“Can a river shift?”
I blurt out at the end of science class,
after the bell has rung,
after everyone else has left.

Mr. Bellamy looks at me like I have
two heads. I don’t blame him.
All year, I’ve only asked two other questions
in his class: “Can I please use the bathroom pass?”
and “Can I do some extra credit
to raise my D-minus?”

When he’s shaken off his shock, he says:
“Well, yes … if you mean, Lyza,
can a river change its course over time—
then yes, absolutely, it most certainly can!”
He seems pleased to see that I’m at last
showing an interest in his class,
even if it is a little late.

He looks at me curiously. “Why do you ask?”
I hesitate. “Well…
I was reading something at my gramps’ place …”
(which is true)
“and it made me wonder …”
I don’t say it was a hand-drawn map
of the Mullica River in 1699. He might get
curious
and I’m not ready yet to let
anyone else know about this, especially a teacher.
So … I just let him think it was an atlas,
something normal like that.

Mr. Bellamy buys it.
He shifts into full-throttle teacher mode:
  “The earth, Lyza, is in a constant state of change….”
  (waves hands excitedly)
  “The atmosphere, bodies of water, and tectonic plates
  are constantly interacting
  (weaves fingers together to demonstrate)
  to re-create the geography we see around us…”
  (spreads arms out wide as if those plates
  and bodies were right inside his classroom)

He has other things to say about
the earth, and he says most of them in the next
twenty minutes.

I try to listen, but I already have what I need:
a second opinion on the question
of shifting rivers,
which seems now to be a lot more
fact than fiction.