Part 20 - May 21 - University Tour

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While the main group had been harvesting salad greens, Frank, Tim, and four other students had returned to the quad with some sports equipment they had collected from the athletic complex. A few of the girls went back into the dorm and brought out some blankets to sit on under the trees to talk or play with the babies and toddlers. Nancy watched as the children drifted into small groups to toss or kick around footballs or soccer balls, and a few were jumping rope. Frank, Tim, and some of the older children set up the volleyball net for anyone who might be interested in playing that game. Nancy walked through the milling groups of children, watching for signs of distress. The group was subdued, but she did not see anyone on the verge of breaking down into tears. She offered words of encouragement here and kind comments there, but mostly she forced a false smile to cover her own worry. She felt a flush of anger at herself and her empty words, and she was sure the children saw right through her lame efforts to comfort them.

What she really needed to do was keep them busy, and the activity in the greenhouse had kept their minds off their present circumstances. But now—what else could they do?

Helen had come back from the food court and stepped into the middle of the group, calling for everyone’s attention. “Who would like to continue the tour of the campus?”

Many voices called out that they wanted to go back and watch the fish in the fishpond, while two of the boys insisted that they wanted to find the campus cafeteria. Helen looked to Nancy and motioned for a conference.

“If you move the children over to that corner of the quad”—Helen pointed toward the southeast corner—“you could keep an eye on them at the fishpond while I take the rest around to finish the tour.”

Nancy realized that Helen was stuck mentally in a campus tour routine. She wondered if this woman was able to deal with the reality that these children were not incoming freshmen. Frank stepped up behind his wife and placed his hands on her shoulders. “Tim and I could stay here and keep watch while you two take the rest of the children to finish the tour—or whatever you lovely ladies need me to do.” He gave Nancy a sad, knowing smile.

“I think that would be a great idea,” Nancy replied, thankful for the man’s diligence. “I probably should finish the tour with Helen so I’ll know my way around campus.”

Helen switched back into full tour mode, signaling the group to, “Follow me, folks.” They followed her around the quad as she pointed out the different halls and the disciplines taught in each, including the business buildings and what services were provided at each for incoming students. As she finished the walk around the quad, they returned to the place where they had started. Helen then led them back to the center and the inlaid compass in the middle of the quad.

“Now that you’ve seen the basic layout of the main campus, I want all of you to look to the north at the library entrance. Remember that the front of the library was designed to be an outdoor stage. When you graduate, you will all walk up the stairs and across this stage to receive your diplomas in front of your friends and family.”

The children looked at her in confusion, then back to Nancy for an explanation. Nancy held her hand in front of her, smiled, and shook her head—a signal she had used in class to forestall questions until later.

Helen continued her tour-speak without noticing the reaction of the children. “Now, if you will follow me, I’ll show you where the milk that you had for breakfast came from.” She turned and started to walk across the quad toward the biology and botany halls. The group walked out of the quad under a stone arch that was a smaller replica of the large arch at the main entrance to the university. Helen led them across the street and into a parking lot, calling out, “Watch out for traffic.”

The children looked back at Nancy with disbelief. Nancy put a finger to her lips. “Just follow Ms. Helen and listen, please.”

A three-story building designed to look like the older colonial buildings on campus faced the parking lot. Helen led the children around the side and to the back of this building, where they walked into a fully functioning farmyard. To the north and east sides of a large multi-sectioned paddock stood two large barns flanking fenced-off areas where animals milled around. To the south of the paddock stood two more buildings, each about one-third the size of the large barns. The sounds of chickens clucking and the occasional crow of a rooster could be heard coming from one of these buildings. Beyond the barns and paddocks were large open fields, covered with lush green spring grass, where four dairy cows, a calf, and an assortment of sheep and goats were contentedly grazing. Helen continued to walk the group along the fenced area to where the children could get a closer look at all the animals.

Helen smiled at the group and, with a sweep of her hand toward the animals and barns, announced, “And this is where our milk and eggs come from.”

A small voice asked, “Can we pet the animals?”

“I’m sorry, dear, not today,” Helen replied. “But if you sign up for one of the agricultural classes, you’ll have more opportunities to handle the animals. If you are planning to build a career in animal sciences, you could very well be spending some of your class time here at the Agricultural Center.” She smiled. “Now let’s continue our tour of the rest of the campus.”

Nancy watched the woman vacillate between reality and her tour mode. Except for her occasional comments about the children starting classes in the fall, Helen appeared to be fine—but Nancy still harbored serious concerns about the woman’s ability to cope with the children.

The group followed Helen back across the street to the sidewalk on the main street that entered the campus. They filed along the tree-lined street, under the grand entrance arch, and onto the main road fronting the campus. Here they took a right turn and crossed this street too.

Helen stopped everyone and announced, “We have two more stops to make, so please stay with me while I take you to the Campus Emporium.”

“What’s an emporium?” Rachel asked.

“It’s a shopping center, dear. Students can go to the Campus Emporium to purchase things they need without having to go all the way into town. There’s a coffee shop, a pizza shop, a couple of clothing shops; students can purchase electronic text and processing apps for their classes, or practically any other supplies they may need. Most of the time, students go to the Emporium as a place where they can eat, relax, and socialize.” Helen finished. “Is everyone ready?”

The children mumbled or nodded that they were ready to continue, so Helen turned and briskly walked down the sidewalk, passing between two buildings into a large open courtyard.

“What does the word ‘emporium’ mean?” one of the first-grade girls asked.

Helen turned to the child. “The term ‘emporium’ refers to a large store that offers a variety of items for shoppers to purchase. Our Emporium is a collection of small shops that offer a variety of goods and services to our students on campus.”

