Graffiti My Soul (23 page)

‘I'm not talking about your coursework, Veerapen.'

‘Or a blatently racist teacher, by the sounds of it. She was saying those things to get a rise out of me. Isn't that illegal?'

‘Look, I can only help you if you tell me what's going on. I've had reports of disruptions in all your classes this morning and I want to get to the bottom of it.'

‘Nothing to get to the bottom of. None of this has anything to do with me. I can't be blamed just because your teachers have no grasp of discipline.'

‘I'm never sure whether I should give you special treatment because of your circumstances, but I can, if that's what you'd like me to do.'

‘You're the Year Head. You should know what to do.'

‘You pushed your History teacher, Veerapen.'

‘Like I said, she gave me a B. I wasn't particularly happy about it.'

‘Do you think pushing a teacher is acceptable behaviour?'

‘It's not as if she listens to what I've got to say. And there wasn't push, just so you know. I brushed past her to get to my seat.'

‘I think we both know that it was more than that.'

‘She was trying to get me to sit at the front and I wasn't even doing anything. It was everyone else who wouldn't stop talking. She's got it in for me, like I have to be made an example or something.'

‘She must have asked you to move desks for a reason.'

‘I was telling Lizzie Jennings to shut up, that's all.'

‘I heard you were telling her more than that.'

‘I told her to shut her fat fucking mouth. That what you wanted to hear?'

This is the only the second time I've ever been in Year Head's office, the first being when I cut Pearson's head open. From the outside, when you walk along the path to the science labs and peer in, it looks huge. So misleading. When you're actually in there, it's as poky as hell and nowhere near as plush as the blue curtains and leather seating suggest. A cupboard with a desk and a couple of Matisse prints ripped from a magazine sellotaped onto the wall (his flowers, not the naked women. We have them at home, that's how I know.) Her desk is covered with paper and books, but all school stuff, nothing personal aside from today's copy of
The Guardian
, a bunch of pickled daffs in a vase that is algae-heavy, and a burnt CD that starts with a ‘C' – could be either Coldplay or classical. No family pictures like you'd imagine a woman her age to have. Not sure if that's because she likes to keep her life outside the school just that, or if, as everyone in our year likes to believe, that she's a possible lesbian.

I know that if I breathe right and relax, I'd be able to see things more clearly. Focus on the goals. But it's too tempting to stay wrapped up in my rage, too easy. Everyone's always saying how much better it is to keep on the right side of things; what they don't mention is how
hard it is to bring yourself out of that state just so you can behave correctly. It's harder than just flicking a switch. I'm a mass of fine electrical wires, powered to cooking point, brain preparing to sizzle.

She asks me again if there's something I'd like to tell her. That ordinarily an assault on a teacher, no matter how small, can result in immediate suspension, but that under the circumstances my behaviour this morning would be overlooked. But – and there was a big but – I had to open up and tell her what was going on. She's hearing the stories but doesn't know who's behind them; the gossip has gone way beyond its remit at this point. She also wants to know if there's any truth in them, because the seriousness of the allegations makes it something she cannot ignore.

‘There isn't anything to ignore,' I tell her. ‘Sour grapes 'cos the running's going good. No one seems to like it when the Paki gets the spotlight.'

‘Veerapen, don't talk like that. Never talk about yourself in that way.'

She obviously hasn't seen any hip hop videos made in the last ten years.

Also, I can't respect anyone who's only learned to pronounce my name properly in the last six weeks. Year Head's stumbling over a few basic syllables makes Brendan's efforts sound natural.

I'm only getting her riled up because I don't want her to start some discussion about how a kid may get confusing feelings about members of the same sex as he moves into adolescence. I'm fifteen, I don't need those kind of lectures. Especially from a woman who's a lesbian on the quiet. Make a sentence with these words: calling, pot, kettle. Why are adults all such hypocrites?

Mum had a similar conversation with me a few months ago after some twat I didn't even know called out a name while we were queuing at the car park machine in the Bentalls Centre. Walked right up to my face and said it. I didn't get out of that chat as easily. I had to swallow my smirks and pretend to open up, something that I won't be doing again.

