Untitled Adam Baron 2. Adam Baron

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СКАЧАТЬ France –

       Legally.

      She gave Lance a low-five followed by a high-five and then they both pretended they were cycling really fast. Lance grinned like a two-year-old in Santa’s grotto, and then it was Marcus Breen. He said sleeping, because, well, he’s Marcus Breen. We all groaned but Mrs Martin laughed.

       Think you’re good at snoozing, meet Mr Breen.

      This boy’s gonna show you how to dream.

      She gave Marcus a double cross high-ten and then pretended to sleep. And she did this with everyone. EVERY person in our class got their own instant song and their own greeting, though some were harder than others.

      ‘Cymbeline Igloo,’ I said.

      Mrs Martin drew her hand across her forehead. ‘Phew.’

      ‘And I like football but I also like art.’

      ‘DOUBLE phew. But here goes.’ And she sang:

       If you need to get a penalty, don’t throw in the towel –

       Cymbeline Igloo can draw a foul.

      I got a double high fist bump after which I got a double toe touch like Vi, but with Mrs Martin and me both doing air drawing at the same time. And I felt this warmth beginning to grow in the middle of my chest, like there was a radiator in there, until it had reached all the way to my ears. It made me feel special, it made us all feel special – and every single morning began like that! This sunny sort of warmth came to us from Mrs Martin and stayed for the whole day. She gave us our own individual greeting with our own rhyme and she NEVER got anyone’s wrong. It was amazing, and I can tell you this: nowhere on the entire Internet does it say that Socrates did the same thing.

      And he only had Plato.

      So, to see someone play any kind of trick on Mrs Martin was probably too much for some of us. Everyone stopped as Mrs Martin gasped and looked down. We all did the same. The jelly (the BLUE jelly) oozed up between her toes like something you might see on Doctor Who, though I wouldn’t know because my mum says I’m too young to watch it (even if Lance does and he’s THREE DAYS younger than me).

      Mrs Martin looked confused at first, not quite able to understand what she was seeing. Then her expression changed. And I expected her to be angry. Miss Phillips would have set her face, hands flying out to her hips. Mr Gorton would have gone VESUVIUS. But what Mrs Martin did was worse somehow.

      This brilliant teacher we all love did not frown. Or shout. Or get mad. Instead, she just went still and said, ‘Oh …’, like you might if someone you REALLY like was saying you weren’t invited to their birthday party, and you’d already bought their present.

      And that’s when I did something I couldn’t quite believe. Mrs Martin stepped back a little. She looked down at us, a sort of not-quite-able-to-believe-it look on her open, worn-in face. Everyone looked away from her, unable to meet her gaze – except for me. When her eyes fell on mine I was suddenly nervous, and unable even to move, because the weirdness of it had crept up on me. Someone putting jelly in her shoes? WHAT? It suddenly seemed so bizarre that instead of a radiator in me there were these weird, frothy bubbles.

      And I giggled.

      I don’t know why – honestly! It just came out. A stupid, childish, RIDICULOUS giggle that was SO loud! It stopped Mrs Martin. It stopped me. Mrs Martin looked even more upset – and surprised – and I could see her mind ticking over, and the completely WRONG conclusion about to make itself inside her head.

      ‘No,’ I said, as fast as I possibly could. ‘That doesn’t mean—’

      But before I could go on I was interrupted. It was Mr Baker (our new head teacher). He was showing some men round our school, but he turned to Mrs Martin, a curiosity on his face that seemed to snap her away from me. And she turned, bent down and picked up her shoe, along with the other one, which had also been filled with jelly. Then she edged through us all, glancing quickly at me with my face burning, before hurrying off towards the staff room, one hand dangling her shoes, the other held up to her face.

      Halfway there she broke into a run.

      

      We were quiet that afternoon. We got on with our work. Or tried to. I couldn’t: the word IDIOT was trampolining in my brain. At last play I didn’t even join in when Billy Lee got his football out, or give my expert opinion on how many goals Jacky Chapman was going to score for Charlton on Saturday. I just looked round the playground as some kids in our class went on as normal while others talked about what had happened.

      Lance and Vi Delap were saying how stupid it was, Marcus Breen wondering why anyone would want to waste perfectly good jelly. You should have seen Daisy Blake, though. She LOVES Mrs Martin. When Daisy’s grandpa died last year, Mrs Martin was epic, telling her that crying was fine if she wanted to cry, and not if she didn’t, changing her morning greeting to add a really long hug at the end, holding Daisy’s hand at home time until her mum or dad came. So Daisy was one hundred per cent ANGRY.

      ‘Oh, come on!’ I said, when I realised that she was glaring at me. ‘I’d never! I wouldn’t!’

      Daisy studied me, then put her hands on her hips as she turned to look round the playground.

      ‘Then who was it?’ she said. ‘Who did it, Cymbeline?’

      And she wasn’t the only one who wanted to know that.

      Mr Baker held a SPECIAL ASSEMBLY before home time. After we’d all trooped in, he stared down at us from the stage. He went on about respect, and behaviour, and asked for the culprit to come forward. Elizabeth Fisher glanced at me, which made me go bright red again even though I was really trying not to. Did Mrs Martin notice? I kept my head down, hoping she wasn’t looking at me.

      ‘Well,’ Mr Baker said, when no one owned up. ‘I was told that this school was full of kind, considerate pupils. And honest ones too. It seems that this might not be true.’

      We were all given an envelope which we were told to take home to our parents. We filed out, my neck and face burning YET AGAIN when I had to walk past Mrs Martin. She was standing next to the wall bars and I could finally sort of understand how Daisy felt. Mrs Martin was trying to look cheerful, as if it was all just some stupid thing.

      But she couldn’t really manage it.

      I kept my head down and followed Vi into the playground, where Daisy was sucking on a new stick of rock (which she must have snuck into her schoolbag because there was NO WAY her parents could have allowed her to bring it in). She was glaring at the passing kids.

      ‘What are you looking at?’ said Billy Lee, when it was his turn.

      ‘You tell me,’ said Daisy, pointing the stick of rock at him. СКАЧАТЬ