Like Soap

When we were fourteen, Tessa, Gina, and I used to laugh at Mrs. Meade, our history teacher, who always came to class like she had dressed in a rush, her hair always boringly tied, her wedding finger always covered in soap, stuck to her wedding band and we wondered how come she didn’t know the trick we knew, of removing the rings when washing our hands, which we did every time with our enamel, and wood, and silver-plated rings – only Gina having a gold ring among us, a present from her Grandma – and we told Mrs. Meade about the soap and the ring, one day, giggling all the while, and she said Hahaha and Aren’t you funny, and Why don’t we talk about it when you also have four children to look after at home and then twenty, forty, sixty more children to look after at work, and Yes, I mean you too, and then, when Tessa got pregnant, twelve months later, we thought Mrs. Meade would go and check her rings for soap too, but Tessa had no wedding band, and when Mrs. Meade went to visit her, in the evenings, it was not to laugh at her, but to help her out with the baby, and her history classes because she said that no matter what, she couldn’t let life slip out of her hands. Like soap.