from someone new, too. Charise from the Lunch Table Girls passed me a note in the hallway that said she’d tried my mom’s constellation cupcakes. Her note said they were Out of this world delicious! I wrote back thank you with five exclamation points and I knew the note would make my mom smile.
The Out of This World note made me more excited about math than I normally am. I knew people who wore NASA shirts had to be pretty great.
But I still missed Talia. I wanted to show her the note, but I didn’t want to interrupt her focus. She needed to be ready to be a rock star at this poetry contest.
So I went back to going over my master plan, half terrified, half impatient for the day Mr. Hickman would finally show up. Only a couple of weeks to go. Apart from my essay, I had printed-out pages, cut-out pictures, glue sticks, tape, and a bunch of other crafty things spread across my room. I was going to be ready, that was for sure.
I talked the plan over with Cecilia almost every night.
Usually preparing and going over plans makes me feel better. That’s why I like getting my homework done early, because it means I’ve planned and that when I walk in the doors the next day I know for sure I’m prepared.
I’ve tried to know for sure that I’m ready for the big things that are coming, but I’m still scared. Terrified.
Timorous. Another Hard Reading Word.
It means scared.
When Scared/Terrified/Timorous Me comes along she pushes her way in, shoving Regular Happy Me into a corner and sort of taking control of everything. If the two me’s were at a party, Scared Me would be the one who started shouting and screaming and talking as loud as she could every time Regular Happy Me tried to talk.
So after school, I grabbed my stuff from my locker and decided to go talk to someone who never, ever seemed to be afraid.
She was sitting at her desk, looking at papers.
“Ms. Trepky?” I said.
She glanced up and when she saw me, she put her pen down and scooted the pages to the side.
“Ms. Monroe,” she said. “What can I do for you?”
Then I didn’t quite know what to say. I’m not usually scared to talk to people, but when the door has somehow been opened for Scared Me to move in, she kind of grabs the steering wheel and doesn’t let go for a while.
“Well…,” I started. Maybe this really was a stupid idea. Maybe this wasn’t something you talked to your teachers about, and I just didn’t know. Probably everyone would think it was odd if they knew. Maybe even Ms. Trepky would think I was weird and awkward.
Ms. Trepky folded her hands on her lap. She had a smile that wasn’t quite a smile because her mouth only moved a tiny bit, but it was more of an Inside Smile and I knew she wouldn’t think I was embarrassing.
“Do you ever get scared? About doing something?” I said it all at once, fast, so I was sure to get it out.
Then Ms. Trepky looked down at her hands and smiled again, and it wasn’t a You’re So Cute smile, which would have made me want to cry, but a sort of Chuckling at Myself kind of smile.
“Let me tell you a secret,” she said.
I stepped closer.
“Do you know what sound scares me more than any other?”
Scary sound? “Fire alarm?” I said.
“The school bell, first thing in the morning.”
My eyes went big. It was like a tiger admitting she was scared of oinking. “The bell? Why?”
“Because it means it’s time to get up in front of you and start teaching, and let me tell you a secret I think every teacher shares. Nothing is more frightening than teaching.”
“But … but we’re just kids.”
“Exactly. You are our tomorrow, and we don’t want to mess anything up.”
“But if it’s so scary how come you do it? How can you do it every day?”
Ms. Trepky scooted her chair back and leaned toward me. Even through her glasses I could see her looking at me very, very closely.
“How important are these things that scare you?”
I didn’t even have to think about that one. “The most important.”
She nodded. “Precisely. If they weren’t, or if you didn’t care deeply about them, they wouldn’t scare you. And so you do them anyway.”
“So how do you not be scared?”
“You don’t,” she said. “But you get better at the doing-it-anyway part, even when you risk failure. And that, in my mind, is the perfect definition of courage.”
We were quiet for a minute, and I tried to make sense of it. Maybe there were also two Ms. Trepkys, the Regular Confident One and the Shy Frightened One. And maybe the Frightened Ms. Trepky made the same shrieks and screams and moans that Scared Me made. Maybe the trick for Confident Ms. Trepky wasn’t knowing how to make the wailing go away, but learning how to dance to it.
“Thanks, Ms. Trepky,” I said.
I didn’t know if I was going to be able to be brave like Ms. Trepky, but I didn’t really have a choice. I had too many important, scary things coming up.
“Libby,” Ms. Trepky said. I looked back at her from the classroom door. She hesitated, mouth open like she was searching for words, and I waited. Finally she said, “Good work in my class, Libby.”