“Do not worry Brenden, I’m not going to ask you to look at me. I know what I am, and I want to let you know that I understand it may take a little time for you to adjust.” Brenden shifted a little as Adam spoke these words, but he did not voice any feigned disagreement with them. “You do not need to deny the feelings you have of my form; I even know how I’m perceived in the eyes of the living, let alone the newly dead. All I ask of you, for now, is to consider what you are responding to and to contemplate your feelings on the way I look. This is not just some idle task; it is an important issue that must be tackled here in the school and in the community of the undead. Some are never able to come to terms with the bodies of their peers - or indeed their own bodies - and overcome the overbearing norms of form that exist in the living world. In fact, over the course of my teaching career, I have had several students who found it a gruelling task to look me in the eye even after their 24-month stay at the school.”
Brenden steeled himself, then slowly raised his eyes to meet those of Adam. The teacher did not respond to Brenden’s action at first and maintained the stern expression he had been wearing since the other students had left his class. However, as the unease that was apparent in the boy’s eyes melted away, something akin to a smile - perhaps one of pride - broke across the man’s lips.
“Good, Brenden. Good. I hope you see that there is nothing to fear here. As long as you are willing to let yourself be open to what may lie over the horizon, you will find that there is much to hope for. Now, I think it’s best for you to go along. You still have a few classes today, don’t you?”
Brenden nodded; expelled a short laugh that was more to do with relief than anything else and made to leave the classroom, almost walking through Ms Halford as he went. He muttered a fumbled apology, before readjusting his course to get to the exit.
“I see you’ve already been able to break through to the poor boy,” said Ms Halford after Brenden had disappeared into the corridor. “However, I do hope for his sake that you have not already started to try and use your… natural influence to induce him to go down to the Tunnels.”
“Matilda,” replied Adam with a chuckle. “I’m so glad that you could stop by and entertain me with your insinuations. You will be glad to hear that Brenden spent almost the whole of my lesson trying to ensure that his eyes did meet my own. It takes quite some time for that fear of the other, the thing the living so often enjoy instilling in each other, to fade away. No, I only asked him a little thing and he came the rest of the way himself. I know that you are only trying to protect the boy and I respect your opinion that there is something to the life among the living. However, I would hope that you could respect me enough to believe that I will give Brenden – my other students as well, for that matter – the information he needs so that he can choose his future path for himself.”
“Yes,” replied Ms Halford with a sting in her voice, “and I think I have a good idea of the particular conception of what you consider our students need. I have seen…” started Ms Halford, before coming to an abrupt halt. She had noticed that a few students were passing by in the corridor, and she waited a moment until she was comfortable they had passed out of earshot. When she resumed her point, she did so in a near whisper. “I have seen the figures for the number of students in your class who head straight to the Tunnels after you’ve finished with them: over two-thirds during your forty years here! That is higher than any other teacher by far, most are not even close to a half. Do you not even believe that it is worth allowing them to try to see what the world out there could hold for them? The ones who need it can try to use their two years allowance out there, and now with the internet, some of the most unfortunate among us can remain outside those dreary catacombs.”
“Oh Matilda, that’s exactly the problem I have. Maybe that’s one of the reasons so many of my students go, I don’t know.”
“Sorry, I don’t understand.”
“The idea that there are those among us who can be considered unfortunate, that word in itself identifies them as something less than others, than the living. And I know full well that such a term applies to myself, but I have no intention of hiding under such a cloak of a word. No, instead of pandering to the standards set by the strange creature of the living’s desire chasing standard of norms, I am not ashamed to say that I believe that we must have the conditions in which we can live as what we are.”
“I have nothing against that argument, Adam, I just do not think that it means that we have to live underground to be who we are. I have lost many friends over the years to those tunnels and find such actions saddening both personally and on another level. Not only do I lose those dear to me, I also see the move
