by John Marrs
That surprised me the most, as she’d always been such a popular girl in her last school. Ever since she was little, I was forever telling her ‘no’ when she asked to invite her friends around for tea. Then I did the same with Alice. Children brought with them sticky fingers on walls, head lice, snot, scabs on legs, repetition, neediness, smells, noise, relentless never-ending questions, chaos, stomach bugs, clutter, broken ornaments and unflushed toilets. So, I encouraged the girls to spend time at their friends’ houses instead.
Either my attack had affected Effie more than I thought, or something else was wrong and neither Tony nor her teachers could get to the bottom of the problem. I was being kept on the sidelines of my own daughter’s life. It was frustrating, to say the least. I knew Tony was doing what he thought best by shielding me, but she needed her mother right now. My presence at that meeting would show Tony I was strong enough to co-parent again. Maybe then he might fall back in love with me.
On my arrival at home, I went through my usual routine of spending the first ten minutes waiting outside in the car, my eyes flitting from window to window, looking for any warning signs like sudden changes of light or shadows between the blinds. Steven knew where I lived, and the thought of him being inside my home, waiting for me, made me nauseous.
I could just about see the figure of a tightly balled-up cat asleep on the windowsill. Bieber had grown useful of late, if for no other reason than his impeccable hearing and loud meow that warned me of any sudden noises or movements outside.
Once inside, I turned off the burglar alarm, locked the door and took the bread knife from the drawer in the hall table, then silently padded from room to room. I looked behind doors, drawn curtains, wardrobes and under beds. Only when I was sure I was alone could I relax.
Tony’s face was a picture when he spotted me across the school reception area. It creased with surprise before he regained his composure. The effort I’d made to look my best hadn’t gone unnoticed.
‘What are you doing here?’ he asked, approaching me. He sounded irritated, which confused me.
‘What do you think?’ I replied. ‘Do you like my dress? I got it especially for tonight.’ I pulled my stomach in and gave him a twirl.
‘I don’t care about your dress,’ he barked. ‘We had an agreement. You don’t come to anything like this, I do.’
‘But it’s time I started. She’s my daughter, Tony. There’s something going on with Effie that you’ve been hiding from me and, as her mother, I deserve to know.’
‘Really?’ he replied. ‘You honestly think that? You think either of the girls actually need you?’
I took a step back, willing myself not to get upset. ‘Why are you being so horrible? I thought that since what happened to me, we’d become closer. We were feeling more like a family again and now you’re treating me like I’m not welcome.’
‘Laura, we have been through this a dozen times.’ Tony sounded exasperated. ‘You and I . . . we are never going to happen. Our family isn’t what you’ve convinced yourself it is.’
My heart felt like it wanted to pound its way out of my chest and I clenched my fists. ‘No,’ I replied. ‘I don’t accept that.’
‘This isn’t the time or the place to be discussing this. Please go home. We’ll talk about it properly later.’
He turned his back on me and began to walk away. The gulf between us widened with every footstep. But no matter what Tony hurled at me or how much he tried to hurt me, I still loved him. And when it came to our daughter, I was determined to prove him wrong.
Ahead, a door with the name of the school’s head teacher opened and a man with more hair sprouting from his ears than his head looked at us.
‘Mr Morris and, oh . . .’
‘I don’t think we’ve met before. I’m Effie’s mother, Laura,’ I said, finishing his sentence for him.
The head looked at Tony, puzzled. Tony closed his eyes and nodded, begrudgingly.
‘Come in,’ the head continued, and we followed him into his office, where two large windows overlooked a cricket pitch and a match in progress. Another teacher stood with his back to us watching the game.
I started talking before we’d even been offered seats. ‘I’ve been reading Effie’s reports and I’m not happy,’ I said firmly. ‘I need to know why my daughter’s grades have fallen so badly. You’re responsible for her education, so as far as I can see, this is down to you.’
‘Let me introduce you to Effie’s head of year,’ he replied. ‘Mrs Morris, this is Ryan Smith.’
‘It’s nice to meet you,’ he began as he turned around. I recognised Steven’s voice immediately, then his face. The bottom instantly fell from my world.
‘Please believe me when I say that, as her teacher, I want only the best for your daughter, too.’
CHAPTER FOUR
RYAN
My pulse raced like the throbbing engine of a sports car the moment I heard Laura’s muffled voice in the corridor from where I was standing in Bruce Atkinson’s office.
She was talking to her husband, and whatever they were discussing sounded as if it was riling him.
As Effie’s form tutor and English teacher, I’d met Mr Morris on a couple of occasions to discuss Effie’s poor marks, weak midterm exam results and distracting behaviour. He’d been listed in school records as the first and only point of contact in all email and telephone communications. There’d been a note attached, strictly forbidding us from contacting her mother except in extreme circumstances. However, none of the other teachers I had asked knew why. I removed the note and reinstated Laura’s email address.
A couple of times I’d slipped Effie’s mum into the conversation just to test the waters, but Mr Morris didn’t acknowledge her. I assumed she played a limited role in her daughter’s academic life. However, since I’d begun blind-copying Laura into those emails, I’d made sure she was up to speed, and I had a feeling it wouldn’t be long before she crawled out of the woodwork.
