Paradise and Elsewhere by Kathy Page

Author:Kathy Page
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Biblioasis
Published: 2014-03-11T16:00:00+00:00

We, the Trees

She should have seen trouble coming from the way he stood out in the class. His hair, growing out of a short cut, was beginning to curl. He had the beginnings of a beard. He was one of many in jeans, dark T-shirt, and a green parka never removed however warm the room. But the way he carried himself was distinctive. She thought he might have trained as a dancer, or served in the military. Even sitting, he seemed taut, poised. During discussions, he constantly shifted position so as to see who was speaking and give that person his attention; he radiated a kind of alertness, physical and mental, that it was unusual to see in a classroom, especially at eight-thirty in the morning. But even so, there was nothing to suggest just how far he was preparing to go.

He asked for a consultation right after the first class.

“Well, sit down, Joshua,” she said, removing some files from the spare office chair she had obtained from the Humanities office upstairs. It was worn, but more inviting than the hard plastic item that was standard issue. “How may I help?”

“I chose this class because of your reputation,” he said.

“For what?” she asked, amused.

“Open-mindedness,” he told her, without missing a beat. “My final project is likely to be unconventional but I hope you’ll be receptive to it.”

“Do you want to say a bit more?” she asked.

“Not at this point,” he told her. “I’m just giving you a heads-up. It’s to do with the forest.”

“The forest industry?”

“Not so much that,” he said. “Well, there is one thing,” he added, “we’re not sure about paper.”

“We?” she asked, but he just looked back at her, and she decided she had misheard. “An electronic file is fine,” she told him.

“Actually, I feel I may want to speak it to you,” he said.

“I’ll still need the text,” she told him, “to mark.” He shrugged, and declined her proffered copy of the course outline for Journalism 200, which listed all the assignments, including the requirements for the final piece: a feature article of 2,500 words on a contemporary issue, showing evidence of a balanced approach, historical understanding, in-depth research, and judicious use of interview material: twenty marks.

At the door, Joshua paused, thanked her and smiled—and it was an extraordinary thing, that smile: it involved every part of his face, and could well have involved his entire body, too; it was blissful, intimate, infectious—to the point that she felt a shock of loss when the door closed behind him and her mood reverted to the norm, which suddenly felt closer to depression than she liked to admit.

It had been a very difficult year: her partner of fifteen years had moved out at the end of the previous semester, after months of emotional arguments over whether or not they should try to adopt. So now she was middle-aged, alone, and left to wonder, Was this it? What was she really for, now? Another twenty years of teaching? There

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