Belinda Missen - Lessons in Love

After that, the public library became my refuge. I worked in the repairs room, spent my days fixing broken spines and wrapping books in protective wrap. Solitude stopped being satisfying when I began feeling like I was wasting my brain. After all, I had a qualification and I knew I was a good teacher. What good was my university tuition debt when I was spending my days gluing books back together instead of teaching? I soon yearned to get back into a classroom, and this role popped up at the perfect time. Getting that phone call from Phillip had been one of the rare fist-pumping moments in the last twelve months.

Tucked away in the belly of the not-quite-Pentagon, with a door that linked to the staffroom, my new library smelled of tannins, vanilla, and dry-cleaned carpet. A small courtyard at the rear of the space still looked like an upscaled terrarium. Wisps of rubbish and overgrown weeds spun about in the warm wind like a bite-sized tornado.

Stacks I used to hide between stood solid like tin soldiers, now with a comforting beanbag at the end of each aisle. I not so silently wished we’d had them during my time; they would have made lunchtimes in the library much more fun.

Penny nattered excitedly as she unlocked the door to my office, a glass-fronted room tucked in the front corner of the library. It looked like the aftermath of an evacuation. Books were strewn across benches, blue and yellow streamers hung from the roof, and random football-themed drawings were tacked to the windows. My attention kept floating back to a caricature of a dark-haired footballer holding a trophy aloft.

‘I guess someone was in a hurry,’ I mumbled.

‘You’ve got no idea.’ The right corner of Penny’s mouth twitched into a smile.

I ran my finger along the spines of DVDs, in numbers heavy enough to cause sagging in the shelves against the wall. An empty table with a large roll of book covering held in place on a dispenser sat under the window. The old workbench brought back memories of lunchtime chats with Mrs Coates. Often, our debates descended into discourse over which Roald Dahl book was the best.

I never did understand her adoration of Royal Jelly until I was an adult. Sick, sick woman. I tossed my handbag under the bench, thrust my hands against my hips, and tried to take in this adult version of a childhood memory.

‘What do you think?’ Penny asked.

‘It’s a little surreal, isn’t it?’ I said. ‘We couldn’t wait to get out of here as kids.’

‘Oh, yes,’ she chuckled. ‘And for someone who was so desperate to get out of here, you spent a lot of time in detention.’

I rolled my eyes. ‘That’s the best you can do?’

It wasn’t my fault I kept scoring higher than Jarrod Sims on maths tests. For so long, he’d been ego-stroked into believing he was some sort of Pythagorean prodigy. When we ended up in the same class, it was a constant tussle every time he took offence. It made my last year of primary school interesting. It became even more tangled when he developed a crush on me in high school.

‘Anyway, time for me to play fairy godmother.’ Penny tapped my shoulder with a ruler. ‘Come, sweet summer child, let’s go make some new friends.’

A tiny cheer rose from the sofa by the window as we entered the staffroom. Four women, all squeezed up against each other and inspecting phones, leapt to their feet like a choreographed greeting party.

‘Please tell me this is Ellie!’ A magazine-thin brunette pushed herself up out of the depths of the sofa and crossed the floor in loud heels.

‘This is she.’ Penny waved her arms about like a game show host. ‘Ellie, these ladies form the bulk of our junior class teachers. This is Grace, and we’ve got Emma, Gemma, and Jemima.’

They almost sounded like an Austen novel. I did my best impression of someone who knew what they were doing, stepped forward, and made my way along the couch, shaking hands and uttering greetings.

‘What’s happening on the sofa this morning?’ Penny asked.

‘The usual.’ Emma used a sole fingernail to tuck a lock of platinum blonde hair behind her ear, her mouth last seen on the back end of our neighbour’s cat. I’d seen that face before on numerous GIFs. ‘Just looking at You Know Whose Facebook, ogling football photos, the usual.’

‘Who what now?’ I looked between the two of them. Then again, did I really want to know?

‘I’ll explain later. We’re on a whirlwind tour of the isles. Bye, ladies.’ Penny grabbed me by the elbow and dragged me in the opposite direction. ‘They’re lovely girls, they really are, but their thirst is real, and their class is sometimes not. Come on, let’s go meet some more people.’

‘Who were they talking about?’ I whispered.

‘You’ll see,’ she muttered, tugging harder.

Where I thought I was going to hide in a corner – I even had a spot picked out at the corner table – Penny made like the amazingly sociable, bubbly person she is and introduced me to anyone she could get a word in with, pushing into twosomes and creating threesomes. With each new conversation, she remembered to include a helpful Brief History of Eleanor. Eleanor is a past pupil, she studied teaching and computing in Melbourne, and has recently returned home. She enjoys knitting, long walks on the beach and world peace, and she once played in an orchestra. Oh, and she’s my cousin. Ask her about the time I broke her arm.

I was both delighted and put at ease by the conversations this started. And the broken arm story was accurate. I was fourteen, and she was trying to demonstrate her best karate chop. With a stick. In hindsight, it may have been the offcut of a railway sleeper. Snapped that bone right in two, she did.

First lesson of the day: I could learn a thing or two from Penny about simply getting out there and being the life of the party. Whatever that special something was, she had it in overflowing buckets and then some.

Phil was busy in conversation with someone else, his bald head gleaming under artificial light, shining eyes lined in laughter. Others milled around and took their spots, echoes of tired greetings and holiday stories repeated ad nauseum while they waited. Eventually, somewhere around the sounding of the first morning bell, we all came to rest in seats and on table edges in some late-thirties game of musical chairs.

‘And a very good morning to my favourite team.’ Phil clapped his hands together, the only person ecstatic about the end of holidays. ‘Welcome back, commiserations if your chosen team lost the Grand Final, and all that buzz. We have one day before the onslaught of final term begins, so I guess it’s heads down today as we prep lesson plans.’

The room was so quiet you could hear stomachs rumble and coffees slurp. The Zip instant boil clung to the wall and sighed as the tank refilled.

‘Look at all that enthusiasm. It’s not that bad, we’ve got a curriculum, we know what to do. We’ve walked this path before.’ He glanced over as the door adjoining my library opened, and three men wandered in confidently late. Leading the pack was an irritatingly handsome man. He was far too attractive to be relegated to a classroom all day.

Around me, women sat up straighter. The mystery of who ‘You Know Who’ was had been solved.

Phil clapped his hands together. ‘Marcus, good afternoon, thank you ever so much for joining us.’

Marcus, who was met by a round of applause, bowed and made a beeline for caffeine.

‘It’s lovely to see you’re still raising our dress standards single-handedly after such a stellar performance on the football field. Well done on the trophy.’

‘I do my very best.’ He pressed his hand to his chest and took a sip of his coffee. He winced and stuck his tongue out in disgust. Yes, the coffee really was that bad.