Ballad

Music from a dream. Music from Nuala. I leaned the back of my head against the wall with a brain-cell killing thunk.

I was beginning to hate mornings.

And the phone was ringing, sending an army of militant miniature dwarves with hammers to work on the inside of my head. I hated the phone at that moment - not just the phone in my room, but all phones that had ever rung before noon.

I fell out of bed and pulled on a pair of jeans. Paul's bed was empty.

I smashed my hand over my face, still caught by the music, by sleep, by sheer friggin' exhaustion, and relented. 'Hello?'

'James?' The voice was pleasant and ominously familiar.

My stomach prickled with the feeling of imminent humiliation.

I shoved the phone between my ear and my shoulder and started to lace up my shoes. 'As always.'

'This is Mr. Sullivan.' I heard laughter in the background. 'I'm calling from English class.'

Crap shit hell etc. I looked at the alarm clock, which said it was a little after nine. It was a lying bastard, because Paul wouldn't have gone to class without me. 'Very logical,' I said, jerking on my other shoe in a hurry, 'Seeing as you're an English teacher.'

Sullivan's voice was still very pleasant. 'I thought so. So, the rest of the class and I were wondering if you were going to join us?' More laughter behind his voice.

'Am I on speaker phone?'

'Yes.'

'Paul, you're a treacherous bastard!' I shouted. To Sullivan, I added, 'I was just putting on my mascara. Time must've gotten away from me. I'll be down momentarily.'

'You said to go without you!' Paul shouted in the background. I didn't remember saying any such thing, but it sounded like me.

'I'm glad to hear it,' Sullivan said. 'I was planning on having the class heckle you until you agreed to come, but this is much easier.'

'I wouldn't miss your fascinating class for all the tea in China,' I assured him. I stood up, spun, trying to find where the smell of flowers was coming from. 'Your lectures and bright smile are the highlight of my days here at Thornking-Ash, if you don't mind me saying so.'

'I never tire of hearing it. See you soon. Say bye to James, class.'

The class shouted bye at me and I hung up.

I turned once more, still feeling that I wasn't alone in the room.

'Nuala.' I waited. 'Nuala, are you still in here?'

Silence. There was nothing as silent as the dorms when we were all supposed to be in class. I didn't know if she was there or not, but I spoke anyway. 'If you are here, I want you to listen to me. Get the hell out of my head. I don't want your dreams. I don't want what you have to offer. Get out of here.'

There was no answer, but the scent of summer roses lingered, out of place in our untidy room, as if maybe she knew I was lying. I grabbed a pen from the top of the dresser, found a bare spot of skin on the base of my thumb, and wrote exorcism and showed it to the room, so she would see it and so I wouldn't forget. Then I grabbed my backpack and left the smell of Nuala behind me.

'James,' Sullivan said pleasantly as I slid into my desk. 'I trust you slept well?'

'Like fleets of angels were singing me to slumber,' I assured him, pulling out my notebook.

'You look well for it,' he replied, his eyes already on the chalkboard. 'We were just getting ready to talk about our first real writing assignment, James. Metaphor. We've spent the first half of the class discussing metaphor. Familiar with the concept?'

I wrote metaphor on my hand. 'My teacher was like a god.'

'That's a simile,' Sullivan said. He wrote like/as on the board.

'Simile is a comparison that uses 'like' or as.' Metaphor would be, 'my teacher was a god.''

'And he is,' called out Megan from my right. She giggled and turned red.

'Thank you, Megan,' Sullivan said, without turning around. He wrote metaphor in Hamlet on the board. 'I prefer demi-god, however, until I finish my PhD. So. Ten pages. Metaphor in

Hamlet. That's the assignment. Outline due in two weeks.'

There were eight groans.

'Don't be infants,' Sullivan said. 'It will be pitifully easy. Gradeschoolers could write papers on metaphor. Preschoolers could write papers on metaphor.'

I underlined the word metaphor on my hand. Metaphor in

Hamlet was possibly the most boring topic ever invented. Note to self: slash wrists.

'James, you look, if possible, less thrilled than your classmates.

Is that merely an excess of sleep on your features, or is it really palpable disgust?' Sullivan asked me.

'It's not my idea of a wild and crazy time, no,' I replied. 'But it's not as if an English assignment is going to be.'

Sullivan crossed his arms. 'I tell you what, James. And this goes for all of you. If you can think of a wilder and crazier time that you can do for this assignment--that has something to do with

Hamlet and/or metaphor--I'm happy to look at outlines for it.

The point is for you to learn something in this class. And if you really hate a topic, all you're going to do is go online and buy a paper anyway.'

'You can do that?' Paul breathed.

Sullivan gave him a look. 'On that note, get out of here. Start thinking about those outlines and keep up on the reading. We'll be discussing it next class.'

The rest of the students packed up and left with impunity, but as I figured, Sullivan called me aside as I was getting ready to go. He waited until all of the other students had exited, and then he closed the door behind them and sat on the edge of his desk. His expression was earnest, sympathetic. The morning light that came in the window behind him backlit his dusty brown hair to white-gold, making him look like a tired angel in a stained-glass window, one of those who's not so much playing their divine trumpet as listlessly dragging it out of a sense of duty.

'Do your worst,' I said.

'I could give you a demerit for being late.' Sullivan said, and as soon as he said it I knew that he wasn't going to. 'But I think I'll just slap your wrist this time. If it happens again...'

'--I'll hang,' I finished.

He nodded.

It would've been a good place to say 'thanks,' but the word seemed unfamiliar in my mouth. I couldn't remember the last time I'd said it. I had never thought of myself as an ingrate before.

Sullivan's eyes dropped to my hands; I saw them flicking up and down, trying to make sense of the words on my skin. They were all in English, but it was a language only I spoke.

'I know you're not just the average kid,' Sullivan said. He frowned, as if that wasn't really what he had meant to say. 'I know there's more to you than you let on.' He looked at the iron band on my wrist.

I tried out various sentences in my head: I have unusual depth or The number of rooms in the house that is my personality is many or It's about time someone noticed. But none of them seemed right, so I said nothing.

Sullivan shrugged. 'There's more to us teachers than we let on too. If you need someone to talk to, don't be afraid to talk to one of us.'

I looked him straight in the eye. I was reminded once again, vividly, of the image of him falling to his knees, throwing up blood and flowers. 'Talk about what?'

He laughed, short and humorless. 'About my favorite casserole recipes. About whatever's freaking your roommate out. About why you look like hell right now. One of those.'

I kept looking at him, kept seeing that image of him, dying, in his own pupil, and waited for him to look away. He didn't. 'I do want a good recipe for lasagna. That is a casserole, isn't it?'

His mouth made a rueful shape that was a cunning impersonation of a smile. 'Go to your next class, James. You know where to find me if you need me.'

I looked at the broad iron ring on his finger and back up to his face. 'What were you when you weren't an