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The hands still soared heavenward.
‘Er, yes?’ said Polly, marvelling that the room was carpeted. ‘Gentleman with the baseball cap?’
‘Mrs, Miss or Ms, ma’am?’
His face was earnest. After all, he wasn’t sure he’d even met a gentleman before, let alone been referred to as one.
‘Miss,’ confirmed Polly with a relieved smile; he was clearly enthusiastic and polite and not the practical joker type.
A class of ten? Do you know, that’s less than the weekly detention crowd at BGS!
Polly looked about her, nine pairs of hands lay neatly on the tables in front of them. A tenth pair were hidden but heard, tapping away at a lap-top. Polly cleared her throat.
‘You there? With the computer?’
‘Yes, Ma’am?’
‘Miss,’ said Polly. ‘What are you doing?’
‘I’m just logging “Miss Polly Fenton” into my file, Ma’am.’
‘Miss,’ said Polly.
‘Miss,’ said the girl, closing the lid of the machine and giving Polly her undivided attention, prefixed by a shy smile and then a beaming, glinting grin displaying a mouth with more metal than enamel.
‘Okey dokey,’ said Polly, surprised at her choice of phrase, ‘you now know me, but who on earth are you? Plural!’
The students delivered their names.
Oh that they could wear name badges too! How ever am I to distinguish between AJ and TC? Lauren and Laurel? And two Bens, would you believe, not to mention a Heidi, a Forrest and the two others whose names I’ve completely forgotten?
‘Super!’ Polly declared instead. ‘And could you let me know which of you are the semaphores?’
The class laughed politely and AJ, who turned out to be the boy wearing the baseball cap, corrected her kindly and informed her that he was a sophomore and sixteen years of age, and that TC, Forrest, Lauren and Ed (ah, that was it, Ed!) were as well. Laurel, the girl with the lap-top, explained that she was a freshman and had just turned fifteen. Polly deduced that the remaining freshmen were both Bens, Heidi and the boy with no name, who was rather overweight but wore the sweetest smile Polly had ever seen in a fifteen-year-old.
‘Splendid,’ said Polly and, as she did so, she observed ten pairs of eyes glaze slightly while the smiles stretched at her vocabulary. ‘Let’s crack on. What’s so funny? Lauren?’
‘It’s just, like, your accent’s so neat, I guess we’re gonna have a bunch of fun learning English from an English lady.’
It was the first time Polly had ever been referred to as a lady so she chose to go easy on Lauren’s command of the English language.
‘Thank you, Lauren, but I’d rather you spoke of a bunch of flowers tied with a neat ribbon – and perhaps an accent that is, for example, jolly nice, and English lessons which, I assure you, are to be tremendous fun.’
The class gave her a swift round of applause; Polly bowed graciously, somewhat mystified by her unpremeditated plumminess and her employment of the forbidden adjective, nice.
‘Now,’ she said, rummaging in her large bag, ‘now, have I a treat for you. Where the Dickens—? Ah, here we are. Pumblechook!’ she declared suddenly, fixing a wild smile on Heidi and making her jump. Silence rapt the students. Polly left her table, on which she had been perched, and walked slowly around the semicircle of desks in front of her, distributing books. ‘Snodgrass!’ she whispered to TC; ‘Sergeant Buzfuz!’ she declared to Forrest. She walked behind Ben (with the blond hair, must remember) and cried ‘Pecksniff!’ above his head as she clasped his shoulders. The class were captivated, Lauren looked positively frightened as Miss Fenton approached her, held on to her eyes and uttered ‘Uriah Heap!’ in sombre tones. Miss Fenton placed both hands on Ed’s desk and growled ‘Chuzzlewit!’, before going to AJ, removing his baseball cap and replacing it, backwards, while she cried ‘Mr Tappertit!’ The second Ben (curly hair, snub nose; curly hair, snub nose) she greeted with ‘Bumble!’ before singing ‘Mrs Fezziwig!’ to Laurel. Just the nameless boy. Polly stood in front of him and tipped her head, ‘Dick Swiveller,’ she declared, after some thought.
‘No, Miss Fenton,’ he said, slowly and ingenuously, ‘I’m Dick Southwood Junior.’
Thank goodness for that.
‘Miss?’
‘Yes, AJ?’
‘Who are these guys?’
‘Dickens!’ brandished Polly, ‘Charles Dickens Esquire. Born the 7th of February 1812, died on June the 9th, 1870. With names as imaginative, as delicious to the tongue, as Snodgrass and Pumblechook, can you imagine how colourful and fantastic the characters are themselves? Do not such names bode well for marvellous stories?’
Somebody whistled in slow appreciation.
‘Miss Fenton?’
‘Yes Laurel Lap-top?’
‘Was that 1812?’
‘Yes, and you don’t have to commit it to the silicon memory of that machine. Switch it off, if you please, and tune in to this: David Copperfield.’
With copies distributed to each member of the class, Polly said ‘Chapter One’ while her eyes sparkled olive at the students. They read in silence until the end of class.
