Chapter 5
It’s Friday, and all I can think is, let’s just get through this weekend, and then we will be free.
We are so close. I have to stop myself from being overtly happy in case Max figures out something is going on. My pupils, who are six and seven years old, must have picked up on how distracted I was today because they were more excited than usual, more rowdy, in their own happy, beautiful way.
Just get through this weekend. That’s all. So close.
I return home from shopping to find a letter stuck on the front door.
SINCE YOU WON’T TAKE MY CALLS OR REPLY TO MY EMAILS!!
It’s attached with Blu-tack. I pull it off and open the envelope.
Miss Price…
I scan to the bottom signature: Diana Ashford-Wells.
Ah. Of course. Mrs Ashford-Wells is little Gregory’s mother, one of my pupils.
I’ve corrected Mrs Ashford-Wells about my marital status at least three times so far, so I know she’s doing it on purpose.
She even met Max once outside the school when he came to pick me up after a parents’ evening, so I don’t know why she insists on calling me ‘Miss’.
Unless she, too, thinks I’m the nanny.
God knows how she got my home address.
Miss Price,
Since I’ve sent you two emails and you haven’t replied to either, I have no choice but to write to you directly.
This is scribbled above the printout of the email, that reads:
Mr Ashford-Wells and I will take Gregory for an educational assessment next week, where we expect to see excellent results. Also, please send me an Individual Learning Plan for Gregory. You will recall that I have asked for this before, but to date, I have not received it.
Again, I ask that you provide us with a letter of support outlining the disciplines in which Gregory excels relative to his peers, as well as a list of special programmes for gifted children in the area.
Mr Ashford-Wells and I believe that Gregory would be well-suited to a chess programme, and we would also like to see him enrolled in a national Maths Challenge.
Also, as previously requested, we ask that Gregory attend reading and maths classes in the year above. He is not being sufficiently challenged.
I look forward to your timely response.
Diana Ashford-Wells.
I shove the letter in my pocket. I teach Year Two at Brookford Primary, and the first time I received a note, as she calls them, from Mrs Ashford-Wells, I was certain I was going to get fired, especially since this is my first teaching position, ever.
But Mike, our lovely headmaster, assured me that Mrs Ashford-Wells does this all the time.
‘When Gregory was five years old, she asked that we enrol him in an advanced maths programme,’ he’d told me. ‘I told her, Gregory only just started his first year of school last week. Let’s see how he settles in first.’ Then he helped me draft my reply, which went something like:
Mrs Ashford-Wells,
Gregory is seven years old. He’s in Year Two. He is a lovely and sweet little boy who is developing well and enjoys school. He is working securely within the expected range for his age, and there are no advanced programmes suitable for Gregory at this stage.
I do not recommend enrolling Gregory in a Maths Challenge programme or enrolling him in the year above. Regarding enrolling Gregory into a chess programme, that would be best left to you and Mr Ashford-Wells, since we have no chess programme at the school.
Regards,
Mrs Kate Price.
I will deal with this letter later. I’m about to put my key in the door when I hear some kind of grunt to my left, loud enough to make me jump.
I stand on my tiptoes and peer over the overgrown hedge at the house next door.
When we first inspected what would later become our house, Max almost didn’t buy it because of the house next door.
You wouldn’t have called it derelict, but it was certainly rundown – the front of it covered in old dirt and cobwebs, paint peeling off and a drainpipe coming loose.
But the estate agent assured Max that the older gentleman who was living there – and had done so for forty-five years – was about to move into a retirement home and the house – ‘a golden opportunity for the right person. You don’t find a fixer-upper like this in these neighbourhoods anymore’ – was already on the market.
I rang the doorbell once to introduce myself, but the older gentleman didn’t open the door. As I walked away, I was sure I saw a shadow move behind one of the dusty windows.
It’s been empty for three weeks, but now there’s a tower of cardboard boxes on the front step, and a dark green armchair rocking back and forth, seemingly on its own, just outside the front door, like it’s trying to squeeze itself into the house.
It’s not succeeding, despite the grunts and huffs and puffs of whoever is pulling and tugging at it from the inside.
‘Shit!’ the chair yelps before toppling down the front step. A woman steps out after it, slim and fit, her slick brown hair in a ponytail, her face shiny with sweat.
‘Are you all right?’ I ask.
She looks around like she can’t figure out where my voice has come from. I raise a hand above the hedge.
‘Oh, hi!’ She waves, smiling broadly and standing on her tiptoes.
‘Hi!’ I say, waving back. ‘Are you okay?’
