Chapter 2
2
‘C ome on in, Kay,’ Nick drawled. He didn’t look up from his phone and his gangly six-foot-three frame had slid down his chair, presenting her with a suit-clad bundle of pointy limbs – all knees and elbows. If this had been her classroom she’d have barked at him to sit up… and put that thing away! But it wasn’t her classroom; it was his office. And he wasn’t her student, he was the headteacher and her boss.
She slipped into the seat opposite.
‘Won’t be long.’
‘No problem,’ she lied, letting her handbag drop to the floor.
‘My wife,’ Nick muttered, managing to look at her. ‘Need to let her know I’ll be late or I’m in trouble.’ He smiled.
Kay managed something like a smile back. Nick went back to his wife and she turned to look at her bag, squinting at it as if it was a puppy who might yet disobey. She’d forgotten something, something that she should be doing right now if she hadn’t had to come to this meeting. The clue was in her handbag, that much she felt sure of. But the handbag sat smug and silent as a sphinx. Turning away, she tilted her head to the ceiling. No, the clue wasn’t there either.
Nick was still tapping. Tap tap… tap tap tap…
Kay closed her eyes. Relax, Kay, and breathe in and out, in and out, in and … She tried to let the words flow, but they stuttered and stuck like a shopping trolley with a wonky wheel. Her fists balled and her jaw clenched and hell, she knew, would freeze over before she relaxed, which was so ironic considering that up until yesterday (when Nick’s email had pinged into her inbox), she’d been bowling along quite nicely. The week’s holiday in Cyprus had changed things. Caused if not a seismic shift, then a gentle tilt in her world and for the three weeks since she’d been back, she’d felt as if she'd been walking on air, clean and fresh as a drain after a slug of Mr Muscle.
Because while she was away Alex, her grown son, had coped brilliantly. He’d managed his meals and the house and his job in a way that had Kay, for the first time since his childhood diagnosis of Aspergers, believing in a different kind of future for both of them. It seemed that Martin, her ex-husband and Alex’s dad, had been right all along. Alex could cope on his own. More than that, he would, she conceded, probably thrive in his own little flat. His needs were simple and as long as they were met, he was happy. It was time, long past time, that she finally released all those dreams she’d held on to for so long. Let them, like feathers on water, drift away for some other mother to pick up. Her son would never be a doctor, or a solicitor or a teacher. He’d probably never travel, or even marry. And the irony of her week away from him, the only time in her life they had ever been apart, was that in leaving him, she had enabled him to leave her. An emancipation that left her both heartbroken and excited. How impossible motherhood was.
And how ironic that the same situation was also being played out with her own parents. Because while she was away, her mother, deep now in the grip of dementia, had gone into a nursing home. And in that one week, her father had been out of the house more times than he had in the last twelve months. He’d always turned down the respite care offered, preferring instead, as he explained, to keep it in the family, which of course meant Kay. She hadn’t argued. Because wasn’t that what families did? Take care of each other? Except after seeing Alex cope so well, it was becoming clear to Kay that the orthodoxies she had accepted without question were vulnerable after all. In other words, she might be wrong. She’d been wrong about the best way forward for her son, refusing to cut the apron strings, using (yes it was true) his diagnosis as an excuse. And now it seemed that the best way forward for her mother might also be an option that neither Kay herself, nor her father, would have considered before. A permanent place in a nursing home. Thinking this, she squinted and turned again to her handbag. What she’d forgotten to remember was something to do with her mother. She was getting warmer, definitely closing in…
‘Thank you for coming, Kay,’ Nick said loudly. He laid his phone on the desk and whatever it was she had come so close to remembering scurried away to the shadows. Lost amongst the fluff and the debris of her overworked mind.
Kay made a half-nod. Thank you for coming? The idiotic things people said these days, as if attendance had actually been optional. Unintentionally she glanced at the clock and then back at her bag. Was the clock a clue?
‘Good.’ Now Nick was looking at her bag. ‘Well,’ he started, ‘as far as?—’
‘Excuse me.’ And like a struck bowling pin, Kay suddenly tipped sideways to sweep her bag up, part the depths of its contents and yank out an empty packet of incontinence pads. That was it! She needed to stop at the chemist’s and pick up some more for her mother. ‘I’m sorry,’ she muttered, stuffing the packet into her cardigan pocket. ‘I just remembered. Need to pick some up on the way home.’ She patted her hip. ‘If I hear it rustle, I’ll remember.’
Nick flexed an eyebrow. ‘Well, obviously I’ll keep this as short as I can.’
