Beginnings

by Debbie McGowan

  When his mum told him that he was moving schools, he thought that the new school would be just the same as his old one, and he’d been a bit nervous about it, especially joining a new class so late in the year. But he didn’t have any choice. They lived too far away from his old school, and he was kind of happy about that, because some of the lads were starting to get really naughty, climbing into people’s gardens and taking stuff from other children’s desks. On his very last day, just before the Easter holidays, two of them had been caught breaking into the deputy headteacher’s office, where the tuck shop money was kept, and their mums had to come in and take them home, in the middle of the day!

  “If you can start tidying away now, children…”

  Mrs. Kinkade’s voice brought George back from his thoughts. He’d finished his hot air balloon a while ago and glanced across to see how Josh had got on with his kite. It didn’t look a lot different from when he had helped him to stick on the piece of red tissue, but at least he didn’t have glue and scraps of paper all over his fingers this time.

  Shaunna and Adele had both created beautiful stained glass projects. Shaunna’s was a kite, like Josh’s, but she had carefully cut the tissue into thin strips and laid these horizontally across each section, so that her kite was all the colours of the rainbow, in order. Adele’s was a butterfly, which she had completed with perfect symmetry, and it was easily the best in the class. Mrs. Kinkade told her so and put a little star next to her name on the wall chart. She smiled proudly, her little pink cheeks lighting up her whole face. Dan almost growled at her as she skipped past to give the teacher her butterfly, so it could be displayed in their classroom.

  Mrs. Kinkade stapled it to the wall, along with any of the other children’s work that was worthy, which included Shaunna’s and George’s. She looked at Josh’s kite and patted him on the head.

  “Well done, Joshua,” she said, “That’s excellent. Would you like to finish it at lunchtime?”

  “No, Miss. I can’t. I’m going to see Mr. O’Malley.”

  “All right, dear. No matter,” she replied quietly, then to everyone, “Please put your chairs under the desks and queue up by the door.”

  The children all did as they were told; George followed suit, bemused.

  “You coming, George?” Dan asked, as they filed out of the classroom, heading for the playground.

  “Err, yeah,” George said vaguely. He was watching to see where Josh went. He was walking very fast, and in the opposite direction to everyone else. “Why doesn’t he come out to play?”

  “Dunno,” Dan said. “Come on.” He broke into a run, and George followed, off across the playground, to where the rest of the five-a-side team was already assembled. Soon after, they kicked off, with George playing in goal once again.

  It would be several months more before Dan discovered that George was a brilliant striker, and years before he scored the winning goal in the Under 18s County Cup, putting his own name and Dan’s (as captain) on record for posterity.

  * * * * *

  The Reading Corner

  It was the very last week of their second year in junior school, and also, because of staff changes, the end of two years being taught by Mrs. Kinkade, to the delight of some and the dismay of others. She had them hard at it, busily tidying the classroom, deciding on which pieces of work they wanted to take home, and which they wanted to throw away.

  Adele and Shaunna had decided to keep almost everything they had done, and their desk was piled high with self-portraits, paintings of flowers and fairies, and so on. Dan and the five other boys at his table didn’t want any of theirs. The five girls at the next table along were copying each other, and each had a modest pile of their best work in front of them. The three girls and three boys at the table behind Josh and George had likewise picked out the best of their work and were presently engaged in cleaning out the art cupboard at the back of the room.

  “Daniel,” Mrs. Kinkade addressed him. His shoulders immediately dropped. She laughed. “You’re not in trouble, dear. Mr. Patton wants to see you.”

  Dan quickly cheered up and left the classroom. Mr. Patton was the teacher who looked after the sports teams, and he had picked Dan out for a special job. With Aitch starting high school in September, he needed a captain for the under 11s seven-a-side team, and Dan was perfect. He was competitive, well liked by the other boys, and reliable.