We sit in silence for what feels like an hour. I concentrate on Jase's blood stain, which still hasn't been cleaned from the carpet.

‘You'd better get going or you'll be late for registration,' she says finally.

Knowing that it's safe to look up, I see she's out of her seat and pointing to the clock.

‘I'm going to ask your teachers to keep a close eye on you this afternoon, and if there's any more trouble you must come and let me know.'

‘OK,' I go, not 'cos I've got any intention of blabbing or sharing any information with her. Not 'cos I want to let someone who isn't a family member know how I am falling out of my depth into something that feels frightening and uncontrollable, but 'cos it's the easiest thing to say.

‘OK. Most definitely. Fo' shizzle m'nizzle.'

I slip into the library on the way back to class and check my emails. Figure I can scrounge a couple of extra minutes and blame it on Year Head. There are two. One sent bulk to the whole of our year, the other one comes up as private. Both JPEGS. The bulk: one with me and Casey with my tits out down the track. Doesn't bother me as much as it should. They're already talking about it, this isn't gonna change that. It's only when I think of Moon that I get the hard knot in my stomach that threatens to turn me inside out. Knowing that, quite willingly, she felt that she had to pass that evidence on, and to him. In the glare of the second JPEG, my own worries are nothing, they don't even compare. Possibly why I got it privately. Pearson has guts, but not that much guts. A picture scanned from the local paper archives, of Jason's dead sister being carried into the ambulance. She's already in the bag, but that doesn't make any difference. I know what I'm looking at. Sick bastard.

Send him a txt to wash over the sick feeling: his dad on the floor in the street with the toe of my trainers in his face. It ends now.

64

Gwyn takes me for lunch at the Italian place. It's expensive, so no one there knows us. She walks with me extra slowly 'cos the bandaged leg has got infected and is hurting like hell. I'm saying nothing about transference either.

She doesn't tell me how much she likes me, only that she saw me snogging Peter Platinum, the runner who's all eyes and teeth, after that race meet in Guildford. She'd come to pick us up from the station, and saw how I was straggling behind, waiting for my opportunity to get my three seconds of tongue whilst the others were getting their shit together. If I tell her that was the first time I'd ever touched a guy's lips, she wouldn't believe it. And he was the one who'd made the moves. The way he'd been checking me out in the changing rooms. One of those times when you think, fuck it. Let him have what he wants. I know he's an old ugly fucker, but there's no other candidates round here. I don't even like the guy. I just wanted to know what it would be like.

‘But how come Moon never knew about it? I would have seen from her face, if she did.'

‘Because I knew how obsessed with her you are . . . were. How obsessed with her you
were
. How you tried so hard for her to think that you were perfect. That's the reason she was into Pearson, in case you didn't get it – 'cos he's riddled with imperfections. You try too hard to conceal yours.'

‘Are you really that easy talking about Pearson like this?'

She's ordered a half bottle of wine for herself, and because they're new and foreign, the staff let it go. She polishes it off almost in one.

‘Not really. But as long as he gets what's coming to him, I'll just about be OK.'

‘Which is?'

‘Nothing less than a long and painful stretch. He killed my sister. He needs locking up.'

65

The first time I see Pearson is at next lesson, English, but Mrs Doe runs her class like a concentration camp, so you can't make the slightest attempt at desk-to-desk conversation unless you want to get killed. We both sit in the centre: me far right by the window, him far left nearest the door. Three desks between us. I have my registration in this room, so haven't moved an inch since I got here. He makes class by the skin of his teeth as usual, so there's no opportunity to exchange pleasantries, which is a big shame. I'm so angry, I'm ready to pull his teeth out.

We spend forty minutes detachedly discussing some book that no one's interested in. Mrs Doe is usually good at reading the code amongst the kids, but she's too busy terrorising us to pick up on our simmering. Also, she was probably late from having a last-minute fag in the language lab with Mrs Fletcher, and so didn't get her ear pulled by Year Head about putting me into witness protection.

