by Pete Kalu
‘Adele, look what you’ve done, you’ve ruined her hair!’
Miss Dolphin is standing over us.
It’s only as I push myself up from the floor that I see the clump of Mikaela’s braids in my hand. I can’t believe I’ve torn out so much of her hair.
‘Off! Now! To Remedial! Immediately!’ says Miss Dolphin, followed by, ‘Mikaela, you poor thing!’
Mikaela is still on the floor, bawling and clutching her head.
I pick up my bag and start walking out of the class as instructed.
‘Get back here!’
I turn to go back to my place.
As I turn, Mikaela rushes past me, still clutching her head.
‘Not you, I meant Mikaela,’ says Miss Dolphin to me. ‘You, Remedial!’
I turn again and make the walk to Remedial. Why am I always the one to get the blame? I’ve had it up to here with Mikaela Robinson. Is it my fault she hasn’t got a boyfriend? She is a sad, sulky, jealous bitch.
I really don’t mind Remedial. They let you doze here, so long as you’ve got headphones on and you’re listening to some Educational CD about something like the Fall of The Roman Empire. Everyone just whacks the volume down to zero and snoozes.
I wonder about Mikaela again, what’s eating her. It’s like my mum and dad when they argue. What they’re arguing about is never what they appear to be arguing about. I decide she’s trying to get the school to ban me from playing so she has more chance of getting noticed. She’s sly like that.
The bell goes for home-time. I bundle everything into my bag and join the crowds fleeing for the bus stops. When I get home nobody’s in, not even Mum. I imagine her staggering around outside an off-licence somewhere.
In the bathroom, I look in the mirror. There’s a pink bruise above my right cheek and my lip is cut in one corner.
I fall asleep. I wake up in a panic, thinking, I forgot to look for Mum. I find her. She’s back home, in bed, snoring.
CHAPTER 7
BENTLEYS & AFROS
Next morning as I walk through the main doors, I’m stopped by a Teaching Assistant who takes me to the Counselling Room. He tells me to sit with my legs together, keeping my hands visible at all times. He obviously moonlights at prisons. The Counselling Room is also the Sick Bay. I’m guessing Friday morning is Year 7’s PE time because there’s three Year 7 fakers in here, all holding their noses or clutching their stomachs, while grinning at one another.
I think about the war in the Middle East. I think about genetically modified foods and their effect on the food chain. I think about whether Beyoncé will ever split from Jay Z. I don’t think about why I’ve been told to wait here because I know.
Miss Duras strides in. She runs Counselling, Sick Bay and Careers. A woman of many talents. She’s got Mikaela tucked behind her. My mouth drops for a moment. Mikaela’s hair is one huge Afro. I can’t help giggling.
‘Don’t laugh, bitch. I’m gonna stab you!’ says Mikaela, safe behind Miss Duras.
‘That’s enough. Sit down. Mikaela. Sit.’
Miss Duras orders all the ‘ill’ kids out into the corridor so it’s just us three, though I can see a Year 7 eye pressed up against the keyhole of the door.
‘I thought you two were best friends. Adele, what’s going on?’ asks Mrs Duras.
‘She keeps saying my grandmother’s not black.’
‘Is that true?’
‘Her grandmother isn’t black,’ Mikaela sneers. ‘She’s white as Snow White.’
‘Mikaela, if Adele says her grandmother is black then her grandmother is black. We believe in self-definition at this school.’
‘It’s just not expressed much in my genes,’ I add for Miss Duras’s sake.
‘Well, there you go. So that’s the end of it. Are we done?’
Mikaela speaks up. ‘She says I’m not street. She says my dad drops me off in a Bentley and I live in a mansion not a council estate.’
And is it true? Does your father drop you off in a Bentley?’
‘No.’
I’m amazed. Mikaela’s just told an outright lie.
‘Adele, you should not say things that are untrue,’ says Miss Duras. ‘Nobody needs to be anything or anyone other than who they are. This school is a Harmony school. We have Asians, Chinese, Africans, Somalis, Greeks, Muslims, Polish and Roma here. We are more diverse than the United Nations. Everyone has to be proud of who they are and be happy with that. Understood?’
She says it like a threat. We both nod because otherwise Miss Duras will keep going with her speech. Unfortunately, she keeps going anyway.
