‘Are those supposed to be hearts?’
‘Dali-inspired vulvas. Mouth-watering!’ Natalia wielded one. ‘This one’s more like a penis! Open wide!’
Laura snorted and dodged, as Natalia offered the penis to Laura’s mum behind her instead.
‘Oh, lovely! I’ll have it with a cuppa!’
Natalia set about serving Mrs Burns at the picnic-cloth-spread tables set up at one side of the hall. She had one impetus for getting involved in a school event, for whom she today bared her razor-nicked legs in winklepicker shoes and a green, floral cotton tie-dress both she’d picked up charity-shopping last weekend, over a padded bra from Primark that pushed her A-cups out to D-level proportions so impressive she kept looking down in surprise.
The fair had started half an hour ago, and was becoming slowly deafening with teachers, parents and pupils filing in thick and fast. There was Miss Francis, done up to the nines in a leather miniskirt. Becky-Big-Tits in a burlesque dress that made her chest look like a giant arse hanging out of polka-dot pants, whilst Mrs Williams appeared with her shrivelled husband peeping out like the Wizard of Oz from alongside the sweeping ship mast of her gown that would do well at replacing the missing stage curtains.
Mr Khan, Harrison and Allsebrook manned the tombola in suits and bowties like a Thornwood funeral-cum-prom crossed with a bad 1920s jazz revival, whilst setting up drums and saxophones on stage was a band Neill had hired from Horsforth, in the hope of redeeming the school’s morale as well as probably the entire day’s profits.
Sam crept up and swiped a cookie.
‘Hey! That’s a quid!’
‘Buys you a go on our Guess the Love Hearts.’
Natalia squinted over at the jar of sweets on their stall. ‘Which corner shop did you nick that from?’
‘Jack and his mate earned it from paper rounds and donated it. He counted them and even washed his hands before, he said.’
‘You trust your little brother to supply edible prizes to the public? After he almost made Mr Harrison collapse with electric shock chewing gum on Sports’ Day?’
‘Nah, they’re fine. I tested one myself. No soap, salt and didn’t turn my mouth blue. Unlike this cookie of yours that’s breaking my teeth,’ Sam bit down, frowning. ‘Harder than Alex… did you know Alana’s shagging him?’
‘No way. She’s Colton, he’s Halton. She wouldn’t be seen dead.’
‘Well Laura saw her stroke his hand yesterday. It’s only do-gooders that’ll come today so I reckon if he turns up, they’re at it.’
Natalia gazed round, taking in the stalls.Someone had rallied a team of grans to crochet a whole series of sizes of heart pillows, presented by two Year 9 girls and one of the grans dragged along as though she was for sale too. Another stall sold perfumes complete with tags - one even with a shop alarm - suggesting someone’s dad had tipped out his last year’s sack of shoplifting like the Robin Hood of Killingbeck proudly unmasking himself on this day in aid of the British Heart Foundation. A pair of girls sold roses wilting at the edges as though the stale chi of Thornwood was already suffusing them of life and hope, whilst the ‘supreme quality control’ Neill had assigned Natalia as Wonka had clearly slipped a vowel. Her cookies were baked last night in a hazy daze whilst she pondered the shock, over and over again, that she’d masturbated herself to orgasm yesterday in the Headmaster’s office as he whispered dirty poetry in her ear, and she both craved and feared looking into his face today to understand how she is supposed to continue life thereon.
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She nipped out for a loo break from the noise, with a quick glimpse up the school driveway. There was Neill’s car, and there was a red BMW sports car in hot harlot red pulling in next to it. Blimey, someone’s parent’s rich. Was that a Z something? Didn’t he say Joan had one of those? There was a blonde head popping up, and…
Just like Joan-in-the-Box, there she was. Mrs Harrogate herself.
Be still my beating heart attack, or I’ll take that petty cashbox of British Heart Foundation funds for myself, she groaned. Had he really invited her? Like Rochester and Blanche Ingram parking their racing horses side-by-side as he brings her home to his house party at Thornwood instead of Thornfield, where insignificant, plain-Jane-Eyre will now quiver in corners, and not like she quivered in his chair yesterday?
Joan’s silky laugh and the slam of the car door echoed over the grounds as Neill now appeared next to her in olive tweed, taking her arm as they began strutting down the concrete catwalk toward Natalia, unseen, holding her breath as still as a ragdoll and as wide-eyed as one, fixated on Joan’s hips motioning forward in silk red trouser suit; salon-fresh blonde hair bobbing rhythmically off her shoulders in time with Neill’s own hair breezing alongside like a rugged man-version.
The light glinted off her sheer tights drawn taut up shapely ankles; red lipsticked lips that had pulled, like a magnet, the lean-in of Neill’s wide grin nattering at her ear, as they walked picture-perfect in a post-coital honeymoon air, far from his downplayed description of ‘drubbing and struggling’… for Natalia felt as hypnotised as he must be! …to stare into the Arse of Joan and agree that if Ofsted give Thornwood a Good, it must surely be because this Helen of Troy is deigning to walk toward it, alongside three-times-the-cock-of-Ryan, Priapus himself!
