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To Be Honest

Page 7

by Polly Young


  Weird people take the bus in the day. Mainly gabbing mums and small kids or greyed out ladies like we did in art last week, or men with Mint crusty coats and I sit at the back and ignore them. I wish I had headphones to really chill out but I still can, in a thinking hard way.

  Fact is, I actually don’t hate being Miss Mint, to be honest.

  At least so far, anyway. A lot of it’s to do with the clothes and the hair and the looks from the boys and

  Taff.

  But there’s another thing that crept up on me this morning, somewhere between watching Harry struggle with his oral and Josh whiz through the Malvolio exercise like he’s on speed or something. Being Miss Mint means being good at English.

  Whether she takes GCSEs as me, or we switch back, I’ll do well ‘cos of being her. Might even get an A*. I can’t lose.

  Mr Morlis’ words about not lying are somewhere in there, wandering about in my head knocking on the walls of my brain but to be honest, who’s going to know if I use what I learn from Miss Mint to ace my GCSEs? I’m just doing my bit for Initiative Week.

  * * *

  So I get off the bus at the corner of town so I can walk past the shops, text Miss Mint to get her to update me on Josh and I’m trying to decide what to do next when I see something that makes me burn and ice up together.

  Felix’s by himself, hunched over on a bench with a pack of chips, feeding pigeons. It’s definitely him. He’s in school uniform but you can only see his trousers ‘cos his parka’s all done up tight to the neck and his chin’s wrapped up like a present.

  In Josh’s cravat. He’s waiting for something, I know it.

  He sees me at the same time and it’s like Tao was when he’d see another dog, bigger or smaller, there wasn’t any logic, he’d just start shaking. Like I do now.

  Then it’s like a shutter click; he’s off.

  Pigeons scatter, bleating, bubbling, as he legs it through slow-shuffling shoppers. His trousers flap and his hair’s waving goodbye, goodbye and he’s sucked round the corner of Iceland and gone.

  * * *

  I don’t feel like going to Costa to drink expensive coffee any more.

  Instead, I walk slowly back to Clementine Road and remember the party when I found Josh upstairs and his expression, like he was falling away, tumbling inside, even though he was drunk and had lost it. ‘Cos Felix’s eyes looked dead just then too; like Olly’s when he comes into registration after playing COD all night. Or like Josh’s at Courtney’s party.

  When I get in, I know what to do.

  Furry slippers on, hot chocolate stirred, marshmallows plopped, I sit down at Miss Mint’s desk, which is pure, clean and painted cream, with handles like stars and pigeon holes for paper that’s heavy, heavenly. I find a fountain pen, midnight blue, with a gold nib. I write and the ink flows like caramel.

  Josh, it’s Lisi. Watch out for Felix. I’ve seen him looking, like he wants to hurt you. I can’t be your friend at the moment, not like I want, but you can talk to Miss Mint, she understands. Some day I’ll explain, sometime soon. Keep out of Felix’s way ‘cos he’s danger and I’m telling the truth.

  I fold it, lick-stick the envelope and the chocolate burns as it goes down, making my teeth ache. But what hurts more is why should Josh believe me.

  * * *

  I must’ve dropped off on the sofa called Posy (I saw it in the Heal’s catalogue) ‘cos next thing I know my phone’s ringing and it’s school, Mr Underwood’s secretary. She wants to know how ill I am.

  “Mrs Wiltshire’s struggling,” is all she’ll say but I know from Miss Mint’s timetable she’s got Amy Thrower period six, who likes to jump off lockers, and David Reid who bites.

  I cough a bit feebly but then I think, hang on. I’m not meant to be lying and saying I’m ill is. So instead I say I’m sure I’ll be well tomorrow, and hang up.

  Normally now if I was at school, I’d have waited with Rach by the lockers, taking the piss out of Josh; checked my phone and got my bracelets back from Debono. I’d be sharing leftovers from Erin’s stall and laughing. I’d be on the way home to Mum.

  Instead, I’m in a house from OK! on my own and I wouldn’t have thought it possible but I’m bored.

  Miss Mint’s diary’s a bit like Mum’s. Bits of paper stuck in, phone numbers at the back; coloured pen running through it in Miss Mint’s writing that’s half-loopy, half-posh, like I could never do. There’s symbols I don’t understand and times and reminders and post-its all carefully folded. I flick to this week.