‘In this school, for some bizarre reason, black is seen as the height of cool. We can all speak Urban, you get me? But that doesn’t make you black. Black is the traffic lights inventor, black is Mary Seacole, the Victorian nurse, black is the first astronomers, black is the Arabic maths, black is the Egyptian kyrogriphics.’
It’s hieroglyphics not kyroglyphics, I think. But who am I to interrupt Miss Duras, mid-flow?
‘...So you might both want to be black but if you want to be truly black you need to check out what black actually is. Black actually is going to your lessons and studying hard.’
Are you gay, Miss?’ says Mikaela. She has been looking at Miss Duras’ thick eyebrows, lip-stick free lips and sports bra straps.
‘I don’t have to answer that question,’ says Miss Duras without missing a beat.
‘Miss is gay!’ says Mikaela, astonished, then, ‘That’s OK, Miss. We’ll keep your secret.’
Miss Duras gets back on her theme. ‘So that was what you were fighting in class about yesterday?’
‘That, and she says I don’t have a boyfriend, when she knows I do,’ I reply, ‘She’s just gaming me cos of the England team thing.’
Miss Duras is looking at her (quite manly) watch. The bell rings. She’s out of time.
‘Mikaela, whether Adele has a boyfriend or does not have a boyfriend is no concern of yours. Girls, we cannot have fights at school. Whatever the England thing is, be nice to each other. You will be in serious trouble if it happens again. Adele, look what Mikaela has had to do to her hair because you pulled her braids out.’
‘I’m proud of my new hair, Miss,’ says Mikaela, ‘it’s natural.’
‘I wish I had an Afro,’ I say, ‘it’s brill.’
‘That’s better, girls. Support each other. Now shake hands and let that be the end of it. Promise?’
Another threat. We both nod and shake hands.
‘Go to your next lesson together, nicely, or I’ll make your lives not worth living. Understood?’
I give a Year 7 a bashed head when I swing open the Counselling Room door. Serves the little sneak right.
CHAPTER 8
HOW TO SURVIVE PARENTS’ EVENING
‘Mummy, you really need to go to Parents’ Evening.’
‘Darling, I’m sure you’re doing wonderfully.’
‘But they want you to hear how wonderful I am.’
We’re in the kitchen. I’ve just got back from school. Mum is looking for a tin of macaroni cheese to serve with toast as my tea. Mia would have cooked steaming Italian pasta in a homemade tomato sauce. Nevertheless, I smile at Mum. She’s almost sober and she’s making an effort. ‘Thanks, Mum,’ I say when she serves me. I kiss her. ‘You’re the best.’
I don’t actually want my mum to go to Parents’ Evening. I binned the School Report they posted last week and faked an email from the school to Mum. It said:
“We have attached your daughter’s school report. Save trees by not printing this file.”
In my version of the Report, I am Exceptional in all subjects except Maths (no point in pushing it too far).
Mum gets through about forty reasons why she’s not going before I say, ‘OK, Mum, I’ve got to do my homework now.’ I leave her babbling something about orchids.
Later, Dad gets back and I hear him ask Mum why she accused the housekeeper of stealing her vodka and sacked her. T
he two of them then spin through their full set of other arguments.
The Complete Mum & Dad Arguments Playlist:
You Don’t Love Me. (Mum)
Love Is Not Found In The Bottom Of A Bottle (Dad)
I’ve Got A Weak Heart (Mum)
Anything Microwaved Is Not A Meal (Dad)
Don’t Fuck The Hired Help (Mum)
You Are Now Being Ridiculous (Dad)
I Can’t Take This Loneliness (Mum)
I Work All Hours & It’s Killing Me (Dad)
[Even If] You Were The Last Man On Earth (Mum)
Nail Me To A Cross, It’s Quicker. (Dad)
Dad then accuses Mum of internet dating. She says it’s not dating it’s a friendship site. Dad says why are all the people she has ‘liked’ on the site men, then? Mum says they’re not, it’s just those are the ones he noticed and anyway why can’t she have male friends? Then they start kissing. I go into the kitchen and this breaks them apart but ends (by the weird logic only known to my parents) with Dad saying he will go to Parents’ Evening and what’s more he will take me with him. Disaster.
