Chapter 1

“Alright, alright! Everybody calm down and return to your seats!”

A man walked in, carrying a bag slung across his torso, and yelled for class to start. He dropped his bag on to the table and took out his materials. His bag was then dropped to the floor, and he turned to face the blackboard behind him.

“You shall call me Mr. Jacobs. I will be your form teacher for the entire year, and only for the year. So don’t get too attached to me, but don’t stay distant either.” Jacobs said in a loud voice as he scratched out his name with the unused chalk on the blackboard.

He turned around and faced the class with a smug smile – a look of intimidation and friendliness.

He took a stack of sheets in his hands and started walking past the desks and passing out the sheets. When he saw a girl, with her head down, busy drawing, he paused by her desk.

“A doodler, hey?” He said, smiling.

The girl looked up. She had a face, seemingly empty of emotion, yet a pair of eyes that seemed to look at him as though she could see through him. Through his every facade, every lie, every flaw he never wanted revealed. Her eyes seemed to pierce his very soul, but it did not hurt. Her gaze was gentle, even though her eyes seemed to pierce.

“No. An artist.” was her response to his comment. She pushed her book out far enough for him to see it in the light. It was him. A drawing of him. He was surprised. Not by the fact that it was him, but by how good it was. How real. The parts that were completed seemed almost as if they were taken out of a photo and pasted there.

“Your face has a unique and beautiful structure. It made me want to draw it.” She said, misreading his surprise.

Tearing his gaze from the drawing and pointing to his face, he asked in astonishment,
“My face?”

The girl just nodded. Another girl beckoned him over. She was the kind of girl that made you look at her rather than listen to what she said. Jacobs focused on her face and strained his ears to hear what she said.

“Don’t bother about Beatrice,” she whispered cheekily, “She’s just weird. But I kinda get what she’s saying. You’re totally hot.” She bit her lip and posed as sexily as she could, stuck in her desk.

Jacobs shook his head and glanced back at Beatrice. Her back was crouched over the desk, her hand moving quickly and deftly, and her shoulder length black hair was already blocking the view of her book. He turned back to face the blonde haired girl staring at him dreamily, as if waiting for him to react the way she wanted him to. He just shook his head again, placed a sheet on her desk and walked away.

Jacobs was not very much older than these “kids” he was to teach and be in charge of. He had gotten into university by the time he turned sixteen, and at the end of about four years, he was ready to take on schools. He had been substituting for quite a while now, and this job, was his most serious one yet. He had to substitute for a whole year. It was more like stepping into a long-term teacher’s role, and then having to take infinite leave until he became a permanent teacher. At twenty-one years old, he had to teach seventeen year olds.

When he was seventeen he was hanging out with eighteen, nineteen, twenty year olds. In year eleven, he was fifteen. He was nervous, having to teach year elevens. It was a very important year for them. He had confidence that he would be able to teach, but when it came to personal affairs, if any of them came to him for help, he was not sure how he would handle them. But with other students, it had been fine, so with this lot, it had to be too.

Jacobs passed out the last sheet and returned to his desk. Standing at the front, he leaned on it till the class quietened down.

“To get to know all of you without having to take years of interaction, I want all of you to write a letter to me. Telling me of your hobbies, what sports you like, blah, blah, blah. All the requirements are on that sheet of paper I just finished handing out to all of you. You can add whatever you want, be it a drawing, a photo, anything that can be clipped onto your letter. You don’t need to finish it now. You have now and tonight to finish it. I want it handed in first thing in the morning tomorrow. Any questions? No? Good, get started.”

The class started to work, discussing with friends, what they were to write in it and so on. Jacobs looked at every child, noticing how they all had a friend, but when he came round to Beatrice, she was alone. As sad as he found it, she seemed fine. She worked as swiftly with this task as she had done with her drawing.

He decided not to bother her, afraid she would become more bothered by his questions. He left the class to work and five minutes before the bell rang for next period, he realised he had forgotten to take attendance. He quickly called and checked down every presence and by the end of the roll; he still had time to spare.
The bell soon rang and Jacobs took the chance to shout out his goodbye over the bell and the chatter of the students.

“I won’t be having any of you for the rest of the day, so I’ll be seeing you all tomorrow morning! Have a good day!”


Chapter 2

The next morning, the students piled into the classroom and placed their letters onto Jacobs’ desk. He watched every single one of them file in from the back of the room, smiling bigger and bigger with every one. Nobody noticed him standing silently though, and they all had a big shock when he suddenly walked out from behind to the front. He had a huge grin on his face. His eyes were sparkling with happiness and satisfaction.

