Page 86 of Them Bones

His fingers stilled.

“Mr. Brown says that you haven’t participated, much… But I’ve seen your… doodles. On your test papers? They’re quite good. I was surprised to hear that you don’t like art.”

“I like art,” Dustin said, “I just don’t like Mr. Brown.”

Miriam pushed her glasses up her nose, surprised. Mr. Brown was universally loved, a big golden retriever of a man who taught a fun subject and cracked jokes, rough-housed with the kids and generally created a much-needed break for many of them who were struggling with the increasing workload ofsixth grade, especially as they prepared for EQAO, the ministry standardized testing.

“May I askwhyyou don’t like Mr. Brown?”

“He makes us work in groups. Talk about our projects with each other.”

Ah. She hadn’t thought of that. He did tend to assign group projects like murals…

“You know, Dustin, just because you don’t like to work in a group doesn’t mean you can skip your schoolwork.”

“I don’t skip it,” he said. “I just do it on my own. But he won’t mark it.”

Miriam pushed her glasses up her nose again. “What do you mean you do it on your own?”

Dustin reached into his desk and pulled out a sketchbook. It was so large it barely fit inside the desk. He flipped it open to the first page.

“This was for theCanadian Identityproject,” Dustin said, spinning it to face Miriam. She pulled her glasses off entirely, pulling the sketchbook towards her, her mouth dropping open.

It was a startlingly realistic-looking charcoal sketch of what appeared to beThe Group of Seven.She remembered this photograph – it was from the twenties, the artists sitting around a table in suits and smoking cigarettes. If she hadn’t seen the graphite bits on the page, she’d have sworn up and down it was an actual photo.

Dustin flipped the page.

“This was for the ‘Inner Child’ exhibit we were supposed to do for Meet the Teacher night,” he said.

It was a beautiful, colourful picture of a scene from The Lion King; a carefree, teenaged Simba tossing his hair in the air, his eyes closed in song, masterfully and painstakingly crafted with a stippling technique.

Dustin flipped again.

“And this one was for the Christmas decorations, for the school concert.”

It was a winter landscape, a watercolour, so beautiful it should have been a Christmas card.

Miriam had never seen a student produce work like this. She’d never even seen adults produce anything like this, outside of an art museum. And in her opinion, most of the stuff in art museums these days looked like it had been done by an angry toddler throwing paint.

“Dustin,” she said, reaching for his hand, but he shrank back. She put her hand back on her lap, to show him she wouldn’t try again. “These arebeautifulpictures.”

He blushed.

Miriam rubbed her eyes. She couldn’t even remember what she’d wanted to talk to him about in the first place. All she knew was that - well-intended as Mr. Brown may be - he was making a mistake. This child had amatana,and she didn’t blame him for not wanting to be part of a group.

“Thank you for showing these to me, Dustin,” she said. “I’m very honoured.” And she realized she meant it. Surely if he’d ever shown any of her other colleagues this kind of work, they’d have mentioned it.

“Can I go now?” he asked.

“Yes, you can go,” she said. He collected his things and left.

Miriam pulled her phone book out of her purse, and flipped to the N’s, dialing out from the phone on her desk.

“Hello?”

“Hi, um… is this Nancy? Is this still your number?”

A pause. “Yes, this is Nancy… Who’s calling?”

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