  Having discussed this with the other teachers beforehand, Mr. Patton was optimistic that it might keep Dan out of trouble, or at the very least, serve as a constant carrot to dangle, should he be tempted into trouble, which was probable, given he was a Jeffries boy. Most of the teachers had had the misfortune to teach both Michael and Andrew; some of the older staff had even taught their father.

  Incredibly, out of the three brothers, Dan was the most well-behaved, but he had a shocking temper and had been in a fight at least once per half-term since he started school. Granted, most of these were related to football, or with his brother, but it was hoped that giving him responsibility for the team would mean he no longer felt the need to challenge the older boys.

  Back in the classroom, Shaunna and Adele were currently sorting out the coloured pencils, checking them against a ruler, discarding any that were less than five centimetres in length and sharpening the rest, before returning them to the appropriate section of the pencil tray. The boys were taking desk drawers to the boys’ toilets, one at a time, and rinsing them under the cold tap. The toilet floor was utterly drenched, and so were the boys. The five girls were sorting the exercise books into ones from their class, ones from previous classes, and new ones, and Josh and George were in the reading corner, tidying the bookshelves.

  Josh picked up a small stack of paperbacks, with the intention of returning them to the third-year classroom. These were the books he had borrowed during the year, but every time he made it as far as the edge of the carpet, George would call him back.

  “Is this one of the books you read?” he said for about the tenth time. Josh blew his fringe from his eyes and turned back.

  “Yes,” he said, putting down the increasingly heavy pile.

  “What’s it about?” George held up the book so Josh could read the cover.

  “Great Expectations, by Charles Dickens.”

  “Who’s Charles Dickens?”

  “Have you never heard of Charles Dickens?”

  “No,” George admitted cautiously. He turned the book around and flicked through the pages. “It’s got very small writing. And lots of words.”

  Josh tutted. “That doesn’t mean it’s hard to read, George!” He took the book from him and went to put it on the top of the pile.

  “Read it to me, please?” George asked.

  Josh spun on his toes and looked at him. “Really? You want me to read to you?”

  “Please.” George nodded enthusiastically. Nobody had ever read to him before, not until he came to this school and became friends with Josh.

  “OK.” Josh tutted again, although it was all an act. He picked up the book and sat cross-legged on the carpet. George sat down next to him. “We can read a paragraph each,” Josh suggested.

  George agreed, reluctantly, for he had tried this many times before and it was very hard for him. He didn’t know half the words Josh knew, but Josh was a good teacher, so George always tried his best.

  Josh began.

  “Chapter One.

  “My father’s family name being Pirrip, and my Christian name Philip, my infant tongue could make of both names nothing longer or more explicit than Pip. So, I called myself Pip, and came to be called Pip.

  “I give Pirrip as my father’s family name, on the authority of his tombstone and my sister, Mrs. Joe Gargery, who married the blacksmith. As I never saw my father or my mother, and never saw any likeness of either of them (for their days were long before the days of photographs)—”

  “D’you know what they looked like?” George interrupted.

  “Who?”
>
  “Your mum and dad.”

  “My dad. Not my mum.”

  “What was he like?”

  “Dunno. Tall, brown hair. He had a big nose.”

  “Oh.”

  “What’s your dad like?”

  “Tall, kind of bald. He shaves his head.”

  “Does he have a big nose?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Oh, OK.”

  With that interlude over, Josh continued to read.

  “—my first fancies regarding what they were like were unreasonably derived from their tombstones. The shape of the letters on my father’s, gave me an odd idea that he was a square, stout, dark man, with curly black hair. From the character and turn of the inscription, ‘Also Georgiana Wife of the Above,’ I drew a childish conclusion that my mother was freckled and sickly. To five little stone lozenges, each about a foot and a half long, which were arranged in a neat row beside their grave, and were sacred to the memory of five little brothers of mine…” Josh trailed off, having noticed that George was distracted.

  “Have you ever wished you had a brother, Josh?”

  “Not really. Have you?”

  “Yeah. Sometimes I think it’d be nice to have someone to play with.”

