The Teacher's Secret (32 page)

Then he'd walked into the classroom. That's when he found himself completely lost for words; he could only look around and wonder what the hell had happened. And as he stood there, staring at the scene in front of him, a picture of Elsie Burnett suddenly popped into his head. Not like she is now but when she was still a little tyke. Six or seven, something like that; when Trina and Len
were still together. That day—the day that's in his mind now—Elsie was hanging on to Trina's hand as they came through the school gate, her little head down, eyes to the ground. Which wasn't like Elsie, who was always a head-up, looking-around sort of kid. So Sid had looked a bit closer, to check she was okay. Only then did he see what had happened: her head had been shaved, shaved so she was practically bald, so she looked like a mangy old dog.

When he'd looked around at Terry's ruined classroom—everything gone, everything destroyed—that's the only thing he could think of: poor little Elsie's shaved head. And when he couldn't stand gaping at it any longer, he'd had to leave. But he'd taken the rug with him, hadn't he? He'd hauled it right down the stairs and past the hall. In the end he'd even had to drag it along the ground. Almost killed him. But he'd done it.

Outside, the commotion is getting louder. He's not surprised to find Ethan at the centre of it. What does surprise him is seeing him with a kid he doesn't recognise. Black as night, he is, so black Sid can't stop himself from staring.

‘Keep away from her,' Ethan is yelling at him. ‘You hear me, you stupid arsehole? You just keep away from her.'

It's not the sort of language Sid likes hearing and if Ethan's not careful someone else will hear it and he'll be getting himself another detention. So he hurries over to see if he can't calm the whole thing down.

But things are worse by the time he gets there: they're so bad that Ethan is almost hoarse from screaming.
Fuck
, he's saying,
fucking this
or
fucking that
.
Fucking something
, at least. Sid can't make it out exactly.

Still yelling, Ethan inches closer to the boy until their noses are
almost touching. Sid feels a shot of admiration for the new boy; Ethan's a tough one and it takes some spunk to stand up to him.

‘So what are you looking at, huh?' Ethan taunts the boy.

The boy doesn't move. ‘Actually,' he says, and he sounds almost British, ‘I'm not quite sure what I'm looking at.'

It's then that Ethan launches himself at the boy, arms right around him as he tries to wrestle him to the ground. But the boy won't fall; he just stays planted to the spot.

It's time to step in, Sid thinks, and he grabs Ethan by the collar. ‘That's enough now.'

But Ethan is still struggling. In fact, he seems almost out of control. ‘You fucking fuck!' he yells. ‘You fucking fuck fuck,' as his voice dissolves.

With an almighty effort, Sid lifts him up so that Ethan's just about dangling in front of him. With his free hand, he waves the other boy away. ‘Just go,' he tells him, keeping his voice low. ‘Just go.'

And to his relief, the boy does. Eyes wide, he turns and walks away.

Only when the boy's well out of sight does Sid let Ethan go. ‘What in the world was that all about? What would Mr P say if he saw you carrying on like that?'

Something in the boy's face stiffens. ‘Well, Mr P can't say anything, can he, because he's not even here. He's not here so he can't do anything about it. So who cares?'

And then he starts crying. Just like that. Sid can't believe it. And the tears keep on coming, they keep pouring down his face, until his nose is running, too, and he's crying so hard his whole body begins to shake.

Sid puts his hand on the boy's shoulder. ‘It's okay, mate,' he says. ‘It's okay. Why don't you just tell me what's got you so upset?'

Ethan doesn't answer.

Sid keeps a hand on his shoulder. ‘Come on, mate, what's the problem? Why did you get stuck into him?'

His eyes on the ground, Ethan shakes his head.

But Sid keeps pushing. ‘Come on, Ethan,' he says, ‘tell me what happened.'

And eventually he does. ‘Well, how would you feel,' he bursts out, ‘if you got moved from your proper table and someone else got your seat just because he's new? And he didn't even say thank you for me moving and now he's going to be friends with all my friends and they probably won't even be my friends anymore. Well, how would you feel about that?'

At first, Sid doesn't say anything. Instead, he just gives Ethan's shoulder a gentle squeeze. ‘Well,' he says slowly, ‘if something like that happened to me, I think I'd feel confused. Angry, probably, too. I'd say that's how I'd be feeling. That how you're feeling?'

The boy doesn't answer him.

‘The thing is, Ethan, maybe you could give him a bit of a chance. I mean, it's not his fault he got your seat, is it? I mean, it wasn't his decision to sit there, was it?'

Reluctantly, Ethan shakes his head.

‘So even if you don't really like him that much, you can't really blame him for that, can you?'

Again Ethan shakes his head.

Sid gives his shoulder another squeeze. ‘Off you go, then, mate.'

As he watches the boy scamper off, his heart goes out to him. A bad business for the kids, having Terry up and go in the middle of the year like that. And because no one's told him anything about it, he's none the wiser. And Terry's not answering his calls. It's all
a bit of a mess really. Tania blames Laurie Mathews—she's made that clear—but she doesn't seem to know much about it either. So they're all in the dark. And if they're all left in the dark, how are they expected to carry on as though nothing's changed? Because it has, hasn't it? Because without Terry, everything's different.

This is what he's thinking about when Laurie Mathews walks up to him. That's a first in itself; she's not usually one to seek him out.