They start ballroom dancing together in the kitchen.
In the car on the way to school next day, Dad says he had not realised all these years that there’s not one brilliant football player in the family, there’s two. And that from now on, he is going to support me totally and he’s ashamed he hadn’t noticed earlier. He then leans over and kisses me on the cheek.
This is so unlike Dad I don’t know what to say. I actually feel a drop of water escaping from my eye. I brush it away and mumble, ‘Dad, I think that’s the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me in my life. Ever.’
‘Nicer than “OK, I’ll buy you the dress”?’
‘Way nicer.’
‘I know Tony gets a lot of attention. But you’re my daughter, and I love you to bits. Don’t ever forget that.’
I’m having to dab my eyes again now. We’re stopped at traffic lights. ‘Are you feeling alright, Dad?’ I throw him a look that is somewhere between a smile and an accusation.
He laughs, gets the car moving again. ‘You’re an enigma, Adele,’ he says.
‘You’re not that good-looking yourself,’ I tell him.
That gets him. He loves it. And I think, why can’t me and Dad have good times like this more often?
‘What am I going to hear at Parents Evening?’ he asks, smiling mysteriously.
I sidestep the question. ‘Mum wants you to dance with her.’
‘What?’
‘I mean not in the kitchen. Take her out dancing. Like when you first met her. She says you and her went dancing in clubs together.’
Dad moves off from the traffic lights in the wrong gear. ‘I had some moves back then,’ he says. ‘We were good. It’s strange. You have to run to stay still.’
‘Taking Mum dancing.’ I nudge him, because he’s drifted off the subject.
‘I would dance with your mum every day if I had the time. One decimal point wrong and you can lose the company millions. I’ve got all the Young Turks coming at me, eyeing my desk.’
‘They’re hiring people from Turkey?’
‘No, it’s an expression. Young, hungry guys, who want my job. They’d step over my dead body without a blink.’
Dad continues talking nonsense. I look him over. I guess he’ll be OK at Parents Evening. It would have been better if he’d built up a bit of a suntan, then he would maybe pass for at least a bit Ethiopian, even if he’s a long way from looking black.
In between humming a tune Dad says that, with the World Cup coming up soon, the big companies are looking for branding opportunities and they’ll pay lots of money for girls who can do football tricks to be in their adverts. He has access to these companies through his bank.
‘Bring them on!’ I say, and he laughs.
We pull up in the school car park and I spot Mikaela. She’s trying to hurry her mum away from their Bentley. I shout ‘Hi Mikaela!’really loud so she has to wave back. Her mum waves back too. She ushers Mikaela over to me. Her mum’s in a push-up bra, her eyebrows are sculpted, and her pencil skirt holds her bum tight. Dad approves of all of it. I want to kick him. Dad kisses Mikaela’s mum once on each cheek.
‘Very continental,’ Mikaela’s mum says, blushing at Dad’s double kiss.
‘Enchantay,’ says my dad in bad French.
I roll my eyes. Old people never lose an opportunity to flirt. Like their lives matter anymore.
‘Nice car,’ I say to Mikaela.
She gives me the finger.
‘Mikaela!’ her mum says. She is walking ahead of us but somehow saw it.
‘She just asked me what room’s History, and I was saying Room One,’ says Mikaela.
‘That’s very helpful of you, young lady,’ my dad says, turning to Mikaela.
Dad and Mikaela’s mum are highly amused by this, for reasons known only to old people, I assume. Before you know it, the two of them have decided to do the tour of teachers together, and drag us with them.
We do English, Maths and the Sciences, one after the other. Eventually, Dad manages to sit through the teachers’ whingeing and complaining without shooting me ‘You-are-dead-when-you-get-home’ looks. Mikaela’s mum has taken to patting him on the shoulder during each teacher’s act of revenge on me and Dad likes this so much he’s almost disappointed when a teacher says something nice and he gets no consoling pat.
‘Only two more to go!’ Mikaela’s mum says, merrily.
Dad laughs out loud.
The art teacher, Miss Jobanputra (aka Miss Dolphin) forgets all my hard work in pottery and simply tells Dad about that one little fight. Dad says it will never happen again. Mikaela’s mum butts in and says her daughter is as much to blame as me, then she goes on the attack:
‘Have you heard of Emory Douglas?’ she quizzes Miss Dolphin.
