I kept going into school because that’s me—I power through. In class, I popped Tylenol and kept the blinds drawn. One afternoon, during a lesson on Beloved, I had to devolve things into a class discussion just so I could sit down and gather myself for a few moments. While I was doing so, a student asked me a question which I didn’t hear; I only realized when I looked up and noticed the entire class staring at me. Another student asked if I was all right. At that point I thought it was probably more alarming to pretend that I was than to simply address the problem, so I asked the class if they could hear it as well.

Like a deep, vibrating . . . hum, I said. Just somewhere there, in the background. I searched their puzzled faces. No one said a word. Or is it . . . Or is it just in my head? I stammered. I suddenly felt ridiculous. I noticed two boys smirking and whispering in the back row. I probably should have avoided the word ‘vibrating.’ I heard more whispers, followed by titters, followed by uncomfortable, muffled laughter. Never mind, I said, and apologized. I assigned some reading and ended class early. I’m sure that gave them plenty to talk about that lunch hour.

Generally I couldn’t care less what students thought of me, though I sensed I was well-liked. They laughed at my jokes. They knew they could speak their minds in my class. I was always encouraging them to question received wisdom and authority. There was a certain group of boys who referred to me as ‘Miss,’ even though I was ‘Ms. Devon’ to all the other staff and students. Miss, can I open the window? Miss, can I use the washroom? I noticed these boys didn’t use this epithet for other teachers. It used to affront my feminism, but I grew to find it vaguely endearing, as if it communicated a kind of familiarity. I suspected it also signalled some unconscious, or perhaps conscious, sexualization of me amongst these boys that I felt ambivalent but probably not altogether unhappy about. If I ever gave any serious thought to my currency among my students it was for Ashley’s sake. I couldn’t imagine it was easy to go to the same school where your mother taught.

Over the lunch hour, after my little episode, I ate leftover curry out of a Tupperware container in the staff lounge as Cass recapped last night’s episode of Drag Race for me. I didn’t watch the show but I followed it closely through her enthusiastic and detailed retellings. Like an ancient bard, she could hold the entire mythology of the series in her head, referencing the exploits of drag queens from past seasons as if they were demigods in a grand, cosmic pantheon. At some point she noticed that I wasn’t following her monologue with my usual focus.