The Tutor Arrives

There is a bowl of fruit and a glass of still water arranged neatly on the table for when the tutor arrives. This will continue to be the case for every appointment over the following months and remain something that he carries latently within himself, both absent and familiar, like a sense impression of the back of his head.

Outside

The tutor is waiting in front of the affluent-looking Victorian terrace. He carries a heavy-looking brown leather satchel that rests loosely against the outside of his thigh, causing his entire body to tilt slightly to the left.

After the faint rattle of keys, the door opens. He is greeted by a woman who appears roughly his own age, likely older.

The tutor will turn thirty-one later in the year – a prospect that will catch him by surprise when he has chance to pause over this matter on the train ride home.

Her dusky hair is tied into a neat ponytail. She offers a smile that is neutral but inviting. This is the contract as he understands it. Unobtrusive geniality. Craning his body up to its full height, he smiles warmly in response. It is an unseasonably dark early Autumn evening, and he is happy to be out of the cold.

The Meeting

A couple of mild remarks are exchanged as she leads him through the house – an exterior manifestation of comfortable city life with which he is professionally familiar – down a corridor, into the kitchen which is filled with the kind of easy clutter that people leave behind when making a hasty exit.

He follows her into the dining room, dimly lit, painted in deep shades of burgundy like the inside of a bottle of wine. This is where the tutor will take his lesson. There on a long oak table is the bowl of fruit, the glass of still water, etc. She asks whether he requires anything. A hot drink. Food. He politely declines and is left alone to unpack the various items from his satchel.

As she leaves, the room is overtaken by a general hush full of damp sounds, the periodic creaking of pipes, a cleared throat, a housecat’s pink-mouthed yawn. A fleeting, tense moment passes in which he wonders if he will be left here forever.

Would he mind?

He finishes emptying the satchel and sits comfortably, hands resting face down at a half meter distance from his body, folded modestly one on top of the other, which he imagines has the effect of appearing statuesque but not intimidating.

After a couple of minutes, the muffled sound of a young voice floats through the ceiling followed by the thumping of stairs. Together with the woman who invited him into the house, a boy, aged between ten and eleven, dances into the room. Upon seeing the stranger watching him from across the table, the boy instantly freezes. The woman, his mother, places a reassuring hand on his shoulder. There is nothing to be afraid of.

One after the other, the tutor and the boy politely exchange names.

Phone Call

He brings the phone to his ear, listening to the brittle and faraway cadence of the voice on the other end of the line. It is the agency who inform him that he has been assigned to a family in the neighbouring borough, a short train ride away. He will be paid standard rate. One session a week. He nods in time with each piece of information. New school. Good family. A fresh start.

With a brief thank you, the tutor agrees to the appointment. There is an airy briskness to the proceedings as if he might wake up the following morning to find all memory of this arrangement gone. As the phone goes silent, he reaches for a glass of water, which he will forget and leave to go flat as he sets about tidying his room, clearing dishes, stripping his bed from the night before.

A few hours later an email appears in his inbox. He clicks open the message. Along with the boy’s name and year group, there is a dry-looking school report, an identikit series of anecdotes concerning the boy’s progress across key subjects. Mathematical ability above average. Well behaved, but sometimes restless. Noticeably underachieving in English. Difficulty spelling.

The Appointment

They meet for two hours every week. He arrives on-time and she opens the door with the same smile, leading him through to the room where he finds a glass of still water and a bowl of fruit on the table. Sometimes she will talk amicably to him about minor family affairs. After school clubs. A holiday. Other times he won’t see her at all, and the boy will open the door at the start of their appointment and pull the door closed at the end and it will be like he was never there.

Spelling Test #1

The boy takes up his pencil and copies out the word from a set list onto a blank page in the exercise book. He watches as the boy writes in large block letters, P E R P L E X E D. Every week they focus on a different set of words – which shorn of context take on an oblique sense of mystery and weight, like seldom, anxious and midnight.