She hurriedly clip-clopped her shoes back to the hall like a donkey. After this wondrous week where there was nothing else in the world but his perverted poetry and her panting petite-morts, if he wanted to parade his ‘Etonian’ student to Joan like he did to the inspectors she felt like she’d have a different kind of petit-mort and die right on the spot.
‘Dya have change?’
A six-foot, leather-jacketed dad - she assumed he was a dad and not the local pimp passing through Thornwood - held out a crisp note pointing earnestly at one of her lopsided planks of fossilised sugar.
‘Er, not for a twenty right now. The Head might, he’ll be here in a minute…’
She suddenly felt nauseous and had to look away from her cookies, just to feel more nauseous upon the sight of Joan, who was standing alone at the entrance surveying the hall, looking for a moment like the apparition of a lost lamb when Natalia first saw her at Christmas. The heads of the Science teachers turned from the tombola, as Natalia wondered if she’d greet them - but Neill now appeared next to Joan - as she straightened her jacket, projected a dazzling smile, and walked in a marital twosome to the crocheted heart pillows like members of royalty cooing over terminally ill children in Great Ormond Street.
Natalia, trying not to stare too much at the dapper A-class couple now advancing in small-talk-step along the refreshments, who even though looked less like the King and Queen of Charn under the drab fluorescent lighting of the hall as they did striding down the car park, still stabbed the pit of her stomach with curious envy, even for what she knew was a duplicitous duo; their equal-sized statures and their quick, slick gestures of a world she was twenty years behind in - whilst pouring too much milk into a coffee for a young mum with pencilled eyebrows.
‘Steady on! I’ll pour me own, ta!’
Mrs Tracey, Coleman, and Francis were going over to greet Joan. Neill stepped back and cast a lip-lick around the hall, as Natalia dropped down too the floor behind her table pretending to rummage for mugs.
A moment later his brown leather shoes appeared on the floor in front of her with a flash of green socks. She could smell his cedarwood shower gel. And now his cough beckoned above.
She jumped upright with feigned surprise.
‘Ah!’ he smiled. ‘I was going to ring the bell, but—’
‘Sorry, I was looking—’
‘Absolutely lovely.’
‘Er—’ She glanced to Joan, who was picking food at the buffet, mid-chatter.
‘Those.’ He nodded down her dress.
‘Oh…! Yes!’ She looked down at the cookies.
‘Which one do you recommend?’
‘Well, they’re both pretty similar. I mean… they’re basic cookies with red sugar glaze, and equally as deformed as each other…’
‘Goodness, I’ve never heard them described like that.’
‘Ahh, ha—’ Her eyes flickered to Joan who was coming up behind him.
‘Straight to dessert, Richard?’
‘I had a rather gargantuan breakfast.’
‘Oh, hello!’ began Natalia. ‘You must be—’
‘Ms Rawley.’
‘Really?’
‘No, Rawley—’
‘No I said, really,’ smiled Natalia. ‘You’re the Headmistress of Harrogate Grammar.’
‘Yes that’s right!’ Joan laughed melodiously, her big blue-green eyes playing off the amused glint in Neill’s azure irises. ‘And you’re…?’
Neill jumped in. ‘Sorry, I should introduce. This is Natalia Molova, one of our top Year 11 students. Natalia, this is Joan Rawley as you know, Headmistress of the finest school in the county, making an unexpected, exclusive appearance today visiting the worst school in the country.’
‘Oh! There he goes!’ Joan tittered. ‘Being transformed beyond recognition, is what you meant, darling! Well, I heard from Lisa that you’d ramped up an effort to raise money for BHF. Beautiful array of stalls!’
Her ruby lips smiled to reveal her pearly white teeth, under a strong but not too large, bevelled nose. Well-defined, glossy eyelids; high cheekbones and forehead smooth with makeup. Soft lines on her neck, chin and jaw that strengthened a certain wisdom to her striking beauty. She looked like an early forties-aged Olivia Newton John.
Neill cleared his throat. ‘You’re not hosting a fair at HG today then?’
‘It’s our Martlets Fun Run Thursday - remember I was saying about old Nelson who got us into the Guinness World Records the first year? Our ten-year anniversary, almost half a million pounds we’ve raised now! And Nelson’s still going at 74!’
Neill had momentarily turned his face to scratch a red shaving sore, as Joan’s smile fell on Natalia instead, who raised impressed eyes back. Joan’s Lancashire voice had a gentrified tone to it, from years fraternising with higher-earning parents of Leeds and Harrogate, and a high-pitched and slight drawl as if she had long been telling off students with forced, patronising patience.