I watched her in the reflection on Bruce’s window as she strolled in confidently. She was a very different woman from the one I’d confronted in my house. Then, she’d been dumbstruck, before lurching from wall to wall, tearing down images of herself and her family, thinking I was going to kill her. Now she was at ease, hair curled and make-up perfectly applied. In our telephone conversations, her voice had been reassuring and calm. At the house, it had been shaky and tearful, but today it was forceful and accusatory.
It took just one introductory sentence and the split-second sight of me to pull the rug from under her feet. After a long separation, Steven and Laura had been reunited.
It had taken a lot of time and effort to engineer our meeting, and I’d needed an unwitting Effie’s help to do it. The moment I saw her photograph in the local newspaper with her mum I’d thought I recognised her, but I cross-checked it with her Facebook profile just to be sure. She was a student at my school. And as I prepared to return to work for the new term, the pregnancy of English teacher Mrs Simmons was a stroke of luck for me. It meant I wouldn’t just be Effie’s teacher, but her head of year and form tutor, too.
I started work again during the school holidays, getting to grips with the syllabus and helping out at some of the extracurricular sports tournaments. I’d insisted on light activity at first, blaming my inability to do anything too strenuous on my fake hernia operation. When school began again in September, I was ready to return full-time.
My colleagues gave me the low-down on which pupils made up Year 10’s hierarchy, and Effie’s name came up time and time again. She was, by all accounts, a very intelligent young woman, but she had a bossy streak. From the first week she transferred to our school, she’d built a clique around her. Social media was her favourite tool, and if she didn’t like someone, she’d rally the troops to make her victim’s online presence hell. When it all became too much for one of her classmates, he’d taken to cutting his arms and legs with a craft knife. He’d since moved schools. However, Effie
had been smart enough to avoid being caught. The apple really hadn’t fallen far from the tree.
I was mindful of the fact she was only fourteen years old and there was a chance she could grow into a better person. But for now, she was exactly what I needed her to be. Bullies like her are always more insecure than the people they attack, so it’d only take a light touch to push her from her pedestal. In my nine years of teaching, I’d learned popularity and intelligence were the only things that mattered to girls like her. Take those away and she’d have nothing.
I started by grading her English essays and tests a little lower than Mrs Simmons had. At first it was an A– instead of an A. Next time, it had slipped to a B+, until by the end of my first month with her, she was averaging Cs. Each time I handed the class their marked papers, I took a moment to watch her scowl as she hid the disappointing bright-red grade on the top left-hand corner of her page from those around her. After the second month, she snapped.
‘Why do you keep giving me bad marks, sir?’ she demanded after waiting until the rest of the class had moved on to their next lesson.
‘I don’t think you’re understanding what I want in your answers,’ I replied.
‘Mrs Simmons never graded me like this.’
‘I’m not Mrs Simmons.’
‘She said English was one of my top subjects.’
‘Your grades tell me otherwise.’
Her face dropped, and the first of several crocodile tears pooled in the corner of her eyes. I remained stony-faced. She had to learn that reaction wouldn’t work on me, otherwise I wouldn’t gain her respect. Instead, I pointed out that some of her reasoning was valid but next time she needed to back up her theories with evidence in the text. Only, when each ‘next time’ arrived, her grades remained the same, or lower. She could only look on, bewildered, as her classmates maintained their marks. I was slowly chipping away at her confidence.
Her essays became longer and longer as she attempted to read between the lines and cover every single point she thought I might be looking for. I marked her down for rambling. One report on Of Mice and Men was so obviously cut and pasted from the Internet that I called her out on it in front of the rest of the class. I swallowed my smile as her face turned scarlet. She’d been expected to take her GCSE in English literature a year early. But when I gave her my predicted grade, she decided against it.
I’d hoped Effie would eventually start questioning her abilities in other subjects, too, but it happened faster than I’d expected. Underneath her bravado, she was much more sensitive than I’d given her credit for. Her standard of work across the board was sinking. Her history, geography, and philosophy and ethics teachers told me her essays were vague and her coursework lacked cohesion. It was as if she were second-guessing everything she wrote, even in subjects like maths, for which there could often only be one definitive answer.
And without her intelligence to lord over her classmates, she did what all bullies do and found another way to seek attention, by playing up and distracting everyone else. One evening after the final school bell rang, I asked her to stay behind and she joined me in my office.
‘I’m not going to lie, I’m concerned about you, Effie,’ I began, and handed her a mug of coffee. She tried to hide her surprise that I was treating her like an adult. ‘Is there something you want to talk to me about?’
‘To you?’ she scoffed. Her default setting of arrogance remained. I had more work to do.
‘Is everything okay at home?’
‘Yes.’
‘Is all good with your parents?’
She paused before she nodded.
‘What about here at school? I know the other girls haven’t been kind to you lately. Is that what’s bothering you? Are you being picked on?’
She shot me a glance. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Are they teasing you about your grades and your – how do I put this properly – your appearance?’