He copies out the word three times each in the same gnomic capitals. P E R P L E X E D. With each repetition the sequence becomes starker. The tutor finds something oddly satisfying about the boy’s writing, the ascent of Ps and Ls, the stamp of X – nothing spontaneous, the product of intense concentration, surprisingly neat, deliberate and therefore troubled, grinding away a path through defective words.

The room is dimly lit. Sometimes the tutor will make sure to flick on the light, other times they will continue their lesson regardless, the light slowly leaking away throughout its duration.  

They turn onto a new page. The boy will now spell the word from memory. Taking up his pencil, he writes the word, P E R P L E X E D, pressing firmly as if to mark every page in the exercise book, settling the matter once and for all. The boy finishes writing, swiftly drops his pencil. He smiles up at the figure sat next to him who gently returns his smile.

There it is, undoubtedly. P E R P L E X E D.

Mother

She often works from home, although the nature of her job remains unclear to him. He loses himself wondering – perhaps due to their unusual closeness in age, the gulf between their respective lives, maybe a degree of seedy curiosity on his part. Even after she invites him inside, into her privacy, he can’t find a way of asking that doesn’t make him want to disappear instantly. 

On one occasion he finds the door to her home-office slightly ajar. Passing by on the way to the bathroom, he is unable to control his curiosity and lingers for a moment. She bends forward in an office chair, her attention focused on the grainy image of an ageless-looking figure wearing thick framed spectacles. Involuntarily, the tutor leans in to hear what they are saying.

Him: What about we aim for a little more?

Her: The quarterly forecast suggests this may be tricky in the short term…

Him: Possible or not, the net total would still be more.

As he tunes into their dialogue, he can’t help but feel slightly awed by her preternatural composure, a quiet confidence to her cautionary role throughout. Just then, the figure on the monitor seems to pause as if picking up on his rogue presence.

With a shot of panic at being caught, he moves briskly on, to the bathroom where he takes in the display of colourful soaps and creams, lemon tiles spot-lit by a sharp yellow light. He spends longer than he should opening and closing the door to the medicine cupboard. He accidentally splashes the toilet seat in urine.

All the while, he recalls the scene outside the home office, and when he does, he thinks of her, the woman, calmly stemming the tide against the charge of more.

Reading #1

The tutor and the boy are sitting reading a book together. It has an electric-blue cover, and its spine is pressed flat against the table.

They start to read the words on the page which are about a boy who is unhappy in school, feeling that he is unfairly overlooked by his teachers who never award him gold stars, despite seeming to give of them freely to others. This leads him to quietly resent his teachers and classmates, who have consequently grown to dislike him in turn. He develops a reputation as a bully. Treading the anti-septic halls on the way to class, the boy is followed by a cloud of wary snickers.

Deep inside his alienation, he starts compiling a list of little strategies, ideas for the acquisition of gold stars – idly at first, the series soon gains steady momentum as new thoughts announce themselves, things he has overheard, that others have said, wisdom he has discovered somewhere inside himself – finish your homework, raise your hand, ask others how they are feeling, wash your hands, tuck in your seat, be an example, place stationary back in stationary drawer, don’t be late…

As the day continues, the list becomes longer, unstable in its boundaries – stop scowling, eat slowly, be honest with parents – until what we are left with are pieces that no longer speak to the boy’s immediate concerns, but fragment unexpectedly, mosaic-like, branching off in various directions – place one foot in front of the other, be braver, treat animals with kindness, turn the other cheek…

They stop reading and close the book. The tutor asks the boy to report back on what they have read.

What is there to a list?

What does the boy wish to accomplish?

Why do we love him?

Views of the boy

Every time the boy takes a seat at the table the tutor notices something new. The way he enters with the same lively hop-and-step as if tumbling into the room. The way he tips the contents of his pencil case onto the table leaving a messy pile of pens and pencils, residua of pencil shavings, a broken ruler, crumbs of old rubbers, that will need to be cleared up at the end of the lesson.