‘Well, in our first year doing this fair we’re more likely to become the place where Nelson loses his eye than gets it back,’ replied Neill, to Joan’s light whack on his arm. ‘But we can at least make half a millionaire’s shortbread. Or rather, these delicious cookies from my Master Baker here.’
Natalia blinked to Joan. ‘Sure you wouldn’t like a petit-four, or a slice of this beautiful traybake?’
‘Ooh! Yes please,’ eyed Joan.
‘You already know which one I want,’ said Neill, as he waved a hand to Joan. ‘Darling, go sit down next to Miss Doris and I’ll bring it over.’
As Joan went to the table, Natalia began, ‘Neill, honestly, you don’t have to help—’
‘You’re filling mugs from this lukewarm, frothy-watered decanter, yes?’
‘Yep.’
‘Ladies? Would you like tea too?’ called Neill. ‘I’ll make you one, Miss Doris, sit down!’
‘More like lay down,’ Natalia murmured. ‘Surprised she trusts you making tea for her ever again.’
‘You did worse at my desk,’ he whispered back. ‘Or better.’
‘Twelve by the end of the night was better than a sleeping pill,’ she smirked as she arranged the cakes on plates.
‘You texted ten Xs and one Z.’
‘Your fault the master baker was so tired. Also your fault these cookies will break your teeth.’
‘Young lady… a rock-hard cookie is perfect with hot wet tea.’
‘Is that Valentine’s poetry you’re writing for Alana and Aisha’s card stall?’
‘If you want a card from there.’
Neill and Natalia brought over the trays to find Joan musing with Coleman and Doris.
‘Oh yes, Jane Eyre’s always been a popular set text at university before it became GCSE syllabus too. Sometimes a bit heavy for the younger students, I find—’
‘Not for Natalia,’ joined in Neill as he sat down next to Joan, opposite Natalia. ‘She’s well averse with the book, as I’ve been flabbergasted on more than one occasion to witness.’
‘Oh, I agree,’ beamed Coleman.
Joan elbowed Neill. ‘We had our Drama students working on it the other day. They made a fabulous show of the bit, you know, where Mr Rochester dresses up as the gypsy palm reader. One of the best bits of the book!’
‘Funnily enough that’s probably my least favourite part,’ smiled Natalia.
‘Oh? Why’s that?’ Joan smiled back with slight surprise.
‘Oh, you know,’ Natalia blinked with hesitation, but motivated by the glint in Neill’s eye, ‘I find it a bit too far-fetched, that this man of large stature - and great, shaggy brow that Jane keeps going on about - could possibly be hidden well enough to pass as a little old gypsy woman, especially speaking at length to Jane, makes it even more ridiculously untenable.’
Joan opened her mouth. ‘Oh, he—’
‘And what makes it more ludicrous,’ continued Natalia, as Joan pursed her lips and Neill’s face was alive in amusement as he sipped his tea, ‘is that Jane wouldn’t recognise the features and manner of this man she loves so dearly, especially with the suggestive questions he asks her and to make it worse, the idea that Rochester would dress up and try and trick her, feels like humiliation, or at least, I think, unnecessary on the part of Charlotte Brontë.’
‘I’ve got two words, Natalia,’ piped up Neill, as Coleman jumped away to serve someone. ‘Santa’s Grotto.’
‘And I’ve got two words,’ replied Natalia. ‘Philtrum, busted.’
He put his hand to his lip. ‘Ooh I hope not!’
She giggled. Joan looked at Natalia then at Neill, confused, whilst Natalia hurriedly looked down, knowing that if she kept her eyes on Neill for too long, she would surely give something away to Joan as though a blob of their lingering-gluey-energy would be flung into her face like a porno money shot.
‘Well you certainly put across a good argument,’ smiled Joan. ‘English must be your strong point!’
‘I like my lit,’ smiled Natalia.
‘A touch too much,’ added Neill.
‘And what is it you want to do…’ Joan asked, ‘er, er—’
‘Natalia,’ Neill and Natalia said together.
‘…Natalia, when you leave school?’
‘Go home and fall asleep. Coming here on a weekend is as horrifying as my cookies.’
They all laughed.
‘Sorry, miss. I think I used up all my critical thinking on Jane Eyre.’
‘What’s new,’ snorted Neill.
‘Shut up you,’ smirked Natalia, kicking his leg, then realising she’d talked rather flippantly for company. Joan blinked surprised, but Neill was nonplussed, then as he looked to Joan, dropped his smile hurriedly, picked up and sipped his empty mug.
‘To answer your question Ms Rawley, I’d like to be a writer.’
‘Penning something as good as Jane Eyre?’ she flashed a grin.
‘No.’
‘Oh I’m sure you— ’
‘Something far better than.’
Joan’s eyebrows lifted five creases into her forehead. ‘Oh! I love your ambition!’
‘It’s not ambition, Joan darling,’ Neill elbowed her. ‘It’s the precise knowledge of something. She also happens to be the best poet I know.’
