Chapter 20
Joe Balls got up early for the morning meeting. Very early. Anything so as to get into work without being seen.
There was no doubt about it, he told himself, tiptoeing down the stairs in order not to wake the rest of the house, it was awkward. Extremely awkward. Joe hadn’t believed his eyes when Gemma had turned up at his door, claiming to live in the room next to him.
Then, before he could take it in, there had been the hamster incident, which had had Lynette and Mike in stitches when he’d described it. It had surprised him: somehow, the mercy dash to the vet had made him see a completely new side to himself. Who would have thought he could have got so worried about a tiny creature?
But when the vet had made that embarrassing assumption that he and Gemma were a couple, he had realised that it would be impossible to carry on living next door to each other. It simply wasn’t professional, which was why he had felt obliged to be rather cool with Gemma when they were back at school the next day.
How, he wondered, as he got on to his bike, parked in Joyce’s garage, could he possibly share a bathroom with a colleague? And how could he have a serious staff meeting with Gemma if they’d both seen each other that morning in their dressing gowns? Hers had been a rather pretty pink one, down just below her knee. His was navy blue paisley silk, a present from Ed a few Christmases ago, which covered more of him than Gemma’s had of her. Even so, she had looked aghast at him as though he was virtually naked.
By the time he arrived at school, he had decided the whole situation was untenable. He would definitely have to find another room to rent. Meanwhile, he needed to concentrate on this morning’s security meeting after that horrendous newspaper report on Lily Dalung, which had led to some extremely terse emails between him, Gemma, Beryl the headmistress, Dilly Dalung and the school governors.
The meeting was meant to have taken place in the main school but Beryl had changed the venue to Puddleducks, declaring she wanted to walk round the pre-school building and check for any possible security lapses on site. What did she expect? Holes through the walls where the paparazzi could poke their cameras? Beryl, like so many of the staff out here in the sticks, was so parochial!
Now, as he let himself into Puddleducks early, thanks to Gemma and the bathroom issue, Joe’s stomach churned, although not with apprehension. The takeaway he’d had last night from that place on the high street hadn’t settled, but he’d felt unable to do anything about it in the lodgers’ bathroom, knowing that Gemma might try to turn the handle on the other side at any minute.
It reminded him of life on the fourteenth floor, where some bright spark had decided to combine the Ladies and Gents to form unisex loos in order to create space for a new office.
Embarrassed, he had often ‘hung on’ as his mother used to say, which was just what he was doing right now. But the urge was increasing – it always did that in times of stress – and dammit, he simply had to go. Wildly, Joe looked around for the staff loos.
Snatching open a door hopefully, he groaned at the sight of the broom cupboard with a stack of metal buckets and mops. Still, he might just need them if he couldn’t find the real thing.
In desperation, he tried another door. With relief, he found it led to a row of loos all right, but then his heart sank again. They were built for Snow White’s dwarfs with miniature seats and slatted doors that had huge gaps both at the top and the bottom, presumably so staff could check that the occupants were all right.
Joe’s stomach gurgled once more. Groaning, he flung himself in, shut the door behind him – no locks! – and closed his eyes in relief, even though it was like sitting on an egg cup.
Bloody hell. A noise! A female noise! Gemma and Beryl were outside in the hall and he, stupidly, had left the main door to the loos ajar so he could hear snatches of their conversation.
‘Can’t understand how it could have happened.’ ‘None of the staff would have done anything like that.’
‘Mind you, since I called the police the other day, we haven’t had any other trouble.’
‘Probably found another story to chase by now.’
Quietly, Joe pulled down the lavatory roll. What was this? Each square had a printed letter of the alphabet on it, with a picture of an object starting with that letter. At the moment, he had D for Drum in his sweating hands.
Now he was in a quandary. If he pulled the chain, they would hear him. But if he didn’t … No. That didn’t bear thinking about.
‘What’s that?’
Joe froze. It was Gemma’s voice.
‘Hang on. The door’s open. Someone’s in there. I can see feet.’ She was whispering, but he could still hear her. ‘ Men’s feet.’
One man, he wanted to shout out. Just me.
Desperately, he put himself together and stood against the door so she couldn’t get in.
‘Be careful,’ called Beryl’s voice.
There was the sound of something being scraped along the floor. No! Someone was carrying a stool and was about to stand on it to look over the top!
There was no other option now. ‘It’s me.’ His voice came out cracked with embarrassment. ‘Joe. Joe Balls. I got caught short, so to speak. I’ll be out in one minute.’
The shocked silence, followed by more whispers and a definite suppressed giggle, was everything he had feared. Pulling the chain (well, what else could he do?), he came out, washed his hands with the tiny bar of pink soap and shook them dry, not fancying the look of the towel, which clearly hadn’t been changed from the day before.
‘Sorry about that.’ He sheepishly waved his hand about as though he made a habit of sitting on miniature loos every morning. ‘Thought I’d test out the er, “facilities” as part of the security check.’
Beryl’s face, which reminded him of a crinkled King Charles spaniel at the best of times, exploded into tears of laughter. ‘Get a life, lad. You needed to go , didn’t you! Nothing wrong with that. It’s happened to us all.’ Her expression grew serious again. ‘Now, we need to talk about this situation. Luckily, Dilly Dalung has said she still wants to keep her daughter at Puddleducks.’
