and looking out his office window at a snowy honeysuckle hedge, he meets with two students, Laura Giardini at 2:30 p.m. who wants to argue about her aptitude test, — I don’t want to be a hairdresser, I want to be a lawyer, why doesn’t the test show that I should be a lawyer? Can I take it again? How many times?
Josh Gatchalian at 3:00 p.m. who doesn’t want to talk about anything, — My mom told me to come, he says. — Nope, don’t know why I’m here. So what if I’m failing band, I never wanted to play the trombone anyway, only fags get good grades in band, Mr. Boyle.
Only a half an hour left in this Monday. Walter opens files on both Laura Giardini and Josh Gatchalian, adds their file icon selves to his list, types in Laura’s history from her pink Grade 10 sheet, figures out Josh’s aptitude test results say he’s suitable for the police or law enforcement or party planning. Walter leaves a voice mail on Josh’s parents’ phones, — I think it would help Josh if we all had a meeting to talk about why playing the trombone is vital. Okay. Awesome. Hope you have a great evening!
Sequestered in his office, he opens his Tupperware again, a piece of carrot crunched in half when he picks up the ringing phone and Max is calling him from down the hall, — Mr. Boyle. Walter, I need to speak with you immediately. I need you.
A piece of carrot half-bitten, half-chewed, the secret thrill he gets when he has to interact with his boyfriend at work. Their dangerous, exciting secret.
Thirty seconds later, his hand on the principal’s doorknob.
The door opening, the vice-principals Morty and Gladys standing at attention on either side of the principal, a carved wooden crucifix hanging on the wall behind his head. Their silence cool metal. Walter’s heart falters.
Walter’s Monday should have been the tedious photocopy of every other Monday, but Max the principal tents his pale fingers and breaks open the rotting egg of Patrick Furey’s suicide to him and the two vice-principals, turning this Monday into a Monday of unique suffering.
— A student in our school has made the disastrous decision to end his life, Max says, his voice quavering. — I have already begun taking the appropriate measures.
It’s okay to cry, Maxie, Walter wants to say. You blubber away. — I’ll draft a memo for the teachers and staff, Walter says instead.
— And put in your memo, says Max, — that staff and teachers are forbidden to discuss the death with the students until I have all the facts. We’ll let the students know on Wednesday.
— In my position as head guidance counsellor I have to ask if you really think that’s a good idea, Max, says Walter. — Better to give them the facts as we know them as soon as possible because the students will figure it out themselves but they’ll figure it out all wrong. We know enough already about how he died, don’t we? Today’s Monday. By tomorrow afternoon the rumours will be out of control. Better to get the grief counsellors in first thing Tuesday morning.
— Get that memo written up, says Max, turning to his desk and picking up a stack of paper. — You may go now, Walter.
Walter exits the office like a butler instructed to go scrub the chamber pots, his face and feelings sutured tight as he trudges back down the hallway, slams through the drawers on his office desk, prepares to write his memo, Monday fucking afternoon.
He tries not to dissolve into the 98 percent water he is made of when Joy rushes into his office and grips him in a bosomy hug.
— Oh Walter, she says, as she grips his upper arm, his overflowing waist, — You looked so sad. Like you needed a hug.
— Sometimes it is hard to understand God’s plan, gasps Walter, trying to pull himself away. — We just have to trust He knows what He is doing. The boy’s in a better place now.
He accidentally touches her bra strap through her blouse, yanks his hand back, pulls himself away from Joy. Clumsily pats her on the shoulder. Joy’s crinkled eyes squish out tears.
— I never understand how that’s supposed to make someone feel better, she says in a flannelly voice, her nose bright red.
Walter starts to draft the memo that Joy will slip into all the teachers’ mail slots Tuesday morning. He tries to hunt down the right words for the memo, thumbing through his thesaurus, settling for appropriately vague, consoling words: unfortunately rather than tragically, passed away rather than died, please refrain rather than forbidden. His face to the computer screen in his office, he swallows, his Adam’s apple sliding up his throat, tipping further up into his sinus cavity, cutting off his breath.
They meet Monday night in the front foyer of their house, Walter and Max, when Max finally swings closed and bolts the door behind him. He kicks off his winter boots, the air heavy. Walter puts a hand on each of Max’s shoulders.
— This day, exhales Max.
— I’ll crack you open a beer, Maxie, says Walter. He kisses Max’s temple. The skin sticky.
They eat from the bowls of stew in front of them, Lieutenant Fong perched neatly in Walter’s lap, studying every movement of his spoon from the bowl to the mouth to the bowl. Max inserting spoonfuls of stew into his own mouth as though administering to an assembly line: deposit, chew, swallow, deposit, chew, deposit, swallow.
Walter’s lips slack, Max’s lips tight.
— At least it didn’t happen on school property, says Max, his words clipped and cauterized. — That’s one good thing.
Walter’s ears pop. — What did you just say? Walter’s spoon clattering into his bowl. Lieutenant Fong skitters to the floor from Walter’s lap.
The growing puddle of stew in Walter’s belly sour, coagulated.
— It didn’t happen on school property. It’s technically not a school issue.
— You know what? says Walter, — This stew tastes like diarrhea. It looks like diarrhea too.
— My mother made this stew, snaps Max.
— Lucky she didn’t make it on school property.
Max’s jaw clicking rhythmically, the scrape of his metal spoon on the bottom of the ceramic bowl. Walter tosses his bowl in the sink, grabs the pot from the stove.
— Oh, and by the way, I don’t appreciate the way you talked to me today, says Walter as he scrubs the glutinous remains of the stew from the pot with steel wool, his man-boobs bobbing under his T-shirt. — We have enough facts about how the boy died. What other details do you need?
Max stands up from the table, rattles cups and plates in the dishwasher as he inserts and reinserts them, his elbows jabbing, stabbing the air.
— Do I need to remind you of suicide contagion? says Max, his face swivelling from the dishwasher to Walter, pencil-dot eyes. — Or are you having some kind of neuron seizure? You cannot even begin to conceive of the damage this will do to the school’s reputation, can you?
Walter harrumphs as he slops the dishrag back and forth across the counter, knots up the plastic bag of garbage, the bag sloppy and heavy as he trudges it out the back door. He swings the green garbage bag in an arc into the trashcan,
