Page 1 of Yes No Maybe

One

Rowan

It’sthefinal,sold-outnight of Coastal High School’s reboot of Shakespeare’sTaming of the Shrew, and I’m staring down the mother of all zits, as if my intimidating glare might convince it to vacate the premises.

It’s the Mount Vesuvius of acne—positioned at the base of my student’s nostril. Its yellow pus crater stretches bigger than a fingertip. Pus moves under the skin window like cells under a microscope, devilishly multiplying. It’s the most heinous pimple I’ve ever seen, and working with teenagers every day, that says a lot.

“Ms. Mackey, I can’t perform,” Eddie Speck proclaims. “Not with thisboogercrusted to my face.”

I offer my most reassuring smile. “A little makeup, and no one will know.”

“We’ve tried that.” Eddie motions to the baffled make-up team standing by and Julio, another student, who plucked me from the audience for this emergency. “Nothing adheres to this thing! It’s makeup-resistant!”

Of course, it is. As someone with permanent burn scars across her left cheek, neck, and hand, I know better than most that makeup fails to hide everything.

“Um, you should pop it. If it’s flatter, it’ll be easier to hide.”

Julio and Eddie look horrified.

“What? You’ve never popped a zit before?”

They shake their heads. Eddie swipes a tear. “Julio… notify my understudy.”

“You don’t need your understudy. Just squeeze it between your fingernails.”

Eddie holds up his hands. His nails are bitten down to useless stubs.

I glance at Julio, who shakes his head. “Don’t look at me. The entire make-up team refuses to touch it.”

“Fine.” I send a hurried text to my sister Mira, who I’m holding five extra seats for in the packed auditorium.Third row. Right side. Look for my stuff.“Boys, let’s find a bathroom.”

“We’re popping the zit,” Julio announces into his walkie.

Eight years in a high school classroom have taught me many universal truths about teaching—the most surprising is that a teacher will do almost anything for her students. Not just the obvious things like tutoring and extra credit, but a daring litany of the unexpected that, if asked in college…would you ever… you would’ve saidhell nowith the emphatic certainty and luxury of someone who thinks she knows everything, especially herself.Silly younger self… so naive.

Consequently, a teacher must be prepared for anything. Teenagers are smart—they’ll sniff out the unprepared, attack, and reduce the teacher to a glorified coat rack to ensure getting away with murder for the rest of the semester. It’sGame of Thronesin there. Once you lose control, it’s impossible to get back.

But nearly anything else can be fixed—a lesson plan, a scheduling conflict, a bad attitude, a heinous zit—and I’m the Fix-It Queen, a behind-the-scenes problem-solver.

Even so, this is the weirdest thing I’ve done for a student. That includes holding a trashcan for Tonya Jeffers while she got sick from the cafeteria’s “clean-out-the-fridge” nachos. And chasing a thuggish ninth grader after he grabbed a student’s butt during carline. Adding zit-popping to the list is unexpected, but the show must go on.

“At leastsomeonelooks amazing,” Eddie says with jealousy as I wash my hands.

I grin. “Buttering me up to do this?”

“A little, but it’s true.”

“Thanks.” A short twirl in my emerald green chiffon dress ripples the sheer overlay. “Dean, I mean, Mr. Maddix, suggested dressing up. I must’ve changed four times.”

Julio’s eyes pinch, but the caboodle-toting makeup artists flash coy grins. “Very pretty,” one says.

“I feel pretty,” I admit—a rare feeling. My eyes travel along my burn scars in the mirror—the spotted beginnings at my lower left cheek from chin to ear, the warped fault line at my jaw, the lumpy coral-esque texture running down my neck, and the pink and red splotches covering my left hand and wrist.“Freddie Krueger face,”a student once called it, prompting my mac-n-cheese story—a fictionalized version of what happened to answer students’ bold questions. I never tell the real story. She exaggerated, anyway—most of my face is unscarred, and from the right side, it’s not seen at all—but the scars create such a strange juxtaposition between woman and “monster” that sometimes I wonder if it stands out more next to unblemished skin. It’s shocking when people discover it, like my scars jump out at them from behind a corner.

I turn away to grab paper towels. “Okay. Let’s do this.”

“Deep breaths,” Julio advises, bracing Eddie against the sink.

My right hand trembles as it meets the enemy.

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