Belinda Missen - Lessons in Love

As it turned out, having a cold would do that to me.

I peered around my old classroom in amazement as he urged me to follow him. Tables and chairs formed a ring in the centre of the room. Thoughts and plans had been scribbled on the whiteboard and crossed out again. Last term’s artwork dangled from ceiling tiles and clung to windows.

Phil took his leave as we sat on the ledge of a table facing the centre of the room. I was more than capable, he reasoned, and I didn’t disagree. Mick was a familiar face. I had this.

‘What on earth possessed you to come back here?’ he asked. ‘Returning for family?’

‘I heard you still made a great coffee,’ I teased. I don’t know that I’d ever seen him without a coffee cup in hand, either. ‘Plus, I thought you could do with checking in on.’

‘See, the coffee has fallen to Marcus now.’

‘Ah.’ I turned towards where Mick’s attention was held at the back of the room, three men scuttling at the realisation they’d been caught spying. It was a Monty Python sketch as they bumped, shuffled, and passed paperwork to each other like synchronised jugglers. Marcus crossed the glass-windowed office, mug to his mouth and watching from the corner of his eye. Busted.

‘Clowns, the lot of them,’ Mick said quietly. ‘And, if I point at them just so, they’ll think I’m talking about them. Egotistical little shits.’

I pulled the folder up over my face and laughed loud and free.

‘I’m sorry I missed the meeting this morning.’ Mick elbowed me gently. ‘I saw your name on the roster but wasn’t sure if it was you, or if someone by the same name just felt like orbiting the area for a while.’

‘Surprise.’ I grinned, throwing my arms out like P. T. Barnum on a slow morning, then scrambling to pick up a packet of crayons that tumbled from my hands and scattered to the winds. ‘How have you been?’

Mick gave a small shrug. ‘You know, just slogging around here, keeping kids out of trouble.’ He slipped from the table and nodded towards the office. ‘Speaking of trouble, come with me.’

I followed him into the small office, which looked like it had been used by the same four men for a few years. It had that old, comfortable look and smell that screamed ‘Keep Out: Boys Only’. Desks were well settled into, a coffee machine had its own small altar in the corner, and family photos lined desks and noticeboards.

‘Ellie, these gentlemen here – and I use the term ‘gentlemen’ loosely – are Tony, Roger, and Marcus.’

‘Hello.’ I gave a tiny wave at the three smiling faces, all seated around one desk in the middle of the room. One by one, they stood, introduced themselves again, and shook my hand. Roger was quick and jangly, much like his bony arms. Tony was limp and damp and looked like he needed to pat down his forehead with a handkerchief before heading back into battle. Marcus, despite being warm and solid, left me with the distinct impression I was being sized up. Did everything have to be a competition? I avoided his continued gaze and turned my attention at the others. ‘I’m just here to meet and greet and take requests.’

‘Kicking ass and taking names,’ Tony tittered.

‘Bingo.’ I set my belongings on the table and watched as they shuffled through papers and pulled out ready-made lists. It wouldn’t have surprised me if they’d stocked up on requests in anticipation of slipping things past the new girl.

‘How has today been for you?’ Mick glanced up from his seat.

‘I’m … yeah, just taking it all in again.’ I pushed myself up on the balls of my feet. ‘It’s making me vastly aware of the years that have passed, and I’m suddenly feeling rather … inferior.’

‘Try being me,’ he joked. ‘Not only is my past coming back to haunt me in the form of you, but Jack is now teaching here.’

‘No,’ I laughed. ‘He is? I don’t think I’ve met him today. I’ll have to go and find him.’

‘He is.’ He nodded. ‘He was probably in the meeting this morning. You’ll find him down in the music hut cultivating his beard and apparently fashionable man-bun. God knows it’s a mess, and his mother hates it, but you can’t tell him these things.’

I snorted. The last thing I’d have pictured him with was a beard. Jack would come in and help Mick on his days off school. As a teenager, helping involved not a lot more than supervising some quiet reading time, or re-enacting a Shakespearean scene to give Mick another ten minutes on lunch break. He was quite the rock star to the small handful of pre-pubescent girls in our class. I wondered if Mick ever understood that. Probably. It’s not as if twelve-year-old girls were renowned for their subtlety, after all.

‘I’ll make sure to tell him you’re here. He’d probably be keen for a catch-up.’

‘If he remembers me,’ I noted, looking around the table. ‘Now, does anyone need anything else from me?’

Silence. One by one, they shook their heads in turn. Only the scrawled lists I’d been given? Nothing more than pencils and glue? Good.

‘No … oh, wait. Yes.’ Marcus peered up at me, brow knitted. ‘I’d like to change my library session. I want a morning, preferably Monday. Could you make sure that happens?’

I blinked twice and stared hard at he who would be Clark Kent. ‘No.’

‘No? Is there a reason for the no?’ He rested his chin in the palm of his hand. I’ll bet that look worked on all the ladies.

‘I’ve been here not quite a day, and I have zero desire to turn this place into a snow globe just yet. I would like the opportunity and support of my colleagues as I settle in. I’m sure at the start of the new year, we’ll look at changing time slots.’

Tony snorted, then hid his mouth behind his hand quickly. My heart gave a bass drum thud, and annoyance prickled at the back of my eyes.

‘I’d really love a morning session though. Do you think you could get another class to shift?’ Marcus pressed on. It didn’t at all surprise me that he didn’t understand the word ‘no’.

‘You can try if you want, see if someone wants to swap,’ I said.

The office was so quiet you could hear my heart using my ribs as a xylophone if you concentrated hard enough. Please, do not put me in this situation, I thought. Not on day one. Yet, there was always one, wasn’t there?

‘Could you ? Please?’ he asked. ‘I’ll be so busy with curriculum all day. It’s not like it’s a difficult request.’

I recoiled a little. Did anyone just see my shoulders curling in on each other? The words were so bloody familiar that it made me think the universe was just laughing at me. It was every night I’d ever tried to get Dean out of his office. Often, I was greeted with a combination of, ‘Can’t you see how busy I am?’, followed with a chaser of, ‘And what are you doing all day while I’m working?’ Anything further was met with, ‘Whatever.’ I wanted to turn around and walk out. Except I couldn’t do that here without looking like a total strop and not the team player that I’d prattled on about in my job interview.

‘Funny about that, so will I.’ I gathered my pile from the table. Papers slipped from my fingers and out onto the table. It felt like I spent the next few moments grabbing at air before Marcus took pity and handed them back. ‘If there’s someone you’d like to swap with, you’re welcome to ask them. If they say yes, you can have your morning. Otherwise, no.’

‘Ha!’ Roger clapped his hands in delight. ‘Boy Wonder doesn’t often hear that.’

‘Is everyone else done?’ I asked. ‘I also have work to do.’

Marcus huffed, hands clasped in his lap. Far from the polite and confident look he carried this morning, he’d now shown me an entirely different person. I stepped into the corridor, took a steadying breath and thought about tearing back in there and giving him a piece of my mind. But what would that prove? I decided to get on with my day. It was day one, something like this was bound to happen. Attitude clashes were the stumbling block of any new job, and he appeared to be a Lego in the middle of the night.