2017
NORTH CAROLINA L I T E R A R Y RE V I E W
started she saw him hardly at all. He was the one who broke the story about the community college where she was Dean of Students. There were discrepancies in the numbers of students enrolled and those who actually took classes. Dummy enrollments. Someone was skimming the money. She knew it was the president of the college, whose doctorate was in Physical Education and who would soon quit to start a Toyota Dealership with the money he stole, but she could not find proof of it, and nightly she fought with her husband who she thought should never have written the story in the first place, since of course suspicion fell on her, no matter that enrollment was the province of the Registrar. Yet she was in charge of recruitment, and since her husband had gone all Woodward and Bernstein, why would her coworkers not think she was his Deep Throat. Because of her they may well lose their jobs. And yet, her husband was all the more adamant about what he called his ethical responsibility to write the truth. He knew she did not have anything to do with it, but if he chose not to write about it (even though clearly there was a conflict of interest), it would seem all the more as if she were guilty. He took it all so seriously, his duty to afflict the comfortable, while she drove, more and more, nights and Saturdays, deep into the county to attempt to comfort the afflicted. She knew all the guidance counselors in the county, and she had them keep lists of kids who were smart but had no encouragement at home to do anything other than go to work in the fields or the blender factory or the chicken processing plants. Some of them had kids themselves. They thought their lives were over and it was her job to offer them a way out of these woods. She loved this part of her job the most. The more people assumed she’d made up students, the harder she scoured the countryside for kids who needed a chance, needed her to save them. Sometimes she spoke to her brother the preacher in Little Rock. I worry about the children, she said. You worry about everyone’s children, he
COURTESY OF THE ARTIST
24
the need, 2012 (mixed media on canvas, 50x60) by Jason Craighead
They thought their lives were over and it was her job to offer them a way out of these woods. She loved this part of her job the most.