‘My appearance? What are you on about, sir?’
‘Oh, sorry, I’m speaking out of turn. It’s none of my business. I just wanted to make sure none of it was getting to you. You’re a normal size for a girl your age, so please don’t listen to what people who claim they’re your friends say about you behind your back.’
Anger spread across her face. ‘Who’s been talking about my weight?’
I feigned irritation at myself. ‘Oh, Christ, look, I’m not good at this kind of thing. The other teachers said I shouldn’t say anything to you and should let the girls get it out of their system.’
‘The other teachers? You’re all talking about me? And what girls?’
‘It’s not for me to name names, but I reprimanded some of them when I heard them being nasty about you in the corridor. I don’t like people who laugh about others behind their backs. You’re not overweight and you’re not stupid.’
She perched on the edge of her seat and sucked in her cheeks. ‘How many? Who?’
‘It doesn’t really matter.’
‘Bitches . . .’ she huffed, folding her arms and sinking back into her chair. ‘I bet it was Britney and Morgan.’
‘Ignore those two,’ I replied. ‘You don’t need people like them in your life. Or Melissa or Ruby.’
‘Them as well? Will you tell me if you hear anything else?’
‘I don’t know . . .’
‘Please, Mr Smith.’
‘Okay, but I won’t be naming any more names.’
She muttered a thank you under her breath and left. And later, when she’d been excluded for a week for starting a fight with Britney and giving Morgan a nosebleed, I couldn’t help but feel smug. I watched from the sidelines as Effie’s clique shrank and she became more and more isolated from her classmates. I’d send her father regular progress reports, but began secretly including Laura in the emails, too.
I’d set a date with her father when I’d met him in November to see him again four weeks later to discuss how Effie was doing. I could only hope the emails Laura had been receiving would spur her into action. But I’d also need to up the ante with her daughter.
I organised regular one-to-one private meetings with Effie each Monday and Friday after school in my office, listening to her as she complained about the teachers and girls who ‘had it in’ for her. Sometimes I’d add fuel to the fire by lying to her about what I’d heard other teachers saying about her in the staffroom.
Less than three months into our time together, and she was thinking of me as a confidant. And as the weeks progressed, I sensed she felt it was becoming something more.
It began with the opening of an extra button on her shirt for our meetings, then a little more lip gloss to make her pout shine. When I stood with my back to her, pouring hot water into our mugs, I saw her checking out my arse in the reflection of the window. When I turned, she averted her gaze.
I saw our closeness as an opportunity to learn more about her home situation.
‘Why don’t you ever talk about your mum?’ I asked. ‘You mention your sister and your dad, but never her.’
‘I’m not allowed to.’
‘Why?’
‘She’s . . . she’s not like other mums.’
‘In what way?’
‘I heard about what happened to your wife.’ The sudden change in direction took me aback.
‘What did you hear?’ I asked.
‘That she . . . you know . . . killed herself.’
‘Uh-huh,’ I nodded.
‘Do you miss her?’
‘Of course.’
‘Have you got a new girlfriend?’
‘No.’
‘Are you looking for one?’
‘Not at the moment, no. But eventually, maybe, yes.’
‘Why did she do it?’
‘I don’t think I’ll ever really know. People are complicated and we don’t always understand why they do what they do, even when we think we know them.’
‘My mum’s like that. “An unpredictable, destructive force
,” my dad says.’
‘Are you close to her?’
She laughed.
‘Did I say something funny?’
‘No.’
‘Then why did you laugh?’
‘Why did you ask?’ She ran her fingers through her hair and entwined several strands around one of them. ‘You ask a lot of questions, Ryan.’
I raised my eyebrows.
‘Sorry, I mean Mr Smith.’
‘It’s my job to ask questions. To help you.’
‘I bet you don’t spend this much time with the other students asking them questions.’
‘They don’t worry me as much as you do.’
‘So you worry about me?’ She tilted her head, and the sun coming in through the window illuminated her strawberry-blonde hair and her grey eyes. Suddenly, beyond all her bluster, I saw her as the child she was. My heart sank at what Laura had reduced me to doing.
‘All my students worry me,’ I replied.
‘Okay.’ She nodded, then picked up her schoolbag and made her way towards the door. But she didn’t leave without turning around to smile at me.
By the time my second meeting with her dad came around, I had Effie exactly where I wanted her. And when I heard Laura outside the office, it was all I could do to stop myself from dropping an imaginary mic and yelling ‘Boom!’
On realising who I was, Laura tried her best not to react. Her face froze, as if she’d become trapped in ice, but it was her eyes that gave her away. As adrenaline made her heart race to get oxygen to her muscles, her brain was working in overdrive. I couldn’t see any of this, but her pupils gave her away. They’d dilated to allow the maximum amount of light in at the back of her eyes to make her aware of everything that was going on around her.
It was a classic fight-or-flight reaction. Although with her husband next to her, she could do neither.
CHAPTER FIVE
LAURA
It took every ounce of my inner strength to prevent my body from reacting in any way to Ryan as he took a seat next to my husband.
