Everyone has parts of their stories they’d rather not share. They’re stuffed deep down like a teenager’s old teddy bear still hidden under the bed sheets. Exposing those raw parts of our stories might lead to shame, or worse—emotions might spill out we can’t control.

That’s how I often feel anyway. No matter how much I might value authenticity, I still put on a performance and hide pieces of myself. I have to. It’s my job. Teaching, in many ways, is a performance, so my students—and even my family—often get the smiling, positive Mr. Ahnfeldt.

That’s why my students are my heroes. Somehow, they find the courage to take off their masks. They share hard parts of their stories with their classmates, and that’s when real community, like a green shoot breaking through the cold ground, suddenly finds life.

Last Friday, JJ asked if she could share a poem she wrote. Her kindness, like her vibrant personality, is striking. She’s constantly thinking about her classmates. A few weeks ago, she told the whole class her “good thing” was that River was in our class. She made the same comment about Bryan a few weeks before.

When I told her she could share the poem, she walked to the front, calmly waited for everyone to listen and started to read.

“You really think that mask is going to last?” she read, almost shouting. “You’ve had it on so long. . .”

She looked up from her paper. With each line, she was intentionally challenging us, and the confidence in her voice gave her words power.

She kept reading.

“Or are you finally going to say something so that everyone can understand and see. . .”

“All the acting that is bringing agony?”

She finished, and everyone applauded.

“You wrote that, JJ?!! I shouted above the buzz of students. “That was incredible!”

She was right. We need to take off our masks. When we let them fall to the ground, we discover we’re not alone. That’s when healing happens. That’s when the agony ends, and we find help.

Dante found that help a couple of months before. He’s in that same 8th period class with JJ, and as his pen moved across his notebook paper one day, any kind of mask he might’ve been wearing fell softly to the ground.

The class and I had just read a few pages in A Raisin in the Sun when Momma tells Beneatha about real love, the kind that shows up when the giver of that love expects nothing in return.

“Everyone get out your journals,” I shouted.

With big, tired sighs, students leaned over their backpacks and pulled out their notebooks.

“Spend some time writing in your journal about when you’ve seen real love.”

Marley raised her hand, and I pointed at her.

“Can we write about our own experience with real love?”

“Definitely! Did everyone hear that?” I asked. “Marley asked if you could write about when you’ve experienced real love. That’s a great idea.”

Pens started scrolling across paper. The class went silent, lost in thought, and I started walking around the room.

Riley, all decked out in his JROTC uniform, was writing furiously, and Issac was working hard in the back.

Then, Bryan poked Dylan with his pen.

“Bryan, stop it!” I shouted. A few people looked up but then went back to work.

By the time I made it to Dante’s desk, the class had been working for a good three minutes. Dante was hunched over, his big arms wrapped around his notebook like he was protecting it.

Is he sleeping? I wondered. I moved closer.

No he was writing, but that wasn’t all.

He was crying, too.

Dante is generally a happy guy. He’s new to our school, but he still has the guts to throw discus on the track team, and his personality matches the size of his arms. People know when he’s in the room. His laughter is loud, and his smile—infectious.

But in that moment, his body shook. Tears dripped onto his paper.

“Hey Dante, are you okay?” I asked, putting my hand on his back.

He couldn’t respond. In between deep breaths, the tears just kept coming. I looked over his shoulder at his paper and saw the words “suicide” and “grandpa”.

He moved his arm to show me more. Something in that journal had stirred up a flood of emotions, so I kept reading.

I read about him wanting to end his life—standing on a chair with a noose around his neck—and his grandpa begging him not to go through with it.

“That’s when I felt loved,” he wrote.

“Dante, this is amazing,” I whispered. “Your grandpa sounds like an incredible guy.”

He nodded without looking up.

“Hey, do you want to take a walk or talk to someone?”

Just as those words left my mouth, I felt some students standing behind me.

Tomas was one of them, wearing a gentle smile, and he was standing next to Bryan, the same guy who had been poking Dylan a few minutes earlier. Only this time the silliness and attention-getting were gone. He was there for his new friend, and his brown eyes, so full of compassion, proved it.

“You wanna go for a walk?” Tomas asked. They looked at me, making sure it was okay.

I nodded, and then Dante got up, wiping away tears.

The three of them walked out the door, and everyone in the class watched in silence. I wanted to clap. I wanted to shout, “Dante, that took so much courage to write!” or “Way to step up for Dante, guys!” but the moment felt too sacred.  When a young man cries, sometimes there are no words.

Like the feeling you get standing in a sunlit grove of Aspens, a kind of wonder had swept over all of us. JJ had written about throwing away our masks, and Dante had done exactly that, celebrating what his grandpa did for him. And by revealing a hard piece of his story, he  bravely stepped out onto that shaky limb of vulnerability and discovered he’s not alone.  Bryan and Tomas got the chance to show him and all of us what real community looks like, the kind we were made to enjoy.

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