Nobody's Fool

eighth-graders had always had a gift for colorful metaphor. It was literal truth they couldn’t grasp, and so it was with Sully. He had been among the first students she’d ever taught in North Bath, and his IQ tests had revealed a host of aptitudes that the boy himself appeared bent on contradicting. Throughout his life a case study underachiever, Sully—people still remarked—was nobody’s fool, a phrase that Sully no doubt appreciated without ever sensing its literal application—that at sixty, he wasdivorced from his own wife, carrying on halfheartedly with another man’s, estranged from his son, devoid of self-knowledge, badly crippled and virtually unemployable—all of which he stubbornly confused with independence.
    â€œI was invited by The Bank, but I prefer to pay my way,” Miss Beryl told him, a small lie. Clive Jr. had called last week to tell her he’d be out of town for the holiday, alluding to his planned absence cryptically, hoping, perhaps, to pique Miss Beryl’s curiosity, a tactic he might have known was doomed to failure. Miss Beryl had her share of natural curiosity, but she resented having it manipulated so transparently. The mere fact that Clive Jr. solicited her interest suggested to her the opposite response was called for. “It’s no fun eating with a financial institution,” she added.
    Sully grinned down at her. “We wear the chains we forge in life, old girl.”
    Miss Beryl blinked. “Who’d have thunk it? A literary allusion from the lips of Donald Sullivan. I don’t suppose you remember who said that.”
    â€œYou did,” Sully reminded her. “All through eighth grade.”
    The first thing Sully saw when he stepped outside onto the large porch he shared with his landlady was Rub Squeers tramping up the street through the snow. At just over five feet tall, Rub was powerfully built, and at the moment he was staring at his feet as he walked, trying, Sully suspected, to pretend that this meeting was a coincidence. Sully had known Rub too long to believe in this particular coincidence. He could tell by the way the young man was carrying his large head, like a medicine ball precariously balanced on his thick shoulders, that he was coming to see Sully and that he wanted to borrow money. In fact, Sully could tell just by looking at him how much Rub wanted (twenty dollars), how much he’d settle for (ten), and how long it would take for them to arrive at this figure (thirty minutes).
    â€œHello, dumbbell,” Sully called. “Don’t you own any boots?”
    Rub looked up and feigned surprise. “Somewheres,” he said, looking down at his ruined black shoes. “How was I supposed to know it’d snow the day before Thanksgiving?”
    â€œYou’re supposed to be prepared,” Sully said, though he himself had led a life of studied unpreparedness. He put a work-booted foot up on the porch railing, tied its laces. “You’re just in time, actually,” he added. “Do this one for me.”
    Rub climbed the steps, kneeled in the snow, tied the laces on Sully’s left boot.
    â€œLeave some circulation,” Sully suggested. “My knee’s about the size of two already.”
    Rub untied the boot, started over. “You look like you’re dressed for work, not school,” he observed. “You going back to work?”
    â€œThat’s the plan,” Sully said.
    â€œYou gonna hire me again?”
    â€œWould you stop borrowing money if I did?”
    â€œSure,” Rub said, though he looked disappointed to have the subject of borrowing come up so negatively. His knees now sported large wet patches. “I miss us working,” Rub said. “I wisht we’d just start up again like before.”
    â€œI’ll see if I can find us something,” Sully told him.
    Rub was frowning now. “Old Lady Peoples is spying on us again,” he said, having noticed the front room curtains twitch. Rub was normally even-tempered, but he harbored a deep animosity toward Miss Beryl as a result of her attempts to educate him back in the eighth grade, some dozen years ago, the year before she’d retired. Whenever Rub saw her, his eyes got small and hard, his voice edgy and scared, as if he imagined that Miss Beryl were still capable of wielding absolute power over him. She was still paying attention to him, and he didn’t like people