  There’s no dentist appointment anywhere near, so I decide to make one. She’ll thank me in the long run. And I might get to speak to Mum.

  Stupid I know but when I dial Mum’s work, my heart fills my whole body so there’s no room for air. It rings four times and then the secretary answers, which is no good but also it is ‘cos I get to book a time without crying.

  “Miss Mint? We don’t have you on our books.”

  I say I’m a new patient, which isn’t a lie, and ask for Mrs Reynolds to do my scale and polish before the real dentist and it’s fixed for Saturday morning which means three days ‘til I see Mum and to be honest that’s fine ‘cos I’m at work ( work! ) ‘til then and come on, what else am I going to do on Saturday with no friends and Taff still not back?

  So I’m feeling quite happy again and I put the diary back but the bit of paper I found on the coach is still there and it crackles like it’s there and wants looking at but I don’t want to look. But I do ‘cos I’m like that.

  Two columns, one on the left with times, one on the right with numbers. In the middle, a list of words that shouldn’t be scary; shouldn’t be scary at all. I think of them separately. I remember where I’ve seen a list like this before, sitting with Rach in French, so I think of them in French, ‘cos I’m good at French and it makes it a bit better.

  Café

  Yaort.

  Pomme.

  Oeuf dur

  L’eau

  Thé vert

  Orange

  I like the how they sound. But I wish there were more.

  * * *

  At half-past four there’s a bang on the door.

  It’s Miss Mint with my hair in a chignon, which for what it’s worth I think is a mistake.

  She needs to talk. It’s funny to watch her. If it was me, I’d be chewing my nails and hopping but she stands like a ballet queen, calm and serene, under the streetlight’s halo. And who am I to stop her coming in?

  “It’s Josh. I’m worried.”

  He’s been missing since lunch. She talks like it’s something he’s done wrong on purpose and I’m itchy ‘cos she doesn’t know him like I do. I rewind back to Felix on the bench and the cravat and his look and it all adds up to emergency.

  “He lives next door.”

  “Does he?” She looks surprised.

  I look at her long and hard ‘cos how can you not know who lives next door, when it’s Josh’s family?

  “He’ll be home for tea. He’s got responsibilities.”

  So then we agree I’ll go and see his mum and part of me’s excited ‘cos I’ll get to go to Josh’s and maybe see him if he comes home when I’m there and I’ll be involved again. Because all the cream furniture in the world can get boring by yourself. Then I remember the letter and I’m not sure if it’s the right thing, but I hand it over.

  “You need to give this to Josh but not let him see you doing it,” and she looks at me with a sweet and sour mix and a bit of a mute telling off ‘cos I’ve used her best paper and I’m giving her instructions. But she doesn’t ask what’s in it. All she says is ok, and I’m glad I asked her ‘cos Josh’s a sucker for drama.

  I know it’s her house and everything but the way she goes round turning lights off and making cups of tea winds me up. But then she’s just home from school and I guess I would too. Then she tells me about Kai.

  “He’s making advances,” is how she puts it and all the hairs on the back of my neck stand up, armed
if not dangerous, wondering what happens next.

  “Have you ... kissed him?”

  She gives me a stare of stone and shakes her head. “I’m not sure if I’m interested.”

  What can I say. You have to be interested? You mustn’t be interested? You’re an engaged woman? It’s not up to you? None of those make sense. Nothing does.

  “Plus he’s being boring about Felix.” She butterfly-sighs.

  I ask what she means and she says he keeps muttering about Felix and Frankee and staring off into the distance whenever Frankee’s nearby. So then I think, obviously he’s moved on from Courtney and Miss Mint’s shot me in the foot so to speak by not kissing him and now he’s after Frankee, who’s going out with his best friend. But who wouldn’t be, with hair and skirts like Frankee’s? I gulp disappointment down with the Mint tea she’s made, which is bitter and yuck, and make a decision.

  “Felix’s bullying Josh.”

  She looks sceptical; hands twisted together like Josh’s Dominic’s lips when he’s lost it. My nails on her hands are growing. She’s painted them Mint. So to show her I’m right, I go on and tell her about the party and the secret looks. I skirt round the discovery of Josh at the rugby club like Courtney circled that bikini in New Look: I’m not sure if I should try it on. I’m not sure. But to be honest, I think I have to.