  “But—”

  “I mean, when it’s raining and stuff, and you can’t go out with your friends to play.”

  “I like being your friend, George.”

  “I like being your friend too. You’re kind of my best friend.” George started rubbing at his knees, embarrassed.

  Josh was overwhelmed. After a couple of false starts, he managed to continue reading.

  “…who gave up trying to get a living, exceedingly early in that universal struggle, I am indebted for a belief I religiously entertained that they had all been born on their backs with their hands in their trousers-pockets, and had never taken them out in this state of existence.”

  He handed the book across to George and pointed to the next paragraph. George frowned and scanned through the first few words before he started to read.

  “Ours was the marsh country, down by the river, within, as the river wound…” He pronounced the word as in an injury, rather than the verb, ‘to wind’.

  “Wound, like when you wind the bobbin up,” Josh explained, accompanied by hand actions. George nodded and continued.

  “…wound, twenty miles of the sea. My first most vivid and broad impression of the identity of things seems to me to have been gained on a memorable raw afternoon towards evening. At such a time I found out for certain that this bleak place overgrown with nettles was the churchyard; and that Philip Pillip, Philip Pill…Phil-ip-Pill—I think I’d have changed my name too,” George said, shaking his head. Josh giggled. George went on.

  “—late of this parish, and also Georgiana wife of the above, were dead and buried; and that Alexander, Bart…” He stumbled again and ran his finger along the name, pronouncing the syllables under his breath.

  “…Bart-hol-o-mew, Abraham, Tobias, and Roger, infant children of the aforesaid, were also dead and buried; and that the dark flat wilderness beyond the churchyard, int…” George sighed in frustration and scratched his head.

  Josh put George’s finger back on the page and kept hold of it, as they traced the words out together, with Josh pausing whenever George got stuck.

  “…intersected with dikes and mounds and gates, with scattered cattle feeding on it, was the marshes; and that the low leaden line beyond was the river; and that the distant savage lair from which the wind was rushing was the sea; and that the small bundle of shivers growing afraid of it all and beginning to cry, was Pip.”

  George stopped and grinned. He handed the book back to Josh.

  “See? It’s not really hard,” Josh said.

  “No. I s’pose,” George agreed doubtfully.

  Mrs. Kinkade had noticed them, sitting together on the carpet, reading the book, and, having decided that it would be counter-productive to the aims of her chosen profession to stop them, allowed them to continue with their current activity.

  “‘Hold your noise!’ cried a terrible voice, as a man started up from among the graves at the side of the church porch,” Josh read—in a terrible voice. “‘Keep still, you little devil, or I’ll cut your throat!’”

  “Keep still, you little devil!” George repeated.

  “Or I’ll cut your throat!” Josh finished in the same croaky, strange accent, so that it came out more like ‘Or oil cat ya frow’, with Josh acting out slicing at George’s throat as he said it. George pretended to topple over dead, and they both giggled. Josh pulled George upright again, and they sat, holding hands, as Josh continued to read out loud.

  “A fearful man, all in coarse grey, with a great iron on his leg. A man with no hat…”

  ***

  Mrs. Kinkade waited until the other children had left for their very last afternoon playtime of the year, before she approached.

  “Your reading has come along beautifully this year, Joshua,” she said, helping him put the final few books back on the shelf.

  “Thank you, Miss,” he replied, turning bright pink.

  “And it is very kind of you to also help George with his reading. You get on very well.”

  “Yes, Miss. I think he is my best friend.”

  “I think you are probably right about that.” She turned and perched on the edge of a tiny table, arms folded, a sad smile settling on her face. “I need to explain something to you, Joshua. You’re not in trouble, or anything like that, but you need to understand that little boys holding hands…” She sighed. “I think it’s perfectly wonderful that you have a best friend to hold hands with, but lots of people would not.”

  “Why not, Miss? Adele and Shaunna hold hands, and they are best friends.”