Natalia laughed. ‘I don’t know. I’ve got the inspiration alright’ - her eyes slipped right into Neill’s - ‘but it often feels like I’m going round and round in circles with it.’
Now his brow jumped.
‘You need the writer’s spark,’ suddenly piped up Miss Doris.
‘It’s writer’s block, isn’t it?’ added Joan.
‘Writer’s cramp,’ finished Neill, as Natalia felt his foot kick into hers.
‘Well thank you for this high tea, please, take this—’ Joan pulled out a ten pound note. ‘Kate wants to show me the flower stall. I should have got more cash out of the machine. Perfume stall too, goodness!’
‘Buy raffle tickets if you want to win whatever’s left from it,’ called Neill.
‘I’m just going to the loo,’ Natalia arose, ‘er, can you watch my stall, sir?’
‘Of course… I’ll get someone else to do it. Young man!’ he called over.
‘Oh, hi, sir—’ came the voice back.
Natalia’s eyebrow raised to see Alex.
‘If you watch over this stall till Natalia gets back from the bog, I’ll buy you a card from Alana’s beautiful stall there and I’ll even write you a poem for the Valentine lady in your life guaranteed to make her gush.’
Alex stared.
‘Go, Natalia, before you do!’
Natalia paced out, turning in bemusement to see Neill busying himself at Aisha’s stall as they handed him a pen.
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*
Upon coming out the cubicle, there was Neill washing his hands.
‘What the—!’
‘Oh, hello! Rather nice in here, isn’t it? These urinals are unusually high, but if you’ve got a long knob…’
She stared around and whispered: ‘What the heck are you doing in the girls’ toilets?’
‘Don’t be so exclusionist. I’m here to ask the question, of what that is you’re wearing.’ His eyes ran down her. ‘Your waist looks like one of those strung up baby leeks at the farm shop.’
‘Huh?’ She smiled looking down. ‘Don’t you like it? £5 from Help the Aged.’
‘Then would you care to help the aged, and explain to me how your 500 pence dress is roughly 500 times more beautiful than the £500 dress that trumpet-blowing, £500,000-raising woman out there who calls herself my girlfriend is wearing?’
‘£500?! God, all the things I could buy with that in Martlets…’
‘I doubt I have five seconds before she comes looking for me. In, in there… I need to make this quick—’
He ushered her squealing into a cubicle, and slammed shut the squealing hinge behind them.
‘Neill—!’
‘Shush. Listen,’ he grasped her upper arms in soft earnest, staring at her up and down.
‘That… give me that! You look absolutely beautiful. You are like no schoolgirl in existence. I mean, on a day of red, we’re both wearing green, green for go! Isn’t this a sign? I simply have to take you out tonight—’
‘Out?! Out where!’
‘Anywhere. Shebabs Indian. No-one’ll know us there.’
‘I somehow think in Leeds City Centre they will—’
‘Shebabs Aberdeen.’
‘Oh,’ she laughed. ‘Sure, Scotland…’
‘We drove four hours one way, why not the other?’
‘What about Joan!’
‘She’s getting dispatched,’ he grunted, dropping his hands. ‘I knew she was brazen, but turning up more abruptly than Ofsted to gloat on my patch takes the Valentine biscuit. Her face when the Science chaps invited her to have a go on the tombola was like they’d offered her a cup of liquid shit.’
‘Hmph.’
‘I mean, I hadn’t noticed the four-pack of Heinz Baked Beans someone donated but what’s one man’s booby prize is a godsend for a single mum from Crossgates. Besides, my head’s been baked too full of beans myself. Your bean. Natalia—’
She stared sceptically.
‘You must be the only person in the history of this repressed school site - and the medieval or mental hospital or whatever this ghastly building was before that - to bless these wretched grounds with your sighs of orgasm - well, apart from myself of course, the day I interviewed Miss Barnes I couldn’t quite help myself, but—’
They heard the toilet door swing open. Someone - or, it sounded more like two people - paced over, slammed the cubicle door next to them, whilst Natalia hurriedly perched up on the toilet lid, drawing up her knees.
There was the sound of rummaging, zipping and laughing under their breath, following by wet, licking sounds, then a deep, long, slow moaning. Neill’s face turned indignant, whilst Natalia’s hand flew to her mouth in silent giggles.
He rapped sharply on the wall:
‘The toilet is for one kind of filth! Your Headmaster here, trying to take a dump!’
There was an immediate scuffling followed by the cubicle door flipping open again, and the sound of bolting out of the loos, whilst Natalia covered her mouth laughing. Somehow that was the only reaction she could manage to how precariously absurd school life had become.
‘Who was that?’
‘Pupils clearly in the Valentine’s mood. Eating each other whilst I eat my words. Come off that lid—’
He took her hands and sighed, frowning and gazing at her up and down as though her appearance were more unfathomable than a Headmaster taking a fictional dump in a girl’s toilet cubicle and barking at others to get out.
