Takeshita Demons (4 page)

Alex opened his big mouth first, pointing from
me to the front of the class. Instead of Mr Lloyd,
there was a tall, dark-haired woman writing on
the board. The whole class stank of sickly sweet
jasmine, as if she'd had some sort of accident with
her perfume bottle.

"Is she your mum?" Alex asked.

The woman was dressed up as if she was about to read the news on TV. She was wearing a shiny
caramel skirt with a white blouse and matching
caramel jacket. Her hair was long and black and just
as shiny as her skirt, and she wore it tied around
her head like an elaborate piece of origami. She had
her back to the class and was writing something on
the board with purple chalk. It was hard to read,
but I could just make out the letters:

"Well, is she?" Alex asked again.

I walked past him to the desk that Cait and
I shared. Her seat was still empty and there was no
sign of her bag. Unlucky. I could usually count on
Cait to back me up when Alex was being an idiot.

"No," I answered. "Is she your mum?"

I pulled my pencil case and books out of my
favourite bag and began setting up my desk for
the day.

"She looks like your mum," Alex hissed. He had
turned around in his seat so he could talk to me more
easily.

"She's not my mum," I said. I focused on my
books, wishing Alex would shut up. It was as if he'd
never seen someone from Japan before. I wasn't the only Japanese person in the world.

"She your aunt then?"

Great. This was going to be tedious. But just as
Alex was getting started, the strange toffee-suited
teacher spoke.

"Good morning, class," she began.

Alex turned to face the front almost immediately,
leaving me blissfully alone. This woman, whoever she
was, had saved me! For a moment I thought I might
even like her, despite her awful outfit and smelly
perfume and enormous hair. But I was wrong.

"My name is Mrs Okuda. Mr Lloyd has fallen ill
and I will be teaching your class while he is away."
The woman smiled, revealing two rows of sparkling
white teeth surrounded by glowing purple lipstick.

A ripple passed across the class. I guess they
were staring at the same thing as me. Her lipstick
and stinky perfume were bad enough, but the rest
of her was worse. Her whole face was caked in pale
make-up and the white collar of her blouse rode
high across her neck, like something from those
old-fashioned movies where the women all wear
petticoats and need maids to help them dress. She also
wore several strings of tight white pearls, crammed
across her throat. It looked as if her head might fall
off at any moment, cut off at the neck from lack of oxygen. It was the worst outfit I'd ever seen on
a teacher.

Someone giggled and I saw Alex whisper to his
neighbour. We all knew what a supply teacher meant,
especially a woman teacher, and especially one
dressed as badly as this. It meant watching videos, no
maths test, heaps of free time, and the chance to make
her really, really angry without getting into too much
trouble. I bounced my freezing feet under the desk,
wondering what Alex would do to get it started.

"So," Mrs Okuda continued, oblivious to the
whispers and nudges of the class. "Let's get to know
each other better, shall we?" She smiled again, baring
her teeth like a fox, this time directly at me. I looked
down at once, examining the grooves in the wood of
my desk. Just because we had the same coloured hair
and the same kind of skin it didn't mean I needed
special attention. I'd kind of hoped she wouldn't
notice I was Japanese. She'd be better off keeping her
eye on Alex.

"Shall we start by calling the roll?" she asked,
but she didn't wait for an answer. She pulled out a
brown folder of papers and took the lid off a black
pen. "Oscar? Jean? Imran?"

A high-pitched screech echoed from outside, in
the corridor. With a squeal of web rubber, Cait came bursting in through the door, her umbrella dripping
with ice and her hair still rammed in a woolly hat.
"Sorry, Mr Llo..." she began, then stopped in her
tracks, staring at Mrs Okuda.

Mrs Okuda stopped her roll call to glance at Cait,
who must have been making a large puddle in the
doorway. "You can leave your umbrella outside," she
said. "And you are?"

"Gait O'Neill," said Cait, and she glanced across
the class, smiling a quick hello at me.

"Right, thank you, Cait," Mrs Okuda said,
scanning her roll and making a mark with her pen.
"You may sit. Don't be late again." Then she continued
with the roll call.

Cait dropped her umbrella outside and came to
take her seat next to me. I didn't look across. I had a
feeling something bad was going to happen.

"Alex. Shaun. Isabella."

She was getting close. I could hear my heart
beating louder.

"Jackson? Robyn? Ursula?"

Then it happened. When she got to my name,
Mrs Okuda stopped, smiling her awful smile right at
me. "Takeshita Miku," she said, saying my full name,
with the family name first, the proper Japanese way.

I cringed. "Yes," I answered, wishing she'd treat me just like all the other kids. "But it's Miku..."
I dared to correct her, glaring as Alex turned around.

"Miku Mouse," Alex mouthed silently, mocking
my name.

But Mrs Okuda didn't seem to notice. Instead,
even worse, she spoke to me in Japanese.

"Anata mo Nihonjin desu-ne? You are also Japanese,
aren't you?" she said, as if it wasn't obvious from my
name already.

Heat rose from my collar in waves. This had never
happened before. I could feel the other kids turning
round in their seats, staring. I never spoke Japanese at
school. Why was she doing this?

"Yes, Miss," I answered in English. I stared at
my desk, willing her to stop. It had been bad enough
when I was new at school. I did not need this now.

"Kyou wa samukunai?" she continued, as if she was
completely oblivious to the shame she was causing
me.