How the boy seems to visibly brighten when he is offered praise and how his wavy brown hair droops over his youthful brow, which tenses when concentrating on spelling words like obstinate or affliction.

The boy enters and takes a seat at the table. The tutor is sometimes alarmed at the mature way the boy holds himself in conversation, his sense of humour, seriousness. He arrives and the boy asks about his family. When this happens, he is taken by surprise and stumbles over his words.

The boy enters with his mother, joining the tutor at the table. With a smile, he recounts his day at school, where they have been creating impressions from autumn leaves. While the tutor readies himself for the lesson, the mother asks whether the tutor might consider booking a second session next week?

How much is the boy party to any of this?

He takes a seat at the table and reaches for the bowl of fruit, picking out an apple, biting into it with animal pleasure. They chat until the apple is reduced to a brown core. A slight sweetness hangs in the air. He notices a sticky thumbprint on the front page of the exercise book.

The boy enters and takes a seat at the table. He is still dressed in school uniform. There are evenings when he appears in the room more casually in a t-shirt with a bright logo. Other times he is dressed down in such a way that it seems like he is ready to fall into bed and sleep.

Still Life

People file into the cavernous exhibition space. In the corner of the room, there is a guard who is fast asleep in his chair. A woman sits with a worn-looking paperback open on the gallery seat next to her, staring glumly at a large painting of fruit.

He is instantly struck by a strange premonition of the boy and his mother, half expecting to bump into them here. Everywhere, there are oil paintings, watercolours of decorative flower arrangements and heaped servings of food. Wandering the gallery, he distantly acknowledges the odd spare power of the images on display. The almost child-like pleasure in categorising objects at rest. Porcelain, sunflowers, grapes, bread…

Reading #2

He reaches around inside his satchel as he waits for the boy to join him. It seems that he has forgotten to pack the book they have been reading. Once the boy arrives, the tutor explains their dilemma, feeling quietly ridiculous.

Unfazed, the boy sets about finding them something else. There is a large cabinet in the corner of the room, the bottom shelf filled with large, expensive-looking hardbound books. The boy removes something from the shelf and sets it before them on the table. They open onto a random page.

He is surprised to find that it is a photo album. The family name is printed on the inside page along with an unfamiliar address. A cold streak of worry flares in the tutor’s chest. The boy seems to be having fun. He flicks through the album, years passing by with each page. Here he is as a baby. Here he is playing football. This is his seventh birthday.

There are surprisingly few images of the mother and boy together. He imagines the boy incognito behind the camera or hidden at the edge of the frame waiting to jump out.

They turn the page and here the boy’s mother appears not much older than a teenager. It looks like she is on holiday, standing on an impressive rock formation in front of a blue smear of ocean. He wonders who took the photo. She is wearing an oversized grey t-shirt, hiding behind a pair of sunglasses, smiling back into the camera.

Once their lesson concludes they replace the photo album back in the cabinet. They say their goodbyes and the boy promptly lets the tutor out at the front door to catch his train ride home.

A Dream

Oppressive heat. Breathing in humidity. The thunder of running taps. Hunched over in thigh high water. The bath stretches before him like the stern of an enormous ship. Water sprays from all directions. The room sweats, glass surfaces mist over. It takes a moment to realise that he is staring down at his exposed belly button. His arms are raised from behind, having been hanging lamely at his sides.

Leaning over his right shoulder, the boy’s mother washes the trunk of his body up to the sensitive pockets of his armpits. She washes him thoroughly, up and down. He feels mildly embarrassed but can’t shake the simple pleasure of being handled gently. Once she has finished, she lowers his arms back to their resting place, before continuing to rub a sponge over his shoulders and back. His face slackens into an expression that is tender and cow-like. She washes his hair.