The children looked at each other with confused expressions. “Come along, I’ll show you.”

Helen led the group into the mall courtyard and the children filed along, looking into the closed shops. Helen enthusiastically pointed out each shop as the group walked past. The children quickly became bored with window-shopping since all the shops were dark and closed. Nancy watched as they became fidgety and tired of the tour and decided it was time to cut it short.

“Helen? I think the children need a break—why don’t we head back to the quad?”

Larry and Jeff’s hands shot up. “Can we go to the cafeteria now?” Larry blurted.

“I don’t think the cafeteria is open right now,” Helen responded. “During the summer break, the cafeteria closes down and the food court and the Emporium serve meals for the students who take summer classes. The cafeteria is designed to serve large numbers of students during peak class season. But we’ll walk past the cafeteria on our way back to the quad.”

The children robotically followed Helen back across the main road and onto a path that wound between more school buildings. The path ended at a side street where Helen stopped and pointed toward the fishpond on the other side. “Your dorm is on this street,” she said, pointing left, up toward the building where they had spent the night. She then walked to the front of the building on their left, facing the street, and stepped up onto the steps. “And this is the cafeteria,” she indicated. “To the left of the cafeteria is the business office, and to the right is the Physics Hall. The cafeteria also houses the food science classes for those of you who are interested in going into careers in the culinary arts or dietary health services.”

Nancy scrutinized the older woman and noted that she looked tired. She decided the tour had gone on far too long and to wrap it up. “Who wants to go back to the quad?” she called loud enough for all the children to hear. She had already heard many of them commenting that they wanted to see the fish again—but she had also heard comments about wanting to go home. The stress of the last 24 hours was taking its toll, and the children were showing signs of it. Nancy recognized they needed a break from having reality stuffed down their throats.

Jeff and Larry approached Nancy. “Mrs. Jackson, could we go in and see how the cafeteria is set up?”

Nancy glanced at Helen’s retreating back, as she had already started to lead the children toward the quad. She turned to the boys. “Come on. We’ll at least look in the windows.”

She quickly jogged up the steps with them. When she caught up, they were already testing the locked doors. They would have to be satisfied with looking through the windows. As they pressed their faces to the glass, they discussed how they would arrange their food service plans for this location and shut down the food court.

Both boys came from families that had been in the restaurant business, and their common background had cemented their friendship since kindergarten. Nancy listened as they talked about opening and running a restaurant just like their parents, eager to get started right away.

“Can Mr. Carl let us in?” Larry asked.

Nancy smiled at their exuberance. Their plans would help them deal with their grief; now she needed to find distractions for as many of the other children as she could to help them through the coming dark days.

“Let’s just get through lunch today and see where we are tomorrow. There’s a lot to do for us to get settled in here.” She all but begged the two excited boys. She was happy they had a goal—a purpose to focus on—but worried about how long their enthusiasm would last.

They turned and hurried to catch up with the rest of the group, walking over the bridge that spanned the fishpond. Nancy and the boys caught up with Helen on the other side.

“Well, that concludes our tour for today. If you will all follow me back toward the student union and the administration buildings, you will be able to collect your registration forms to sign up for classes in the fall.” Helen turned and started walking back toward the quad.

The students looked to Nancy, confusion written on their little faces.

“Mrs. Jackson, are we going to school here after summer?” one of the children asked.

“When do we get to go home?” another child whined.

Nancy sighed, then called out to Helen, “Helen, could we go back to the library steps, please?”

“Well, we usually end the tour back at the administration building, but if you want to go back to the library, that won’t be a problem.” Helen continued walking across the quad directly to the library. Nancy signaled for Frank and Tim to help gather the children together in front of the building.

Nancy stopped at the bottom of the steps and used her voice and hands to direct the children to sit facing her. Once they were seated, she spoke. “You know that yesterday we came here because—except for us—everyone else…” She paused, searching for a way to explain the situation.

“Everyone is frozen,” a young voice stated flatly.

Nancy looked up and saw AJ looking back at her. She nodded, then repeated remorsefully, “Frozen. Carl and Sam have gone to get their horses and check to see if anything has changed. When they get back, they’ll tell us what they have found. Until something changes, this will be our home.”

The sound of sobbing could be heard from several directions within the large cluster of children. Many of the older children had their arms around the youngest, giving what comfort they could, but all of the children who had been clinging to the hope of going home to their parents were now forced to face the reality of their situation.

Nancy held up her hands for attention. “Until something changes, this is as safe a place as any for us to stay. As those of you who came on the tour have seen—thanks to Mrs. Helen’s kindness—there is a large variety of venues available for us to use here, and yes, if we are still here in the fall, you will be taking classes.”

“Hey, that’s kinda cool,” a young male voice said. “We’ll be going to college next year. We just passed up middle school and high school and now we’re going straight to college.” Some of his friends quietly chuckled with him.

“You mean you just barely passed to middle school,” a young feminine voice snipped.

“Who said that!?” the boy demanded, as some of the other students chuckled louder.

Nancy forced a weak smile. “Well, I guess if anything about this situation is ‘cool,’ that might be it. If nothing changes, you’ll all be going to college this September.”

The sobbing had diminished slightly, replaced by sniffles. Nancy looked up, thankful for the warm, sunny spring day. “Mr. Frank, Tim, and the other children have brought up some sports equipment, so if you want to play some games or just sit under the trees and relax, take this time to do that.”

Helen stepped up beside Nancy and announced, “My chefs and I will need to go down to the food court to prepare lunch. I think we could use a few more volunteers to help.”

Larry and Jeff jumped to follow Helen, along with several of the older students, back to the food court to prepare lunch for the group.