After the service everyone flocked around Mrs Joseph, and outside the school she was stopped by people with microphones desperately seeking something for the six o’clock news. I really wanted to speak to her again but I knew I stood no chance whilst the television people surrounded her. Fortunately as soon as they got what they wanted they were off. All I had to do now was get past Mrs Martel, who had become her private bodyguard. That was tough. I had to wait until almost everyone had gone before I could make my move, and then they were heading for the staffroom and I knew that if they went in there I would have to wait ages before she came out. So I made my move, and just as I was making my move I realised that I didn’t have anything to say.
‘Hello, Mrs Joseph. Good to see you again. Well, not good really, if you know what I mean. I mean, it’s good to see you, but not like this. I mean, sorry.’
‘Don’t be sorry,’ she said. ‘I know what you mean. Sometimes I say things that just don’t come out right. Don’t worry, I know what you’re trying to say.’ She paused for a moment before adding, ‘I remember you. We met before.’
‘That’s right,’ I said, happy to be remembered. ‘When you spoke at the assembly.’
Mrs Martel interrupted. ‘He’s always asking questions, this one.’
‘That’s not a bad thing,’ said Mrs Joseph.
‘I suppose you have a question ready right now,’ said Mrs Martel.
‘Yes I do,’ I said quickly. As I replied I realised that once again I didn’t have anything to say. But I had to say something.
‘Are you OK?’ I said finally.
‘I’m OK,’ Mrs Joseph replied.
Mrs Martel looked at me, rather puzzled. ‘Are you OK?’
‘Yes, I’m fine.’
I could see that Mrs Martel was about to dismiss me. She spoke to me as if she was in class.
‘Well, what do you have to say?’
So I said the first thing that came into my mind.
‘My name is Jackson Jones. I’m one of the witnesses.’
Mrs Joseph reached out and shook my hand. ‘Pleased to meet you, Jackson. How are you coping?’
‘I’m doing OK.’
‘The students have all been offered counselling,’ said Mrs Martel.
‘Is it helping?’ asked Mrs Joseph.
‘Well,’ I hesitated. ‘I’m not actually having any counselling, but you could say I’m having a kind of therapy.’
‘I didn’t know that,’ said Mrs Martel.
‘Interesting,’ said Mrs Joseph.
‘It’s therapy that’s like individually tailored to me. Maybe I’ll tell you about it another time.’
Mrs Joseph smiled. ‘Yes.’
‘OK, Jackson. On your way now,’ said Mrs Martel. ‘He’s a strange one. Harmless, but strange.’
That’s Mrs Martel, our great head teacher. She would often speak about you as if you weren’t there. There was absolutely no subtlety about her. When I told her that I was having a kind of therapy tailored to me she just presumed I was paying someone money to talk to them. She couldn’t imagine that I was finding my own way of dealing with it, and I was. I was traumatised by what I saw, and I was pretty sure it was going to stay with me for the rest of my life, but we all have different ways of overcoming things, and my way is to try to understand why things happen. I just didn’t want to lie back and let life happen to me. My mother said that when I was small the word I said the most was why. But I wasn’t going to tell Mrs Martel all that so, ‘Goodbye,’ I said. And I went home.
Chapter 6
Between the Lines
That evening my mother brought home a whole stack of newspapers, much more than usual. I watched her as she flicked through the pages, stopping briefly every now and again, but then carrying on after a quick scan.
‘Mum, what are you up to?’
‘A friend at work said she saw you in a paper,’ she said, excited. Then she yelled, ‘There you are. Look at the state of you, you don’t half look miserable.’
‘Mum, it was a memorial service, not a graduation ceremony.’
‘Yes, but it’s not the end of the world.’
‘No, Mum, it’s not the end of the world, but it’s the end of someone’s life.’
Mum read quietly for a moment before adding, ‘Well, it says here that Mrs Joseph said that the service is not about someone dying, but about someone living. She said it’s a celebration of life, so there.’
‘I know, and I agree with her, but I still think it’s no time for fun and games, you have to be respectful.’
My mum knew I was right but she had to have the last word.
‘All I’m saying is looking like you hate yourself is not being respectful.’
But I wouldn’t let her have the last word.
‘And all I’m saying is, it’s not about the way you look, it’s about the way you feel.’ I reached out for the newspaper. ‘Let me have a look.’
It has to be said, I did look really sad, but I didn’t remember feeling that sad. I came to the sad conclusion that this was how I looked when I wasn’t wearing any particular expression. It was my default face.
Mum left the room and I went and sat on the floor where the rest of the newspapers were and began to scan through them myself. Every one of them covered the memorial service, and every one of them claimed to be an exclusive. Then a report caught my eye. It was by Mark Townsend, a local journalist who had gone on to the local streets to ask people what they thought should happen to Boy A and Boy B. The piece had the headline, ‘Let them bleed’. The worst quote of all came from a boy called Adi Macenzi. He said, ‘Those two are children of the devil, and they should go to hell and burn in everlasting fire, like their father, the devil.’