‘Have you seen enough yet?’ she laughed, gripping his hands back, and twirling her skirt side to side as though they were dancing salsa. He groaned softly, pulled her into his chest, took his hands to her face and uttered:
‘Let’s get this foul fair, and that fair fowl over with…’ He leant his ear to the cubicle door. ‘I’ll go first. Right, there’s no-one here, come out—’
Natalia slipped out of the cubicle. Just as they were leaving, Mr Harrison walked in, looking as alarmed as she did.
‘Is it ok, I…?’
‘Come in, come in, Harrison!’ Neill called as he breezed past.
Natalia could now see on the door was a sellotaped A4 sheet, on which was written:
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‘GENDER NEUTRAL TOILET’
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‘Rr-right. So what happened to the boys’ loos?!’
‘Out of order,’ Neill called back to her. ‘It’s literally woke or broke!’
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*
The band played a funked-up Fly Me to the Moon whilst Natalia served a steady slew of cookie and tea customers with giddy arms still tingling from the blessing she never in a million years envisaged receiving in the dank toilet cubicle. What had been her seat of private gloom for four years, was now the unlikely confessional where the lust of the world’s most beautiful man gushed upon her. Her eye followed him round the hall with his fair fowl, now shaking hands with the BHF rep at the charity info stand, not feeling so envious anymore of the soon-to-be-dispatched! He can’t be serious about Aberdeen? But he wants her, because he can’t resist her, and it was worth the pinched bunions to clinch him better than the bugle-blowing Blanche could!
At a break in cake traffic, she sidled up to Sam’s stall.
‘Hey. You two might be right about Alex. I heard someone in the toilets earlier and I wonder if it was him and Alana!’
‘Shagging?!’ Sam eyes widened.
‘Or slurping, not sure which.’
‘Gross.’
‘Are you alright?’ frowned Laura. ‘I saw Neill kick your foot under the table earlier. Thought it was a bit weird?’
‘Oh! No, we were just joking, you know… about wedding bells, with that posh lady he’s head over heels in love with.’
‘Might have been her in the toilet then,’ Laura nodded to Joan now walking out of the exit door, held open by Neill yawning with a fag packet in his other hand. ‘They say he’s sex mad.’
‘Nah, she’s not supple enough. Whoever was in the loos scrabbled out like two cats from a wheelie bin.’
‘Is that your mum?’ Sam frowned.
‘She’s even less supple.’
‘No, over there—’
Natalia turned and did a double take at a familiarly half-brushed auburn head standing at the refreshments.
‘Oh. My. God.’
She rushed over.
‘Mum. What the heck—’
‘Oh, this is Mrs Molova?’ chirruped Dinkey, looking apologetic. ‘I don’t think we’ve ever met! You weren’t at Parents’ Evening last night?’
‘Sorry love, I couldn’t make it.’
‘Ever,’ frowned Natalia, watching Mary fill a beaker to the brim. ‘Mum, you do realise you’re supposed to dilute that blackcurrant juice?’
‘Keep your hair on. I’m only ‘ere to check your school out, I haven’t seen in what, twenty year or summat. What’s happened to yer stage?’
She was gazing up at the gaping empty curtain pegs, just as a velvety laugh came behind them from Joan, now filling two beakers with sparkling water.
‘I was wondering what’s happening with your stage curtains, Richard!’ as she passed him a cup.
‘Part of our transformation,’ replied Neill, as Natalia turned bewildered at these three in interaction. ‘With the funding we’re in the process of acquiring I’ll create an auditorium fit for concerts and plays. It’s my aim to make Drama GCSE available here, with the best set-up in Leeds. Or, East Leeds…’
‘Wonderful, so the government funding was approved?’
‘Er, not yet—’
‘Ah!’ Mary’s face turned on Neill’s. ‘So you’re the ‘Eadmaster that burnt down Wykebeck Green on Fawkes’ Night? I see you still wear ties yoursen?’
‘Pardon?’
Natalia watched mortified.
‘Dya reckon you keep these kids in line without, y’know, a good bit of old-fashioned discipline like in our day? Now, I know our Natalia’s always hated ties, once they got rid she wasn’t so maungey getting dressed on a mornin—’
‘Oh! You must be Mrs Molova! Pleasure to meet you!’ Neill held out his palm, to Mary eyeing him dubiously as he vigorously shook her limp hand. ‘Indeed, as with all matters at Thornwood, I go on a pupil majority decision. And if the budget grants it, we do it!’
‘Oh, aye?’
Natalia looked down her mum in dismay. Large bags under her eyes, two holes in her jean knees - that couldn’t pass as fashionable holes - and now she squawked over to Stacey’s mum with zero etiquette:
‘Judy! Long time no see! How’s the love rat!’
Natalia was digesting just how much credibility she’d lost since feeling like a goddess in the toilet, and how to swiftly remove her mum like pus from a pimple, and the pimple from her life full stop, when she felt Joan’s balmy hand on her shoulder in the same place where Neill’s had squeezed it when she orgasmed in his office yesterday.
