‘Get in! Ra ha, he’s scored!’
Padding downstairs in her school tights on her way to examine the sparse contents of the fridge, there came a grunt of an unfamiliar male amongst the hollow sound of TV football from the living room. Another boyfriend then. A day of new men everywhere, she mused to herself, not daring to volunteer a glance inside in case they were drunk already.
'You had a good day, love?'
Her mum had heard her peeling off the yoghurt lid. Sounds sober enough, Natalia thought, as she gave back a 'yeah!' and slipped back upstairs.
She'd often wished she had a sibling. For now she was happy to have only her diary to talk to. This time her waggling pen rejoiced in her vent to Mr Neary earlier: school as a prison, is that how she really feels? It wouldn't be half as bad, she thought, if she had likeminded people to share conversation with, so she didn't feel that dreaded dullness going in every morning. If there weren't girls in class mocking the fact she actually wants to do the work, which was admittedly, just as dull half the time.
She wondered what the visitor, Neill, thought when he heard her response. If she ever saw him again, she could ask him. But then, what could be done about it? She wanted to ask, why did he want to know why she truants, when no-one else cares?
She lay back on her bed, her eyes closed with the thought that probably, she would never see him again, and had missed the chance to continue the dialogue with someone who showed even a passing interest in her opinions. She sighed and swallowed - and frowned, swallowing again, feeling a catch in her throat - it was beginning to feel sore. A silver lining of illness: a reason to have a day off.
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The next day, Tuesday, her nose was blocked and her throat like razors. Her mother surprised her by bringing up hot lemon. Wednesday she was running with mucus, another whole day to spend reading, sniffling and resetting her mind of the idiot boys in form class, and by Thursday, she was well enough to come back to school. Except for a slight cough, her fever had gone and her nose had dried up to face the last two days of the week, which would see through her report card to the end.
On the chime of the morning bell for form at 8.45, she decided she'd nip up to Neary's office to explain she had been off with illness, in case the message hadn't been passed on, and he wondered where she'd been with the report card.
An unusually loud and animated 'EN-ter!' uttered from within.
As she pushed the door, Natalia's eyes fell on the looming figure alone in the room.
It was none other than that man from the other day: Neill, standing by the window as he'd been last time, but this time in a royal blue suit and brown tie, trying to light a cigarette by the open window, one large leg cocked up on the sill to cock it toward the open air.
After clicking the lighter he glanced, and said in a loud but flat voice:
'Oh, it's the report card girl.' Then he double glanced and added:
'Whom I've since realised is also the girl who wandered out in front of my car the other day.'
Natalia murmured in surprise as she dropped hold of the door, where she only just noticed, a paper pinned over the original plaque 'Mr Neary, Headteacher' on which was hand-scrawled:
MR NEILL... HeadMASTER!
'What's going on?' she stammered.
As the door fell closed, his cigarette was finally lit, his leg back on the floor and he took his first drag, he remarked:
'For an intelligent girl, I can't quite believe you haven't figured that one out.'
She stood utterly confused, but with a mild and creeping pleased feeling to see him again.
'Um, where's Mr Neary?'
'Gone, dear, gone. I'm the new Head. See the sign on the door?' His tone was a hair away from being patronising, slightly smiling that she still didn't get it.
'Yee-eah,' she said. 'The new Head?'
'Correct,' he said, looking at her bemused.
'Right. Er, are you allowed to smoke in here?'
'Definitely not,' began his reply, 'but technically I'm not in the room,' glancing towards his arm which was now propped over the windowpane dangling out into the open air.
A reluctant chuckle now caught in her throat, still trying to taper her surprise with seriousness. She was slowly chewing over the realisation that the meeting here the other day, was a handover to a new Head, and now, the posh well-dressed man had become, like magic, the Head himself.
It was not so much the logic that evaded her, but the sudden excitement in her life where nothing interesting ever happened. Neill's face, that only the other day had looked upon her in a princely, kindly fashion, was now sitting large as life like the Cheshire Cat - smoking a cigarette like the Caterpillar - as if the drab, dismal office had suddenly transformed into Wonderland itself.
'Lost for words?' he queried as he frowned down at his fag, then squinted at her. 'Brought me that sagging green card, have you?'
'Oh yeah, yes I have,' she finally fumbled into her pocket for it, with a hurried explanation: 'I've been off for two days, so I missed Neary leaving, so you just have to sign that I've been off ill. And, erm, still am, a bit.' She coughed.
He remained by the window, almost grimacing from her last comment.
'Oh - ' as she, still in a daze of bewilderment, realised would have to walk beyond the accepted parameter of where she normally stood. She paced over the thin grey carpet to present it to him whilst he was still half out of the window. Having to lean right toward him, her body shuddered from the smoky breeze.
He still didn't seem to want to receive the card, so she gingerly pointed it towards the large hairy hand that was resting on his trouser leg, which finally came up for it. He puffed his fag once, then looked down and read out her full name.
'Natalia Molova. Year 11. So you're what, 15?'
She nodded. He looked down at the card. 'Hmm.'
He shifted the card into the same hand as his cigarette, and rummaged with his other hand into his jacket pocket for his lighter. Tossing his cigarette into his grasped lips, he struck the lighter against the card, and the flame caught it.
Natalia gasped. 'Oh my god! Sir?!'
She took a step back as the flame began to lick up the card and continued to shoot up till it engulfed it in its entirety; Neill exclaiming 'Jesus!' and dropping it like a hot potato into a metal bin by his foot.
'That went up quick!'
'What the - ' Natalia stared at the bin and then back at Neill. 'Oh my god, Mr, erm, Mr Neill? I don't know what to say.'
It was a moment so unexpected, so boldly incorrect and rebellious, she could barely believe what she had seen.
'That's what I think of that idea,' he concluded smugly, as the tiny inferno fizzled out. He puffed again on his cigarette and turned to Natalia with a mischievous look, his eyebrows raised and for a second looking as if he were a little boy who had done something he precisely knew was wrong, and revelled in it.
'Mr Neary won't mind now he's gone, will he?' he added.
Natalia, still lost for words, almost snorted. 'My god, I can't believe what you just did, sir? Does that mean the end of my report card?'
He chuckled. 'Intelligence clearly restored.'
Still half-propped on the window ledge stubbing out his fag, he swooped his stocky body down into standing position with a dull thud onto the carpet.
'Why not help me figure out what to do instead of them,' and as his hands flicked the air to usher her backwards toward his desk. 'I'd like you to finish answering the question I gave you the other day.'
Natalia's mouth dropped open in half-readiness and half-surprise, but then realised the time.
'Sir I'm already late, I've missed form.'
He glanced up at the clock, then at his watch. 'Still two minutes left, I'm sure you can run fast. Who do you have?'
'Mrs Williams.'
'I'll ring down to her now and explain.'
'Oh, thanks,' as she headed to the door.
'Can you come back at break? Or, I guess you'll be busy with friends.'
'I have none,' she shrugged, her hand turning the handle.
He stared at her for a moment, moved his sharp eyes round in surprise, then said 'ok, I'll see you then.'
She waited till she'd reached the stairs... looked around at the pupils swarming up and down, then burst out laughing.33Please respect copyright.PENANAYhwLLuHydn
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Find out what happens in Natalia's next meeting with the extraordinary Mr Neill in Chapter 3, Tea in a Trance.
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