‘Really?’ Joe could hardly believe it.
‘That’s down to Miss Merryfield here.’ Beryl flashed a warm smile of approval at Gemma, which made Joe feel like the least favourite child. ‘The parents, including Miss Dalung, say she’s a real gem.’
Turning back to Joe, she sniffed, making it clear she didn’t feel the same way about him. ‘Not that that means we should be complacent. I want to take a look around and see if anyone could have got in without us knowing. I’m absolutely certain that none of the staff would pull a stunt like this, and several parents have approached us promising that none of them would have done anything to jeopardise a child’s safety by talking to the press.’
Joe cleared his throat. ‘If you don’t mind me saying, all this is very na?ve. Most people would do anything for money.’
Beryl shot him a sharp look. ‘Not in Corrytown, they wouldn’t.’
He exchanged a glance with Gemma, finding, with a surprised flash of relief, that her face confirmed exactly what he was thinking. Beryl wasn’t living in the real world.
‘There are some oddballs out there,’ began Gemma tentatively.
Joe nodded gratefully. ‘She’s right and I do think, if you don’t mind me saying, Beryl, that we should have talked to the parents more formally about the situation.’
Ignoring Beryl’s hostile expression, he reached into his pocket for the notes he had made earlier. ‘Now I’ve got a few suggestions.’
They spent the next half an hour putting forward various ideas, which included Joe’s proposal to write to the Press Complaints Commission about the invasion of a child’s privacy. As Gemma pointed out, they couldn’t afford to have photographers peering over the fence like the ones she’d sorted out the other day. He had to hand it to her: she had guts! Pity he hadn’t been there to see it.
‘Right,’ said Beryl at the end of the meeting. ‘All that sounds good. Better be getting back now, hadn’t we, before school starts.’
He turned to say goodbye. ‘See you tonight then,’ he said to Gemma.
Beryl raised her eyebrows.
‘We live in the same house,’ explained Gemma, flushing.
‘Not like that,’ added Joe, but Beryl was already clucking something about it was none of her business but she was glad to see that they were getting on so well. She then bustled off, leaving Joe to shuffle from one foot to the other in front of Gemma, feeling that he ought to say something. On the fourteenth floor, when you needed to get out of an awkward situation, the best plan had been to surprise the opponent with an unexpected comment.
‘Nice loo paper, by the way.’
Gemma’s face relaxed. ‘Thanks. I ordered it from this new educational supply company to improve my children’s spelling.’
Big mistake. They were never ‘your’ children: he’d learned that in the inner city, where he’d seen too many teachers trying to help kids who then spat in their faces afterwards.
‘Pity you can’t do the same with their maths.’ The comment slid out of his mouth before he could stop it and, too late, he could see he’d hurt her.
‘We’re working on it. The numbered loo paper is coming in next week.’
‘I’ll look forward to seeing it.’ There was a pause. ‘Not, I mean, that I intend to make a habit of sitting on Puddleduck loos.’
They both laughed, and Joe felt a sense of relief that he had saved the situation. It had been surprisingly nice just now, when they’d been working together rather than against each other.
‘Just one thing.’ She was moving towards her desk as she spoke, and her authoritative tone made him feel as though he was the junior and not her. Something inside him bristled.
‘I hope you don’t feel,’ she said smoothly, ‘that you have to find another room to rent, just because of me. I’m sure it will work out if we don’t get in each other’s way.’ She coloured again. ‘I mean, what I’m trying to say is that I’m a very private person. In fact I was thinking. Suppose you use the bathroom before, say, seven, and I use it at seven thirty. Does that give you enough time?’
There was something in that. After all, it would be a pain finding somewhere else to live right now. Maybe he and Gemma could make it work just until Christmas and then he’d start flat-hunting. ‘I prefer to get up earlier. How about six thirty and seven?’
She seemed amused at this. ‘I’ll find my kitchen timer.’
Was she poking fun at him? Ed had always teased him about his strict timekeeping.
‘By the way, what are you going as on Wednesday?’
‘Going as?’
‘For the assembly. You know, the Significant Figures.’
‘Oh that.’ He tried to sound as though he hadn’t forgotten about it. ‘I’m still making up my mind about that one. Are you still going as the first Queen Liz?’
He’d tried to phrase this casually, but somehow it came out in an awful pseudy way.
‘No. I decided my dress wasn’t right.’
Her voice had a slight edge to it. Women were so odd about clothes! In his experience, you never knew how you were meant to react. Was she expecting him to assure her that the dress would be perfect, even though he hadn’t seen it? That would have been just what Ed would have required.
‘At the moment,’ she continued more brightly, ‘I’m thinking of Peter Pan, because I’ve still got my old green school tunic.’ She flushed. ‘You never know when that sort of thing will come in handy, do you?’
Suddenly he had a mental vision of Gemma in tights. Where on earth had that come from? ‘I’m sure you’ll find something. Is that the time? I must be getting back to the main school. See you later. As for the security lapse, I don’t need to remind you that as Beryl said, this simply can’t happen again.’