‘You know, Richard,’ began Joan, inclining Natalia toward them both as though she were an unusual object of note, ‘I should introduce you to my friend, Shafqat Ullah Shah—’
‘I think you’ll find that’s Natalia Molova,’ he replied, as Natalia’s face creased into silent giggle - ‘unless Joan’s speaking a branch of Yorkshire dialect as indecipherable as your dear mother’s,’ he added in quieter address to Natalia.
‘Shaf. He’s Moroccan,’ Joan continued. ‘Philanthropist and a dear friend of mine. Lives in Ripon. Charming chap, and a multi-millionaire! Owns a foundation that gives grants to state schools. You’d get a lot more from them than the Guv.’ She elbowed Neill. ‘Happen to think he’d adore you, and how you elevate the lowly origins to high-risers. You could use your top students to back you up!’
She winked at Natalia, who now realised that her embarrassing mum, for the first and probably only time in her life, had actually served as a selling point for something.
‘Wow!’ Natalia nodded, feeling her cue to speak. ‘That sounds amazing, Ms Rawley. Yes, Neill’s been working his socks off for the school!’
‘Which foundation?’ Neill frowned. ‘He’ll be at the conference next month then, if he lives in Ripon?’
‘No, he’ll be back in Marrakech,’ Joan’s sweet breath and perfume crossing back over Natalia, as Natalia stood between them feeling like the new adopted child of these two middle class figures whilst her own shambolic parent cackled Custard Cream crumbs over the crafts stall. ‘Owns homes here and out there. He’s over now to see his son who coaches Arthur. He’ll be flying back mid-week so I’ll be sure to catch him before! We’ll talk about it over drinks at the Tap tonight. Martini masterplan for a million, eh?’ She patted his face.
Neill seemed to gaze into mid-air just past Natalia’s face, as though Joan’s palm had turned him into a statue with the power of Queen Jadis of Charn herself.
‘Wow,’ Natalia repeated to fill the silence. ‘Imagine that windfall for Thornwood, Neill? No gender neutral toilets required!’
Joan laughed, as Natalia blinked in earnest for Neill to respond.
‘Yes thank you darling,’ he smiled faintly now, not clear on who he was addressing. ‘Sounds marvellous.’
‘Well I’d love to swoop you away with me right now Richard, but I know you’ve got your hands full. I’d best get going! Arthur will need his lift back from footie training. Thirty lessons and he’s still not clinched his test! And he wants to learn to fly next!’
‘I’ll walk you to your car.’
Natalia wandered back to her stall, where only a handful of her hard cookies remained, and Sam munched the last petit-four. Her mum was perusing the card stall with another large cup of blackcurrant juice in hand.
‘These are all calligraphed creations,’ Alana beamed, ‘with burgundy ribbon roses, black pom poms and white pearls, artificial gypsophila flowers and white chiffon ribbon—’
‘‘Ow much?’ Mary croaked.
‘Five pounds for the smaller, six for—’
‘Five quid for a card?’
Natalia stepped up. ‘Mum—’
‘I thought Clinton’s were expensive enough! But…’
‘Mum, they’re handmade. Please, don’t—’
‘Ah!’ Neill was now weaving back in between greeting or bidding farewell to various parents. ‘Do you have a lucky someone, Mrs Molova?’
‘Well I’ll have you know, I just caught my bastard boyfriend cheatin’.’
Natalia closed her eyes and took a deep breath.
‘So the day is young, Mr ‘Ead.’
‘Mum,’ Natalia lowered her voice at her ear. ‘What are you talking about? Not Darren?’
‘Bastard’s seeing someone else,’ Mary continued at the same volume, if not louder, making Natalia regret asking. ‘I saw her on his phone.’
‘Oh.’
‘Naked picture of her! Had ‘em spread like a stick-up. Her sixpence looked just like one of your biscuits there!’
Sam by the cakes snorted, whilst Aisha and Alana at their card stall looked to each other and dissolved into giggles. Dinkey, Miss Doris, Miss Francis and four parents stood staring over from the refreshments.
Neill coughed. ‘I’m sorry to hear that, Mrs Molova. Perhaps come and sit down for a bit,’ as he guided her arm to the side, nodding to Dinkey, who grabbed a chair, as though she were an OAP about to collapse.
‘Bastard even tried to tell me the phone wasn’t his,’ Mary continued, as she sat down without thanks. ‘Says he was given it by a boy who got an upgrade. Since when do boys go giving away their phones to an old lanky dickhead like him? I knew summat were fishy when he said he won 400 quid on a scratchcard, got a phone that’s worth 300 and ordered a stripper for 200. It just din’t add up!’
Two dads broke into laughter, whilst Francis and Coleman suppressed theirs with difficulty, and the gran on the crochet stall, grinning from ear to ear, seemed to have suddenly developed better hearing than she’d demonstrated in the past hour.