Talk English, I wanted to scream. What are you
doing? Instead I answered politely, hoping she'd think
enough was enough and get on with the roll call. "Yes,
Miss, quite cold today." What was she doing, asking
me about the weather? In Japan it was normal for
strangers to talk about the weather. In England too
I'd noticed, but she didn't need to do it in front of the whole class. Please.

But still she didn't stop.

"Mada Nihongo wo hanasu yo ne. So you still speak
Japanese." She narrowed her eyes. "And I guess you
still know...."

I couldn't look, I just sank lower in my chair.
She hadn't asked a direct question, so I figured she
didn't want a direct answer. I decided to stay silent.
And there had been something strange in the way
she'd spoken. As if she wasn't even speaking to
me, but to herself, somewhere in the back of her
shiny trussed-up head. And what did she mean by
"still know"?

I could hear the clock ticking, could feel every
pair of eyes in the room focused on me, burning holes
of shame into the top of my skull. I willed Mrs Okuda
to forget about me and start calling the roll again.

Then, thankfully, something broke the silence.
It wasn't Mrs Okuda finishing the roll. She'd missed
heaps of kids' names out, but it was as if she'd
forgotten all about roll call. Instead, she was writing
something on the board. The chalk screeched, and
slowly chairs rumbled as the other kids turned to
face the front. I steamed with relief.

When the chalk squeaked to a stop, I sneaked
a look at the board.

"An essay," Mrs Okuda announced. "Write me
an essay, introducing yourself. It should be two pages
long, no pictures. Due lunchtime. Any questions?"

The class groaned. Alex's hand shot high in
the air.

"Yes?" Mrs Okuda asked, flashing her white and
purple smile.

"On Tuesday mornings we play dodgeball in the
gym," Alex smirked.

"Yes?" she asked, waiting.

"Well, we won't have time to do essays before
lunch if we're playing dodgeball."

"Then we'll have to give dodgeball a miss
for today." Mrs Okuda smiled, then she sat at
Mr Lloyd's desk, crossing her legs as if that closed
the conversation.

Other kids' hands went up almost at once.

"Yes?" she asked, sounding slightly annoyed.

"When will Mr Lloyd be back?" someone asked.

"I don't know. He's quite sick."

"What kind of sick?"

"Hands in the air," Mrs Okuda said, but she
answered anyway. "He has chicken pox." She smiled.
"It can be quite severe in adults. It could be several
weeks before he gets back." She looked across at me, making eye contact before I could snatch my eyes
away. She looked pleased and her eyes were shining.

No one else seemed to share her enthusiasm.
Several weeks? No dodgeball? For seconds there
was a stand-off. No one moved. No one spoke.
We just sat there, looking at Mrs Okuda, who just
sat there, looking back. She seemed as hard and shiny
as a toffee.

Then Alex broke the silence, putting up
his hand.

"Can I go to the toilet? I'm busting."

"Me too," said Oscar, his desk partner, waving
his hand in the air.

"I feel sick," said another kid, his hand shooting
up. "I think I might puke."

"I'm gonna pee right now," Alex added, wriggling.
"Miss, I can't hold it in."

A few kids giggled from near the door, but Mrs
Okuda didn't seem to hear them. She didn't move at
all. Instead she seemed to grow taller, as if she were
somehow stretching up and over Mr Lloyd's desk.
In seconds she seemed to be hanging over the whole
class, even though she was still sitting down.

Her voice boomed down, slow and calm. "You
will work," she said. "And you will work quietly.
There will be no trouble from this class."

Everyone fell silent, even Alex. Hands went
down, kids stopped wriggling, feet stopped kicking
the desk in front. One by one, the class opened their
desks and pulled out paper and pens.

Mrs Okuda knew she'd won. "Two pages," she
said. "Before lunch. I will answer any legitimate
questions."

The class began writing with hardly a whisper.
Even Alex. I could hear the clock ticking. We were
never this quiet for a supply teacher, not even for
Mr Lloyd. A girl near the front put up her hand and
Mrs Okuda went to help her with her question.

I glanced across at Cait, who was trying to take
things out of her bag without making too much
noise.

"What happened to you?" I whispered.

"Bus," she replied. "The weather..." Cait's family
lived right on the outskirts of the catchment area for
our school. She had to travel by bus every morning,
but some afternoons she came back to mine till her
dad could pick her up after his work. "Where'd she
come from?" Cait asked, pointing at Mrs Okuda.

"Dunno." I rolled my eyes. We'd never had a
supply teacher quite like her before. I opened my
notebook at a blank page and took the lid off a pen.

"Okuda," Cait said. "Is that Japanese?"

"Yep," I nodded. I didn't mind if Cait asked me
about being Japanese. She'd been round to our flat
often enough to see what it was like. Plus she was
Irish and had mad curly hair, so she knew what it
was like to be different. "She was speaking Japanese
earlier."

"I thought so. Strange. Maybe she just wanted to
be friendly?"

I raised an eyebrow. Since when did I want to get
friendly with a teacher?

Cait grinned at me. "Don't worry. Hey, can
I come to yours this afternoon? My dad'll pick me up
before tea."

It
"Sure...

"Takeshita-san." Mrs Okuda's voice snapped like
a whip from the front of the class. She was looking
up at me from where she stood helping the girl,
still using my surname instead of my real name.
"Shizuka-ni," she commanded. Silence.

Embarrassment steamed off me. Would she insist
on doing this all day? All week? Cait put her head
down and began writing her essay. I knew I should
start writing mine, but there was nothing I wanted
to say. Nothing I wanted to tell this woman about
myself. I didn't want her to know anything at all
ABOUT ME.