‘It’s OK.’ And even though she could feel herself flushing, she gabbled on. ‘There’s a chemist on Park Road, open late. I’ll pop in there. It’s not that far out of my way.’ Why was she doing this? Why was she explaining herself to a man, who had a wife to do chemist trips? A wife who would, right now, be cooking his dinner, pairing his socks, changing the nappies of any family members that needed changing. Nappies? That felt like a clue… She looked at her handbag again. Hadn’t she already solved the puzzle?
‘Or.’ Leaning back in his chair, Nick nodded at her cardigan pocket. ‘You could always pop a reminder in your phone calendar?’
‘I could, couldn’t I?’ Kay smiled. Of course she could! If she ever found herself at the end of the day with forty minutes spare to work out how to affiliate all the calendars of her life she could just pop a reminder in! If she wasn’t wasting precious time watching Real Housewives of Beverly Hills (which was very relaxing), she could do that!
‘Shall we start?’
‘Of course,’ she beamed.
Nick leaned to his computer. ‘Right. Well as I hope I made clear in the email, Kay, regardless of the fact that this is now?—’
‘Official?’
He looked at her. ‘Yes, unfortunately, that is the right word.’
Her lips pressed to a thin hard line. She would not cry. She would not… A tear sneaked out. A great fat disobedient glob of wetness. Fuck it! She patted her pocket, pulled out the empty packet of incontinence pads, stuffed it back in and searched the other pocket until, finally, she found a scrag of tissue.
‘Kay.’ On the other side of the desk, Nick waited. ‘This is still resolvable on an informal basis,’ he said gently. ‘And that’s how I would like to manage it.’
Kay blew her nose. What did he expect her to say? Me too? She didn’t say anything. She was twenty years older for God’s sake and, after this stupid shaky start, determined to retain her dignity. Thirty years of teaching with an unblemished record and now this official complaint that could never be erased. Because no matter how it was resolved, whichever way Nick spun it, the slur would remain.
‘Let’s start at the beginning,’ Nick said. He peered at his screen. ‘Mrs Woods first made contact back in May. And I forwarded you her concerns?—’
‘You did,’ Kay said and before she could stop herself, added, ‘Friday before half term.’ Friday afternoon? Who forwards that kind of mail, on a Friday afternoon, before a week’s break?
‘Ah.’ Nick glanced at her, a flush of discomfiture crossing his face. ‘Look, Kay.’ He leaned his elbow on the desk and rubbed at his chin, which was pale and smooth as a teenager’s. ‘You’re a good teacher.’
I know – she didn’t say.
‘You know it.’
I do – she didn’t say.
‘The whole school knows it.’
As it should – she didn’t say.
‘But—’
She raised her chin and watched him.
‘We have to take parents’ concerns seriously. And despite the fact that a formal complaint has now been recorded, that is still what we’re terming it. A concern. You can understand that?’
‘Of course,’ she lied. Oh, to go back to the last century! To when Lizzy, the headmistress then, simply told the caretaker to switch off the lights when parents’ evening had gone on too long, had threatened to get stuck in the bog of parents’ concerns.
‘Good.’ Nick glanced back at his screen. ‘How was your holiday? I hear you went to Cyprus.’
So – he wasn’t even going to apologise for the timing of the email. She shifted her weight and scratched at the itchy point on her neck. The always itchy point. For nearly a month now, this parental concern had been squatting like a sulky child in the corner of Kay’s mind. The mother of one of her year ten pupils had become convinced it was Kay’s personal dislike of her son (and not the boy’s lousy attitude) that was responsible for his poor grades. The week in Cyprus had kept the issue in the shadows, and since she’d been back Kay had done her best not to think about it. Which had been surprisingly easy. Nick had promised the parent in question, Mrs Woods, that he would investigate, which he had with what Kay considered to be a long and productive chat between the two of them. Most importantly, she’d felt a real improvement in her relationship with the boy himself, Zac. Which is why, last week, she’d felt confident enough to ask him to step up and swap roles with her for a few minutes. A light-hearted challenge to keep him engaged in the class, that Zac had embraced with enthusiasm and thoroughly enjoyed. So how, in the name of all that was sane, that five minutes of laughter and good-humoured repartee had been twisted into this official complaint, stating that she had forced Zac into a situation whereby he was humiliated and embarrassed and left feeling unsafe, Kay had no idea. An official, unmovable, indelible complaint: she still couldn’t quite believe it was true. After thirty years! ‘The holiday was lovely,’ she answered perfunctorily. The sooner this was over the better.
‘Great.’ Nick nodded. ‘And your mother? How is she?’
Kay’s mouth widened in surprise. In five years of his headship, she hadn’t had a single personal conversation with him.
‘Emma was telling me.’ He indicated the door, on the other side of which, during school hours, sat Emma, the school secretary.
Well, that made sense. She did talk to Emma, who talked to everyone else.
‘I understand,’ he said quietly. ‘You have a lot on your plate right now.’
