Chapter Text
Rocky is fascinated to learn that I’m a schoolteacher.
Actually, he’s fascinated by human education systems in general. It’s very different on Erid, apparently, much more communal and experience-oriented. Because they have eidetic memories, there’s much less need for memorization exercises and constant review, and kids move into specialized programs much more quickly. Apprenticeships are extremely common, and not just for the young, since Eridians live so long that it’s unusual to stay in the same job field their entire lives. Rocky tells me that Adrian has had a few different interests over the years (though he himself has no intention of ever leaving engineering behind — he’s a passionate little weirdo, like me). Erid is so community-focused already, really modeling the it-takes-a-village approach to raising children, that the end result is that there are actually very few specialized teachers rather than just field experts who rotate through as instructors. Making a career of it is rather novel.
Rocky wants to hear all about it, and asks frequent questions during our trip to Tau Ceti e. He’s almost more interested in that than in my background in scientific research which will, hopefully, help save both of our worlds. Then again, I suppose Erid has plenty of scientists. Helpfully, my years as a middle school teacher are some of the most solidified in my recovering memory. Less helpfully, I keep accidentally exposing him to the less pleasant aspects of our society via the pitfalls of the American school system. For example: why a teacher would have to use their own already limited salary to purchase paper mache supplies for a classroom project. That one stumped him for a while. I’d never really thought about how to explain capitalism to an alien, and I never want to have to think about it again.
Today we’re talking about the social requirements for teachers. I’m not sure exactly how we found our way to the topic; I think it started with why I tend not to use the kind of “rude words” that Rocky enjoys in his own language. My reluctance to teach him human equivalents is a recurring frustration for him.
“It’s about being professional,” I say, half my attention on running through daily system checks for the Hail Mary. There are so many daily system checks I’m supposed to do, holy moly. “Kid-friendly, y’know? If their parents are going to leave them with me for hours every day, they want to know we’re not going to give them any bad habits.”
“Not bad habit. Is language,” Rocky insists.
I level him with the same look I’d give one of my students if they tried that excuse with me. “You’re telling me you’d let a little Eridian kid say that word you shouted at your molding tools earlier today and not blink an eye?”
“...Cannot blink,” Rocky replies, fidgeting in a way that tells me the answer he doesn’t want to give is ‘no.’ He fiddles a tool between fingers (which has earned some level of forgiveness since its error this morning, apparently).
I shake my head, amused. “Anyway, it’s about expectations. Even if their parents swear at home, they don’t want us doing it, because they can’t control it or respond to it the same way. They need to have some idea of how teachers are going to behave if they’re going to trust us with their kids.”
Rocky lets out a thoughtful whistle. “Why parents not trust if teachers part of family community? Why not leave children, question?”
“I’ve told you, humans are more focused on small groups, especially in the area I’m from. Some parents don’t even trust their own siblings with their kids—” here, Rocky jolts slightly in genuine surprise “—so to give so much of their care to someone who isn’t family, someone they don’t even really know, that’s a big ask.”
Tilting his carapace from side to side, Rocky considers this. “Understand,” he says finally. “...No, not understand why only small groups for children, but understand great trust position for teachers. Very important, take care of children minds. Grace very important, very much trust.”
My cheeks warm slightly at the compliment. “Well, trusted enough, I guess. And it’s not just their minds; kids need a lot of protection. Teachers are responsible for their physical safety during the school day, too.”
“If child fall and hurt, teacher fix, question?”
“Well, maybe, but there’s usually a school nurse for that. I meant more like…” Hmm, oh boy, I do not want to bring the concept of mandated reporting into an alien’s first impression of Earth. Something else. “Like a fire drill.”
Rocky taps inquisitively on the flood. “Fire tool? Tool for fire, question? Does not sound safe.”
“No, no. Drill in this case means practice, like a procedure you do when you don’t actually need to, so you know you could do it correctly in an emergency. A fire drill is practicing what we would do if there was a fire in the building. We have the kids line up and learn how to check for heat, stay low under the smoke, where the nearest exit is, all that. So they’ll be ready if they need it, but hopefully they don’t. And if it did happen, the teachers would be in charge of making sure all the kids get out okay.”
The mention of fire has Rocky vibrating slightly as he replies. “Yes, important for world of oxygen. Fire happen often at schools, question? Grace have to take care of students?”
“Not that often,” I assure him. “I never had a fire at my school. We just practice since it could be really bad if it happens and the kids don’t know what to do, just in case. Some schools will have other types of drills depending on where they are and what’s most likely to go wrong, usually weather events. Like tornado or hurricane drills, or active shooters.”
“New words for kinds of practice,” Rocky informs me.”
“Ah, yeah, we haven’t really talked about our weather much, have we? A tornado is a localized column of very fast-moving air that stretches from the clouds down to the ground; they can rip up buildings if they’re strong enough. A hurricane is similar, but it starts over the ocean so it picks up a bunch of water too, and it can cause flooding. Oh, I don’t think we’ve talked about flooding, either…” I’m gearing up for a full pivot to weather talk — and very curious to hear how Erid’s patterns compare — when Rocky stops me.
“Third kind of practice? Sound like word Grace use when does not-swear.”
I have to walk a few things back to make that make sense. Oh, right. Shooter, ‘shoot,’ like I said just this morning when I stubbed my toe on a table leg. Wait, oh man, did I really mention active shooter drills? I didn’t even think about it. And now I have to tell him what they are. “An active shooter is when… If someone comes to the school with a particular kind of weapon called a gun. To hurt people.”
