Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District had doubled its security budget in recent years . . . The district adopted an array of security measures that included its own police force, threat assessment teams at each school, a threat reporting system, social media monitoring software, fences around schools and a requirement that teachers lock their classroom doors, according to the security plan posted on the district’s website.
— NBC News, May 25, 2022
Safe Schools
1.
On most days school starts at 8:35.
But on Tuesday it didn’t start until 8:49 because the blue bus was running a bit late.
The blue bus was a bit late because when Estella, the blue bus’s driver, arrived at the corner of Wells and 26th, she greeted Gabriela, Mason, Mañuel, Poppy, Vance, Tara, and Aisha, but not Isaac.
Estella glanced at her phone. No message from school, and no message from Isaac’s aunt, Joyce, who always texted if Isaac wasn’t going to be at school.
On Tuesday, school didn’t start until 8:49 because at 8:32, Estella, the bus driver, texted Isaac’s aunt to say he wasn’t at the bus stop, and at 8:33 Joyce wheeled across the courtyard to her sister’s place to bang on the window of her nephew’s room, shouting, “Isaac! Baby, get up! You’re late for school!”
On Tuesday, school didn’t start until 8:49 because at 8:39, Isaac was running across the courtyard, hair plastered flat to one side of his head while on the other side it stuck up everywhichway, like an old man’s eyebrows. Isaac ran down the street with his pillow case seam’s imprint still etched on his sleepy chubby cheek, to the corner of Wells and 26th, out of breath, shirt inside out, to catch Ms. Estella’s blue bus, which had waited for him.
2.
Tanisha’s 16-year-old stomach started growling loudly during 2nd block which was art and they were in the pottery studio and you really couldn’t get any further from the kitchen than the pottery studio so she was irritated with herself for not stopping after 1st block when she was right there and could have grabbed a breakfast burrito on her way but what was done was done and she couldn’t concentrate so she told Carlos “Hey if Mr. Sekou or Profe González asks tell them I went to the kitchen to grab a snack” and she saw the sun was out so she took the long way through the garden and noticed the slugs were doing a number on the lettuce again and thought not for the first time “What good is this organic gardening bullshit if the slugs get all our food?!” and when she got to the kitchen she ate a bowl of snacking strawberries and chatted with Jemma (who was making lasagne) and Jackie (who was making soup or maybe sauce) about the goddam slugs and then grabbed a banh mi (which looked better than the burritos) and headed back across campus and still had 25 minutes to work on the clay bowl she was making.
3.
The three teachers in Room 7 were each talking to different kids.
Mr. Matt was sitting in the pillow corner with Ben whose face was red with anger — or maybe embarrassment. They were speaking quietly and no one could hear what they were saying, but Ben looked like he might cry.
Ms. Lora was in the resting loft with Mel, Julia, Tam, and Courtnie who kept interrupting each other as they recounted Ben’s transgression. Tam said loudly enough for everyone in the class to hear, “That was bullcrap, Ms. Lora! He needs to know he cannot just go around acting like that.”
Mx. Sage was working with the remaining twelve 5th-graders (Dorsey, Elsa, Jay, Jules, Audrey, Fran, Clara, Darlene, Nupur, Jessie, Kyle, and Dwayne) as they read and responded to each other’s poems. (The prompt was, “Write a Children’s Bill of Rights.”) Elsa was providing feedback to Jay: “I just think you need to explain why you think kids have a right to music and what that even means. Like do they have a right to listen to music? Or play music? Or both? I just think you’re not being very clear in this part.”
4.
In the 3rd floor bathroom, Candice was peeling off her blood soaked tights and underwear. Unfortunately, even her new yellow skirt had a big oblong brownish-red stain. She texted Dani, “Got my fucking period and it looks like a massacre in here can you go to the clothes pantry and grab me some stuff?”
Dani was outside watching Joe, Cy, and Wei play some ridiculous game with a hacky sack when their phone buzzed and they saw Candice’s message and replied, “I got you. Where are you?”
A few minutes later Dani arrived in the 3rd floor bathroom with a pair of black leggings, still-in-the-package Jockey cotton underwear (French cut, black, size 8), a washcloth, a towel, a bottle of Tide stain remover, and a plastic garbage bag.
Dani said, “I bet if we put stain remover on that skirt right now, that blood will come out. It’s a cute skirt, by the way. That color looks fucking amazing on you.”
5.
Junior didn’t make it to closing block on Tuesday. She liked all her closing block teachers (Ms. Cassandra, Ms. Tapper, and Mr. Soto), and she loved Applied Maths (though she didn’t know why it was called that), so it wasn’t that she didn’t want to go, or was cutting class or anything like that. It was that 4th block was right after lunch and she had played a fierce game of kickball with Jody, Ju, Leslie, Carmen, Callie, and the rest of the kickball crew, and then she’d eaten too much lasagne, and when her 4th block teachers (Ms. Katharine, Mx. Cory, and Lady Gladys) dimmed the lights for quiet reading time, and she curled up in one of the reading nooks with her book, she immediately fell asleep. During final break, between 4th and closing block, Lady Gladys texted Mr. Soto: “Hey Paul, I’ve got Junior in here fast asleep. I don’t have any kids for the rest of the day and I am thinking to just let her rest. Is it critical that she come for closing block today?” Mr. Soto replied: “NBD. Let her sleep. Thanks for letting us know.”
