CHAPTER 17
MYLES
My palms are sweating. I’m standing behind my desk in my classroom, glancing towards the door every five seconds as I watch the queue of eleven year olds grow and grow out in the hall ready to be let in. There is no reason for me to leave them outside, raucously waiting for their very first day as a high schooler to begin. The bell hasn’t gone yet but there isn’t a rule that says I can’t let them into Form early.
Form. Form.
Such a funny term for what it is: a fifteen minute period at the start of the day to confirm attendance and pass on any important information to twenty kids who probably couldn’t care less.
My nerves are getting the better of me.
The classroom is a wall of windows on the hall side, so the children can see everything I’m doing—or rather not doing. I pretend to be doing something important for another minute when I’m really just rearranging my notes for the day and will have to arrange them back once this is over.
I finally move to open the door and plaster on a calm smile, “Good morning, everyone.”
The noisy hustle silences at my appearance, and that is truly terrifying.
“When you come in, I want you to take a seat wherever you’d like, but choose wisely, because it’ll be yours for the rest of the year.”
Moving aside, the shuffle begins into the classroom. I haven’t quite figured out how I’m going to police the seating arrangement, but they don’t need to know that.
I have admittedly been fortunate with my Form group—a bunch of Year 7s experiencing their first day at Webster’s right along with me. I know Brinsley hasn’t been quite so fortunate, as she’s taken over a group of Year 10s from her predecessor. Fourteen year olds are much less easy to control.
I know from the faculty induction we were given, new Year 7s are grouped in forms with at least one of their friends from primary school by request where possible. This is now glaringly obvious as a group of four girls sit together at the front, giggling any time they throw a look at me, and a good ten boys who gather over the back tables. The remaining students find seats where they can.
“Alright,” I collect a sheet from my desk and hand it to the table of girls, “I’m handing out a blank table plan. You need to write your name where you’re sitting and pass it on.” I then collect the stack of school planners on my desk and leave them on the table on the other side. “Same premise with the planners. Take one and pass it on. When that’s done, we’re going to take the register. When I call your name, you need to come up to the front and get your schedule for the year.”
The room becomes a hive of movement and murmuring. I take a seat behind my desk and wait for the table plan to come back to me. I tag it with ‘7WEB3’—the name of our Form group and slide it into the tray on my desk. Behind me, the whiteboard is turned on displaying my computer screen. The school’s logo is at the top, my name underneath it, and the form group below that.
After the register is done, I play the video all the form tutors have been given, watching along with the kids as Eric Paulson, the head teacher, gives a stiff welcome introduction that looks like it was recorded about fifteen years ago. Knowing how long Paulson has been the head teacher here, that is entirely possible.
For the Year 7 students, there’s an assembly in one of the halls tomorrow morning, so I make sure they write it in their diaries and mark the hall on their maps before they leave.
Given it’s a Tuesday, after an inset day yesterday, my first class of the day is ‘9B’, my secondary group of Year 9s. I have two groups of Year 7s, 8s and 9s, and then one group of Year 10s and 11s—my GCSE students.
I instruct them to sit where they please as I did with my Form group, and hand out a seating plan while I introduce myself and the curriculum this term. Thankfully, nowhere this year in the specifics does it mention ‘A Study in Pink’, which leaves no opportunity for any of the students to draw, or paint, or impression genitalia.
“Sir,” a boy at the back with dark tousled hair and a lanky frame sticks his hand up.
I quickly consult my seating plan, “Yes, Jamie?”
The teenager lowers his hand and leans forward, “My brother had Miss Rose last year, and he said they got to draw dicks and vag.”
I close my eyes briefly, trying not to laugh. “Try not to use those words on school grounds, please?” A great start to my first day. I know they’re trying to test my boundaries. I expected it.
“What, vag?” He’s grinning.
“No, you know what.”
“Oh right, yeah. Cocks, then.”
I give the boy a withering glare. “Did you have a question or are you trying to fluster me?”
