The Revelation of Paisley Parker
by Douglas Young
part 1
Paisley Parker was the dark-haired, freckle-faced, green-eyed girl in young teaching assistant Fitzhugh Rainwater’s freshman English class who had said nary a word the whole term. Even when Mr. Rainwater called roll the first day, she was the one student who answered neither “Here” nor “Present” when her name was announced, but just raised her hand with a facial look bordering on fear.
Fitzhugh noticed her that first class for being pretty and petite but still sitting on the last row and appearing way too shy and insecure for a gal blessed with her looks. She also stood out as the only student in class to often wear a dress. She generally attired herself much more conservatively than most co-eds, usually sporting a long dress or skirt well below her knees. Despite a fetching figure, she never showed cleavage or wore anything to accentuate her physical assets.
Though she uttered not a word in class, every time Mr. Rainwater looked at her during the lectures, she always looked back. He also noted she was the one student who smiled at all his jokes and attempts at humor, even when they misfired. He only saw her lovely teeth and just how wonderfully attractive she could really be when he made her laugh. Even if the whole class roared, his eyes zeroed in on Miss Parker to relish her toothy, glorious grin.
Since he spent 100 percent more one-on-one time talking with most of his other students, Paisley remained the enigmatic maiden of mystery who most intrigued him that fall. In spite of all the books to be read and papers to be written for his graduate courses, plus all the lectures to prepare and papers to grade for his own class, in quiet moments he sometimes found himself thinking about the almost ethereal, alluring gal in the back of his classroom.
Something else intriguing him early in the term was how she appeared to be paying rapt attention to his every word but never took a note. Could she have some kind of aural photographic memory? Or did she not think anything he said was worth writing down or, worst of all, was he actually boring her? Perhaps she was a genuine genius who just didn’t need to take notes and/or was a budding poetess or wordsmith who had already read the poems, short stories, and essays assigned.
Failing her first essay buried that idea. Still, though she had a weak command of punctuation and spelling, he found her paper’s arguments touching, since they betrayed an almost childlike charm. In an essay on the CIA, after expressing her amazement at the agency’s ingenious high-tech means of spying all over the planet, she concluded the essay on a note of cheerful awe, exclaiming: “The CIA knows everything about everyone, just like Santa!”
It struck Fitzhugh as delightfully darling. After reading so many far better composed essays which argued oh so ponderously or ever too passionately for or against the spy network’s exploits, Paisley had penned a paper expressing admiration for all its tools of spycraft as well as a naïve hope the CIA would use them only for good. How lovely if we could all keep such sweet innocence forever, he thought. Or maybe not.
It stung each time he circled yet another punctuation error or misspelled word, and he tried to be as gentle as possible pointing out her paper’s poor organization and weak arguments. The essay read as if Miss Parker was at pains not to debate anyone despite the assignment being to write a persuasive argumentative essay.
He found himself spending far more time on her paper than the others, not just to correct all her errors but more so to find excuses to praise any parts of the essay that were somehow sound. So, instead of just writing her grade at the top of her work (57/F), he added as many supportive comments as he could, emphasizing every plausibly positive aspect of the paper, as well as pointing out its potential and hopes she wouldn’t hesitate to let him go over it with her in the office. The one time he smiled grading the sweet mess was when he underlined her closing Santa sentence and wrote how cute he thought it read.
How he dreaded having to return her paper. She had made one of the worst grades in the class and he felt awful at how upset she might be. Had he graded her too harshly? Was it really right to scrupulously note every single error? Should he not have found ways to inflate her grade?
But he knew the ultimate cost of such cheating. Almost half the university’s students never graduated, and he figured it was largely due to poor writing skills. To lie to this girl about the need to improve her prose dramatically would just perpetuate the problem, as he imagined too many of her middle and high school teachers had done. How much easier it would have been just to skim over papers and not really grade them, he noted. How much more time and less frustration he could have enjoyed, and how much more guilt and lack of sleep?
On the day he returned the first assignment, he studied Miss Parker’s reaction as she received her essay, but her face betrayed no emotion. She reminded him of TV footage of criminal defendants in the courtroom looking stone-faced like silent film comic Buster Keaton as their guilty verdicts were read. Trying hard not to look obvious, he glanced at Paisley more than usual during the lecture to detect any change in her demeanor but saw none. To his relief he noted she kept him in her gaze the entire class, continued to smile at his every attempt at humor, and even laughed twice.
He felt better when her second paper was slightly improved (a 64/D) but worried his written remarks praising her for going from a grade of F to D might strike her as effusive. He found himself desperately wanting her not to give up and to continue her positive movement. Still, she was a long way from the C average required to pass the course, and this was a class everyone had to get through to graduate.
When her third paper garnered a 67/D+, he decided to implore her to come to his office so they could go over her papers in person to try to jump start her towards at least earning a C. Since she neither responded to his invitation on her first paper, nor his plea on the second, he decided to speak with her in person after the next lecture.
