Atlanta goes by the English department, a dark little quad of classrooms. No lockers up here, and the day is almost done so it’s mostly empty—a few kids laughing, passing around yearbooks, dumb shit like that.

She knocks on the door to Mrs. Lewis’s classroom. The teacher looks up from a white carton of gummy lo mein, caught in a moment of embarrassment as she’s got a squid’s tangle of noodles dangling from her lips. She knits her dark brows and quickly slurps up the noodles.

“Sorry,” Mrs. Lewis says, dabbing her lips with a napkin. “Kind of a tradition. Last day of the school year means a carton of Chinese from Happy Peking.”

“They have good egg rolls,” Atlanta says.

“They do. What can I help you with, Miss Burns?”

“Just thought I’d tell you to have a good summer.”

The teacher smirks. “And here I thought you didn’t like me much. From what I hear, I was the only teacher to buck the B-plus trend.”

“Yeah. You were.”

They hang there like that, in an awkward staring match, for ten seconds that seem to stretch into a geological epoch. Finally Mrs. Lewis says, “I’m sorry to hear about your friend.”

“Mm. Yeah. Thanks.” A sour feeling sucks at her guts. “Did you have him as a student?”

“I did not. He was in AP English. Mr. Shustack teaches that.” Again the teacher dabs at her mouth with the napkin. “I’m surprised.”

“At what?”

“That you didn’t write anything for the yearbook. For your friend.”

“Not much to say.”

“Some wrote poems.”

Atlanta shrugs. “I’m not the poetic type.”

“Your analysis of ‘To an Athlete Dying Young’ was surprisingly incisive. Sloppy in execution, perhaps, but some powerful insight in there.”

“Dying young’s kind of a theme these days.”

Mrs. Lewis doesn’t say anything. Her pained, sad smile says it all.

“Housman was gay,” Atlanta says matter-of-factly.

“He was. You should read all of ‘A Shropshire Lad.’”

“Maybe.” She pauses, then winces with the sting of truth. “I probably won’t.”

Mrs. Lewis laughs. “Well, at least you’re honest.” Then, in a fit of her own honesty, she says, “My son died. When he was five. Leukemia.”

“I’m real sorry to hear that. I didn’t know.”

“Don’t be. It was before you were born. But it’s why I teach that poem. Among others. Life is equal parts strange and beautiful and horrible, and we’re tossed into it without a map or an instruction guide. Poems and stories have a way of helping us make sense of things.”

Atlanta’s not so sure about that. She’s not sure anything makes sense anymore. Even still, she offers a wan smile and a wave. “Maybe. I’ll see you next year, Mrs. Lewis.”

“Have a good summer, Atlanta.”

But Atlanta knows the days of good summers may very well be over.