Shattered and Worn
A shattered sage-green lavaliere lays on a black velvet bust. A beautifully thin and bony palm reaches towards the broken pendant.
A woman wearing a dark dress with a dark brown bag draped from her shoulder walks up the dull, concrete steps of Oxford campus. She stops at a massive, bronze idol of Oxford’s most recent chancellor, Miriam Elbe Fennell.
She looks up and smiles at the shining statue. An odd spark of sage green sparkles from its solid glasses.
“A lovely morning to you, Ms. Fennell.” She shallowly curtsies and walks to her class.
The woman walks into her classroom; a rounded room, riddled with rigid wooden desks and wiry rolling chairs. She walks towards her desk; a tiny table teeming with jades and jewelry scattered along the skirt with a white vase sitting on the corner.
She sets her bag beside the bottom of the desk. She turns to the blackboard behind her desk and grabs a piece of chalk.
Her hand chases the chalk as it creates the curves of a charming chandelier woman.
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RIIIIIINGG!!
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Her students start filling the classroom. Her hand decorates the woman’s dress.
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The students’ murmur.
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RIIIIIINGG!!
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She sets the chalk down and takes a step back, admiring the woman.
“Been practicing, Ms. Wallaker?” a student asks.
“Not at all.” She grabs an eraser and wipes away the drawing.
“Why’d you erase it?!” another student asks.
“I need the board for today.”
“You could’ve let us take a picture of that masterpiece before killing it!”
Ms. Wallaker chuckles. “I’ll try to keep that in mind the next time I draw something.”
…
RIIIIIINGG!!
“I wish you all an easy afternoon!”
Most of the students walk out of her classroom.
…
A small group of students walk up to Ms. Wallaker’s cluttered desk.
“Why did you choose to teach history, Ms. Wallaker?” one of the older students asks.
“Umm,” Ms. Wallaker thinks. She looks at her desk. “I chose to teach history to learn more about everything I had.” She picks up a small wooden box with an emerald pendant sitting atop a small black velvet bust.
“For example, this was given to me by one of my old friends as a birthday gift.” She sets the box down and turns it towards the students. “She said it was one of her old family heirlooms but her dad didn’t want to pass it down because it was all shattered and cloudy. When I-”
The students pick the box up and pass it around. “How is it so clean now?”
Ms. Wallaker stands up. “I cleaned it.”
“How do you know how to clean this stuff?” one asks.
“I own a jewelry and metallics shop down in Cowley.”
“Greenquill Inc.?” another remembers.
“Yup!”
“I’ve been there a few times!” They set the box back on Ms. Wallaker’s desk. “I had to go there to get my parents’ wedding rings fixed.”
…
“How do you manage the store and teaching here?”
One of the students admires the chaotic arrangement of her desk;
“I have employees during the week-” a pile of papers to the right of her laptop, “-and I go in on the weekends.-” a basket of pens and pencils behind it, “-They’ll usually have stuff saved for me-” a small, wiry, mosaic snail to the left of the basket “-to do because I’m the only one-” a lonely lily laying in a white, rose-patterned vase on the corner of her desk “-that knows how to fix the cloudiness and roughness-” and an old, thin, black journal leaning against the vase, “-of old gems and rocks that people bring in.”
The student picks up the journal and skims through it. One of the other students nudges them.
“It’s okay,” Ms. Wallaker says.
“Where’d you get this from?” the student holds up the journal.
“My grandmother left it to me after she died a few years ago. I barely use it, I don’t even know I keep it around anymore.”
The student sets the journal back against the vase.
“I suppose none of you want to miss lunch, do you?” Ms. Wallaker stands up and starts to lead them out.
The journal starts to push the vase.
“And I’ve got a few papers to grade anyway.”
“Thank you,” each of them say.
The group of students walk out of the classroom. Ms. Wallaker starts to close her door.
“Ms. Wallaker!” One student yells.
Ms. Wallaker peers back out of the door.
“Are you married?”
She smiles. And nods.
The door closes.
KKRRSSSS!!
The silver-rimmed emerald rolls up to Ms. Wallaker’s foot. Parts of the silver pendant are spread across the floor in front of her desk. She crouches down, picks up the gemstone, and walks to her desk. She sets the gemstone down.
She cleans up her desk and picks up the rest of the broken pendant.
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She grabs the pendant’s box and sets the pieces onto the indented bust. She closes it.
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