Rocky is quiet for a moment, and I wince at the silence. It’s a delicate topic, for sure. I know violence isn’t unheard of on Erid; it’s not a utopia. But the impression I get is that it’s significantly less common than on Earth, likely due in part to the extremely community-oriented society. To such a species, which casually relies on hundreds of neighbors and friends to help raise their children, such an act directed at a building full of their youngest would be unthinkable. Frankly, it should be unthinkable to humans too, but that’s just my opinion.
“Specific weapon is common enough for special practice, question?”
“Ah. Unfortunately, yeah, it’s kinda common. It’s also a lot more dangerous than other options. Someone could bring in a knife or a bat instead, but they wouldn’t be able to do nearly as much damage. A gun can hurt a lot of people very badly, very fast, which is why it’s important to be prepared.”
Thinking about it in the abstract brings back the more specific memory of the training I took at Grover Cleveland Middle School. A session given to us alongside inclusivity and workplace safety talks for the year. The tone had sombered somewhat for the discussion of shelter-in-place and sightlines. We did the drills twice a year with the kids (who took the whole thing much less seriously and needed to be corralled into place), so all the teachers had to know the procedure well enough to direct classrooms through it regularly. The last year I taught and took that training, I’d been sitting next to Troy, an English teacher who I got along with well enough, on a surface level at least. He’d had a cold, and had coughed through the whole presentation. Amid the standard information recited about how to block the door and which corner to pile the kids into was a tense undercurrent — the knowledge that, if the worst happened, there was more that would be expected of us.
I’d read the stories. As an American educator in the 2020s, I couldn’t not. Some were so awful they made me want to lock myself in the bathroom and cry, while some schools were “lucky” enough not to lose too many. Some were terrifying in a particularly selfish way. I remember a woman, watching the news on the latest shooting in the midwest as it played out on the tv at the gas station. When it was reported that the lone fatality had been a second-grade teacher who stood in his classroom doorway between the shooter and his students, she let out a quiet sigh. “Thank God,” she said.
They didn’t say it out loud, that we were expected to be a barrier when all others failed, but everyone in the room heard it. And in theory, I agreed with them — with the principal, the parents, the woman at the gas station. If someone had to die, better for it not to be a kid.
“Bad bad bad bad,” Rocky sings. An extra ‘bad,’ one more than usual. I agree with him there.
“Yeah, bad. But that never happened to me, either. I mean, we did the drills, but never the real thing.”
Rocky looks somewhat mollified by that, but he’s clearly still thinking deeply. I carry on with the system checks, flipping a couple extra switches while I wait, just to fill the quiet. “Human teachers… also protectors,” he says slowly. “Protectors of human children, most important beside child family.”
He doesn’t add his question modifier to the sentence, but I consider it anyway. I’m not sure it’s entirely accurate. It’s not quite how I would describe the job, and there are other roles I would think of first for “protector”: doctor, social services, the intended purpose of police officers. Then again, teachers are the adults that kids spend the most time with aside from their parents from ages 5 to 18, and goodness knows I’ve felt pretty protective of the ones who cycled through my classes over the years.
“Yeah, I guess they are.”
Rocky turns back to his task, less tense than a minute ago. “Understand. Makes sense for Grace.”
I blink. “Why do you say that?”
“Grace very kind, very brave,” Rocky says easily. “Good for protect young.”
My mouth fills with saliva as a wave of nausea rises up at his words. I swallow it back down. I’m not sure why I’m so averse to the statement. Sure, I’ve never been great at taking a compliment, but he’s not entirely wrong. Even though I don’t remember the decision, my being here on the ship is basically taking a bullet for the entire human race. But back when I was a teacher, in the part of my life that I do remember, I would wonder.
Again, in theory, if there’s an emergency and someone is going to get shot, I’d rather that person be an adult than a child. I’d loved my kids, every year, every one of them, even the “difficult” ones. I’d always told myself, if it came to that, I’d do what I needed to do to keep them safe. I’d wanted to believe it. But I’d never been sure that I really did. Fear is a very powerful thing, and I’ve always had a lot of it. In the moment, when it mattered, could I really have made my feet move?
It was always a theoretical debate. I’d never been tested.
I clear my throat. “So. Did we talk about flooding, then?”
To his credit, Rocky does not question the subject change.”Word means a lot of water where there was no water. Did not say much more. Is common on Earth, question?”
“Kind of. It depends on where you live, and some are worse than others. Do you have them on Erid?”
Rocky hums. The sound would be thoughtful if a human made it, but for him it’s more like a nervous shudder. “Sometimes, not often. Very dangerous.”
“Yeah, I guess you guys probably aren’t very buoyant. Can you swim?”
“Words?” Rocky asks, which is how the conversation moves along to recreational swimming (which Eridians don’t do, by the way).
It’s a good day. Despite the heavier topics, most of the conversation is very pleasant, and we’re making steady progress on our trip, hopeful we’ll find something useful. I don’t think about it again until weeks later, when I’m sitting crumpled on the floor of my ship, head pulled down between my knees with the weight of my newest memories.
I’m a coward. I didn’t take a bullet for humanity; I tripped and fell into the right position and then got shoved onto a spaceship because I was too scared to move on my own.
The memory is rewriting my whole life, at least the parts of it I actually remember. The parts I thought I knew. My self-perception is being slashed through with a thick red pen: wrong, wrong wrong, false information, see me after class.
And I have an answer to an old question. If I couldn’t make myself die for the entire population of the world, there’s no way I could have stepped in front of a gun for my students, no matter how much I wanted to save them. I’m just not brave enough for that. I never will be.