I am sixteen. He is thirty-four, tall and thin, a dynamic instructor who has been known to jump on his desk when acting out the murder of Polonius in Hamlet, a man whose narrow ties against his starched white shirts look like stained-glass windows. A man who just this year returned from teaching English in Orleans (which, until he says it, I don’t know is pronounced without the s), France and Frankfurt, Germany. A man who drives a two-seater with the steering wheel on the right-hand side. My high school English teacher.

I was in the kitchen cleaning up after dinner when I heard the glass shatter. I simultaneously took a deep breath, closed my eyes, and waited for the inevitable outburst.

He poured his second, maybe third vodka tonic.  He didn’t even look at me as he eased his six-foot-something frame through the sliding glass doors onto our deck. His words grazed by me as he sat down in the folding chair placing his drink on the small table between us, next to his worn copy of Machiavelli’s, The Prince.