Meanwhile, Neill and Natalia exchanged an uneasy glance.
‘Mum, people here don’t need to hear this,’ Natalia quietly pleaded.
‘I’m enjoying it!’ remarked Sam. ‘My mum goes mental if dad orders the wrong chow mein, not a stripper!’
‘Are you sure that’s blackcurrant juice?’ Natalia took a sip of her mum’s drink. ‘Bloody hell! Is this Chattanerve Apap?’
Neill chortled.
‘Just Asda plonk, love. I brought a little tipple in me bag—’
‘Are you kidding?’ Natalia whispered. ‘That’s wine in your Robinson’s squash bottle?’
‘You know with my agoraphobia I always carry a bit of comfort to get out of the house with, love…’
‘Mrs Molova, it’s been lovely to meet you,’ spoke Neill in his softest diplomacy, ‘but I think it’s time to go home and rest. We don’t have licence for drinking on school grounds today, and I—’
‘Aye up, I thought you were the New Age ‘Ead! No ties, no report cards—’
‘And bring your own booze,’ scoffed Natalia.
‘Pour Mrs Molova a glass of water, please Steve, and I’ll order her a cab.’
Whilst Dinkey placated the protesting Mary that the school will cover the fare, Natalia pulled at Neill’s sleeve as he tapped his phone, whispering:
‘Neill, I need to talk—’
‘Come, come out—’
They stepped out into the quiet of the corridor.
‘Neill… those Anons you got to deface the three… or rather, three-plus-one… musketurds…’
‘Mmm?’ His sober face looked about to burst into laughter.
‘One didn’t happen to have outgrown bleached blonde hair, a boot nose and a dreadful penchant for rapstar-gone-wrong tracksuits?’
‘Mmm, no. Well actually, darling, I don’t know. I organised it through my green supplier…’
‘Ganga guy with the tats?’
‘Aaron, yes…’
‘Is he skinny?’
‘Fat as a pig.’
‘Hm. Aaron? What’s his surname?’
‘Tinegate.’
‘Tine…’ she muttered.
‘They call him Tiny. Funny that…’
‘Oh, fuck. Your Anons must be bloody Darren and Aaron! The skinny buffoon and the fat technophone! Like the fucking Badden Brothers from 101 Dalmatians, you couldn’t make it up!’
‘Don’t you mean technophobe?’ he chuckled.
‘Yes, I know that. But the opposite, what that stupid woman called him…’
He looked confused.
‘He put Just Eat on his phone…’
He frowned down at her crotch.
‘The app, the same you put on mine… oh, it doesn’t matter. More importantly, Darren has a phone with a picture of half of my nipple on!’
‘Half a nipple. Right. We can deal with that.’
Sam was just coming up to the doors. ‘Nat, your mum’s mouthing off again…’
‘Shit. Quick—’
Mary was ranting to a small audience now, including the charity rep from the other side of the hall who suddenly fancied a large cup of lemonade.
‘Men! Watching out for nothing but their willies! They all need to be strung up by their testicles! Apart from you,’ she sidled up to Dinkey who was blushing like a schoolgirl. ‘I bet Geordies are alright, aren’t they love?’
‘Come on mum,’ Natalia took one arm and Sam took the other. ‘A taxi’s on the way, so we’ll go home, talk about Darren and get him to delete all that stuff, shall we—’
‘Oh, all that’s deleted alright!’ Mary released both her arms in a chop-like move. ‘As soon as I saw that filth, I took his phone and threw it straight in’t Cock Beck!’
Natalia flashed round to Neill. ‘Oh, good! She threw it straight in’t Cock Beck!’
‘Oh, good!’ Neill enthused. ‘She threw it straightint… pardon?’
‘Into the Cock Beck. Stream running through East Leeds, Neill.’
‘Ohh! Good!’
‘It were good!’ joined in Mary, looking pleased. ‘He cried like a bleedin’ baby!’
The four of them, including Sam, burst into a rapture of laughter gaily chinking beakers as Dinkey, Doris, Francis, three parents and two pupils looked on bewildered.
‘Cab’s here,’ Neill glanced at his phone.
Mary, looking replenished from her rant as though it had been counselling worth coming out for, waved her hand. ‘Well it’s nice to meet you Mr, Mr…’
‘Neill,’ said Natalia and Neill together.
‘Come on, pet,’ Dinkey took Mary’s arm as she relented to let him lead her to the door.
‘Phew,’ sighed Natalia. ‘Is this fair over yet?’
‘We’ve just got to announce the raffle and the Love Hearts winner, I believe,’ Neill nodded to Sam. ‘Simple, smooth, then we’re done.’
Mrs Williams, who’d been keeping herself and her husband at the other side of the hall through the commotion as though keeping her distance from an escaped tiger from the zoo, was now onstage adjusting the squealing mic.
Natalia slipped into a chair next to Neill at the back of the gathering as the prizes were rattled off.