“Both?”
I roll my eyes but can’t help my smile. Oh, to be fourteen again and discovering my body and the things it can do. “Go on.”
“Well, are you gonna be doing that? ‘Cause my brother’s is up on the canteen wall and I want that, too.”
“Which one is your brother’s?” Another student asks—one of the girls. I try to hide my shock.
“The pink one.”
I have to roll my eyes again. “No, Jamie, we will not be doing the same study this year. But whatever you end up with at the end of the year could still go on the wall. If it’s good enough.”
“I’m really good.” He insists. “I just thought we’d be drawing penises and shit.”
“If you’re as good as you claim you are, you’ll excel at whatever creative task you’re given. Right?”
That shuts him up and sets a determined look on his face.
“We’re not doing anything like last year, because this year you’ll be narrowing down your own skills. You’ll get to research a whole host of well-known artists, whittle it down to two you like the most, or feel most similar to creatively, and create a portfolio of works based on that.”
The prospect of creative freedom seems to encourage them.
“There’s a folder on each of your tables with a selection of artists and a brief bio. You’re going to spend the first hour researching and the second hour coming up with theme ideas to do in their impression. And when I say theme, I mean something cohesive—animals, transport, a location, fashion, nature.
“Next week we’ll do the same again, except the first hour we’ll be going to one of the computer rooms so you can look a little further than what’s in front of you. Any questions?”
“Can our theme be genitalia?”
“No. Keep it clean, please. I’ll be consulting on all of your themes before you start your workload in a couple of weeks.”
A scruffy boy at the back of the room puts his hand up. I notice his polo shirt is far too large and heavily discoloured. Something tugs in my chest.
I check my seating plan again. “Yes, Sam?”
“What if we’re not very good at art? At all?”
I study him for a moment—the shaggy hair, gaunt features, hollow cheeks, slumping figure. I feel him a kindred spirit to when I was at school—clothed in hand-me-downs and desperate for a haircut and a meal that hadn’t come rationed out of the freezer. Bottling my anger and letting it fester into something it shouldn’t. Avoiding the unwarranted wrath of a foster parent who considered me nothing more than a nuisance, who fostered for all the wrong reasons.
I shouldn’t project onto an oblivious boy, but I can spot a child of the system as well as a hawk can spot a field mouse.
“It doesn’t matter,” I tell Sam honestly. It doesn’t matter to me that he thinks he can’t draw, or paint, or impress. Because not everyone can, and there’s undoubtedly something else in another classroom that he can do. “We’re not just drawing in this class. You find a style that you’re most comfortable with and go from there. And if you’re still not sure, then that’s what I’m here for.”
He doesn’t look pacified by me, but he doesn’t say anything else.
I tell the class to begin.
* * *
At half twelve the bell signals the beginning of lunch. On Tuesdays, the period between morning break and lunchtime is spent with my form group again for PSHE. I’m not entirely sure why it’s not handled in science lessons but what do I know? I’ve had the training to teach it and so I must.
Once my classroom is empty, I lock it up and head to the staff room for lunch. There’s a small selection of sandwiches, snacks and drinks, so I take my pick and find a table. Within five minutes, Brinsley joins me with her pre-made lunch of some variety of tomato pasta.
“You. Are. So. Lucky.” She tells me with a worn-out look.
“I am?”
“Yeah. Not only do you not have to teach a bunch of fifteen year olds about safe sex measures,” I wince at the thought—my lesson plan covered bullying today, “but all of your lessons are two hours long. I’ve had sixty kid’s names to go through today, and I’ve still got another forty to go!”
I pull a face. “Sorry?”
Brin huffs, “I bet you are.” She gives me a look, gaze scanning my clothes.
I glance down at myself. “What?”
“I’m used to seeing you in shorts or jeans… This is weird. I didn’t expect you in this.”
