by Casey Watson
It had been a particularly emotional last day of term, the day before. I suppose it’s always a little emotional when you reach the end of any term – not least because you tend to be at the end of your mental tether anyway, so the slightest little thing can set you off. And I was already a bit on the wet side when the day started anyway, Kieron having come home the previous evening with the announcement that he had asked a girl out on a date. Her name was Crystal and they were going to see some indie band called Brash, this coming weekend.
And as Mike observed, after Kieron had trotted upstairs to change, he’d looked almost as shocked by this development as we had, having spent all his teenage years up to that point pointing out that he ‘didn’t do girls’.
Plus there was the small matter of Riley, who had been officially recognised as David’s girlfriend, when he had given her a pre-Christmas gift of a ring. No, not an engagement ring, she had been quick to point out, but just a symbol of how much she meant to him.
So there was no chance of me getting through the day without a tear in my eye even if you didn’t factor in my little brood in school.
And I’d barely entered the premises before the ordeal began, because Shona was waiting for me just outside the reception doors when I arrived. I knew it was me she’d been waiting for because as soon as she saw me coming up the steps she peeled herself away from the wall and headed straight for me.
‘Shall I help you with one of your bags, Miss?’ she asked shyly when I drew level with her.
Being five foot nothing definitely had its advantages, I decided, as I thanked her and let her take some of the strain for me. One day I’d get streamlined or rationalised, or whatever it was, so that I didn’t hoick quite so much to and fro every day. In the meantime, I was grateful for any help I could get, and Shona, though not a big girl, was definitely a growing one. She had sprouted at least a couple of inches in the short time she’d been with me.
‘So, how are things going?’ I asked her, as we walked the familiar route to my classroom.
‘Okay, Miss,’ she said. ‘I’m enjoying being back in my class again a bit more now. I mean, I’m going to miss you and everyone in the Unit,’ she added hurriedly. ‘Specially Molly and Imogen, but it’s nice to be back with all my friends.’
‘And I’ll bet they’ll be glad to have you back,’ I said. ‘Our loss – and it is a loss, losing my super-brilliant organiser – is definitely their gain.’
I pulled my keys from my bag and got the classroom door open. There was still a faint whiff of party about the place. Difficult to define, probably even harder to analyse, but very much present all the same. ‘And how are things at home now?’ I asked Shona as she followed me in and put my satchel on my desk for me. ‘How are you doing, sweetheart? You managing okay?’
‘That’s what I came to see you about,’ she said, shrugging off her backpack and putting it on the desk in front of her. ‘We’re going away, Miss. To a place called Center Parcs. Have you heard of it?’
I nodded. ‘Indeed I have,’ I said. ‘Wow, how exciting. For Christmas?’
‘And New Year, too. We’re going on Friday. My Auntie decided we’d have more fun there. You know … because there’s lots to do there, and everything. There’s a big indoor swimming pool and a huge play area for my cousins, and you can go bowling and I think they even have an ice rink. And you stay in a house in the forest, like a proper cabin. I saw pictures in the brochure. It looks really good.’
And so much better, I thought, than staying in a house steeped in recent pain, stuffed with bitter-sweet memories and shot through with thoughts of a future that had been taken away, and with oh, so many hours to be filled. ‘That sounds brilliant,’ I agreed. ‘Just the thing. I am properly jealous. Any room for a stowaway in your swimming bag?’
She smiled. She’d undone her backpack and now plunged a hand into it.
‘I got you a present,’ she said shyly, producing a card and a gift, the latter wrapped in silver paper liberally covered in cartoon robins.
‘Aww, love, that’s so sweet of you,’ I began, taking it from her, and trailing off as I knew I probably wouldn’t make it to the end.
‘It’s to say thank you,’ she said. ‘And sorry, as well. Because it means I won’t be able to come in and help you get the classroom displays organised after all, will I? I’m so sorry. I was looking forward to it too.’
