Tesseracts Eleven by Holly Phillips

Author:Holly Phillips
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: EDGE Science Fiction and Fantasy Publishing
Published: 2012-01-25T00:00:00+00:00

Phoebus ‘Gins Arise

Kate Riedel

No-one was really surprised when Miss Claudia Parry threw the sans-serif ball from one of the new Selectrics at Dacia Middleton, hitting her on the side of the head and sending her bleeding to the nurse’s room.

Not that Miss Parry had ever done such a thing before in her thirty years of teaching typing and stenography at Buck’s Crossing High School. Still, it was common knowledge that all of Miss Parry’s students were snapped up by offices down in the city, not only because they were highly skilled, but because after going through Miss Parry’s classes, they could cope with anything that even the most cantankerous boss could throw at them. Of course, this last was not meant to be taken literally.

Dacia Middleton went to the nurse’s room. Miss Parry went right on teaching up to the bell at the end of the hour.

Word had already got round. Mrs. James and Miss Honimacher, who taught social studies and music respectively, stopped their conversation in mid-sentence, ­raising their cups of coffee to cover the abrupt silence when Miss Parry came into the teacher’s lounge. Miss Parry crossed to the hotplate to boil water for tea, the Cuban heels of her plain black leather pumps sounding as firmly and rhythmically on the green linoleum tile as the fingers of her students on the Remington manuals they had to master before they were allowed to touch the Selectrics.

Mrs. James lowered her cup and said brightly to Miss Honimacher, “Were you able to arrange a recording session for the choir?”

“Oh, yes,” Miss Honimacher said. “Mr. Smith was quite reasonable. It should be a good fund-raiser for the new robes. And — you’ll never believe this!” she giggled. “He told my fortune!”

“Really,” said Mrs. James, taking a sceptical sip of coffee. “Cards? Crystal ball? How much did he charge for that?”

The water boiled. Miss Parry poured it over the tea leaves in the pot, put the lid on the pot, and the crocheted cosy over all.

“Oh, no money. It was on the sign on his door, and I asked about it, and he said all I had to do was bring a loaf of bread and—” she lowered her voice, giggling again, “a bottle of wine. I was a little nervous, going into the liquor store—” Teachers at Buck’s Crossing, the female ones at least, were supposed to set a good example for the students, and not consume alcohol.

“It is a rough part of town,” Mrs. James said, smoothing over the peccadillo. “So what did he tell you?”

Miss Honimacher’s prefatory giggle was interrupted when Miss Hansen, the principal’s secretary (who had got her Selectric a whole year before any were budgeted for Miss Parry’s classes) put her head around the door.

“Miss Parry? Mr. Guillet wants to talk to you.”

“I’ll be there in a minute.” Miss Parry took a cup and saucer from the cupboard and, in the renewed silence, poured tea and took it with her. As the door closed behind her she could hear Mrs.

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