At the start of the following class, he returned the students’ third essays. When Paisley came up to get hers, Mr. Rainwater whispered to her to please see him after class. The startled look she gave resembled fear.
“Don’t worry,” he immediately tried to reassure her. “You’re not in any trouble.”
Feeling guilty that he might have frightened her, he repeatedly looked her way during the lecture to see if she seemed all right. For the first time he saw her often staring at the floor or looking at length out the window. He found himself trying to formulate how to put her at ease after class while not losing track of the flow of his lecture.
At the end of class, after the other students had left, Paisley slowly approached him.
“Miss Parker! How are you?”
“Okay ... I guess. How are you, sir?”
He noted she was one of the first students to call him “sir” and that she had the voice of a little girl. With her shoulders hunched and her head down, she gave the impression of thinking she was an inconvenience.
“Have you been studying all the comments and corrections on your papers, Paisley?”
She silently nodded.
“I think you have, too, since your writing has improved with each new paper. I’m proud of you, Paisley.”
Suddenly she looked up at him surprised and smiled.
“But for you to pass the course, you have to earn a C average, and I’m concerned you really need to improve your next several papers to do that. So could you please bring your papers to the office sometime soon so we can go over them together in real time? I think that might help you more.”
She smiled slightly and nodded but then quickly looked at the floor again and said nothing.
“You don’t have to if you don’t want to. I certainly can’t make you. But I really think it would be worth your while. If you can’t stop by during office hours, let me know when you can and I’ll get there earlier in the day or stay later. You’ve already shown real improvement with your last two papers. I just want to help you write better, Paisley.”
It was his last words that finally coaxed a full grin out of her and an affirmative nod of her head.
“Swell.” He smiled. “I look forward to hopefully seeing you soon.”
“Thank you, sir. I appreciate you.”
They walked out of the classroom and said goodbye, and the whole way back to his office Mr. Rainwater felt slightly buzzed by her last sentence. No one had ever said that to him. He was glad he had reached out to the girl and now caught himself worrying more about her emotionally than scholastically. She personified “painfully shy” and appeared far too insecure for such an attractive young lady. That her soft voice sounded much more like that of a 10-year-old child than a late adolescent troubled him, too. Something about her left him feeling distinctly unsettled. But he was sure she was sweet, and he was determined to help her all he could.
Several days passed before he heard that little girl voice again. While hunched over yet another disappointing essay, he was slightly startled to detect it coming from his office door.
“Hello, Mr. Rainwater,” Paisley smiled. “I’m here like you wanted.”
“Have a seat, Miss Parker.” He stood and motioned to the chair in front of his desk. She smiled and sat.
“What a lovely dress. Yellow like beautiful daffodils!” he marveled. Indeed, she looked lovelier than ever.
“I call it my William Wordsworth dress in honor of his ‘Daffodils’ poem.” The suddenly beaming young lady smiled.
“Yes! That’s my favorite of all his poems, and I love his work.”
“Me, too. I love the Romantic poets.”
“‘Bully for Miss Paisley,’ as President Teddy Roosevelt might boom. Cheers, dear. I adore the Romantics and, if you check your study guide, you’ll see we’ll read a whole slew of them too.”
“Do you like William Blake?”
“Totally. Paisley, I’m so impressed you enjoy poetry, and especially the classics.”
“But I’m still a sucker for sappy romances. It’s my guilty pleasure....” She looked down and giggled.
What a splendid smiler to have such a charming chat with her about their favorite poets and novelists, Fitzhugh thought, and he was elated at how much quality literature she knew and loved, including several works by John Steinbeck, Ernest Hemingway, and F. Scott Fitzgerald.
“So who’s your favorite author?” he asked.
She paused and then smiled, started to speak, and then paused, lowered her head, and smiled again.
“Don’t be shy. I promise not to laugh no matter who it is. Heck, I’m just excited a student is actually reading literature and even on her own time.”
“L. Frank Baum. I love the Oz books,” she blushed.
“I do too, Paisley! They’re absolutely adorable; fabulously fun and whimsically witty. I still read them and appreciate their satire a lot more now than when I was younger.”
“So my professor likes the Oz books,” she grinned. “I thought maybe you’d laugh and think they’re just for children.”
“Hey, there’s some wonderful children’s literature that’s lovely for all ages: the Oz books, Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass, and J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter books. And it was the Dr. Seuss books that got me excited to read.”
“I love Dr. Seuss!” She smiled more happily than he had ever seen her.
After thoroughly comparing their favorite writers, they got down to her writing. It turned out she had never attended decent schools, had written not one term paper, and yet made A’s and B’s on the few essays required of her in high school — with almost no teacher comments or corrections written on any. And almost all the tests she had ever taken had only non-essay questions, usually multiple choice. All the easier to grade, thought Fitzhugh.
Copyright © 2021 by Douglas Young