‘Yes! No!’ She laughs, hands planted on her waist. ‘Don’t mind me.
I’ve been fighting with my furniture all morning.
My removal men left this one outside, can you believe it?
And all that, too.’ She points at the boxes, flapping her T-shirt to let in some air.
‘Is it just me? Or is it hot in these parts?’
I look up at the grey sky and tighten my coat against the wind. ‘I think it might be you.’
She sweeps her hair back with one hand. ‘I’m going to need ten showers after this. Anyway, I’d better get a move on. Here goes!’
She goes down a step and grabs the armchair again. This time it gets stuck in the door.
‘Can I help?’
She pokes her head out. ‘Oh, God. Would you?’
‘Hang on.’ I leave my bags on the mat and walk around the hedge.
I position myself behind the chair.
‘If you could push…’ she says on an outbreath.
I brace against the chair and push. It doesn’t budge an inch. ‘I don’t think it’s going to work,’ I say.
‘Really?’
‘It’s too wide.’
She lets it go. ‘Are you telling me it’s not going to fit through the door?’
‘Maybe that’s why your removal men left it outside.’
She makes a face. ‘Great. Now I have to figure out what to do with it.’
I frown at the chair. ‘There might be a way.’
‘Okay?’
I start shifting the chair to the side. ‘If you turned it…like that…I think it might go in.’
‘Oh! I see. Oh, yes! That makes sense.’ We both twist it into position.
‘And that way…’ I grunt. ‘Now, if you pull it…then we push in the back first and tilt it…this way…’
‘I have a feeling I’m going to love you forever,’ she says, breathing hard with the effort.
A couple of minutes later, the chair has made it through the door.
‘Please don’t hate me, but can we drag it down there?’ She tilts her head to indicate the hall behind her.
‘Of course.’
We carry the chair down the grubby hall and into the living room.
‘You have no idea how happy I am right now,’ she says, standing up straight. She wipes her hand across her forehead, leaving a dark streak just above her left eyebrow.
She’s taller than I am, early to mid-thirties, with a lovely round face and a bouncy air about her. She extends her hand, glances at it, wipes it on her jeans and extends it again.
I laugh.
‘I’m Teresa,’ she says. ‘But my friends call me Teri.’
I shake her hand. ‘I’m Kate, I live next door, with my husband and stepdaughter, so if you ever need anything…’
‘Are you or your husband handy? Because I could use the help…’ She lets the sentence trail as she turns her head slowly. I follow her gaze.
‘Oh, God…’
We both stare at the living room.
‘Wow. You have your work cut out for you,’ I say, taking in the state of the room. The walls are yellowed with age, there’s a single light bulb hanging from the ceiling and the window is so dirty you’d barely know it was daylight.
She wipes her forehead again. ‘A renovator’s dream, they said.’
‘They got that part right.’
‘I have this horrible feeling I made a terrible mistake.’
‘It’s not so bad,’ I say. ‘It just needs a good clean and a lick of paint.’
‘Yes…’ She makes a face. ‘That’s what I thought when I bought it, but now I don’t think any amount of cleaning or painting is going to fix this dump.’
‘What if you sniffed the paint before putting it on? Would that help?’
She bursts out laughing. She has a nice laugh – loud and genuine.
‘Anyway—’ she raises her arms in a make-the-best-of-it gesture ‘—it’s all I could afford, so…what can you do? You don’t happen to know a decorator, do you? Or an electrician? Every time I turn on a light switch, I feel like I’m taking my life into my own hands.’
‘Not really, no… I’ve only just moved here myself.’
She scratches the back of her head. ‘And I don’t suppose your husband happens to be one of those incredibly handy types?’
‘Not that I’ve noticed. I mean, he likes to tinker – you know, men and their toolboxes…’
I gaze around again. Her furniture doesn’t look any better than the house: a wooden table with a burn stain in the centre, three slightly damaged white plastic chairs and a green sofa that matches the armchair we’ve just wrestled with, both of which look like they’ve seen better days.
A draught bursts through the house, making me shiver even though I’m wearing my coat.
‘You look cold, Kate. I’m sorry. It’s the window in the utility room. It’s stuck.’ She sighs. ‘What was I thinking buying this place? I’ll probably freeze to death in here.’
‘You’ll be fine,’ I tell her. ‘But look, I should get on, but if you need anything, as I said, I’m just next door.’
‘Thank you.’ She shakes my hand again. ‘I’m so glad we’re neighbours, Kate. I think you and I are going to be great friends.’