She was blushing furiously by now, and my eyes had filled with tears, so between us we made quite a pair. ‘Come here,’ I said, scooping her into my arms for a hug. ‘I tell you what. The display situation is like my ironing pile at home. You think you’re up to date and then when your back has turned it always piles straight back up again. Let’s make a plan for you to help me over February half-term, then. How about that idea? There’ll be several boards that will need changing again by then, won’t there? But you must still stop by as soon as we’re back and tell me all about your Center Parcs trips, promise? And we’re bound to have lots of leftover goodies to use up, so I’ll have posh biscuits for visitors then, too. In the meantime,’ I added, letting her go and indulging in a sniff, ‘I think I need to find yet another tissue!’
Of course getting showered with cards and gifts is all part of the business of working with children; not for nothing do all those ‘Best teacher’ and ‘Thank you, Miss’ cards – not to mention mugs and teddies – mysteriously appear in all the shops come July. But it’s not something you ever get cynical about, either. Yes, for sure, some come as the result of mums thinking ‘Ah, that’s a thought!’ while pushing a trolley round ASDA – I’d done it myself, plenty of times.
And that was fine – they way I looked at it, such gifts and cards spoke volumes too. If a parent felt moved to get a present for a child to bring into school for their teacher, it seemed to me the child was probably not coming home from school every day telling their parents that ‘Mr or Mrs so-and-so is a pig’. No, it probably meant, on balance, that things were going okay. That was the way I liked to think about it anyway.
Sometimes, however, presents couldn’t help but make you cry, and that was an end to it. My heart card – in pride of place on the mantelpiece, as I’d promised – still choked me up every time I passed it, and if I’d thought I’d got away with it once Shona had hurried off to registration, then I was a fool – which I wasn’t, so I didn’t.
In the meantime, however, I needed to dry my eyes, stash Shona’s present away ready to put under the tree once I was home, put the kettle on and get the first period organised. Because the last day of term was notorious not just for wellings up from wet women, it was also, traditionally, the day in the termly calendar where, for reasons that had never become completely clear to anyone, the kids had formed the impression that they didn’t have to do any work.
‘No,’ I remember saying on the last day of the first term I had ever worked there, ‘it’s the last day of term, not the first day of the holidays. That’s what happens tomorrow.’ It had mostly got me nowhere.
Still it, could have been worse; the last day of the summer term (the end of the school year, of course) was so entrenched as a non-day that many of the older pupils, for a time, didn’t even bother to show up. It was only when Mr Moore had had one of his periodic crack-downs that the truancy numbers for the day started to plummet. It was truly amazing, as he was fond of recounting, how many seemingly intelligent parents took their teenage children’s protestations that the day was ‘optional’ at face value. And even among those who didn’t, just how many were swayed by the seriously old chestnut of ‘none of my friends’ parents are making them go in’.
There was no danger of that happening in the Unit. Though Jim and Kelly and I had been clear that today was a school day, and should be treated as such, that didn’t mean we hadn’t planned plenty of fun activities.
And one of the constants in my little group – and this seemed to hold true, whatever the mixture of children at any one time – was that there was always a proportion
for whom the business of sitting nicely was only marginally less difficult than it would be for an excitable six-year-old.
And, as if on cue, it was Gavin who was first into the classroom, doing his usual manoeuvre of sweeping in, as if propelled by an invisible cattle prod, then seeing me, remembering that speed wasn’t always of the essence, and pulling up so quickly that if he’d been a character in a cartoon he would have had those little puffs of smoke drawn behind his feet.
‘Miss!’ he said, skidding to a halt. ‘Miss! Guess what?’
I smiled at him and guided him to his seat, gently but firmly. ‘Um, you’ve discovered the secrets of the universe?’
‘No, Miss, don’t be silly! You know I had that ’pointment with the doc? You know, in case I was mental? Well, I had to go back last night an’ you’ll never guess what.’
‘What, Gavin?’
‘He said I’m not North Polar! I’m a completely normal kid, is what he said. Can you believe it? An’ my mum swore I was North Polar! But I’m not. Isn’t that good? I just have my ADHD and that’s it!’
