I nod. “We had a bear like that when I was a student here. He went away eventually, and nobody ever got hurt.” I tap the sign. “But it’s good to use the school tunnel while he’s around; best not to give the bears any ideas before they hibernate.”

The girl giggles behind her hand, and the boy nods. I stand there, suddenly unsure of where to turn.

The boy pipes up. “On your way to the market, Ms. H.?”

“Yes, that’s right, I am,” I answer, and work my jaw, trying to place his face. His eyes are a soft brown, kind, the tips of his fingers stained with color, and a camo backpack is splayed open at his feet, where I spy a folder labeled Algebra in black Sharpie. Something I can work with. “Have you mastered linear equations yet?”

Giggles from the girl again.

“Shut up, Tasha,” he hisses, then turns back to me. “Nah, Ms. H., we’ve moved on to quadratic equations.”

“Ms. H.,” says the girl, Tasha, “you said the exact same thing yesterday and the day before that—”

“Shut up, Tasha,” says the boy. “She’s new here; sorry, Ms. H.”

I can see that the boy is trying to help me, but with his giggling sidekick, the effect is that of a spotlight. The idea that I do something over and over and that these kids have watched me makes my skin crawl and reminds me that everything I do to live a normal life is an absolute farce. I scratch at the back of my neck, completely lost in the useless matter inside my brain, but I try to ignore the girl, focus on the black staining the tips of the boy’s fingers, the side of his hand. An artist. I take another leap. “How’s the art coming?”

His eyebrows arch up with his wide smile, and he leans over and pulls a black notebook from behind the Algebra folder. Holding the notebook open in front of him, he steps toward me. One page is covered in tiny geometric shapes in varying shades of pencil gray that combine to form a larger pattern. “Kinda like M. C. Escher,” I say, trying to let my eyes cross in case the kid has created a picture within a picture.

“Huh?” he says.

On the opposite page is another pencil drawing of a dragon, but even in gray shades it’s a beautifully detailed picture, with dark eyes that stare at me from above a long scaled snout. “You’re really good.”

“Thanks, Ms. H.!” He closes the notebook and slides it into his backpack.

Another flyer tacked to the board grabs my attention, and when I see it, my back muscles stiffen.

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