Language of Love

Dormire

I get a phone call from Fitz that night. He asks me if I can come over for, as he called, a "grading party." I agreed and dragged my laptop and paper stacks to his apartment. One of his roommates lets me in and points to the living room. Fitz sits on the couch muttering to himself.

"Hey," I say. He looks up from his paper. I glance over him. He's got on one of the school tee shirts staff were given at the beginning of the school year and a pair of pajama bottoms. They're plaid. He's got glasses on, I've never seen them before. They look good on him.

"Hey." He responds. He chuckles a little, "What are you grading?" I pull out my AP Latin Binder. I've got 15 tabs, one for each student. I flip open tab number 1. Maria Caldwell, the founder's granddaughter.
"AP Latin. It's translations of the Aeneid." I say. He looks at me, horrified.
"You've got to read the Aeneid, like 17 times. And translated by high schoolers?" He says. I nod.
"Yeah. What are you grading?" I ask. He groans.
"I gave my German II class a paper they should have been able to have translated last year. Clearly, they can't." He says. We grade in silence for a few minutes before I hear him muttering under his breath.
"Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. How are they so damn stupid?" He says, getting louder and louder.
"My thoughts exactly," I say scribbling a 63 on student #5's paper.
"A 63? Dang." He says.
"Half of it is in Latin, they didn't even bother to use the word bank." I exclaim, "I gave them a word bank!"

"I need a break." He says, about 20 minutes later. He stands up and wanders into the kitchen.
"Oh my god." He says. I look up from my paper. He points to clock. It's 3:45 am.
"Shit," I say, now clear I had been over here for much longer than an hour.
"I mean, there's no point of me going to bed, I won't fall asleep before my alarm with go off." He says.
"Me either. I guess we can just keep grading." I say. He flops back down on the couch. I scoot next to him.
"Can you read this?" I ask. He nods.
"You'll be able to read it in a few years you get better at reading shitty handwriting the longer your teacher." He says.

He reads it aloud and I mark off what's wrong. At 5:00, his roommate wanders out. He glances at us and then pours himself a bowl of cereal. Fitz glances up. His roommate waves and walks back into his bedroom, munching on cereal. Another man walks out, this one red-haired and short.
"How'd you two sleep?" He says, sarcastically.
"We didn't," Fitz grumbles marking up a paper.
"Didn't think so." He says with a wink. I flip to the next paper and roll my eyes.

"I need to shower, and brush my teeth and fix my hair and do my makeup. I have to go." I say. He nods. He's tired, very. He gives me a small smile, but it's forced. The circles under his eyes are dark.
"See you at school." He says, his voice hoarse from staying up all night. I go home and find a skirt. It's blue with a scalloped edge, next I take an oversized cream sweater and slip it on. I'm not showering. I won't look any better. I dig for a scrunchy and throw my hair into a messy bun. I lather concealer on my face. With pink lipstick and blush, I look alive again. I brush my teeth and swish.

I gather up my papers and walk out the door. Fitz walks out as I'm locking the door.
"Morning." He says. I glance over, his hair is wet, he must have showered. He's got on fresh clothes, but he didn't shave. I kind of like it.

    I don't see Fitz most of the morning. During my planning, Courtney walks in.
    "Did you hear? They hired a new orchestra teacher. Today is her first day." She says.
     "I hadn't heard. Want to say hello? We can find Fitz and Devin, let's all walk down there." I say.

    We set out to find them. I find Fitz in his room, resting his eyes. He doesn't sleep because when I walk in they snap open.
     "There's a new orchestra teacher," I say, "I was about to walk down there with Courtney and maybe Devin. Would you like to come?" I ask.
      "Sure, Marx should go too." He says and walks around his desk. Courtney finds Devin and we convince Marx to go.

     The new teacher's classroom is located at the end of the music hall. The hall is two over from foreign language. Luckily, the new teacher doesn't have a class.

     I open the door and peek my head in. A tan woman with dyed blonde hair faces away. She spins around. I gasp.
     "Mrs. Horton?" I ask. She smiles.
     "Grey Thorne!" She says. I hug her. "I'm Ms. Tomlinson now." She adds.
      "Oh, sorry," I say. I decided to introduce my friends.

      "I teach Latin now. These are some of the other foreign language teachers." I say. Fitz reaches out his hand.
      "Fitzgerald Kennedy, German." He says.
      "Courtney Brasher, Dutch," Courtney adds.
      "Devin Pruitt, Russian." Devin introduces.
      "Marx, French," Marx says. Ms. Tomlinson cocks her head.

      "Marx? Is that your first name or last?" She jokes.
      "Last. They all just call me Marx." He remarks.
      "Well, it was nice meeting all of you." She says. The rest of the group walks out, but I straggle behind. She smiles.
"Tell me about yourself. Are you married? Kids?"
"Not married, no children," I say.
"Fitzgerald or Marx?" She asks.
"What?" I question.
"You like one of them. Which one?" She explains.
"Fitz," I answer. She laughs.
"You even call him Fitz?"
"Yeah..."