A lot on your plate? Kay looked at him. It wasn’t that she didn’t like Nick. True, he was no Lizzy who finished off half and full terms with drinks to 70s hits in the staff room, rather than emails that outlined concerns . No, it was more that he was a different generation with different ideas, some of which she could accommodate and some of which she couldn’t. The isolation room for example. Whenever she passed and saw the row of small heads, spaced in their blank cubicles, her gut rolled like a barrel. That wasn’t teaching. But then again, she couldn’t deny the success of the Friendship Bench he’d introduced, a simple idea where kids feeling lonely or left out might sit and wait for someone to notice and then include them. She’d witnessed its modest methodology time and again, marvelling at the innate goodness in children. So, although for better or worse it did increasingly feel to Kay that the terrain of her professional world was transforming so fast she could barely stay standing, she was, she knew, still a good teacher. Regardless of what went on outside the classroom, inside it she remained in control, respected. She could still do it. So, if Nick was now trying to imply something else… If he was insinuating… Her thoughts crashed aground. ‘No more than usual,’ she said, tight-lipped, a little depleted.
Nick nodded. ‘My wife’s grandmother had dementia. It was… it’s hard.’
‘Fuck-a-duck!’ Kay slapped her hand on the desk.
‘Kay?’
The dementia team! That was it. That was what she really needed to remember! The phone call they were due to make, which was the first tentative stage in the process of, perhaps – because she wasn’t quite there yet – admitting her mother into the nursing home permanently. It was today at six. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said and shook her head. She had to get back. Her father needed to be with her to take the call, even though she hadn’t even told him the call was happening yet! And how had that happened? How was it that in the time between she and her mother’s carer Craig deciding upon this first step, she hadn’t found an opportunity to sit down with her father and say: You’re not to worry. Nothing’s decided. It’s just a phone call. This is what I’m thinking … This is what is needed, Dad … This can’t carry on, Dad … I can’t cope any more, Dad … Because it was too hard, that’s why. Because it would break her father’s heart clean in two, that’s why. ‘I’m sorry,’ she mumbled, burning up with a heat that could have come from the guilt she felt, or the shame she felt, or even the hormones she was shedding through menopause. Take your pick. ‘I just remembered something,’ she added quietly. ‘Something quite important… yes…’
Nick was watching her, studying her actually.
Her eyes half closed. This too much on your plate conversation had reached a dead end she couldn’t see a way out of. She was trapped, because it was true. How could she have possibly forgotten something so important? Too much on her plate? It was heaped, overflowing. Starters, main and dessert all lumped together. Alex. Her mother, her father. Her job. The cat. Her weight. These flushes. The dragging fatigue. The washing machine spin cycle not working, the leak at the back of the kitchen sink. Portion after portion after portion… Unable to extricate herself from Nick’s questioning stare, Kay fell back on the only thing in her life that had never failed her. Her humour. ‘The funny thing is,’ she said lightly, ‘The carer that my mother has, he went to this school. I used to teach him maths.’
‘A him? Really?’
‘Craig Taylor. Before your time.’
Nick nodded. He was stuck on the him part , exactly as Kay knew he would be.
‘Of course my mother gets his name wrong.’
‘She does?’
‘She calls him Tony,’ Kay said. ‘Tony Blair.’
Nick’s eyebrows shot up.
And suddenly Kay realised why she remained so ambiguous about Nick. It wasn’t just the generation gap. It was the sense of humour gap. Tony Blair? It was funny. My God, when did it become necessary to get permission to laugh at something so obviously funny? ‘It’s good actually,’ she added.
‘Is it?’ Nick floundered.
‘Oh yes. My mother always had a lot of respect for Tony Blair, so at least she’s stopped hitting him. Craig, I mean. Not Tony. Obviously not Tony.’
‘Right.’ Nick’s jaw remained slack.
Kay looked at him. No more too much on your plate bullshit again – she didn’t say.
‘Right.’
‘So! I suppose we’ll be needing to fix a time for us all to meet?’
‘Er… yes.’ Nick held her glance half an uncomfortable moment longer, then palpably relieved, turned to his screen. ‘Mrs Woods has suggested next week.’
‘Fine.’ Kay waved her hand at his screen. ‘Just go ahead and schedule something. I’ll make myself available.’
‘You don’t want to discuss it further…’ He trailed off, because she was shaking her head.
‘No.’ She absolutely didn’t.
‘OK… Well, I’ll need your account in writing before…’
‘Of course.’ Kay heaved herself to her feet. ‘Was that it? Because, if you don’t mind, I do really need to get on. I’ll have something with you by tomorrow.’
‘Kay.’ Nick too was standing. He opened his palms. ‘Are you OK?’
‘Absolutely fine,’ she said and swung the door open.