Perhaps my work wardrobe is somewhat eclectic, but I didn’t want to cycle through black or grey trousers with plain shirts every day. Today I’m wearing a black dress shirt with light grey plaid suit trousers and braces.
I shrug. “I didn’t want to be boring.”
“When me and Shez were about fourteen, there was this new Geography teacher that started, and he always wore trousers like that, but with a white shirt and black braces. And he’d got a stretcher in one of his ears and these thick black glasses. All the girls fancied him.”
“Except you, right?” I joke.
“No, I did fancy him. It was Sheridan who thought he was trying too hard.”
I snort, even though the subject of Sheridan makes me a little angry. And only at myself. The day after we got back from our vacation, I went through every social media platform I could think of trying to find her and failed miserably. She doesn’t even have a LinkedIn, and I don’t know the name of the company she works for.
I could’ve asked Beau or Nash, but it would’ve ended up in a fight I don’t want to have. I was too nervous to ask Brin or Shirley because it meant possibly letting on what had happened between us. There was the possibility that Sheridan had already told them but given the way the two of them spoke to me, I assumed that wasn’t the case. There hadn’t been a Bennett family gathering for me to attend since coming back, and with the animosity between Beau and I, I’m not entirely sure I’d go to one if the opportunity arose.
Still, I think about Sheridan—Birdie—and that night all too often.
“If he worked here now, would you ask him out?”
Brinsley looks horrified. “No, I have a boyfriend. Plus, he’s at least ten years older than me, which I find a bridge too far. Add that he was actually my teacher once upon a time makes the whole thing a massive no.”
“Fair enough.”
“I was going to say, that’s you now.” Brin gives me a pointed look. “You’re the teacher all the girls are gonna fancy.”
“I can’t see how that’s a good thing.” And I remember the French teacher saying a similar thing.
“It’s fine if you don’t do anything about it.”
I can’t keep the grimace off my face, and Brinsley laughs maniacally.
“Your face. Myles, you’re too good for this world.”
“I think not pursuing a student just makes me an average member of society.”
“Bare minimum.” She points her fork at me. “Valid.”
Shirley, in a form fitting burgundy pant suit, suddenly appears and slides into a free seat. “I know this is just gonna make my Brinsley roll her eyes, but this is so nice.”
I chuckle, and sure enough, Brin rolls her eyes like a teenager. “I’m glad there’s familiar faces here,” I admit.
“I agree,” Brin says with a forkful of pasta halfway to her mouth, “even if one of them is my mother.”
Shirley swats her daughter’s arm. “Before I forget—Myles, our next family meal is the first week of October for Brian’s birthday. It’s the first Sunday, so make sure you keep the day free.
I mark it in the calendar on my phone to appear contrite. “Noted.” I might have to be dragged to it by my ears, though.
“Good lad. How’s your first day going? I didn’t see you at break time.”
I’d hidden in my classroom at break to give myself fifteen minutes to breathe. I’d also seen Emily the French teacher prowling the halls and wasn’t mentally prepared to be hit on like she had done nearly every day last week while I was settling in. I’d shoved my earphones in and pretended to be deep in concentration when she ambled past. Didn’t stop her from knocking the door, though. I pretended not to hear her.
“Yeah, fine. Good. Overwhelming, but fine so far.”
“When don’t you have any classes?”
“Tomorrow before break, Thursday after break, and Monday middle period.”
Brinsley’s mouth falls. “You have six free hours a week?”
Brinsley is an English teacher, which means she has two classes per year group, and multiple lessons with them a week. At least three hours, as it’s a core subject. Art is not a core subject and is only an elective for GCSE students.
Shirley leans in and mutters something to Brin, which I imagine to be along the lines of the fact that I am undoubtedly paid less for the pleasure. When Shirley pulls back, Brin seems suitably scorned.
“I also have Thursday afternoons free, so if you ever want to stop by my office, feel free.”
Given the lack of a mother figure in my childhood, I’m grateful for the offer and likely to take her up on it. “Thanks, Shirl.”