It wasn’t just that I thought it was a terrible thing to say, which I thought it was, what really got me was the person who was saying it. Adi Macenzi had left school earlier that year but before he left he made sure he earned himself the reputation as the worst bully ever in the history of school. With his back-up of four followers he would demand sweets, goods and money, with menaces. For the last three months before he left he made my life hell, and he drove Delbert Singh to attempt suicide. Delbert left and moved on to another school, but Adi Macenzi got away free. He wasn’t even approached about it. Apparently there was no evidence. There may not have been any evidence but every pupil in school knew the truth and most were just too scared to say. I was. I knew about the school’s no-bullying policy, it was pasted all over the walls. I knew that if you let bullies get away with it they got away with it more, but he was smart enough not to get caught by teachers, and we were all scared. No one was willing to make the first move to end his reign of terror. We all thought that if we did one of his cronies would step up and take his place. When he did leave school one of his cronies did take his place, Terry Stock, another vicious waste of space. I knew now that I had to talk to Adi Macenzi. Sitting in front of a counsellor wasn’t my style but understanding what happened was, it would be my therapy.
I knew that Macenzi spent his days hanging outside a train station selling on used tickets. His nights were spent outside a local club trying to get clubbers to use illegal taxis, so it wasn’t difficult finding him. On my first visit to the train station that Saturday afternoon I found him trying to convince two Polish students that buying a couple of return tickets from him would be cheaper than buying them over the counter because of something to do with peak times. Fortunately they realised that there were no peak times on Saturdays and they walked away. Macenzi turned and bumped into me.
‘Jackson Jones, my old friend, what can I do for you, or what can I do you for? You know I like to do you.’
He hadn’t changed one bit, but I had.
‘I suggest you start doing something for yourself,’ I said.
‘Tough talk, be careful or you may get a slap. I think you may need a slap,’ he said, stepping towards me.
‘I think you may need a job,’ I said, standing firm.
‘You’re growing up quickly, Mr Jones.’
‘I’ve just come to ask you something.’
‘Ask away, Mr Jones.’
A couple of his friends came and stood next to him but I just wasn’t in the mood to be intimidated.
‘I saw you in the newspaper this week.’
‘The press are all over me, I know. Fame, I’m coming to terms with it,’ he said, looking to his friends, who smiled on cue.
‘Well,’ I continued. ‘Who are you to say that whoever killed Mr Joseph should burn in hell? Look at all the stuff that you’ve done.’
He laughed even louder. ‘Are you mad? I don’t like teachers but at least I’ve never tried to kill one.’
‘So you think bullying and driving people towards suicide is a good thing?’
‘What you talking about, boy?’ he said, moving another step towards me. ‘The only thing I did was run a protection business. You know me, I’ve always been a business man, and if you read the news and listen to the politician people they’re all trying to encourage small business people like me. Yeah, boy, I’m an entrepreneur. The police, they do protection, I was just running a private protection business.’
I kept standing my ground.
‘I can guarantee you no one ever felt protected by you, and yes, I can see by what you’re doing here that you’re a business man.’
‘You’re getting so brave. I still say I never killed anyone, and never mind saying whoever killed Mr Joseph, it wasn’t whoever who killed him, it was Lionel Ferrier who killed him. You know it, I know it, and by the time I’m done everyone will know it. He’s a weirdo, his mum’s a weirdo, and his friend’s a weirdo. Just ask anyone on Fentham Road and they’ll tell you.’
‘And what happens on Fentham Road?’ I asked.
‘That’s where he lived. You don’t know anything, do you?’
‘I may not know a lot, but at least I’m not a bully,’ I said, looking for a way out.
His two friends began to walk around the back of me, and he moved even closer.
‘At least I believe in God, so yeah, they should burn in hell. Now go before I slap you,’ he said, clenching his teeth.
I didn’t have the energy to argue with him, and suddenly I wasn’t feeling so brave.
‘Of course,’ I said. ‘I’ll go before you slap me, and you just keep believing in God.’
Chapter 7
A Place of Safety
I decided to go to Fentham Road that evening. It was a road I had passed many times before but one that I had never been down. It was the kind of road that didn’t really lead anywhere, so if you didn’t have any reason for going there you wouldn’t. I got there at seven o’clock and children were playing football across the street, dogs seemed to be barking in every house in competition with the music, which seemed to be coming from every house. I also noticed that an unusually high number of men were working on their cars. The street was like a dog sanctuary, cum playground, cum car workshop, cum carnival. I know what this is, I thought, it’s a tight-knit community. How nice, I thought, until I was approached by a boy around my age dressed in denims that were so big he looked like he was hiding another person in them.
‘Not from round these ends, are you?’
‘Not really,’ I replied.
There was an empty plastic bottle on the floor; he kicked it towards me.
‘What do you mean, not really? You’re either from these ends or you’re not. Are you from central or what?’
‘No I’m not from central.’
‘So where you from?’
‘Why do you want to know?’
‘Just talk when I talk to you.’
‘I told you,’ I said as convincingly as I could. ‘I’m not from central.’
‘I doesn’t matter anyway, just go before I blow.’
