Mark Swallow - Zero Per Cent

From here we went into whole school assembly – my first visit to this hall in which I am sitting now – to be addressed by Bumcheeks, the headteacher.

“As you know,” he began after many minutes of staff shushing, “Chevy Oak is one of the most popular schools in the borough and I would like to start this morning – this academic year – by simply congratulating you on being here.”

Older kids back-slapped each other facetiously.

“Our greatly improved set of results last year is still more evidence of a school on the move, a school aiming high, a school marching forward with confidence.”

At which point everyone began stamping in time, which caused Bumcheeks to turn bright red and pause a while.

“There are, it must be said, more of you than ever before. We are jam-packed in here, jam-packed in our very narrow corridors and in the playground even more jam-packed since the marvellous new block has gone up. We cannot reduce your size because, boys and girls, you have a habit of growing like aubergines. From now on, as you will have noticed from the new signs, you will keep left in the corridors and observe the new queuing system at lunch. But the main measure I wish to introduce – from tomorrow – has just been further justified by yet another nasty incident in the playground, a Year Seven boy hit in the face by a—”

The chortling briefly drowned him.

“Listen! Hit in the face by a football. Therefore I have decided on a measure we have long been considering – a ban on full-size footballs in the playground. From tomorrow you will only be allowed to use…”

“Wot?” The need to listen was suddenly urgent.

“I will tell you what just as soon as I get silence…”

“Oh WOT!”

“… only be allowed to use tennis balls.”

The baying began in earnest.

“Nah, nah, nah!”

“You can’t do that, Bumcheeks.”

Chairs bucked noisily.

“Tight, man. That’s dark.”

Aiming high, I looked up to check no sunbeam from an upper window was singling me out for warm favour. Three hours in school and the dreaded football outlawed!

The atmosphere was dangerous for the rest of the day as kids made especially violent use of their footballs before the ban. In a similar spirit of urgent frustration two older boys slammed me up against some lockers so a padlock dug into my back. Then they jabbed something else up into my heart. So much for sunbeams. Was this the “recreational bullying” Dad had told me to watch out for?

“Take this one for example,” said one to the other as if continuing a debate. “There’s a bunch of nasty little stiffs coming into this school. Why’s there not room for footballs? Let me tellya. Because of this.”

“You are in fact a stiff,” said the other who’d nicked our football.

“So neat in his new school uniform.”

“Neat as mumsy fuck.” His pony-tail quivered with anger.

“You want to loosen up a little, mate.” He yanked my tie and then, on second thoughts, tightened it totally. The other stabbed me again – this time right up into the armpit – and then scored me across the forehead with the same weapon.

“Record-keeping’s important. We got so many to get through we don’t want to be repeating ourselfs, innit.”

Michael saw us from the far end of the corridor and shouted to me that he was going to get his Uncle Denny to handle it after school.

“Nah, actually I’ll get him. He’ll come straight up school!” They turned towards Michael on his mobile and must have clocked the genetic link because they swore and dropped me over a fire extinguisher to hurry off in the opposite direction. Michael pulled me out of the corridor and into a classroom where he loosened my tie.

“Is it blood?” I asked, raising my head from my hands, gasping.

“Could be, man. Just in time, eh?” He was triumphant, breathing hard and fast, rabbit-punching the whiteboard and then plunging his face into a bag of crisps he’d ripped apart.

“Thanks for your help, mate.” I was still shaking and dabbing at my wound, which was in fact pink highlighter pen.

“It was nothing. Do you want me to take you somewhere? To Ronaldson? I’d like to tell him what made them run. Teach him to diss our Denny!”

“Nah, I’m fine…” But nor did I want to be left to face these corridors alone.

Dad came in late from Zürich, but there was enough time for him to get furious on my behalf. Tommy and Rosie didn’t even bother to take up their stair positions but I settled with some nervousness.

“Do you see now, Polly?”

“See what?” But she had caught a glimpse.

“Jack can’t cope. They are beasts in that school. They may be part of your blessed community but that hardly makes it better. They will beat up our son because of the way he looks. He is powerless. What can he do?”

“What did you do at your precious public school, Martin? How did you survive?”

“This didn’t happen, if that’s what you mean.”

“I don’t believe you weren’t bullied.”

“Don’t say it like that. I wasn’t terrorised. This Chevy Oak is an aggressive place. His primary school cardboard castles and peppermint creams, they won’t help him now. Football might have done but he seems to play that less and less.”

I shot downstairs and burst in. “I gave it up today!” They barely looked at me.

“So what, Martin? Games aren’t everything.” Mum was plunging her needle in and out of my blazer.

“Football isn’t a game. It’s a vital early form of communication. Before they can really talk, boys kick a ball. And if boy doesn’t kick ball, boy gets himself kicked. It’s body language at its simplest.”

Mum turned on me.

“Why don’t you play?”

Stay strong, Mum, I remember thinking. You don’t have to ask his questions for him. They both looked at me.

“It goes through my legs, especially at this new school. We have to play with tennis balls.”

“Tennis ball football?” cried Dad. “Now I’ve heard it all.”

My first break at Chevy Oak School had broken painfully. The second had to be much, much better. These twenty minutes, I could see, were the day’s key jostle time – preen-time, be-seen-time – even more important than the end of school at the front gate.

It poured with rain lesson three. Bumcheeks came on the loudspeaker to say we could spend break in our classrooms. I was relieved. But the sun mocked me, coming out brilliantly just before the buzzer, and I was soon being urged towards the sopping tarmac by hundreds of kids.

The airport was as busy as usual, executive jets from the side runway taking off directly across the playground. Would Dad actually be able to look down on my antics? The sudden sun warmed me a bit through the reinforced seams of my blazer. Lots of juniors were enjoying the new football rule, and even Michael and Razza were mincing about with tennis balls. Nothing there for me of course. I remained on the step, alone with the voices.

“ This is where we live, ” I could hear Mum say. “It may not be particularly peaceful or lovely, Martin, but…” I traced her sing-song tone with my finger on the pitted brickwork.

Two of our classmates were taking the opportunity to play mini-tennis with a couple of old racquets. I saw my pony-tailed attacker from yesterday casually interrupt the mini-tennis (“Can I be ball boy, children?”) and walk off with their ball to laugh coldly with his mates.

“ He’ll be dragged down… ” Dad’s insistence was loud inside my head.

“It’s a perfectly good school with a nice mix of all sorts. There aren’t that many difficult kids. Besides, what do you think he is going to be dragged down into? This is where he lives – he’s in it already. Difficult kids are part of the experience. They lead difficult, realistic lives.”