‘Sid,' she says, ‘just now, there was a lot of shouting.'

He nods. ‘Just a bit of an argument between a couple of the kids.'

‘More than a bit,' she says. ‘I couldn't believe it when I heard it.'

‘Ethan can get a bit hot under the collar, that's all. He's calmed down now. He should be all right now.'

She looks unconvinced. ‘Well, quite frankly, I was appalled by what I heard. Absolutely appalled.'

The language. She'd be talking about the language.

‘And to speak like that to a child of colour, that's what I can't believe.'

Sid's a bit confused by that: swearing's swearing in his book, doesn't matter if it's at a white kid, a brown kid or a black kid. ‘He shouldn't be speaking like that,' he agrees. ‘I told him as much.'

‘Well, I'll be taking it very seriously, I can tell you that much.'

She's getting herself worked up now. Sid doesn't really get it. Give the kid a serve, wash out his mouth, but in the end, it was just a bit of bad language; he's not sure it deserves to be a hanging offence. Then again, he's not the boss, is he?

Mel

The next afternoon, Mel leaves home late and finds herself almost running to get to the principal's office on time. With Diane, there was never any beating around the bush—she'd just come out with it, whatever it was that Ethan had been caught doing that particular time. This one's different.

‘It's about Ethan,' she says. ‘I'm afraid his behaviour has been unacceptable.' Her tone sounds like she's about to send him off to jail.

Mel waits for more.

‘Completely unacceptable,' she says. She's about to say something else when there's a knock at the door. Before she can say anything, the door opens and in walks Adam.

‘Sorry I'm late. I was on a job and couldn't get away.' He gives Mel a shamefaced smile. ‘Sorry, babe.' There's an empty chair beside her and he plonks himself down on it.

Laurie—Ms Mathews—Mel's not sure what she's supposed to call her—continues talking. ‘As I was saying, Ethan's behaviour has been unacceptable today.'

‘What—again?' Adam says this with a smile that fades when Mel gives him a warning look. His next question is less flippant. ‘How bad?'

‘To put it bluntly,' she tells them, ‘I was horrified. Horrified to see him picking on a student who's not only new to the school, but new to the country. I was absolutely appalled to hear the racist tirade that came out of your son's mouth.'

Mel arches forward. ‘That's a pretty serious accusation. What did he say?'

Ms Mathews shakes her head. ‘I don't really want to repeat it.'

But Mel is insistent. ‘Well, we need to know what he said. I mean, if it's so bad he could be suspended, we need to know exactly what he said.'

Ms Mathews clears her throat. ‘Mr and Mrs Thompson,' she says, ‘on Sebastian Chuma's first day at this school, your son called him a fucking black cunt.'

Mel is shocked into silence—Adam too.

‘So,' Ms Mathews tells them, ‘I'm sure you can understand why I feel it necessary to suspend your son.'

As soon as she's out of the office, Mel turns to Adam. ‘I'm going to kill him,' she says. ‘I'm going to rip his filthy head off. Then I'm going to ask him what the fuck he was thinking.'

Adam gives her his lazy smile. ‘Don't you think it might be a bit tricky to ask him anything, babe, once you've ripped his filthy head off?'

She looks away because she doesn't want him to make her laugh. She wants to stay angry long enough to be able to really give
it to Ethan.
Fucking black cunt.
She can't believe it. Can't fucking believe it.

‘Give me the keys and I'll wait for you in the ute,' she says. ‘I'm too angry to even look at him.'

Adam checks his watch. ‘Five minutes until the bell rings,' he says. ‘I'll grab them and bring them back to the car.'

Mel nods. ‘You'd better warn Ethan he's in for it.'

Adam leans over to kiss her on the lips. ‘You look so hot when you're angry, babe.'

She pushes him away from her but not before she gives him the ghost of a smile. ‘Make sure you tell him he's in for it, big time.'

Adam nods. ‘Sure thing.'

The ute's parked right outside the school office. It's the only good thing about getting hauled into the principal's office half an hour before home time: there's no fight for a parking space. The bad thing is having to deal with all of Adam's shit when she opens the car door and tries to climb up into the front seat: building plans, paint sample sheets, hammers and screwdrivers and the rest of it. She pushes it all onto the floor and kicks it out in front of her so she can stretch her legs out.

Fucking black cunt.
Even thinking the words makes her flinch. Where would he have even heard them? Not that it much matters now. Because he's topped it with this one. Little shit. What the hell was he thinking?

There's a small mirror on the back of the sun visor in front of her. Looking in it, she tries to apply a coat of lip gloss without smearing it all over herself. She's still trying to get it right when Josh comes running hard at the ute. He jumps in the back seat but doesn't sit down. Instead he stands up so he can wrap his arms around the back of Mel's head. ‘Ethan's in trouble, isn't he?'

In the mirror, Mel gives him the look. ‘Oh yeah, Joshy boy,' she says drily. ‘Ethan's in big trouble.'

And Adam must have given Ethan the heads-up on that one because he's looking super scared as he makes his way towards the ute. Well, he'll be looking a hell of a lot worse by the time she's done with him.

As soon as they get home, Mel orders him to sit at the kitchen table.

Ethan opens his mouth to say something, then stops.

‘Well?' she asks impatiently.

‘Can I go to the toilet first, Mum?'

Standing behind him, Adam mouths,
Just say no
.