Of course I felt it very unfair that he should speak to me that way, but I realised as I replied that I was beginning to sound like my head teacher.
‘How dare you speak to me like that? I have the right to walk down this street.’
Suddenly he shouted out loud, ‘Tommer, Craig, Fudge, come here. There’s a kid here thinks he’s got the right to walk down this street.’
He called three, but six appeared. I decided to use the best self-defence move I knew – I turned and I ran. But as I began to run I was stopped by four more who were waiting behind me, the most frightening of them being two girls.
One of the boys shouted, ‘Let me do him.’
Another of the girls shouted, ‘No, it’s my turn.’
And a woman’s voice from nowhere shouted, ‘Leave him alone, what’s he done to you?’
I liked the sound of that voice but as she argued with the small boy in the big clothes I just couldn’t see where it was coming from. The boy shouted at her as he continued to look my way.
‘Why don’t you shut your big mouth?’
She shouted, ‘Have some manners.’ I saw her leaning out of an upstairs window a couple of houses down from where I was standing.
‘Up yours,’ the boy shouted back.
Then a man appeared next to the woman in the window.
‘Hey, you, don’t talk to my missus like that.’
The boy replied defiantly, ‘I’ll talk to her how I want.’
‘No you won’t. I’ll come down and make sure of that,’ he said, leaving the window.
‘Run for it, lads,’ the boy shouted. And in a moment they had all scattered.
By the time the man got down I was standing there alone. I was beginning to see him as a bit of a hero until he spoke.
‘What are you doing around here anyway? We’re sick of people like you coming around here and starting trouble.’
Not sure what to say I said, ‘Thanks.’
‘Don’t thank me,’ he said, looking down at me as if he hated my guts. ‘I didn’t do anything to earn your thanks. Just think yourself lucky. Go, cos if you don’t they’ll come back and tear you apart, or they’ll get their dogs to do it for them. Now change your location.’
The woman, who was obviously his missus, turned up.
‘Leave him alone, Jason. He’s had enough as it is, he must be freaked out. He’s not from round here.’
I wasn’t very good at reading faces on this day. She looked at me like she wanted to kill me and said, ‘Do you want to come in? Fancy a cup of tea?’
I was surprised. Her man wasn’t.
‘Do you have to invite every Tom, Dick and Harry in? What’s wrong with you? Is my company not good enough for you?
‘Meaning?’ she said, placing her hands on her hips.
‘Meaning nothing,’ he said as he walked back into the house.
She looked me up and down as if she was thinking of adopting me.
‘What’s your name, son?’
‘Jackson.’
‘Yeah, OK. Jackson. What’s your first name?’
‘That is my first name.’
‘Jackson, really? Don’t tell me your second name’s Jackson as well. Jackson Jackson, is it?
‘No. My name is Jackson Jones.’
‘Jackson Jones. I like it.’
Another woman was negotiating her way past us on the pavement. As she passed she said, ‘He’s a bit young for you, isn’t he, Carla?
‘He’ll grow up,’ she replied.
Even the nice people around here are really frightening, I thought.
‘So is your name Carla?’ I asked.
‘Let’s say I answer to that name when I’m in a good mood. Now come on in before we end up in the papers.’
On entering the hall I was confronted by shoes that looked as if they were trying to escape. The living room was packed with furniture; it was difficult to see the floor. I made myself small and squeezed around a large wooden coffee table in the centre of the room and sat down on a settee. There wasn’t much room for sitting; like the other ch
airs in the room it was covered with cushions.
‘That’s right. Sit down and make yourself comfortable, I’ll go and make you a cup of tea. How do you like your tea?
‘With one sugar,’ I said.
She lifted her head towards the ceiling and shouted at the top of her voice, ‘Jason, do you want a cup a tea?’
‘No,’ he shouted back. ‘Bring me a beer from the fridge.’
‘OK,’ she replied as she turned back to me. ‘Hey, you don’t want a beer as well, do you?
I shook my head.
‘He lives here but I never see him,’ she continued. ‘He’s fixing our wardrobe now, he’ll be in the loft tomorrow, the garden shed the day after, then he’ll break the wardrobe again so that he can fix that again. Anything to avoid talking to me.’
She left, leaving me staring into a blank television screen that was so big I couldn’t help watching it even though nothing was on. She soon came back with the tea. The tea tasted as if it had five sugars in it, or maybe one very big teaspoon. It was so sweet that when I tasted it I wanted to spit it out, but after all the effort she had made I thought I should at least act grateful.
‘Thanks. Great,’ I lied.
‘Everyone loves my cuppas,’ she said proudly.
‘I can see why,’ I lied again.
She sat down at the other side of the room next to television.
‘So where are you from, then?’
‘Why does everyone around here want to know where I’m from? Is it that important?’
Carla took a cushion and hugged it against her stomach. ‘The thing is, people around here want to know everything. Not just where you’re from, they want to know everything, and if you’re a stranger you stand out. Everyone round here knows each other. But not me. No, I mind my own business. Don’t go putting your nose in other people’s business, that’s what I say. Keep myself to myself, that’s what I do.’
Teacher's Dead Page 2
