Show Ups

The Lovers’ Tiff

Mister Hedges was nowhere to be seen when 2A1 arrived at his first floor classroom for our English lesson. Finding the door unlocked, we streamed in.

On the far side of the sunlit room and halfway back, I pulled up a chair and was about to sit down when I heard a kerfuffle. Ann Howe had just rested her heavily laden bag on a front row desk when Brian Lack walked past and snatched it. With Ann in hot pursuit, Brian came tearing down the gangway alongside me and launched the bag my way, two handed, as he ran to the back of the room. Catching the bag was a matter of instinct and good luck on my part, as it lessened the impact of it slamming into my gut. 

‘Urgh! I don’t want Aggie’s bag!’ I cried, as I flung the bag at her.

 Ann, who’d already swung towards me, half caught it as it fell to the floor.

‘What’s going on here?’

Mister Hedges was standing at the door. I froze. Ann froze. In just a few seconds we’d gone from quietly minding our own business to being trapped in the spotlight.

With the rest of the class sitting in angelic silence, Mister Hedges wandered over and stood between us, arms folded.

‘Well?’

I left it to Ann to explain. The truth would surely exonerate us, but Ann didn’t explain. Flustered, she only succeeded in talking herself into a tizzy.

‘I was just getting my bag back,’ was the sum of it.

Being no stranger injustice, I couldn’t help getting anxious.

‘Well?’ said Mister Hedges, directing the question at me.

With the eyes of the class upon me, I suddenly felt unnerved. Telling the truth could get me off the hook but with Brian listening carefully, I had to be careful. After taking the likelihood of some unpleasant retribution into consideration, I meekly followed Ann’s lead.

‘I was just giving it back, Sir.’

Mister Hedges clasped his hand to his chin, seemingly as an aid to thought while he assessed the evidence. The tension rose as five, ten, fifteen seconds ticked by. Then suddenly, he seemed enlightened. ‘I see,’ he said, as a knowing smile crept across his face, ‘then what we have here is a lovers’ tiff?’

I could have died on the spot. Ann too, I suspect, when a cheer went up that left the pair of us burning up with embarrassment. And there on the back row, lapping it up, was Brian Lack, the swine.

The Daydreamer

Another science lesson: My mind wandered, as always. Desks, old desks, laid out in rows or in double blocks, each with a unique mixture of scribbles and scratches, and an assortment of ink stains seeped into the grain. Raising a desk lid in another classroom wasn’t permitted but a crafty peep often revealed a poster on the underside. The Small Faces, Jimmy Greaves, Bobby Charlton and The Troggs were few of many that smiled upon a clutter of books, pencil shavings, sweet wrappers and bits of fluff that had accumulated since the last desk inspection. Only the desk’s rightful owner could use the lid as a screen for whispering and giggling and making the odd murderous threat. And in the case of some dirty sods, nose picking. And where did the snot end up? Under the desk of course, as anyone who remembers the horror of coming into contact with the solidified snotty artex will testify.

I was rubbish at Music. And French. I wasn’t very good at Technical Drawing either, but I tried. Science though, horrible dreary Science, was the worst of all.

I wasn’t listening to Mister Berger. Mentally, I’d switched off and gone to a world created by posters on the wall. Between the groovy, far out, psychedelic fashion themed posters favoured by the girls of Mister Berger’s form, there were some football ones. One in particular caught my eye – a collection of Manchester United pictures assembled by Alan Greenstreet that was spoiled by the title. I made a mental note to inform the dozy pillock of the standard abbreviation of United when I next saw him in the playground.

‘Lynch! What did I just say?’

 Mister Berger’s voice jolted me from my daydreams. In time honoured fashion I stuttered and spluttered.

‘Stand up, Lynch!’ he snapped. ‘What have we been talking about?’

When I responded in gibberish, an angry Mister Berger called me to the front of the class, whereupon he plonked the chalk in my hand, stood me in front of the blackboard and told me to take over the lesson. Then he abandoned me, shuffling off to the rear of the classroom doing that funny walk of his.

 Out on my own, in full view of a smirking class, I felt my face glowing.

‘Well come on! Tell us what we’ve been talking about. Write it on the board.’

I had no idea what he’d been talking about. He knew it and so did everyone else. With no way out, I assumed the grin of a halfwit.

‘And take that stupid grin off you face, boy!’ Mister Berger barked. ‘Now what were we talking about?’

 That finished me off.  ‘I don’t know Sir, I wasn’t paying attention,’ I replied meekly.

The humiliation over, Mister Berger relieved me of the chalk and sent me back to my desk. A lesson learned? To try and concentrate harder, perhaps, but I still loathed Science.