  She’s quiet when I tell her. Then,

  “Do you think Felix ... did something? To Josh?”

  Even from a mouth that looks like mine, I’m shocked ‘cos I hadn’t been thinking that, not even to myself. But the fumbling and fogginess is further away the more I clutch at it and all I see is the look on Josh’s face.

  I croon I don’t know and hug my legs right up to my chest and rock on Posy the sofa, with the horrible taste of Mint tea and the memory of booze and I think about Taff and if he was here which one of us he’d choose.

  The clock is at five and Dominic’s arms will be flailing and doors will be slamming if Josh’s not home. I think of his mum, of Edward’s soft head and how it needs toughening to cope with the new baby.

  “Maybe I should go over now.”

  She watches me rub her engagement ring, which I’ve taken to doing instead of shoving my nails in my mouth, and doesn’t say anything. So I get up and put her shoes on, but not the heels this time; she’s got Uggs by the door, which help make me feel solid.

  I open the door and Josh’s there, walking home. I close it again, not all the way, but so he doesn’t see us, and watch as he swings his bag right up. He stands

  for a millisecond

  while it splays its straps, hangs like a penguin chick, awkward then

  falls.

  He goes into the house.

  “Well,” says Miss Mint, “that’s one less thing to worry about.”

  Chapter 11: Wednesday, third night

  Alicia Payne doesn’t have to hate me. I’m just saying.

  But last year in the woods behind school, she decided she did. It wasn’t my fault Tao barked and went bonkers, she shouldn’t have picked up that stick. I know it’s irrational; there’s no need to fear her but even with Miss Mint’s skin on something inside that girl’s fired up and furious and I see it.

  I’m back at school and it’s Wednesday and Miss Mint’s Wednesdays are fine, she says. But that’s ‘cos she’s used to it. Year 11 English double, periods 5 and 6, might be her idea of fun but Alicia is making it hard. And ‘cos we’re deep down, proper sworn enemies in real life, it’s harder.

  The Menagerie ’s moved on so they’re on to fragility. Miss Mint prepped me, explaining the characters and themes and how relationships can get so intense things can break.

  “Like glass animals might,” I’d said, “or friends.”

  “Yes,” said Miss Mint. “But also like partners,” and that had been when I was rubbing the diamond and she’d looked at it like it might evaporate.

  So anyway, Alicia Payne is maybe the least fragile girl in Fairmere, the south coast or maybe the world.

  “Miss, this play’s fucking shit.”

  “Thank you, Alicia. Outside.”

  I’m learning to stop things before they spiral and leave the class unpicking fire escapes.

  She properly hates me, Miss Mint or not. It’s there in her nose stud, taped over; gross. It’s there in her mouth, which is down-turned, primed for battle. Once in the corridor, she starts to volley.

  “You can’t make me do this,” her eyes slide.

  She’s served. “Make you do what, Alicia?” Pause.

  But she heard.

  “You’re well out of order.” She knuckles the wall.

  “I’m not the one swearing,” I say.

  Thirty-all.

  She hesitates. Presses the stud in her nose. She winks at Lloyd Parker, then stares at her toes.

  She looks at me sideways, then says quietly,

  “I’m sorry.”

  “That’s ok.”

  It’s forty-forty.

  I open the door and we traipse back inside. She fist-balls her eyes like I’m mean and she’s cried.

  “Sit down, Alicia please. Take your book out now, hon.”

  She settles; obliges.

  I think the game’s won.

  It’s all going well, though the sun’s slipped away and with it the will to live in the case of a significant few, whom I have come to rely on for answers to questions I have no idea of the answer to. Ten minutes from the bell we need something else. I think quickly.

  “Donna. What are you wearing on Friday?”

  Donna stops scoring the back of her hand with compasses and raises traced-on eyebrows, which if I didn’t know humans had, I would not think existed.

  “Miss, that’s weird.” Felix, whose head’s been buried for a while in his jumper, uncoils.

  “Head up please, Felix.” A Miss Mint bangle shake and he’s back in his box. “No, it’s not. It’s a perfectly ordinary question. Friday’s non-uniform day, in case you’ve forgotten.”