I laughed out loud at that. Well, once I backtracked to what he’d put in his note for the secrets box about being referred, and as a consequence worked out what he was on about, anyway. Bless him. I couldn’t help it.
‘That’s great news, Gav,’ I agreed. ‘Imagine that, eh? By the way, you know Santa lives at the North Pole, don’t you?’
‘Don’t be daft, Miss, there’s no such thing as Santa. Everyone knows that. Only reindeers. Oh, and polar bears. Lots of them.’
We didn’t bother with lessons on the last day, not in the usual sense; I just liked to recap on what we’d learned over the term, looking back at some of our activities, the evidence of which was on the boards all around us – and which would be coming down at some point ready for next term. And a change of kids, in some cases, I thought as I watched them, and reflected on the friendships that had been made.
Good ones, I hoped, some of them – and that all-important camaraderie. Something I saw again and again as kids went up through school. Whatever they did, whatever classes they went through and where, once they’d forged a relationship with the Unit, with me and the team, and with each other, it was like an invisible bond they shared – one that didn’t break.
Though it was limbs that I was slightly more concerned about breaking when Kelly and Gary Clark arrived to spend an hour with us, and that the latter had a game of Twister under his arm. Hardly the sort of thing you’d expect from our professional Child Protection Officer, much less a lesson, but then again, didn’t it count as PE? Our new girl Gemma even got into the spirit of it all, and it was delightful to hear her shrieking with laughter as she tried to follow Imogen’s instructions – and, as a consequence, inevitably landed flat on her face.
All in all, it was a great day and a very emotional one too. I hated goodbyes, even if I was going to see them all next term. ‘You’re such a wuss, Miss,’ observed Henry, watching the tears slide down my cheeks as I tearfully hugged them all in turn before they left. Then it was my turn to go home and, despite my initial reservations, I finished the term in exactly the same frame of mind as I’d started it – tired but happy and with a sense of excited anticipation about what the new term might bring.
I also recalled Don’s words about end-of-term-itis. And though I didn’t feel quite burnt out, the twinkly lights of home were calling, and I knew I was ready to flick off my classroom light switch for the final time.
I picked the book up now, and placed it back on my bedside table before opening the curtains to let in a new day – the first day of two glorious weeks of Christmas holidays. It was a new copy of Double Act, the Jacqueline Wilson book Gavin had ripped the pages from, and I smiled at the note Imogen had written on the flyleaf about how reading about Garnet and Ruby and their dad’s new girlfriend, Rosie, had made her realise she wasn’t the only one who was sad. I flipped it over to the back cover and read the start of the blurb: No one can ever be like a mother to us, especially not stupid frizzy dizzy Rose! It made me wonder again why I had forgotten the true significance of this book, of why it had seemed so important to Imogen.
She must have delivered her secret gift by stealth the previous afternoon, because I’d not left the classroom, but I had no memory of anyone going over and putting it on my desk. But there it was anyway, neatly wrapped and tied with curling ribbon, and, judging by the size and feel when I picked it up, a book.
I’d looked at the tag attached to it, and I’d smiled. It was hand-made, with deckled edges, and it took me straight to a memory – a much-cherished memory from my own childhood. A memory of when my sister and I would sit down at the dining table with our mum and start officially ‘doing’ Christmas. We’d do it every year, and it would almost always be a cold, wintery evening – making garlands out of strips of coloured paper she’d have bought in Woolworths, creating snowflakes out of circles of tissue, carefully folded and snipped, and making gift tags from the previous year’s cards. It was quite a privilege, as it involved using my mum’s big metal pinking shears, which, being meant for sewing and easily blunted, were usually out of bounds.
A legacy of the post-war years – or the make-do-and-mend years, as my mum always called them – it was the sort of thing you didn’t see much any more. I flipped the tag over, and there, just as I’d suspected, was Imogen’s small, careful handwriting. ‘Dear Miss,’ she’d written, ‘Merry Christmas!’ Then there were brackets, between which she’d underlined a second message, namely ‘Pleeease don’t open this till you get home!’