“I hope all of you had fun doing the letter. I did one too!” He laughed gleefully. He went behind his desk and retrieved his letter from a drawer.

He casually went back to the front and sat on his desk as he read out his letter about himself, addressed to the entire class. He designed the requirements in a way that it made the writer self-examine themselves without actually knowing that was what they were really doing. There were questions in there that most people would not know how to answer about themselves without doing some asking themselves. They had to find certain items and describe certain events of their lives. The requirements were very general. Anybody would have been able to fulfil them.
It was like a treasure hunt, and the island for searching was their lives. The requirements were merely guidelines, and he had hoped they realised it too, and wrote a proper letter about themselves, including his requirements.

When the class was over, he took the pile of letters and brought them to his desk in the staff room. He prepared a snack and some tea and settled down to read.
It was interesting to read about all the lives of the kids in his class, and write a reply to each of them. Some were handwritten, some were typed up. A lot of them had many spelling and grammar mistakes. He had a great amount of excitement for this task, but after reading and writing replies for a number of them, he realised his interest and excitement had gone down quite a bit and he was getting impatient. Impatient for what? He was not sure, but after a few more letters, he found his answer.

The letter from Beatrice.

He took care in examining hers. It was unique. Very unique, at first he had thought it was printed, seeing as it had not been on lined paper, but it was handwritten, hand-scripted more of. The generic white sheets of paper had beautiful cursive handwriting scripted onto it with ink. He could tell she even used a nib.
She started the letter by addressing him.


Dear Mr. Jacobs,
People put me under the stereotype of loser/nerd, or art freak/genius. It depends on who you ask. I, for one, do not really care. They can call me whatever they like, it is still not going to affect the way I behave, or the way I just am. I am a person who loves to create pieces or art, using words or paint, whatever the medium is, I just love it. The thing I love the most is making everyone see beauty in everything. Even if the thing is a rotten old dead branch, I still want to let everyone see the beauty I see in it. I want people to see things the way I do. I want people to be able to understand me. I guess that is why I do so much art... because I want people to know what is on my mind.

Even though they treat me this way, all I want is for them to see what I create, and if they cannot understand anything from the things I create, then so be it. Beauty is not a thing everyone can see. It is a gift I have been blessed with, and I am thankful to God for it. My question for you is can you? Can you see beauty in everything around you? I hope you can. You are different from other teachers I have had. I hope I can find something different in you. No, I know I can find something different in you.


Jacobs paused. He was not sure if he could continue reading if what Beatrice had intended to do with this letter was to put such trust and hope in him, that he would be different, that he would be able to see what she sees. He put the letter on the table and took a drink of his tea. It was already cold. He ate a piece of cheese sandwiched in between two crackers then went for a walk around the school.
It was cold that winter. It was cold every winter. He tugged his coat more tightly around him as he walked through the vacant areas of the school. When he returned, his head was clear, filled with only cold air. He sat back down and looked at the letter. It was then he noticed something was clipped to it. He pulled the attached out from behind and saw what it was. It was a photocopy of Beatrice’s finished product with the words ‘Welcome to the School’ scripted across the bottom. Next to those words were her signature and the date.

He saw beauty in everything she wanted him to see, but was that seeing what she saw? Was that the same as what she wanted? He did not think so. He only thought what she did was beautiful. He did not think he could find beauty in a rotten old dead branch, but he wanted to. He wanted to know more about this girl. She fascinated him. He wanted to understand her, understand the way her mind worked. Why she drew her new teacher. Even though she had already explained it, he did not understand her words. He did not think there was anything unique or beautiful about his face. He only thought of himself as an average looking guy, did not think there was anything more than that, yet here was this girl, who was everything but ordinary, telling him that she knows he was not either.

He wanted to know what she saw, he wanted to see what she saw, and he could not see it from just the drawing of him. He needed to talk to her. Have a conversation over lunch with her. He wanted to see her. Let her know she was not alone, that he could understand her if she talked to him more.

But no. He was only a teacher. Further more, she was four years younger than him, and a student. He did not want to make it seem as though he was in love with her. But why did he even think of that if he had not the slightest motive of wanting to get closer to her in that manner. This was all making him very frustrated and angry at himself. He finally got himself a job that would boost his resume majorly, and yet here he was trying to make his mind up about whether or not to have a deep relationship with a student. It was an obvious no! He could not! Not in that manner. He would lose his job. He might even lose his teaching licence. What was he thinking?!

He ran his fingers through his hair, as though by loosening up his hair was going to make one of these burdens drop off as well.


*Chapter is incomplete*