  They haven’t; none of them have. You don’t forget non-uniform day; no one does. You sometimes forget your pound but you never forget to wear different stuff. It’s for some local homeless charity I think, but I’m not sure ‘cos I wasn’t really listening in year group meeting this morning.

  “Um,” Donna looks around, making a ‘WTF?” face and a few girls lip-curl their support.

  I wait.

  Today, I’m wearing a pale grey, three quarter length cardigan coat from Jigsaw, made of the lightest silk wool that ever existed and underneath a scoop-necked, bronze top. My nails are silver. And my classroom’s cold.

  The radiator’s stopped working for some reason; I noticed at lunch but it’s taken ‘til now for anyone else to comment.

  “I’m well frozen,” Alicia snipes. “Miss is too.”

  “Oi, Miss, I can see your ...” Lloyd does a pointed throat-clear; taps his pecs.

  I think Donna must feel sorry for me, ‘cos before I can even worry about if Kai’s looking, she swoops.

  “Went shopping at the weekend Miss. Got boots like yours.”

  I smile a thousand suns at her. “That’s very flattering, Donna. Harry, how about you?”

  Harry Brigham sighs deeply and looks like he’d rather be shot. “Dunno, Miss.”

  I do. It’ll be black tracksuit bottoms and an Arsenal shirt with stains. But I choose to be kind.

  “I’m sure you’ll look fantastic, whatever it is. But what do you think Tom would wear?” He looks blank. I prompt. “From The Glass Menagerie. Tom Wingfield. Or Laura. Or Amanda.”

  More stretching, looking at watches, “Miss, can we pack up now?”-ing. I hold my ground.

  “Because what I want each and every one of you to do is come to school — if you’re brave enough — on Friday, wearing what you think one of the characters would.”

  The classroom froths, spills over: I’ve done it. I’ve managed to give them the biggest laugh of the day so a part of me’s glad and I smile too but I’m
really cold now in the flimsy cardi-coat and another part’s scorching ‘cos I feel like they’re laughing at me. And it’s horrible.

  They pack up and paw the ground, stamping while I make them put chairs up and stay ‘til they’re quiet ‘cos I’m the teacher so they do what I say. Right?

  Then the floodgate’s released and they empty the room in thirty seconds flat; hoodies all over the place; one chair falls down, but there’s someone who’s left at the end and it’s Alicia. She’s knocking on the edge of my desk and ‘cos I’m standing on it to turn my speakers off I have to grip the board to stop the wobble. She looks like a child from where I’m standing but I suppose that’s ‘cos she is.

  “Miss?” And I think, did I take her phone? Do I need to sign her report? Is she here for another verbal spar? I study her whitewashed cheeks and feel something like sympathy. It’s never good when you choose the wrong foundation. Someone should tell her.

  “Yes, Alicia. What can I do for you?”

  And slow, like it’s agony, she shifts her eyes away from the field and Velcros mine.

  “I need help, Miss.”

  And I nearly fall off the desk, I swear.

  But instead, I clamber down carefully, in case she turns bad in the five seconds it takes me to find my feet and her eyes let me slip. When I’m down, she slumps in a chair. Her neck claims her chin like quicksand.

  “I wish I was better at English.” The words pierce me somewhere up left, ‘cos it’s a mumble, but the meaning’s sparklingly clear. She really wants help. From me.

  I have options here. It’s three fifteen and I have no meetings, no detentions coming in and to be honest I could spend some time with Alicia Payne, helping her make sense of things. Or I could revel in the fact that I know she’s crap at English and tell her to go away ‘cos I don’t have time.

  But that would be lying.

  So, mainly because I have to and only a little bit ‘cos I want, I sit down, pull up my chair, indicate she does the same. Turns out she missed last controlled assessment. So Miss Mint sorted her out and she’s got to do it again, on her own and after school. Next Thursday. That’ll be with me, then.

  So of course, she’s come to me for help now, just as she’s realised there’s no way out; nowhere to go to make it not real. She thinks she can’t produce creative texts. She thinks she can’t imagine. She thinks she can’t write right. And I think who am I to tell her no problem, it’ll be fine, you can do this; you just need to concentrate.

 

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