No Heroes by Chris Offutt

paisley with red trim. It was the kind of shirt I’d never have worn as a student because people might think I was a sissy. In my new role I wanted to set an example that was contrary to mountain dress for men.
    I drove the Malibu proudly, enjoying the attention its rumbling engine commanded as I deliberately cruised the length of campus, giving a little extra gas in front of the administration building. Many people believe that the education problems in eastern Kentucky are due to the quality of instruction at Morehead State University. Over the years, MSU went from being a beacon in the wilderness to a dim light shining primarily on itself. The mission statement of serving the region is impossible to meet as long as the university kowtows to coal companies for financial contributions.
    The students were my people, from my hills, at my school but I was nervous as a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs. I parked at Mrs. Jayne’s house and gathered breath deep into my lungs. I can do this, I said to myself.
    I walked briskly to campus, sweating through my shirt, stumbling twice over minuscule imperfections in the pavement. My assigned office was in a small house that had been a private medical office. Instead of framed diplomas on the wall, I hung a map of eastern Kentucky counties. I opened my notes and reviewed my lecture to each of the four writing classes: Creative Nonfiction, Advanced Undergraduate Fiction, Graduate Fiction Writing, and Intro to Creative Writing. I had taught these courses elsewhere, but it was my first experience teaching four classes in one day.
    Just before nine o’clock, I left my office and drank coffee from a Styrofoam cup, watching students stroll to class. The majority were quiet and clean-cut and I wondered what became of the contemporary version of myself—long hair, ragged clothes—and how I would recognize the ones I came to help. Hip-hop music spilled from low-rider pickups driven by boys with their hats on backward. Many cars had tinted windows embellished with gothic script. “Only God can judge me,” read one, a line from a Tupac Shakur song, the perfect phrase to embody hostile rebellion in the Bible Belt. Kentucky has 120 counties, more than any other state, and license plates display the drivers home county. Those cars playing the loudest were from deepest in the hills, and I knew that some of the drivers had never seen a black person except on television.
    I dumped my coffee and headed for class, entering the stream of people. I stopped in front of the English building and reminded myself that I was a teacher now, not a student. The bushes rattled behind me. “Hey, Chris,” someone said. Out stepped Harley, a boy I’d grown up with in Haldeman, now in his late thirties. His breath smelled of whiskey. I’d not seen him in over a decade.
    â€œDamn, Harley, you like to scared me to death.”
    â€œThe law went by a minute ago is all.”
    â€œAre they hunting you?”
    â€œI forgot if they are or not. I just always hide.”
    â€œWell,” I said. “They ain’t around right now.”
    â€œI got half a joint in my pocket if you want to come up in the woods and burn one with me.”
    â€œI can’t, Harley. I start a new job today.”
    â€œThey say you’re a schoolteacher now.”
    â€œI just fell into it.”
    â€œThey’re hard up, my opinion.”
    â€œYou working?”
    â€œHell no,” he said. “I get the crazy check.”
    â€œYou ain’t crazy, Harley.”
    â€œI know it, but the State don’t. And don’t you go telling them nothing, either.”
    â€œYou’d best get up in them woods,” I said. “Come on, we’ll cut through the building.”
    â€œSon, we ain’t allowed in the college.”
    â€œI am, Harley.”
    I led him into the English building, through a hall thronged with students to the rear exit. He put