here and gone

I walk in to my room and she's perched on a stool, my telephone pressed against her ear. She speaks softly and replaces the receiver.

"Hi," I say, sounding surprised, but pleasantly. I speak as if to a bird taking its first steps after landing, not wanting to scare it away.

I wait, because it seems the thing to do, and she says something, shyly, about her in-school suspension, a left-over from the last time she was here. At the bell, I send her off more kindly than I sometimes do.

I had not yet heard about how far she had gotten, but I wondered all the same about whom she had on the phone. Later, I hear from the voice of authority and a principal, too. The details of her absence filter through. I decide that the next day I'll bail her out of in-school for the morning; it will make my life easier, maybe buy some goodwill. Something's not right, and somebody should help her, or listen, or be there. The time comes, I make the call--and she's gone.