by Gabrielle N. Rippel

Am I in Hell? I think to myself, surely this must be Hell. I have very obviously died and gone straight to Hell.

Loud, needy, and somehow always sticky, children circle me like sharks around their prey. The high pitch screech of a banshee resonates inside my ear, if I wasn’t dead before, the aneurysm I most certainly received after that sound has killed me.

“Children, let’s close our mouths and put on our listening ears.” A soft-spoken male teacher, scrawny in stature, mimics the actions in the front of the brightly decorated Kindergarten classroom. To no one’s surprise the children ignore his mild request prompting my right eye to twitch uncontrollably.

  “Class, I know some of us are having big feelings, but let’s remember to sit with those feelings and not express them with our mouths—” The teacher, continues as a small child chucks a large wooden block at me landing squarely on my nose.

“Oh for fucks sake shut up!” the words escape my mouth before I could stop them. For a brief moment the welcome silence is deafening before the eruption of tears from a classroom full of kindergarteners. I’m never having kids…

“Oh Mary…” a familiar disappointed voice whispers behind me, what’s worse is that it came from my six-year-old niece Gemma.

“But…” I stammer gesturing to the chaos and pointing to bruising nose.

“I apologize Mr. Hooley, my aunt Mary suffers from Tourette’s, she can’t help it.” My overly mature niece interjects.

“I most certainly do not have–” I boast in shock.

“She doesn’t like to talk about it.” Gemma leans forward towards Mr. Hooley as if sharing a secret.

“I see, that’s quite alright. Thank you for sharing that with me.” Mr. Hooley turns his attention back to the now whimpering room.

“Class, we have a very special guest today for our Career Day series! I know everyone was really excited when Jordan’s dad presented last week sharing his career as a zookeeper,” Mr. Hooley tries his best to introduce me.

“I liked that he brought in the baby fox” a small girl in a sundress exclaims.

“That’s right Leah, he did bring in a baby fox, along with a few other small animals.” Mr. Hooley continues.

“I liked the Lizard the most!” the red-haired block offender shouts.

“Yes, Brandon the lizard was really cool wasn’t it?” Mr. Hooley comments with the patience of a nun. “Today we have Gemma’s aunt Mary here to tells us all about her fun job! Now class, Mary’s behavior may be different from ours because of the way she yelled earlier, but that’s because she has a special superpower called Tourette’s.”

“I most certainly do not—” but he ignores my interruption.

“Just because she’s different, doesn’t mean she should be ignored right?” Mr. Hooley prompts the class.

“Right.” They mumble in unison, including my niece.

“What the hell kind of teacher is this?” I ask Gemma, who immediately shushes me.

“Please welcome today’s speaker, Miss Mary the astrophysicist!” He reads the job title from a small white card in his hand before looking at me with disbelief, I couldn’t tell if it was because he thought I had Tourette’s or because I’m a female in my field. Let’s get this over with.

I carry my box with today’s demonstration items to the front of the classroom taking over Mr. Hooley’s spot.

“Hello,” I start.

“What’s Tourette’s?” Leah interrupts. I brace myself in annoyance, but one discouraging look from Gemma keeps me in my place.

“Never mind that, I’m here to talk about my job as an astrophysicist.” I press on.

“Is that a special job for people like you who shout?” A toothless kid asks.

“No,” I snap, “it’s a job for people who love outer space.”

“Like the stars and moon and stuff?”

“Yes, plus lots of more cool things like planets and blackholes—”

“Do you live in space?” Brandon asks.

“No, that would be impossible.”

“Why would it be impossible?”

“Well, because there isn’t air in space” I explain.

“Yeah, that’s why astronauts wear special suits when in space” Gemma tries to explain.

“Are you an astronaut?” Leah asks.

“No, I mostly work on a computer…” I stammer.

“That’s lame, what kind of astronaut doesn’t go to space?”

“I’m not that kind of…” I stumble over my words. When Gemma asked me to present my job to her class I was flattered. Now I realize I wasn’t fully prepared for what that would look like when the audience is a bunch of six-year-olds.

“Have you gone to outer space?”

“No—” I reply.

“What kind of astronaut hasn’t gone to space?” a hear a kid mumble in the front row.

“What’s in the box?” A small girl in the back next to Gemma asks.

“Oh!” I nearly forgot my demonstration; I overturn the box emptying its contents and 20 colorful kites cover the floor at my feet.

“What do kites have to do with outer space?” Brandon scoffs.

“I wanted to use them to show you the physics part of my job—”

“Do we get to keep them?”

“Yes—” The classroom erupts with cheers.

“Mr. Hooley, can we fly them now?” Brandon begs.

“As long as Miss Mary is finished with her presentation.” He explains. Suddenly I have the undivided attention of twenty pairs of eyeballs watching me hold up a kite. I let out an audible sigh.

“I’m finished.” I say in defeat and the classroom explodes in cheers as greedy children grab a kite and run out the side door to the playground, leaving me in their wake.

Gemma hangs back, I motion for her to come to my side before crouching down to her level.

“Gemma, the next time you ask me to present to your class…”

“Yeah?” She replies.

“Don’t.” I say sternly.

“Deal.” She agrees. I lead her outside to join her classmates as we watch 20 bright kites soar the skies.

The above story was a fourth place finalist in the NYC Flash Fiction Challenge.