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September, Part I


How, HOW did he end up with this job?

He had applied just for the fun of it, not expecting that he would actually get the position. For God’s sake, he went to law school! His goal in life was not to become a first grade teacher!

Still, here he was, facing thirty odd six year olds who were surprisingly seated, despite the volume rivaling that of a rock concert. For a brief moment Diego wondered if that she-devil principal had ‘coerced’ the children into behaving.

He had no idea how to approach the situation. He had no knowledge of kids and had no desire whatsoever to learn about them. This being said, he hadn’t the faintest idea of how to catch a six year old’s attention. In a fit of frustration, he slammed his coffee mug on a nearby table, trying to think of what to do.

This seemed to silence them. Fair enough.

“Alright then…” Diego tried to collect his thoughts. What was it like when he was in kindergarten? “I am Mr. Diego and you will address me as such. Is that clear?” Oh, wow. Smooth. Keep using that tone of voice and they’ll form a mutiny against you, he thought.

“Ego?” one of the girls asked in the back of the room.

“Eggo waffles?”

The whole class burst into laughter.

This was going to be a very, very long nine months.

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A week or so into the year, Diego Armando was very much on the verge of causing some grievous bodily harm to the next person who looked at him the wrong way. He was only mere days away from showing up with an Uzi in hand, ready and willing to repeat Virginia Tech all over again.

Not knowing what to do, he sought guidance from the only other first grade teacher.

“They’re always like that,” Mia Fey pointed out without the slightest hint of annoyance. “If you’re patient, you should be fine. As far as teaching goes, just read off the curriculum. These are only little kids; they’re not really capable of confusing you.”

He’d be running to her many times in the following months.

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Diego quickly discerned the troublemakers from the quiet kids, the obnoxious from the intelligent. Being the organized (read: utterly confused) man that he was, Diego had learned that no, it was not a good idea to teach math after lunch and that yes, little kids would do anything if it meant play time not getting taken away.

He had to say; by the end of the second week he had become significantly less annoyed than when he initially started this job. God knows he was scary enough to put the little twerps in their place, and the obedient students listened to him and were essentially at his beck and call. Teach them a couple things, read them a story, give them a worksheet or two and they were on their way.

He still tried to remember what it was like to be that age, but he drew up a blank every single time. He wondered if he was the token bully, the average joe, or the kid who had no friends. He wondered if his teacher acted the same way he did, and if so did said teacher scare the living daylights out of him?

He liked watching kids in their nature environment more than he cared to admit.

September, Part II

By the sixteenth or so, Diego had memorized most of the kids’ names. He considered this quite a feat, considering how many of them there were. On the other hand, there were around four Matthews, two Jessicas, three Roberts and two Johns. His job was not made any easier by this. He addressed them by their last names, and thankfully they managed to get the hint.

Eventually, of course. After the first five or six times.

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On top of impatiently teaching the kids the rules of subtraction, he was mortified every time Mia Fey asked him how he was doing. He’d obviously come up with something that wasn’t true—probably along the lines of ‘fine’ or ‘good’—but she wasn’t a stupid woman, as far as he could tell. She just smiled and nodded, letting him have his moment. Maybe she’d even throw in some advice.

She had managed to pique his interest.

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There was a girl in his class who never spoke. Literally, never. Never raised her hand, never went talked to her classmates. She just sat in her one seat quietly until it was time to go home. She didn’t play with the other kids. She was almost like a ghost with the way that she was there, but at the same time wasn’t. This alarmed him, but he figured that most shy kids were like that at the beginning of the school year and would in due course open up.

Her name was Linda, he remembered.


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As fate would have it, Mia had two other relatives in the school; her sister was the secretary and her cousin was a student.

When Diego first met Maya, he would’ve never thought that she was even related to Mia in any way, shape or form. She was perky and not the brightest crayon in the box, but nonetheless had a pleasant personality. She didn’t even look anything like her sister. He had yet to meet the other Fey girl. From what Mia had told him, she was in the second grade.

This was merely the tip of the iceberg in terms of the people he would meet.

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Even without doing the math, Diego knew that he would’ve made much more money—and probably would’ve had a much more legitimate career, considering what he went to law school for—being a lawyer. And yet, there was something satisfying about knowing that you were getting these kids ready for the cruel, tough world ahead of them. It was strange in the sense that he had no desire to have any children of his own and didn’t particularly like them at all. Even upon the first couple of weeks meeting his class, he felt something of a connection to them, a desire to teach them the ways of life.

Okay, maybe that was an exaggeration. But he still had a very foreign affection for them.