‘Ladies! Lay-deez! Upper Four – attention this instant! Lucy Howard, back to your place. On your chair, young lady – do not soil that desk with your derrière. Quiet. Angela, excuse me, Angela! How do you fancy detention tomorrow? You don’t? Well then, shut it! Thank you. How gracious you all are. This is Miss Carter, who’s taking Miss Fenton’s place for a year. She’ll be your form teacher as well as English teacher to some of you. Alison Setton, bring me that paper aeroplane. Now!’
‘Miss Reilly thinks she’s so cool when really she’s naff.’
‘I am cool, Alison, you just can’t handle it – detention tomorrow – you can sew position tags on to the new netball vests. This, as I said, is Miss Carter. You are all to be cordial, friendly and SILENT.’
Megan Reilly fixed the class with an uncompromising stare, patted Jen on the shoulder and whispered to her that she was hoarse already, bless the blighters.
‘A word of advice,’ she disclosed in quiet warning, ‘don’t smile until half term.’
She patted the new teacher again and left the room, remonstrating to Jesus, Mary and Joseph when she heard the decibel level soar just as soon as she’d closed the door.
Jen Carter stood behind her desk and in front of a blackboard. She’d never used a blackboard before. At Hubbardtons they had expanses of wipe-away white. And odourless, non-toxic coloured markers.
She’d never heard such a racket.
She’d never taught a class with more than twelve students to it.
She’d never taught only girls.
She’d never met blighters.
How in hell’s name was she going to gain their respect, how ever was she even going to get their attention?
Don’t smile.
How long was it till half term?
She turned to the blackboard and began to write her name in long, sloping letters. The din continued, subsiding only temporarily when the chalk grated at a particular point on the board. It was like the volume being switched off. And then switched on, twice as loud, immediately after. She turned back to the class.
‘Quiet, please.’
Did she say something?
Dunno. Couldn’t hear it if she did.
Bet those teeth are capped.
Yeah. And those boobs are definitely plastic.
‘Ladies,’ she tried, ‘quiet?’
Ha! We’ve got her, she’s cracking.
Come on, let’s all hum.
Yeah! And sway slightly.
‘Per-lease!’
Jen turned back to the blackboard and stared at her name. Amazingly, the volume was cranked up a further two notches. Brainwave. She took a deep breath and then dragged her fingernails across the blackboard (capped teeth were impermeable to the screech) before spinning on her heels. The class, still soothing their jaws with their hands, were silent; momentarily at least. Fixing her eyes on the clock at the back of the classroom, Jen spoke from the pit of her stomach in deep, curdling tones.
‘Shut. The fuck. Up.’
8.40 a.m.
Respect!
‘Don’t you ever, EVER make me swear again,’ she told thirty pairs of awestruck eyes.
FIVE
‘Kate, please may I use the phone?’ asked Polly.
‘Sure,’ said Kate and, disconcerted by Polly’s sludge-green eyes, she placed a wand of raw spaghetti between the pages of her book and discreetly left the kitchen as if she had been just about to anyway.
‘Hullo?’
‘Dom?’
‘Hullo, Pollygirl – how are you? How’s it going? What am I saying! Hold on. Max? Max! Quick! I’ll pass you over. You take care, Miss Fenton – them yankies can be wankies. Max? Max! He’s in the frigging bath, Polly. Would you believe it? Call back in five mins, yes?’
‘’Kay.’
‘Hullo?’
‘Meg?’
‘Po-lly!’
The women shrieked at each other nonsensically down the phone for a moment.
‘Max is in the bath.’
‘So I’m your second choice – charming!’
‘Dear Miss Reilly,’ soothed Polly, knowing Megan meant no mischief, ‘I’ve just finished my first full day. It’s the first chance I’ve had to use the phone. I can’t be too long – just give Max enough time to dry.’
‘How are you, girl? What’s it like?’ asked Megan while she located Polly on the school photograph and stroked her with her little finger. ‘Is it incredible? Have you met Tom Cruise yet?’
‘Yes,’ said Polly, ‘and no.’
‘Anyone who looks remotely like him? Brad Pitt, at a scrape?’
‘No,’ said Polly, ‘and no. Or not that I’ve met so far, I’m afraid. There might be, but I’m jet lagged beyond belief. Do you know, this place, Meg, is so, so beautiful. There’s so much space for the children – in class and out. Guess how many I have in a class?’
‘Can’t! Tell!’
‘No. More. Than. Twelve.’
‘Jee—’
‘And they’re all impeccably behaved. They’re even quiet before class!’
‘—zus. No wonder That Carter Woman looks so shell-shocked.’
‘Everything OK?’
‘If you call Upper Four OK.’
‘Say no more. What was for lunch today?’
‘Lunch? Pie and mash, or mashed ratatouille and mash. And some clumpy pink mash for pud.’
‘Do you know what I had? Ask me!’
‘I say, Miss Fenton, what did you have for lunch?’
‘I had Caesar Salad with a selection of cold cuts and a freshly baked roll.’
‘Stop, stop – that’s just not on.’
‘Well, I could have had vegetable burritos, if that makes you feel any better.’
‘No it bloody doesn’t.’
‘Or there again, chicken papardelle with tarragon cream. The Federal Government subsidizes the food while making guidelines about fat content and protein quotas.’