It is unclear exactly how long this goes on for. The only mark of time is the water which pours from the taps into the bath which is now close to overspilling. The room is almost entirely befogged. As she wipes down his shoulders, he notices a slight rattling beneath the rushing taps. Rattling becomes rumbling. Without a further qualifying moment there is a loud knock at the door.

He shudders awake, covered in sweat. After showering off the night, he sets about making coffee. Waiting for the kettle to boil, he checks his phone. The screen lights up. A very good morning, indeed. He has been paid.

Near Miss

The late glimmer of winter sun radiates down on the tarmac as the tutor makes his way from the train station to his lesson. The sunshine makes for a welcome departure from otherwise plummeting temperatures. Walking at a steady pace, he enjoys the brisk scene, steps dissolving into music from his headphones.

As he crosses the road, his satisfaction is interrupted by the sudden and overwhelming blast of horns. He jerks to a stop to avoid a narrow collision with a moving vehicle. Everything happens so quickly, the van speeding past him and out of his life so fast that for a moment it is as if nothing has happened.

Later, he will reflect on his near fatal encounter. He considers in an abstract way what it might be like to be crushed under the wheels of a large vehicle. Unbidden comes the word, propitious. He makes a note that he will teach the boy this word the next time they meet.

At Night

Lying in bed, half awake, his attention passes vaguely over the shrilly lit laptop screen. It is getting late. All attempts at thought are distracted by the shadowy rattlings of the night. Somewhere outside his room there is somebody talking under their breath. From the window, disembodied footsteps call in sequence each return and departure from the shared building.

He is still except for the tips of his fingers which prickle over the touchpad, glancing over the list of unread emails. The combination of darkness and the light emanating from the laptop causes his vision to burn at the edges. During these strange moments shortly before sleep he is filled with hollow fascination for the impossibility of really seeing anything.

He continues to gaze at the screen and when he gently closes his eyes finds that he is still looking at the screen, the ghost of an image, appearing somewhere beneath his vision. Out of the dark, he sees the boy, his young face, wavy brown hair curling over his ears.

It is too late to do anything, he thinks. If he stays awake much longer his eyes will start to sting. Perhaps they are already watering, and it is as if he is crying alone in bed.

A Result

The boy is waving a piece of paper as he comes bounding into the dining room. He rushes past a Christmas tree which is decorated with silver tinsel and white glowing lights. It is all he can do to not collapse over himself bringing the table and everything with it down to the floor.

He is clutching his latest school report. Together they read the arid document which details a series of modest improvements, particularly in the boy’s spelling. The tutor feels happy for this small accomplishment.

At the end of their lesson, the boy’s mother hangs around to thank the tutor and he notices that she is dressed differently, impressively, as if preparing to go out for the evening.

She thanks the tutor for helping their family. There is a second of thick silence, bodies shifting awkwardly, as if she has misspoken. It is clear that some excess meaning has escaped, a word that she wishes could be swallowed up again.

Helping their family.

Spelling Test #2

It is time for their lesson. The boy readies himself by opening onto an empty page. The tutor watches him.

Shoulder to shoulder, they are two figures cast in the same dim light.

By now he is accustomed to the peculiarities of the boy’s handwriting, the amplified lettering and crude design of a language that remains in some part adversarial. He checks the boy’s work. At the top of the page he has written the word A P P A R I T I O N.

It has been spelled correctly. He turns to the boy who looks around innocently and asks him what it means. He trips at the absurd thought – to spell a word you’ve no concept or meaning for…

The boy turns to the tutor, waiting for an answer that will satisfy his curiosity. The year is almost up and there is no time to waste.

With a smile, weak and unnerving, he calmly explains everything.

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J.B. Baxter is a Government of Ireland Postdoctoral Fellow at Trinity College Dublin. He is the author of the academic monograph Samuel Beckett’s Legacies in American Fiction (Palgrave), and an editor with the arts magazine Hypocrite Reader. Twitter: @chromakeydream