I write Jase a note and slip it to him via Chinese Peter.

We all talk about this Rob Fleming guy and his record shop like he's under the microscope, like none of us have ever fucked-up in our lives. Like, ever. And Pearson is the most scathing of the lot. And because he's talking so much, because he's actually read the book for a change, Mrs Doe is nodding her head excitedly and lapping it up. It's enough to make you sick.

‘It's not like real life. Who buys records any more?'

‘You're such an expert on real life,' goes Jase. ‘You're a regular documentary-maker.'

‘And he moans all the way through. He's such a loser.'

‘Stop interrupting, Jason. Daniel's making an interesting point here. Don't stop, Daniel, please carry on. What makes, him moaning d'you think?'

‘A bad technique with women. Those lists. They're not even interesting.'

No one's laughing. Mrs Doe's not picking up on anything. Eyes too blurry with the
joy of teaching
. Focusing on Pearson like he's her private student or something.

‘How about this, Daniel. Here's a man whose life is littered with so many disappointments that he's become paralysed with fear. That if he makes a mistake, any happiness with the girl of his dreams will disappear. Do you think his moaning is more or less understandable in this context?'

I'm looking at Chinese Peter, but he's ignoring me. The note is under his book and isn't moving from there, not whilst Mrs Doe is in the vicinity.

‘He goes on about lists all the time because it's the only thing he gets right,' I pipe up, making as much noise as possible. ‘Makes him feel good about himself.'

‘He's hiding,' Pearson barks back, eyes locked. ‘My parents taught me to have a low opinion of anyone who hides away from their problems. People like that deserve a slap.'

The only sound in the room comes from Jase scraping his chair back. Note received. He's two seats away from Pearson and could have him eating parquet in a minute. The temperature shifts. The atmosphere becomes thicker and gets caught in my throat. Everyone in class is less interested in Mrs Doe and her legendary temper, and more intrigued by the current exchange of opinion. They all know that we won't be talking about soppy books for much longer.

It's not nails down the blackboard, but it comes close: Jase still seated and pushing his chair slowly back. A plan formulating behind those pinched eyes.

‘No one's interested in this book, miss. Why can't we read that one on The Krays, like the other class?'

Pearson continues to lecture but, like the rest of the room, has his eyes on the chair legs as they move closer to the desk behind. Jase is no longer holding his text open at the page we are supposed to be examining. His fist is wrapped around his pen, nib out. Even Lizzie Jennings, who's supposed to hate him after he dumped her outside Tesco, is fixed on his every move.

‘I would hardly call The Krays literature,' goes Mrs Doe, who, with her sixth sense that all of the older teachers have when they sniff an ounce of trouble, moves to a space behind our row of desks, at a point equidistant between the two of us.

She stands legs apart, arms behind her back like a high-kicking FBI chick who kills truculent boys with her bare hands. This would be funny if she wasn't nearly sixty and so sharp-tongued.

‘Has anyone else got any thoughts they'd like to share? We can talk about any book you like, so long as it's fiction.'

Only me and Pearson raise our hands.

He's up on his feet. I wasn't ready. For once I was actually thinking about the book. The sound of more chairs sliding back, a symphony of screech as everyone prepares themselves for what they think will come next.

It's all very quick. Mrs Doe doesn't get a chance to move out of her FBI-agent-on-alert position. Everything that happens is down to Jase.

In years to come, if we are all still alive and haven't been fried in the electric chair, Jase's dive will become legendary: a sudden leap downwards that most goalies would kill for. It helps that his arms are so long and rubbery, shooting past the statue that is Mrs Doe, and reaching for Pearson's legs.

Both of them are on the floor. Jason on top of Pearson and going for his throat. Pearson struggling to break free, his hands uselessly flattened under him. He wriggles like a half-alive fish in the fryer and makes use of his legs instead, giving one high kick after another.
Most get Jason in the back. Only one manages to hit the target and get him in the head. Gives Jase a hint. He stops strangling Pearson and starts bashing his head against the floor instead.