  “Yes. And that is precisely my point. It’s all right for little girls to hold hands, yet it’s frowned upon for little boys to do the exact same thing.”

  “Like the way girls aren’t allowed to wear trousers to school?”

  “Yes, I suppose it is just like that.”

  “It’s not fair, is it, Miss?”

  “No, it isn’t, Joshua. It isn’t fair at all.”

  ***

  “Hi, Mam.” George ran into the flat, grabbed a biscuit from the almost empty tin and was all set to run straight back out again.

  “Hang on, you,” his mother called. He stopped in his tracks. “Uniform off, please.”

  “But it’s the holidays!”

  “So? Will you not need your kex in September, lad?”

  “I’ll get new ones.”

  His mother laughed and rubbed his head. “I’m hopin’ you won’t grow so much over summer.”

  “Oh.” George sighed. He clomped off to the bedroom to get changed, depositing his uniform in the green-and-white laundry bag, ready for the next visit to the launderette, and made his way back through the living room. He stopped, thoughtful.

  “Mam. Why aren’t boys allowed to hold hands?”

  “What, love?”

  “Miss said boys can’t hold hands.”

  “Did she?” His mother frowned and took the last cigarette from the box. She was going to have to borrow some money again. “Why? Who was holdin’ hands? You?”

  “Yeah.”

  “With a girl?”

  “No.”

  “Well.” She searched for her lighter, patting her pockets and then pushing her hand down behind the couch cushions. She found one and tried to light it, but it was empty. “Fetch us some matches, will you, love, please?”

  George ran into the kitchen, returning a moment later with a matchbox containing a single match. His mother used it to light the cigarette, inhaled deeply and closed her eyes.

  “Mam?” George sat next to her and took her hand. She opened her eyes and smiled.

  “We’ll be right, lad, don’t you worry.” She looked down at his little hand inside hers. “If you want to hold hands with another boy, then you bloody w
ell hold hands with another boy,” she said. “But be careful. There’s folk who think it’s wrong, and they can get right nasty about it.”

  “Why?”

  “God only knows, love. But it’s them that’s wrong, not you. And don’t let ’em tell you otherwise. D’you hear?”

  “Yes, Mam.”

  “All right, love. You go off and play. Tea at six.”

  He leaned across and kissed her cheek, and then he was gone.

  * * * * *

  Dawn ’Til Dusk

  Jess arrived at school and went straight to the classroom, as her dad had told her to, stopping off only once along her journey in order to explain to Mrs. Robinson why she needed to go inside before the bell.

  “My mummy had her baby yesterday, Miss,” Jess told the teacher, smiling a huge beaming smile. She was so excited to have a new baby sister.

  “Oh, how wonderful!” Mrs. Robinson said, clapping her hands together.

  “She’s called Daisy, and she is six pounds exactly. I’ve brought in these little cakes for the class.”

  “All right, lovely. You go on in.” Mrs. Robinson stepped aside, and Jess skipped past, slowing for Mr. Granger to open the door for her.

  “Thank you, Sir,” she said, and continued on her way. Alas, the classroom door was still locked, and she had to wait a few minutes for her teacher—Miss Hampster—to arrive. She was the best teacher in the world, their whole class agreed. Especially as she, too, thought it was funny that her name was almost the same as the furry little creatures that the fourth years took home for a week at a time. Jess couldn’t wait to be in fourth year. She put the cakes down on the table outside the classroom and counted the weeks with the help of her fingers.

  “June the twenty-eighth today, so two days, plus July, August, September…” She hissed through the number of days and divided them by seven. “Ten weeks!” she whispered excitedly.

  “Good morning, Jess.” Miss Hampster smiled as she drew up alongside and put her key in the lock.

  “Good morning, Miss,” Jess replied. She picked up the cakes.

  “I’ve just seen Mrs. Robinson. She says you have some good news to tell me.”

  “Yes, Miss,” Jess said and went on to explain.

  “Congratulations! Are you happy?”