And I’d missed her, the minx, but I didn’t blame her. No matter how far she’d come or how relaxed she now seemed, she was still, I felt, a quiet girl at heart. Never an attention-seeker, I knew she would have probably found it daunting to have actually given whatever this was to me herself.
And that was fine. I’d duly popped it in my bag before finally heading home, and, though my first plan had been to put it under the tree with all the other presents, it had called to me, somehow, as the evening had gone on, because I think, on some level, I already knew what was inside. And I’d read it, cover to cover, learned all about Ruby and Garnet, who’d also lost a mum and gained a step-mum, and it made me think and, mostly, made me cry.
‘This is definitely the way to do it,’ Riley observed as we pushed a laden trolley round our giant out-of-town supermarket. It was eleventh-hour shopping and it was eight in the evening; not my usual way of doing things at all. But when your daughter offers to come and help you do all the shopping once she’s home from work, you don’t refuse. Well, I don’t. I’m not that mad.
‘You see, Mum?’ she continued. ‘That’s where people always get it wrong, isn’t it? They all rush around like lunatics trying to get everything done early, which means they’re all fighting each other over the tins of Quality Street and arguing over spaces in the car park, whereas, actually, if you just hold your nerve in these situations, look’ – she cast an expansive arm around her – ‘isn’t this so much better? This place is almost empty!’
I smiled as I weighed up the merits of a BOGOF on nuts. Wouldn’t I just end up throwing half of them away in March? Oh, to be 18 again, I thought. To be at a place in your life when ‘Will they run out of turkeys?’ is not a question that ever enters your head. Or to be like Mike, perhaps, whose Christmas ‘preparations’ these days consisted of a) getting the decorations out of the loft for me, and b) going into town to buy half a dozen presents at teatime on Christmas Eve. Oh, if only.
‘You’re right about that,’ I said, taking the box of cereal that Riley had got down from a high shelf from me. How did my daughter get to be five foot quite something when I was five foot absolutely nothing? ‘But, as you might have already noticed, the veg aisle is half empty as well.’
Riley grinned. ‘Mother, trust me, the world won’t go to hell in a handcart for want of a few minging sprouts on our plates. In fact, it’ll be a much nicer place, when you think about it
, won’t it?’ She laughed then, wrinkling her nose. ‘And on so many levels.’
And, of course, she was right, and I was just about to agree with her when we rounded the aisle to find ourselves trolley nose to trolley nose with two familiar faces – those of Imogen and her grandfather.
‘Well, I never!’ I said. ‘Fancy seeing you here!’
Though, actually, it wasn’t such a big shock to do so because though I’d never seen Imogen there – she hadn’t lived round our way before, had she? – bumping into pupils and former pupils was a common occurrence. Pretty much all of the local teenagers attended the school I worked at, so it would have been surprising not to bump into them.
But to bump into this one at this time was particularly pleasing, because it meant I could thank her for her present in person.
So I did, adding that I had read the whole book from cover to cover, the previous night. ‘In bed, like I used to do when I was your age,’ I confided. ‘Because once I started it I just couldn’t put it down.’
‘I’m glad you liked it,’ she said shyly.
‘I loved it,’ I corrected. ‘And I can also see why it’s meant so much to you,’ I added, meeting her gaze and lightly touching her forearm. I could see she was squirming slightly, and I absolutely understood, so I didn’t want to make too big a thing of it. ‘Anyway, what brings you here?’ I added. ‘Oh, this is my daughter Riley, by the way. As you can see, we’re trying to get Christmas organised, finally. Though I’m sure there are better things to be doing than wheeling a trolley round a supermarket right now, eh?’
‘Last-minute list,’ Mr Hinchcliffe said, waving a small piece of paper. ‘We’ve been dispatched, haven’t we, Immie? Nan’s orders.’
‘And to get some bedding for me, as well,’ Imogen added excitedly. ‘Daddy sent some money so I can choose a new duvet cover and curtains. He’s decorating my bedroom ready for when I go back after Christmas.’
