Gauze

I. 

Heidi is fat and wears her rain clothes well—they are bright orange and from Canada.

Do you know how much she loves the rain? 

More than other things, at least. 

In October she sits under the slide and watches the rain fall; each drop a blackbird. This is Heidi from North Carolina, she is new to this school. What is your opinion of her? They ask me, because I am her teacher—

“she seems to really love the rain,” I say. “She only goes out to recess when it’s raining,” I say. “But she should always go. It’s good for her to run around.” 

I know in my head that she does not run around, though, she sits under the slide and listens for the rain instead of playing. One day when the rain turns to ice and a kid falls down the back of the sledding hill and bites his lip clean through, Heidi is there like a lightning bug as if she knows that something is wrong

“Jimmie,” she says—“he doesn’t pay attention to things,” she says. And the bag of ice is wrapped in orange gauze like her orange snow clothes are wrapped around her

“I’ll keep an eye on him in the future.” There is so much grown up in her voice that I am afraid. 

 II. 

I think Heidi feels good about herself even though she is fat. She does not seem to flinch at anything, even at gym class, and she celebrates frozen custard at lunch, and she does well academically. 

Most days it is raining, every day it is raining. Glory be, God, thanks for the rain, lord, for Heidi’s sake. When it rains the sky is orange. When it snows, then sky is orange too, blushing as if it has been gossiping about someone, or about all of us at once. 

And then there was that day that it didn’t rain, and Heidi went out to recess anyway—and I saw them against the not-orange sky, sitting together under the slide.