‘Is he in my class?’ Miss Dolphin asks.
‘Emory, whom I have met in person, was the Black Panther’s graphic designer,’ Mikaela’s mum lectures her. ‘He did so much for positive images of black people. Are his design principles taught at this school?’
My dad, who has been a racist all his life (Dad’s Racist Playlist: Islam Is The Cause Of All The World’s Problems. There’s Too Many Black Football Players. There’s A Reason The Roma Are All Poor And Criminals. This Island Is Too Small.) is nodding fervently as Mikaela’s mum makes her point.
Miss Dolphin faffs and stutters. ‘We teach a wide range of influences,’ she manages. She then smiles the way psychiatrists smile at crazy people (I guess) and taps her watch. Time’s up for the two of them.
Mikaela pats her Afro proudly and her mum goes doey-eyed on her. Dad says, ‘You have a beautiful daughter, and I can see where she gets it from.’
Mikaela turns to me and mimes two fingers down her throat at the same time as I’m doing the same action. That has us in giggles.
The last room is next to the toilets. It’s PE. No parents are in there. Mikaela’s mum wants to give it a miss – ‘On principle, the stereotyping of black children as athletes is dreadful,’ she says.
Dad agrees but persuades her to go in.
Miss Fridge reminds me of a drowning woman grabbing for a lifebuoy. She seizes our parents and sits them down.
‘It is a double honour to have before me parents of the two most exceptionally gifted football players I have ever had the pleasure of teaching in my entire career. They could both make the England team. Imagine that!’
Dad is impressed.
Miss Fridge is relentless: ‘Mikaela is an amazing midfield general, Adele is a simply amazing goal scorer. If you two girls could play as a team, we could win the League. Imagine that! And have both of you playing for England!’
I can see my dad and Mikaela’s mum are actually imagining this, Dad with dollar signs in his eyes, Mikaela’s mum dreaming of Mikaela doing a Black Panther lap of glory, clenched fist held high.
‘Unfortunately for us, nobody knows w
hich of them is going to turn up on match days, whether Miss Jeckyl or Mrs Hyde,’ says Miss Fridge. ‘At England level, they’re looking for consistency and I have to deliver my opinion on that to the selectors.’
‘Consistency is no problem for my daughter,’ says Dad. ‘She gets out of the same side of the bed every morning. Very consistent.’ This amuses both Dad and Mikaela’s mum.
‘What about you, Lydia?’ Dad asks Mikaela’s mum.
‘I’ve brought Mikaela up to be consistent,’ says Mikaela’s mum with robot eyes.
‘Consistency is what I shall need from these girls to show they are ready for England. And you, the parents, can help with that.’
Dad is startled, but loves it. Mikaela’s mum takes it in her stride.
‘As parents,’ Miss Fridge says, poking towards them with a finger, ‘you must want them to play for England. True?’
They nod.
‘That means making sure they get to matches on time. And having a good night’s rest beforehand so they are ready to Give Their All. With your help, as good parents, we can get a hundred percent from both girls at tomorrow’s match.’
Miss Fridge would have gone on for another hour but a bell rings to indicate Parents’ Evening is over.
‘I’m sorry,’ says Miss Fridge. ‘Our Union says we must stop now. No overtime. We’re in dispute. I’m sure you understand.’
On the walk back to the car park, Mikaela’s mum says she totally approves of the teachers’ position on unpaid overtime, and that workers can only win by acts of solidarity, anything else plays into the hands of the Capitalists, their Bankers and the other Oppressors. My dad agrees wholeheartedly and gets her telephone number ‘as an act of parental solidarity’ before Mrs Robinson and Mikaela get in their Bentley.
‘Nice car, Mrs Robinson,’ I say.
‘Thank you,’ says Mikaela’s mum, sliding behind the wheel. ‘And it’s we women who need to be in the driving seat in this world. We’ve watched the men mess it up long enough!’
Dad chuckles. Mrs Robinson pulls off, then promptly stops again because her car is making a racket. She’s got a flat tyre at the back. She gets out. ‘Just my luck,’ she says. ‘I’ll call the RAC.’