‘Guess we both had our mums turn up today,’ he muttered under his breath.
‘At least you can drub yours,’ she whispered back. ‘After your million pound Martini.’
‘Fuck off. It’s the weekend and I don’t want to talk shop. I want to talk slop. Sloppy cake, and I want to go to Aberdeen… or even as far as Newcastle. Geordies are alright…’
‘There’s always Valentine’s.’
‘Don’t predict much escape with that one. Can’t net a million quid grant by Wednesday.’ He sighed. ‘This is going to be a long old schmooze.’
‘Have you written a poem for her Valentine card yet?’
‘Ejaculate, and A58… home to my own bed, is the one thought in my head.’
She giggled. ‘Make the most of it…you look good together.’
‘I’ll tell you what looked good together. Your hand and the netherland.’
‘Oh they’ll be together tonight. Thinking of you and your backhander.’
‘Lady Laurels with her protégée turn you on?’
‘I felt like her protégée too. So use your top to bottom pupil to back you up like she said, and give her one for me, Grottweiler.’
His breath caught in a snicker as he blinked at her, bemused. ‘Of course, darling.’
Once the last raffle prize was applauded, Sam handed up a slip of paper.
‘We have a winner of the Love Hearts. It contains 587 sweets, apparently, and the closest guess was… 520. The winner is Miss Doris!’
‘God,’ whispered Neill as they all clapped, watching Doris going bright red as she stepped up to receive the jar. ‘Do we get to sit and watch her suck through the whole lot?’
‘That your Miss Dormouse fantasy?’
‘Only since I met you.’
‘Meeting my mum didn’t repulse you then?’
‘Makes me more certain I’ll get you away from her this week.’
‘Not if Fun Run Nelson gets you first…’
Doris promptly popped off the lid and offered the jar around to everyone arising. ‘Ooh, I can’t possibly eat all these myself!’ she tittered, as hands of all sizes and cleanliness plunged in. Williams, coming down heavily from the stage, smiled and obliged to dunk hers.
‘Ooh!’ she stared. ‘There’s something spiky—’
She withdrew her hand in surprise to find two wrapped condoms amongst her palmful of sweets.
‘What on earth—!’
Neill walked over. ‘Goodness. What peculiar sweets Doris has given you!’
‘Oh my god! What’s she holdin’!’ shouted Alex.
Miss Doris had pulled out and was staring with horror at a smooth, pink shell-shaped object as though it was a tarantula at her wrist, then squealed and dropped it to the floor, where it began vibrating in a circle and peels of laughter erupted from dodging feet.
Doris, Williams and her husband shrunk back in horror, whilst parents and pupils stood around helpless with laughter, two already filming it on their phones.
‘Is that a—’
‘Doris won a buttplug!’
‘It’s a vibrator!’
‘A practical joker! …Neill!’ glared Williams. ‘How can you let this pass to the public?’
‘Nothing to do with me,’ Neill held up his hands, as Miss Francis reached to pick up and switch it off, faintly smirking.
‘The jar was Sam’s!’ Alana called. ‘Love Hearts was her stall!’
‘I beg your pardon!’ Sam’s eyes flashed back. ‘I didn’t know this was in there! You’re the slag who could have done with this jar when you were all over Alex in the bogs earlier!’
There were yelps of laughter from pupils, as Alana’s mouth fell open. The teachers looked appalled.
Dean suddenly heckled, ‘it’s not a secret everyone’s been using the Gender Neutral Toilet as a shag stop! I saw Miss Barnes and her Michelin Man boyfriend go in, and he made this huge sound like he’d stubbed his toe!’
There were roars of laughter.
‘Are the boys’ loos broken?’
‘Sign fell off and people have been using it anyway…’
‘What else is in the jar?’
Dean and Aisha rushed forward, as Neill barred them. ‘Right, right! Avaunt, you cullions! I think that’s enough of the Foul Fair!’ He clapped his hands, whilst Williams attempted to reprimand five pupils at once. ‘Let’s move along, please, through the fog and filthy air!’ as Neill ushered everyone to the exits. ‘Sweep on, sweep on, you fat and greasy citizens!’
Williams turned and glared.
‘Shakespeare, Anne,’ added Coleman.
‘Want this, Kate?’ smirked Francis, passing the vibrator to Coleman in a lowered hand.
‘I’ll need that, ladies,’ as Neill plucked it from her. ‘For evidence,’ he added.
As Neill bestowed goodbyes on tittering staff and parents drifting out the exits, they passed by the toilet, where Williams now stood open-mouthed at the ‘Gender Neutral Toilet’ sign still stuck to the door.
‘Horrifying, don’t you think?’ Neill stepped over and ripped it down, as Mrs Williams managed a wry smile at him.
‘About the only thing you two agree on, isn’t it?’ Natalia laughed, just as she felt something slip into her coat pocket.
‘See how much of a Fun Run you can get with that, cookie.’
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