Dear Jen,

1/8/92

Dear Jen (unless I've been doing something wrong and all of my colleagues secretly hate me, most of us usually just call each other by our first names when we're not in front of the students),

That I impulsively wrote a date on this without thinking about it might mean that I've spent a little too much time over these past few years drilling it into the kids' heads to date their papers. Oh well. In the case that you had forgotten it, at least you have it now. I'll admit, however, that despite not knowing you very well, I'd be surprised to hear that you're a forgetful person.

The unintended irony of his words was a small pinprick on her heart, but she sought to ignore it.

I suppose how I ended up at St. Catherine's is very simple and complicated at the same time. To turn a long story into a very short one, I came here at 18 on a student visa, so graduating college meant that I either had to go back to Italy or find an employer who would pay to sponsor my work visa. That's near impossible to pull off as a teacher, so I tried to make myself indispensable and thought that my best shot at doing that would be to find a school that would want someone to teach Italian and Latin as well. I prayed that the investment would seem worthwhile if they could hire me to teach what would normally require two or three different people, and it worked.

I hope I didn't say anything yesterday to make you think I dislike Principal Ambrose. In a way, I have her to thank for the fact that I even get to be here at all. I always sensed that she had very high expectations of me and it made me nervous when I started here, but I think it made me a better teacher.

Jen felt bad that he seemed to feel guilty for his comments – he simply had no way of knowing that she already had a quite firmly established opinion of Nora – and an uncomfortable sensation rapidly knotted its way through her insides. Although the thought sounded terrible even in her head, she felt like her mind and heart were hardwired to resent Nora. She didn't know how to hold that reality in tension with this benevolent side that he'd encountered.

Nonetheless, I'm glad that your first week is going smoothly. Unless it isn't. But in that case, perhaps you'll at least get some funny stories out of it.

One last thing – you mentioned that you wanted to learn some Italian, so I thought I might as well leave a little something for you here. You've earned it after reading such a long note.

Italian Lesson of the Day:

l'insegnante = teacher

Robert

1/8/92

Dear Robert,

If you're worried about anything you said somehow getting back to Principal Ambrose, don't be. I consider myself to be pretty good at keeping secrets.

Things are going well for me so far, so I'm unfortunately lacking in funny stories. Bummer. We're only halfway through the week, though, so there's still time for that to change.

You make it sound as though reading a long note is a bad thing to endure, but you should know that I'm quite the bookworm. Is there such a thing as reading too much? If there is, I'm definitely guilty of it. My friend Jude – he's the librarian here, have you met? – is trying to convince me to read The Sun Also Rises. I usually like Hemingway fine, but I could never get invested in that one. Have you read it?

Jude probably shouldn't know I've been complaining about him. I hope you're good at keeping secrets, too.

Sincerely/Yours Truly/Whatever,

Jen